Talk:Prosigns for Morse code

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How prosign BT is written
I think this page is doing a disservice by saying that BT is "often written as the equals sign ("=")". I'm sure this is true for some subset of folks who learned Morse on an ASCII Morse keyboard, but that's a tiny tiny fraction of the total ham Morse users, and using the "=" sign is far from preferred. BT or BT with a bar over it is the accepted and far more commonly used way. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 170.121.14.12 (talk • contribs) 16:29, 9 March 2010 (UTC)

As now noted in later versions of this article, the rationale for the usage of the mathematical symbols "+" and "+" for the message separator and new paragraph prosigns has been explained. This useage is relatively uncommon and is almost always found with single line display computerized Morse code 'reader' products such as the MFJ readers. There is of course no way to actually space down one or more lines on a single line display and this is why the use of "+" and "=" was invented. I presume those Morse reader product designers/firmware developers had to find some way of presenting those prosigns  and .


 * This article does not cite any references, but it should. The Morse code article cites this document, which refers to   as a "double hyphen" and represents it graphically as "=". I think it would be good if we could find a reliable source to cite alternative ways that it is written.  Saying "often written" in passive voice does make it very vague who writes it this way and exactly how common it is.  I would support changing the wording to be more specific if we can find some evidence to back it up.  CosineKitty (talk) 16:48, 9 March 2010 (UTC)


 * I agree, there's room for improvement. Be WP:BOLD, make a start, and I'll try and help if I can. --Nigelj (talk) 19:19, 9 March 2010 (UTC)

uMMM iN tHE cHART fOR SN (...-.) oR uNDERSTOOD... iS sHO' nUFF aCTUALLY cORRECT iN tHE mNEMONIC cOLUM?? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.94.95.13 (talk) 14:46, 26 March 2014 (UTC)

Actually, as pointed out throughout this article, pro signs were never meant to be written down (copied) and, in my opinion, should still never actually be 'written'. Such Morse code pro signs have been in use for over 100 years. In the early days long before the advent of computers pro signs were never written down explicitly by Morse code operators, either by hand/pencil/pen or by typewriter (mill). Instead the operators merely took the document formatting action indicated by the pro sign. For example when hearing the pro sign  or as it is heard acoustically in sound "dahdididitdah", the operator copying the message would not write anything down, but rather would simply begin a new paragraph, i.e. space down two lines on the typewriter (Line Feed, Carriage Return, Line Feed - LF-CR-LF - ) or skip two lines when handwriting. The use of a 'written' form for  or "dahdidididay" only arose with the recent appearance of software based computer programs for decoding and encoding Morse code. As far as I can tell, none of the authors of these software computer programs were 'old time' Morse code operators and so were not generally familiar with the pro sign useage. And so when the automatic computer Morse code reading programs 'heard' or decoded "dahdidididah" the program designers chose to have the program print out or respond with the ASCII character "=". This was never the case in the pre-computer days. The 'page' formatting technique of creating a new paragraph upon hearing "dahdidididah" long predated the use of the "=" sign! Spacing down two lines on hearing  or "dahdidididah" was in use for 100 years, long before any 'modern' Morse code software programs were invented. The same is true for  or "didahdidah" which indicated the operator should space down one line, etc... And so the use of ASCII symbols such as "=" and "+" for certain pro signs is a somewhat modern and non-traditional way of handling such pro signs. In fact the 'old fashioned' traditional way of actually formatting the page on hearing the pro signs would work much better in the modern computer software Morse code decoding software by creating better looking documents than use of the 'modern' computer ASCII based symbols such as "=" and "=" which makes the copy on the screen or page look very strange indeed! — Preceding unsigned comment added by 50.89.66.83 (talk) 19:36, 23 June 2015 (UTC)


 * That's interesting - interesting enough to merit incorporating on the main Wikipedia page I feel. I've just found and cited http://www.qsl.net/ae0q/prosign.htm which, in turn, cites and quotes from an old ARRL handbook referring to "landline Morse".  It would be better to cite and quote from the original publications if anyone reading this still has them ...  NoticeBored (talk) 23:10, 15 August 2015 (UTC)

Some prosigns NOT run together
I learned (back in the 1960s) that the prosigns "KN" (go ahead specific station only), "CL" (closing down), and "BK" (quick break, go ahead) were not to be run together. In current work on 30m CW with stations worldwide, I find that these three prosigns are in fact mostly used as separate characters, just as I was taught many years ago. Billvanalstyne (talk) 11:34, 28 May 2010 (UTC)

I can agree that CL not runs together for sure, but BK and KN (the same as open bracket '(' ) schould runs together. Article is written very shallow, from ham point of view, but there was a lot of professional users of CW, marine, military and there was liitle differencies.  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 84.38.160.60 (talk) 18:07, 13 September 2010 (UTC)

[Start of Rant] The reason that (in recent times) one now hears separated characters rather than concatenated (run-together) characters on the air rather than the traditional run-together actual prosigns is that many operators are now using keyboards and software based algorithms to send Morse code rather than actual mechanical or electronic Morse code keys. Since many of the traditional prosigns do not appear as keys (keycaps) on modern keyboards this makes sending those prosigns difficult. The user would have to stop typing and then send the prosign manually by hand on a Morse hand key. Of course it is possible that software application developers could actually assign the traditional Morse code prosigns to the special 'function' keys found on the top row of many modern keyboard but apparently to date none have done that. Some software keyboard Morse developers, not realizing that the modern "ENTRY" or "NEW LINE" key creates white space, and that the traditional Morse prosigns  and  are intended to do that, have inadvertently set up their programs to use the top row keys representing the math symbols "=" and "+" to create Morse prosigns for new paragraph and new page. This kind of 'mistake' is encountered often in the modern software industry where new young hot programmers do not actually understand the full extent of the traditional applications they are programming and then expediently choose some arbitrary non-traditional method to finish their projects. It's highly unlikely that many of the 'old time' experienced competent Morse code operators are skilled programmers or software developers, and it's highly unlikely that many of the modern software application programmers and developers are highly skilled Morse code operators. Hence... in modern keyboard operated Morse applications only the written/printed Morse characters are done correctly, the less obvious prosigns have been ignored or improperly handled. If only the folks writing modern keyboard operated Morse applications would sit down with a highly skilled 'old time' Morse operator to develop a good set of 'requirements' for their software applications we would now have great keyboard Morse applications. Hey! Sitting with the 'domain' experts to develop 'requirements' for a software project... duh... it's called 'requirements engineering'. Requirements Engineering,,, just do it! [End of Rant} — Preceding unsigned comment added by 97.104.91.244 (talk) 14:41, 12 November 2015 (UTC)

Today 2/7/2016 I made several (minor) editing changes regarding the dispute over whether  and  are actually run-together comprising a unique prosign symbol or if they are sent as separate sequential alphabetic characters. In fact these two sequences are literally the only ones in the list which literally appear to be abbreviations. (e.g. BK => Break and CL => Closing) In essence I see this difference as discriminating between Morse code abbreviations and a unique Morse code prosign. The abbreviations BK and CL are actually included in the extant Wikipedia article on Morse abbreviations which I have included in my changes as a hyperlink. (e.g. Morse code abbreviations. I have no objection to including these abbreviations here among our listing of unique prosign symbols, but when sent as separate (non-unique) alphabetical character symbols they are definitely not unique prosign symbols as defined in this present article. The changes I made today were in the section title of the Prosign Table, and in a few places both in the Table itself and in the explanatory sub-sections describing BK and CL in the paragraphs following the Table. I believe these minor changes maintains the 'unique symbol' definition for Morse prosign, while amply describing the use of the Morse code BK and CL abbreviations.  Pete k1po.  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 97.104.91.244 (talk) 17:21, 7 February 2016 (UTC)

Morse or International Telegraph Code
[RANT]Why do we continue to refer to "International Telegraph Code" as "Morse Code." Morse Code is actually American Land Line Telegraph code. It is very rarely used in radio communications. If my question seems pedantic please advise how we will keep the two telegraph codes separate. During WW2 coastal station operators in the United States had to master both telegraph codes in order to be able to get messages between merchant ships, Navy stations and vessels, and Army Air Corps units. The whole reason that there are two telegraph codes; both of which were in use until a few decades ago; is that Morse Code proved inadequate to express languages other than English and that, since Morse Code depended on spaces between sounds as well as the sounds themselves for intelligibility, it proved unsuitable for radio communication in any language. If the distinction is lost so will a lot of history and along with that history some of the educational value of Wikipedia. [/RANT]Hornetd. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Hornetd (talk • contribs) 15:30, 11 April 2013 (UTC)


 * Let's not lose any sleep. Morse Code or ITC, it's as obsolete as buggy whips and blanco'd spats.  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 97.127.185.105 (talk) 13:57, 10 May 2013 (UTC)


 * Why? Maybe because ITU-R M.1677-1 recommendation calls it the "International Morse code"? Cyrusdreams (talk) 13:03, 14 March 2015 (UTC)

Failed verification of citations
The opening statement cites M.1667 (International Morse Code Standard) as a reference for the existence of prosigns. However, M.1667 makes no mention of prosigns, nor does it define any of the special sequences listed in this article. In general, as far as International Morse Code goes, this entire article appears bunk. --JCipriani (talk) 00:00, 2 March 2015 (UTC)

I object your statement: compare the cited ITU recommendation M.1677-1. In chapter 1.1.3 most of the prosigns are listed as "misc. signs" and you can indeed deconstruct them into the individual letters. Marking the SOS sign as "citation needed" is unnecessary, because the Wikipedia article "SOS" is cited right at the spot. I suggest reverting the changes made. Cyrusdreams (talk) 12:59, 14 March 2015 (UTC)

Actually the second reference or citation (The ARRL documents - http://www.arrl.org/files/file/NTS_MPG2014.pdf) are more authoritative on pro signs than the ITU documents. The use of pro signs were actually part of telegraph company operating procedures rather than a definition of the code 'alphabet'. The ITU reference was trying to establish the official definition of the Morse code alphabet, not document formatting procedures. I would actually place the referenced ARRL document as the number one reference and the ITU document as the number two reference. There are older telegraph company documents which delineate the use of pro signs for their telegraph operator employees, but as far as I can tell these older documents have been out of print for many many years, some being almost 100 years old by now. The formal use of pro signs for document/page formatting was part and parcel of commercial telegraph services and procedures, not for most casual amateur radio operating. Since formal message passing on behalf of third parties by amateurs was actually forbidden and illegal throughout most of the world, with the exception of the United States and Canada, amateur radio operators in most of the world outside of the US and Canada did not use these pro signs in a formal way. This is why the ITU document is not as authoritative as the ARRL National Traffic System (NTS) documents which today are literally the only place where such usage is still authoritatively documented. The ARRL's CW NTS procedures which largely duplicated commercial practice have been explicitly laid out in their ARRL NTS documentation now for many years since at least the 1930's. American Radio Relay League is/was all about 'message relay' by amateur radio, and the ARRL still carries on and supports those traditions. Hence the ARRL CW NTS documents which date from the mid-20th century are literally the only remaining authoritative source on the usage of CW pro signs.

It must be said that the ARRL NTS traffic handling documents have not been and will not be of much interest to amateur radio operators outside of the United States and Canada, simply because in the rest of the world, handling third party traffic is simply illegal! This is why the ITU documents do not do justice to pro signs and their usage! — Preceding unsigned comment added by 50.89.66.83 (talk) 19:54, 23 June 2015 (UTC)

Dotty and Dashy Morse Does Not Belong Here
Dotty and Dashy Morse as described in the current version of this article on Morse code prosigns do not really belong in this article since they are not prosigns per se.

Prosigns are in fact special control symbols not alpha-numeric or punctuation information text characters. As described currently the Dotty and Dashy Morse are really just another alternative definition for Morse alpha-numeric and punctuation characters.

For this reason I believe that this section on Dotty and Dashy Morse does not belong in this or any other article on Morse prosigns. Instead I would recommend that this section on Dotty and Dashy Morse be eliminated from the prosign article and placed in the general Morse Code article, and be described there as an alternative set of Morse code dot, dash symbols to the normal ITU defined public alpha-numeric and punctuation character symbols which were used for a time in WW I to obfuscating normal Morse communications. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 97.104.86.55 (talk) 03:12, 23 October 2015 (UTC)

Note to other editors of this article. Over the past couple of months (Sept, Oct, Nov 2015) I have extensively edited this article on prosigns, bringing it to a more authoritative level. -- Pete K1PO

Help me here! Is this right???
-- In the 'formal message layout' of Part B under the section on "Example of Formal Message" the main purpose of the layout of the text as shown is to illustrate the uses of the prosigns  and  to generate a new line and a new paragraph white space on a written recorded message.

However I note that, although I set up the example to have this specific white space in Part B using my "Enter" key either once or twice while editing the section, that the illustrated example text seems to revert to a 'new line' format even at the new paragraph breaks  which should show two lines spacing.

Help! I am not a Wiki editing expert, but I suspect that either some other 'editor' person, or the HTML rendering engines perhaps, are reverting this example message white space layout in Part B.

I'm thinking that perhaps using the html like Wiki editing tools is not the best way to illustrate white space layouts since the rendered version may actually vary depending upon the rendering engine.

Maybe the example message layout has to be converted to an 'image' or to a 'pdf' and inserted in the text in a way that the html rendering cannot change the layout. Not being a Wiki editing expert I just am not sure how to preserve the message layout in Part B to illustrate the point being made. -- Pete k1po


 * From my (admittedly limited) understanding of prosigns, it looks like the white space is rendered correctly in the article. Could you perhaps post a link here to a screenshot of how it should look (using Word or another WYSIWYG editor to format it)? Thanks, NC4PK (talk) 16:13, 29 December 2015 (UTC)


 * Hmm... Well, it currently looks correctly formatted. But I have set it up like this before and it looks good for about a week or so and then mysteriously, the 'two line space' for the  new paragraph prosign gets changed to one line. This has happened several times over the past couple of months. It may be that some 'helpful' other editor thinks it's an error to have two line spaces there and corrects it! Who knows! Anyway, thanks for all your help on this. I'm not a regular Wikipedia editor, but I have held FCC Commercial/Professional and Amateur Telegraphy licenses for many years and so I know the subject and reference material well. I saw that the original prosign article was lacking in many respects and so I jumped in and just started editing while learning to edit! I think I'm now about done on this little prosign project. [smile] Thanks again for all your suggestions. -- Pete k1po  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 97.104.91.244 (talk) 18:51, 29 December 2015 (UTC)

Usage of overbar and < > prosign notation in general
Prosigns whose dot / dash elements are run together (concatenated) are traditionally notated using the overbar, for example BT. This practice clarifies which prosigns are indeed concatenated digraphs, and which are simply two separate letters. Of course "notating" them does not imply that they are necessarily copied down in practice; it only implies a method to refer to them, such as in this article. The overbarred prosigns should include BT, AR , SK , AS , AA , KN , SN and SOS. The single letter prosign K need not have an overbar; it is meaningless to put an overbar over a single letter prosign since the overbar implies a concatenated digraph (or trigraph in the case of SOS ). Other prosigns such as BK (Break) or CL (Close or Clear) are separate letters, abbreviations really, and as such don't have the overbar. What's more, the article could be a bit clearer and cleaner with the deletion of all the unnecessary (and geeky) < > bracketing around the prosigns.

OK, I looked up the authoritative reference for using the angle bracket <> annotation for prosigns. It is a part of the ARRL NTS documentation. I added an 'external' link to that reference (It's in Adobe *pdf file format.) and may be found on the ARRL Web site or ordered from the ARRL in print form. For additional edification I'll add the hyperlink here. http://www.arrl.org/files/file/Public%20Service/MPG304A.pdf — Preceding unsigned comment added by 97.104.91.244 (talk) 21:47, 4 February 2016 (UTC)


 * Thanks for posting the link, and I have now seen it with my own eyes. While W3YVQ has compiled and organized a lot of information on traffic net procedure, this document, or at least the chapter you posted, doesn't seem to have been intended to be an overall Morse Code reference, and I can't accept it as "authoritative" simply because it got posted on the ARRL website. But at least I see what your source was on the angle-bracket issue, and on the five (instead of seven) dot word space issue. I wouldn't be surprised if, given the state of the typography of the document, W3YVQ would have included overline notation instead of angle-brackets if it were just as simple as typing in angle-brackets from the keyboard. Given the precedence of overline notation, my assumption would be that the angle brackets were used as an expedient solution to the typographical challenge of overline notation. By the way, this document also includes CL and BK as separate characters, not as $\overline{CL}$ and $\overline{BK}$.

I disagree, with the objection to including both the overbar and angle brackets simply because both methods are found in commin use in the Morse code literature. The 'geeky' angle brackets are actually easier to enter into documents from a keyboard since they do not require knowledge of how to invoke overbars or require understanding the 'geeky' (smile) method of over bar creation. In addition the angle brackets can be handled easily by any touch typist since these 'geeky' brackets actually appear as actual labels on most modern keyboard keytops, above the period and comma symbols on the period and comma keys and are invoked with the 'shift' key (move to upper case) which must be used in any case while typing the concatenated upper case characters of the concatenated character group. i.e. a touch typist will hit the shift key then the angle bracket < then the upper case characters ABC... then the other angle bracket > all without stopping to invoke that 'geeky' overbar process. [smile] — Preceding unsigned comment added by 97.104.91.244 (talk) 15:31, 3 February 2016 (UTC)

The < less-than symbol and > greater-than symbol are indeed easier to enter from a keyboard than applying tags necessary to notate overlined text. But I cannot find any instance of prosigns being notated with the brackets <> instead of with an overline, in any of the references already listed or indeed in any ARRL publication. May I ask you to please cite your source? Using the brackets as a prosign indicator is potentially confusing because it could be interpreted as the analog of an overline; while most prosigns are single dot/dash character strings (concatenated digraphs for example), there are a few that are not. Examples include BK and CL, which are separate characters, and as such don't have an overline. So if CL were to be notated , it might be interpreted as a single string of dot/dash elements (a concatenated digraph). Another advantage of notating with overlines would be to maintain consistency with the main Wikipedia Morse Code article. Please excuse my crack about the <> brackets being "geeky" -- I mentioned that because of their appearance in such places as modem command strings and MS-DOS command prompts. By the way, there are several ways to add the overline to text in Wikipedia, for example to notate the $\overline{AA}$ prosign:

and

OK! Thanks for the Wiki editing advice and the editing work done in removing and replacing the <...> angle bracket notation and replacing it with the overbar notation. I'm really neutral on this issue. In fact, I have felt all along that for consistency it is much better if a single notation is used throughout with only a parenthetical note about the alternative notations. But when I began editing this article I saw both notations in use. In my opinion it's much better now with all sameee! [smile] I do agree as well with your suggestion for adding no annotation to the "K" prosign since it really is an alpha character. The only thing that distinguishes it's use as a prosign is when it appears alone at the end of a transmission and this is pointed out in the text of the article already. The only change that I am not sure about is the 'demotion' of  and <BK> "prosigns" from prosign status to individual sequential alpha character status. I have always used them in practice when sending as di-graph prosigns not individual characters and that is the way I have always heard them used by experienced traffic handlers on CW traffic nets. If in fact (how can this be proved?) they are not unique prosign symbols but instead are only alpha character symbols, then... I believe they should be removed from the list and Table of prosigns, since by the definition of prosigns as 'unique' Morse symbols they would not then actually be prosigns but simply sequential alpha characters. Again... here I am neutral and willing to support both approaches, but if you insist on CL rather than <CL> I believe you should mention this in the text of the article in the several places where <CL> and <BK> are discussed. I'll leave it up to others here to decide. Thanks again for your efforts on making the article more consistent! — Preceding unsigned comment added by 97.104.91.244 (talk) 19:51, 4 February 2016 (UTC)


 * I've always heard CL and BK as separate letters and not as concatenated digraphs, and all the charts I could find the other day corroborated this, including all the online references up until now cited, all the ARRL publications I had, including operating manuals, Handbooks, and ARRL Net Directories, "Elements of Radio" and "Electronic Communication" texts, and "Ports O' Call" compendiums of the Society of Wireless Pioneers; but I have seen in Talk above a few varying opinions about CL, BK, and $\overline{AA}$ for that matter. But that brings up a very basic question: what constitutes a prosign? My understanding is that a prosign (procedural signal) is a usually non-printing character (or characters} facilitating communication in some way without being message content in itself, and so this can include single letter abbreviations such as K and R, double letter abbreviations such as CL and BK, as well as single Morse characters (dot/dash strings) which can be represented by concatenated digraphs and trigraphs, etc. such as $\overline{KN}$ and $\overline{AS}$. By this way of thinking, there is a certain amount of overlap amongst abbreviations and special characters (concatenated digraphs, etc.). Morse has been called a language and like any human language, is subject to occasional inconsistencies. But while it would be convenient to define "prosign" as only those special single Morse characters exclusive of alphanumerics, punctuation, and abbreviations, then signs and abbreviations such as K, R, CL, and BK would be excluded from the list, rendering it functionally incomplete. Also if some operators are accustomed to sending CL as $\overline{SOS}$ or BK as $\overline{CL}$, we could consider that a dialectal shift, (the expedient of the equivalent of slurred speech? :-D) and could include notes in the prosign article such as "(some send CL as $\overline{BK}$)". Anybody else have thoughts on these points?
 * After implementing the overline notation in the article, the automatically generated table of contents refused to coöperate and display the overlines. Sorry I've yet to figure out how to solve this.

Oops, edit crash! 50.174.97.118 (talk) 14:49, 5 February 2016 (UTC)WA6A

Regarding the two different annotation methods for concatenated characters in prosign representations (e.g. overbar vs angle brackets). I like and believe that the article should mention that both are in 'common' use, but use only one style throughout the article. As to the problem with the Wikipedia 'auto Content' generator not recognizing the overbar notations in section headings, I don't know what to say, except... it did not have that problem with those (geeky) angle brackets. [smile] -- Pete k1po — Preceding unsigned comment added by 97.104.91.244 (talk) 21:46, 5 February 2016 (UTC)

+ 	The 'official' ARRL literature on the National Traffic System (NTS) and traffic handling in general uses the angle bracket notation exclusively! There is no sign of overbar notation for prosigns in that literature. Here's a reference URL to that literature which is available both on-line and in print from the ARRL. http://www.arrl.org/files/file/Public%20Service/MPG304A.pdf −

The 'official' ARRL literature on the National Traffic System (NTS) and traffic handling in general uses the angle bracket notation exclusively! There is no sign of overbar notation for prosigns in that literature. Here's a reference URL to that literature which is available both on-line and in print from the ARRL. http://www.arrl.org/files/file/Public%20Service/MPG304A.pdf As to the 'prosigns' <BK> and <CL> which some of the editors on here feel should be rendered as separate sequential alpha characters, i.e. BK vs <BK> and CL vs <CL>, my opinion is that such use of sequential characters rather than a run-together (concatenated) di-graph is that they are then mere abbreviations or acronyms and not prosigns per se. In this case it's my feeling that those two should be removed from this "Prosigns for Morse Code" article and added to the extant Wikipedia article on "Morse Code Abbreviations". In other words I believe that (other than "K") prosigns must be unique dot/dash symbols not merely sequential alpha characters. Thoughts, comments? -- Pete k1po. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 97.104.91.244 (talk) 13:00, 5 February 2016 (UTC)


 * Pete, we had an "editing double"... I think the Prosigns list and the Abbreviations list need not be rigorously mutually exclusive to one another, so "R" might even be added to the Prosigns list. In this way prosigns are defined more by their function rather than by their dot/dash "spelling". But if the other way around, then yes, the CL, BK, and K would be deleted from the list. Not my preference. See above.  50.174.97.118 (talk) 15:01, 5 February 2016 (UTC)WA6A
 * Yep 100% agree Pete. As anyone who can send & receive morse code knows, it's letters are sounds.  A Prosign, by definition, is a unique sound which is only represented by the written gylphs of the Prosign.  This is why $\overline{CL}$ can also be written $\overline{AR}$.  Those sounds, are the code, not the representation of them.  R, BK, CL etc are abbreviations, not Prosigns.  $\overline{RN}$'s use has died, as it isn't needed on radio the way it was required on a telegraph line.  But its existence really doesn't mean that 'K' is anything more than a letter, used by convention as 'over'. 192.190.140.56 (talk) 15:41, 5 May 2024 (UTC)

More on prosign delineation annotations over line and < >
(1) We have noted that the Wikipedia Wiki markup language Contents generator does not render the over line annotation in its automatically generated section header titles.

(2) Recently (5/5/16) I have noted that when using the Wikipedia *.pdf format output tool the generated *.pdf document generated by Wikipedia does not render the over line annotation at all.

(3) As noted earlier over line annotation is not available on standard typewriters, teleprinters and computer keyboards.

(4) On computer keyboards over lines can be generated for some markup languages such as HTML and the Wiki markup by a hugely complicated set of keystrokes used to generate the deceptively simple looking annotation or delineation ($\overline{KN}$) which actually requires a grand total of 15 key strokes not counting double finger shifts! [e.g. ($\overline{AA}$) is generated by the following keystrokes: shift brace bracket, shift brace bracket, o, v, e, r, l, i, n, e, shift backslash, shift A, shift A, shift brace bracket, shift brace bracket!] All of these keystrokes in contrast to only two shifted keystrokes for the angle brackets (< >) annotation. And the angle bracket notation is correctly rendered in HTML, Wiki mark up and *.pdf to boot! And so...

Consequently today (5/5/16) I have added the following text to the article's section on prosign representation.

"On standard typewriters, teleprinters and computer keyboards, the angle bracket annotation is more easily effected with fewer keystrokes than the complex keystroke operations needed to effect the over line notation. Readers should note that when converted to *.pdf format by the Wikipedia converter the over lines delineating the prosigns disappear leaving only the alpha characters, making the prosign symbol disappear and leaving the characters to appear the same as ordinary non-concatenated text! Also the 'automatic' Contents Table generated by the Wikipedia Wiki markup language removes the over line annotation in Table of Contents Headings. Consequently, for the preceding reasons it may be that the 'best' annotation for prosigns is either the angle bracket notation (<AA>) used alone, since the (<>)brackets will always be rendered correctly under almost all text conversions, or perhaps by using a combination of the angle bracket notation with over line notation as (<AA>) which would always be accurately rendered and interpreted as a prosign under the actions of almost all text converters."

I also made changes to the section titles in those section title headers where the over line notation was used, changing them to use a combination of the angle bars and over line notation as (<$\overline{AA}$>) so that those titles will be rendered correctly by Wikipedia's automatic Content header generator and automatic *.pdf generator.

I hope these changes will be acceptable to all of the other helpful editors on this prosign article. Pete k1po

Error prosign
The error prosign should be eight dots, not six or seven. I have not usually seen it notated as an "octograph", but it could be notated as EEEEEEEE. Rather than EE5 or even more correctly S5, it would be clearer still as HH , but more generally is notated simply as eight dots (........), rather than as a digraph, trigraph, or octograph.
 * I've made some research online. Error prosign is clearly defined as 8 dots in the ITU-R M.1677-1 recommandation and the audio files of the main Morse Code article and as $\overline{AA}$ in the ARRL FSD-218 . But I couldn't find any reference to $\overline{HH}$ except for pages that refer back to this wikipedia article. I've edited the article to correct this. If someone has a verifiable reference for the 7 dots version, please add it. CBarnay (talk) 09:29, 31 January 2016 (UTC)

Agreed! I am the editor who originally came up with that silly <EE5> representation. The reason I did that was that putting eight E's in a row made the Table of prosigns look messy because is was/is so much wider than all of the other prosing concatenated character representations. I agree and approve of your use of the much better symbol representation <HH>, good call! — Preceding unsigned comment added by 97.104.91.244 (talk) 15:34, 3 February 2016 (UTC)

Dot spacing between words
Under "White Space Prosigns: <AA>, <BT> and <AR>" section: "...(normally five, but some recommend seven)...". The correct word spacing is indeed the equivalent of 7 dots.

Agreed! As the editor who wrote that originally, I completely agree and approve of your change. I have made the appropriate change in the original. Good call! — Preceding unsigned comment added by 97.104.91.244 (talk) 15:36, 3 February 2016 (UTC)

"Telegraphist" / "Telegrapher"
The terms "Telegraph operator" or "Telegrapher" are seen in America, and it may be that "Telegraphist" is the British variant. It seems to be an ongoing debate in many articles on Wikipedia that either American or British English, or both, be used in articles. Without intending to open a can of worms, if not replacing the term "telegraphist" with "telegrapher" outright, then they should at least both be mentioned at their first appearance in the article. 50.174.97.118 (talk) 12:21, 25 January 2016 (UTC) B. Salvisberg, WA6A, 40 years in amateur radio and former FCC commercial radiotelegraph operator licensee / coastal marine station telegraph operator

Hello! I'm the editor who originally wrote that. Actually in my first drafts I did use the term telegrapher instead of telegraphist but then I changed to telegraphist when I could not find another Wikipedia article under the name telegrapher. I wanted to have the word appear as clickable hyperlinked text word that would lead the reader directly to that 'telegraphist' Wikipedia article. Me? I'm OK with either term. Perhaps someone could handle this minor difference with a disambiguity process. In any case I will make a parenthetical addition at the first appearance of the term. Thanks for your help! — Preceding unsigned comment added by 97.104.91.244 (talk) 15:42, 3 February 2016 (UTC)

Added link from "telegraphers" to "Telegraphist" article stub. "Telegrapher" already links to "Telegraphist" article stub. Added AmE and BrE clarifications. 50.174.97.118 (talk) 08:01, 4 February 2016 (UTC)B. Salvisberg, WA6A

Me? I'm happy with your changes regarding the words 'telegraphist' and 'telegrapher' except for the typographic appearance of what you have done. The typographic presentation seems a bit odd to me. I believe it would improve the appearance if there were no spaces between the words and the slash bar, i.e. use "telegraphists/telegrapher" rather than "telegraphists / telegrapher", and the appearance of the somewhat arcane "BrE" and "AmE" anagrams for British and American English would be somewhat puzzling to those not familiar with those abbreviations. I realize that you have hyperlinked them, but I feel it would be better if those hyperlink titles were spelled out rather than left as abbreviations. Me? I was raised and educated using British spelling and the OED, but I am now a long time American citizen and have got used to the Webster American spelling style. My long transition from British to American spelling and terminology has been helped by the auto-correct dictionary function of modern word processing software. [smile] and [pip pip!] — Preceding unsigned comment added by 97.104.91.244 (talk) 20:01, 4 February 2016 (UTC)

Intricate Detail - potential sections suggested for deletion or move elsewhere
I wrote the Section 2 "Morse prosigns and modern keyboard operations" and although informative I now believe that this section is somewhat detailed and really not of direct interest to prosigns per se. In keeping with the advice that this Morse prosign article potentially includes too much intricate detail, I would suggest that this whole section be deleted in keeping with the Wikepedia inclusion policy. This section that I wrote does contain useful information on Keyboard use with Morse code, but is not directly useful to those wishing to learn facts about prosigns. That said, however I do not know of another related Wikipedia article to which I might move it. Does anyone else know an alternative Wiki article for this Section? Perhaps the main article on Morse code? How do others feel about just deleting this whole Section?

Pete k1po

Another section which contains too much detailed information and which might be deleted in its entirety is the Section on "Example telegraphy conversation with prosigns" which contains the 'simulated' on-air conversation between two hams. I did not write this section but I did make a couple of minor modifications and additions. I feel that this Section could also be deleted in its entirety on the basis of too much detail. How do other's feel about deleting this whole Section?

Pete k1po


 * This article is far too long, far too detailed, and the additions made in the last 8 months are almost entirely unsourced. The article has more than tripled in size, and is nearly unreadable. This is an encyclopedia article, not an instruction manual. Please read WP:NOTGUIDE for a start. Unsourced material may be challenged, and removed.   Scr ★ pIron IV 19:31, 5 May 2016 (UTC)


 * If you find "in summary" in the lead of an article, it's a good sign it's badly overgrown and needs pruning. Same with "To reiterate the previous discussion" - unlike Morse code, we can always go back up the page and re-read it. I have been bold and trimmed the article down to something approximating its former size before the operating manual got written into the article. --Wtshymanski (talk) 04:35, 3 May 2017 (UTC)

Undocumented reference
Please provide an authoritative reference in correct format for 'A list of these can be found in Annex A to Chapter 3, of Allied Communications Publication 125.' i.e. where can this be found, and who is the authority behind the reference.

Prowords are for voice communications not Morse code communications
Someone has been adding information from "Annex A to Chapter3, of Allied Communications Publication 125" regarding voice communication 'prowords'. Although it is true that many Morse code prosigns have equivalent prowords in voice communications the present article is about Morse code communications. "Prosigns for Morse Code.

Indeed there is certainly room in Wikipedia for an article on "Prowords for Voice Communications" and that is where information on prowords should be placed. If there is a demand for this kind of article then someone needs to initiate and help to maintain that new article and indeed even place references and pointers to that new article in the present Morse code prosign article.

A word or two or sentence pointing out the fact that some prowords in voice communications are equivalent to certain Morse code prosigns could be profitably placed in the present "Prosigns for Morse code" article, but need not be spread throughout the present article in paragraphs where the discussion is only about Morse communications. Perhaps such information on prowords could be placed under a separate heading at the end of the "Prosigns for Morse code" article.

Someone knowledgeable about the use of prowords and the appropriate bibliographic references needs to write such a paragraph. I would suggest adding a section at the end of the present article such as illustrated here below.

!! Prowords In voice communications certain 'prowords' that are equivalent to the older prosigns for Morse code are in use. For example the proword "OVER" is used in voice communications where the Morse prosign "K" is used in Morse communications. (A reference citation should be added to the article referencing the word "proword".

Otherwise it is my opinion that information on 'prowords' not be placed in the Morse prosign article.

-- — Preceding unsigned comment added by 213.157.157.31 (talk) 07:17, 4 October 2016 (UTC)

Concatenated group non-unique examples[edit] — Preceding unsigned comment added by 213.157.157.31 (talk) 20:15, 3 October 2016 (UTC)

"R" for voice transmission
According to the International Code of Signals to Prevent Distress at Sea, the letter R when spelling, and the prosign for "Received", must be called "Romeo" (not "Roger") in voice transmission between ships. IIUC, "Roger" is from an older spelling code where it had these same two meanings; it may or may not be still in use for airplanes to mean "Received", I'm not sure. (The letter R can also be used to mean "Received" in flashlight Morse between ships; the corresponding flag code is the code pennant: halfway up the halyard it means "I see your signal", hoisted to block it means "…and now I understand it".) Tonymec (talk) 13:43, 16 June 2018 (UTC)

— Preceding unsigned comment added by Tonymec (talk • contribs) 13:44, 16 June 2018 (UTC)

or É?
According to this reference, represents both the prosign "Further message sign" and the "accented letter e", and it's represented as  (e with overbar). However, this representation is not consistent with the one used in this article, where the overbar means concatenation of symbols, and it makes no sense to concatenate a single symbol ( would just be e); the book probably uses this overbar to represent "accented/modified letter" either due to the lack of an é character with a proper acute accent or because they are using a second meaning for this overbar. In any case, since the meaning of the overbar stated in this article is different to that one, I suggest replacing  with É since it's what the book seems to mean. (I replaced it but the change was reverted, so I wanted to discuss it here rather than starting an edit war.) —Cousteau (talk) 19:15, 31 December 2018 (UTC)

Q signal
I notice "QRS" (the Q code for "send slower") is present in the table, but no other Q codes are. Should QRS really be in there, separately from the rest of the Q codes? 2602:24A:DE47:BA60:8FCB:EA4E:7FBD:4814 (talk) 23:52, 7 August 2021 (UTC)
 * Q code has its own article and ought not to be included in a list of prosigns. --Wtshymanski (talk) 03:32, 11 August 2021 (UTC)