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country-files

The DX-cluster country file (cty.dat) — callsign prefix to entity, zone and coordinates

What it does

The lookup table every logger and contest program uses to turn a callsign into a DXCC entity, CQ and ITU zone, continent and coordinates: cty.dat and its siblings (cty.csv, swiftlog_cty.dat), as published by AD1C, installed under the shared data directory.

Why you would want it

Loggers bundle a copy and it goes stale between their releases; new prefixes and entity changes arrive weekly. One current copy on the machine, updated like any other unit, is what AHRL's fan-out was trying to achieve by hand.

Before it will work

Nothing. A program that reads it has to be pointed at /usr/local/share/hammunition/data/country-files/cty.dat, or names this unit in its own manifest's depends; none does yet.

How it installs

  • data (Jim Reisert AD1C's country files; free to use and redistribute with the copyright notice kept (copyright.txt in the release), https://www.country-files.com/): https://www.country-files.com/bigcty/download/2026/bigcty-20260906.zip (339,004 bytes)

Known problems

The first data unit (D-049). No reader in the catalog consumes it from this path yet, so today it is a current cty.dat on disk and nothing more; the loggers still read their bundled copies until their manifests say otherwise. Installed as plain files, mode 0644, root-owned.

Keeping it current

  • probe: none
  • strategy: reinstall
  • A dated release most weeks, announced on country-files.com; each is a zip under /bigcty/download//bigcty-.zip. Bump the URL, the hash, the size and version together.

Where to get help with the software itself

The country-files.com site and its contact page; AD1C maintains the files and announces each release there.

Source: catalog/packages/country-files.yaml