so ive been using N1MM for a while now mostly because thats what everyone told me to use when i first got into contesting and it does work great for that, no complaints there really. but for everyday logging between contests its kind of a pain, like it doesnt feel designed for just sitting down and working a few DX stations on a sunday afternoon and writing notes and stuff.

someone at the club mentioned Log4OM and i downloaded it and poked around but honestly the interface threw me off a bit, theres a lot going on. i do run WSJT-X for FT8 and that seems to play nice with pretty much everything via UDP so thats not really the concern.

i guess what im wondering is whether anyone actually runs both — like N1MM for when a contest is on and Log4OM or something else as the daily driver — and how annoying is it to keep them in sync or not have duplicate QSOs showing up everywhere. or is there some other setup that just handles both cases without switching apps all the time.

yeah i do exactly this, N1MM for contests and Log4OM for everything else. the key is just being disciplined about ADIF exports after each contest and importing into Log4OM. its maybe a 2 minute thing after you're done. duplicates havent been a big problem for me because Log4OM is pretty good at catching them on import, just make sure you have the dupe checking set right in the import settings.

the WSJT-X UDP thing works fine with Log4OM running as the primary logger, just point the UDP output at Log4OM's port and it logs automatically. i actually killed N1MM entirely on non-contest days after i got that workflow sorted out. Log4OM has a bit of a learning curve but once you get the layout customized the way you want it its genuinely nicer for casual operating, you can pull up a callsign and see all your previous QSOs with them, notes, lotw status, all of it right there.

honestly i just use N1MM for everything including daily logging and never really bothered with Log4OM. probably not the answer you want but it does work, the everyday logging mode isnt as bad as people make it out to be once you get used to it. though i will say the notes field situation is not great.