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1990-04-25
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------------------------------------------------------------
CHESSTD Version 2.00
by Stephen Wharry
------------------------------------------------------------
CHESSTD is a program for the tournament director to assist
in making the pairings, pairing charts, wallcharts,
calculates tie breaks, and more for chess tournaments.
CHESSTD makes pairings (both Swiss and round robin style)
based on the pairing rules found in "USCF Rules of Chess".
However, the tournament director has complete freedom to
modify the pairings to his/her satisfaction using a powerful
pairings editor. Error checking routines are programmed
into CHESSTD to insure equalization of color, alternation of
color, equality in pairing, and no multiple pairings between
two players or multiple one point byes.
CHESSTD is compatible with and written in conjunction with
CHESSRPT, a program written to generate crosstables and
tournament reports to USCF. Thus CHESSTD and CHESSRPT
comprise a complete package for automation of the majority
of TD functions before, during, and after a tournament.
The program will work on any IBM compatible DOS based
system. DOS 3.2 or greater is recommended!
This program is being marketed on the Shareware concept.
This means you may try out this program free of charge.
HOWEVER! If you find this program of use, you are required
to become a registered user by remitting $10 to
Stephen Wharry
4842 Clearview Circle
Bartlesville, OK 74006
Registered users will receive information on free updates of
this program and other chess related software.
CHESSTD page 2
CHESSTD Version 2.00 1
Installation of CHESSTD 4
Starting up CHESSTD 4
Using CHESSTD 5
Selecting commands/entering data 5
Selecting players from the player's list 6
Selecting from a pop-up list 7
Selecting the output device 7
Quit 7
File 8
File - Open 8
File - Save 8
File - Purge 8
File - Directory 9
Edit 9
Edit - New (Tournament) 9
Edit - New (Players) 9
Edit - Format 10
Edit - Tourney 10
Tournament name 10
Number of Rounds 10
Date 11
Section/class 11
City, State, Zip 11
Sponsoring affiliate and ID# 11
TD's 11
Edit - Cards 12
Edit Player's Card 12
Name 12
USCF number 12
Rating 13
Round information 13
Color 14
Opponent 14
Result 15
Edit Round Information 15
Add Player 15
Delete Player 16
Adding/Deleting players after the first round 16
Edit - Pairings 16
Quit 17
Paste 17
Cut 17
Add 18
Subtract 18
Black/white 18
CHESSTD page 3
Print 18
Print - Wallchart 19
Print - Pairings 19
Print - List 19
Print - Cards 19
Tie Breaks 19
TD 20
Swiss pairings 20
Round robin pairings 21
Edit pairings 21
Assign byes 21
Pair as... 22
Enter results 22
Forfeit player 22
Withdraw player 22
CHESSTD 22
DOShell 23
If you have problems 23
CHESSTD page 4
Installation of CHESSTD
Installation of CHESSTD is simply a matter of copying the
program CHESSTD.EXE to the directory or floppy disk of your
choice. (Gosh, that's sounds hard doesn't it!!!) You can
'install' as many copies of CHESSTD in as many directories
or floppies as you want.
Since CHESSTD supports DOS paths, you could even choose to
have the program on one directory or floppy and the data on
another directory or floppy. Or you could keep data for a
number of tournaments scattered in different directories or
floppy disks.
IMPORTANT! If want to handle round robin pairings as well,
you will need to copy the file CHESSTD.RND along with
CHESSTD.EXE to the directories or floppies where CHESSTD
will reside. CHESSTD will automatically look for
CHESSTD.RND when making round robin pairings.
Types of files
CHESSTD creates three types of files, wallchart files,
pairing files and user defined files. The first contains
the wallchart data as are defined primarily for the Swiss
style tournament. The extension for these files is '.WCT'.
The pairing files contain the pairings defined for a given
round and have the extension '.CTD.'. The CTD files are
usually overwritten once a new set of pairings have been
made.
The fourth type of file created by CHESSTD is the user
defined file. This file is usually a copy of a wallchart,
crosstable, or game report 'printed' to a file. The
filename and extension for these files are defined by the
user.
Starting up CHESSTD
To start CHESSTD, simply type CHESSTD at the DOS prompt.
(Whew, that might be a little tough?) The files CHESSTD
creates will reside in the default directory, unless a path
is specified as part of the filename.
Alternatively you could specify the filename on the command
line. The filename (and directory) you specify will be
loaded automatically upon startup.
CHESSTD page 5
Example: C>CHESSTD D:\CHESS\66open
Will run CHESSTD and automatically load the wallchart file
called 66open.WCT from the D:\CHESS directory.
Using CHESSTD
Selecting commands/entering data
Commands are selected in one of the following fashions:
Type the single letter corresponding to the first letter
of the command. (Tough HUH!)
OR
Use the tab, shift-tab, or cursor keys to highlight the
command you wish to activate. Then press RETURN/ENTER.
OR
Use the mouse, if you have one, to position the cursor
over the command and click a mouse button.
(Sorry if I confuse you by interchanging RETURN and ENTER
for the large key located near your right little pinkie.
IBM in it's wisdom decided to change the world overnight and
re-label this key. If you see RETURN, read ENTER!)
ENTER at any time will activate the default selection which
is either highlighted, enclosed in <>, or is the first item
on a list. The most common example of the latter is the 0)
Quit item in the list of chess players.
When prompted for data, you may either press the enter key
and accept the data being displayed, or you may type in new
data. Most of the data input of CHESSTD uses what I call a
limited line editor which allows you to type over any data
displayed on the line. You may also use the home, end and
cursor keys to move around on the line. All data between
home and end will be read back into the program once you
press the enter key. The insert, delete, and backspace keys
may be used to add or delete characters in the line.
Besides the ENTER key, the ESCAPE key has a special meaning
for the limited line editor. Pressing the ESCAPE key during
data input will append a 'Q' to the end of the data and
immediately exit the data input for that item. In several
cases I handle this by removing the 'Q' from the data and
exiting from the routines. This resembles using the ESCAPE
key to back up or abort data input screens. Bear in mind
that this is not always so.
CHESSTD page 6
A special editing mode is activated during the routine to
edit the pairings. In this case, there are four commands
that are active. These are explained in detail below.
However, note that the 'cut' command is activated by the Del
key and the 'paste' command is activated by the Ins key.
Selecting players from the player's list
A number of CHESSTD routines will present you with a list of
players. The names of the players may be listed in
different colors depending if the player is assigned a bye
for the current round, or the sum of his/her score with the
opponent's score adds up to one. The color of the player's
name doesn't prevent you from selecting that player.
When requested to select a player from a list displayed on
the screen, any alphanumeric character(s) can be entered.
If the data you enter is numeric, the data will be
interpreted as a number. If the data you enter is
alphabetical, the first player's name that matches the
characters typed will be selected.
For example:
If a player is listed on the screen as "16) Wharry,
Stephen", he could be selected by typing in the number
16.
OR
By typing in as much of the last name as is unique.
Thus, if no other players has a last name beginning
with W, then typing in a 'W' will select "Wharry".
Note: Capitals are ignored.
OR
You can use the mouse to select the player either by
clicking on the player's number or on the player's last
name. If the player's name is entered with only one
space separating the last and first name, CHESSTD will
match the whole name. If not, CHESSTD will match only
the portion of the name clicked on.
In addition to typing in alphanumeric data, the cursor keys
can be used to manipulate the player's list on the screen.
Pressing the cursor keys will move the player's list up/down
one player. Pressing the page up/page down keys will move
the player's list up/down by 16 players at a time. The home
key will begin the list at player #1 and the end key will
end the list on the last player.
CHESSTD page 7
Selecting from a pop-up list
In several points of CHESSTD, you will be presented with a
list of items with the first item highlighted. This is a
pop-up menu. You can press the escape key and exit without
selecting any of the items, or you can use the cursor keys
to position the cursor (highlight) on the item you want.
After positioning the cursor, press the "ENTER" key and that
item will be selected. Alternatively, you can use the mouse
to scroll through the pop-up menu and click on the desired
item.
Selecting the output device
In the print routines you are asked to select a device for
output. The options are a printer, a file, or the screen.
The default is the screen. If you select the printer as the
output device, the output will be directed to the line
printer attached to the computer. (Well what do you know.
Isn't life weird!)
CHESSTD was written to interact with an EPSON printer,
however no special codes were embedded in the software. The
most complex code used is ASCII 12, which is commonly used
as the printer control command for a form feed.
Note: For pretties, the IBM special graphic characters have
been used for printout of the wallchart and pairing cards.
This may yield weird characters, if you're printer is not
capable of printing these special characters. (I suggest
MPMPrint, a shareware program to substitute psuedo-graphic
characters to the printer).
Selection of the screen as output will display the
information requested, on the screen.
Selection of a file as the output 'device' is a little bit
more complex, but not much. After selecting the file
'device', CHESSTD requests a filename for the output file.
You must specify the full filename including the extension
and the directory. The latter is only necessary if you wish
the output to go to a directory other than the default
directory.
Quit
In the main menu, the QUIT command will generate a button
box asking you if you really want to exit. Enter 'N' to
return to CHESSTD or 'Y' to exit back to DOS. In most of
the other menus, the QUIT command will return you to the
previous menu or to the main menu.
CHESSTD page 8
File
The file menu contains those commands used to manipulate the
wallchart files. The two most used functions will most
likely be 'Open' and 'Save'. These commands are detailed
below.
File - Open
The 'Open' command is the opposite to the 'Save' command.
You specify a directory and a filename. If you specify the
extension, it will be ignored.
If you use a wildcards as part, or all, of the filename, you
can press the 'F1' key (function key one), and a directory
listing of the appropriate files will be displayed. Use the
cursor keys or mouse to select the file to be opened.
In addition to the wallchart file, a file containing the
extension 'CTD' is also opened and read in at this time.
This file contains the current round number and the current
pairings. These pairings can be edited just as if the
pairings had just been made.
File - Save
The 'Save' command will save the current data to the file
specified. After selecting the save command, you are
prompted for the filename. Again any normal DOS file
specifier is acceptable. You needn't specify the extension
since CHESSTD will use 'WCT' regardless of the extension you
type in.
If you wish the file to be stored in another directory/disk
besides the default, you must specify the new path at this
time.
In addition to the wallchart file, the Save command will
write the current pairings to the same path specified for
the wallchart file. These pairings can then be edited in
the future to rebuild the pairings for the round, change
color allocations, or anything else you might want to do
with the pairings.
File - Purge
The 'Purge' command is used to purge/delete the specified
files. CHESSTD assumes you will want to purge WCT files and
will create the filename on this basis. You can use
wildcards and change the directories at this point. CHESSTD
will prompt for each file prior to purging the file. Answer
yes or no.
CHESSTD page 9
File - Directory
The 'Directory' command allows you to obtain a directory of
all wallchart files. After selecting this item you are
prompted for the filename. At this point you may enter any
normal DOS file specifier. Here also you can use wildcards
and change directories. CHESSTD will show the results of
the directory command in a window. If more files are
selected than will fit in the window, you will be prompted
to continue.
Edit
All of the data entered into CHESSTD can be entered or
edited using this command. The operation is very straight
forward. As you are prompted for data, either enter new
data, edit the old data, or press the ENTER key to accept
the data. You may use the delete, insert, backspace key as
well as the cursor keys to change the displayed data.
CHESSTD uses a limited line editor. All characters typed on
the screen between the 'Home' position and the 'End' will be
read back into CHESSTD. To find the Home and End, simply
press the appropriate keys. The right/left cursor keys can
also be used to find the beginning and end of the 'line'.
Edit - New (Tournament)
After selecting the New command, you are prompted to select
either a new tournament or a new player. The former is to
be used when you are setting up a new tournament and wish to
initialize all the tournament information. The latter is
used to add players to the current tournament wallchart.
After selecting a new tournament, you will go through four
routines, the Edit Format, the Edit Tournament, the Edit
TD's, and the New Players (Add players) routines. These are
detailed below.
Edit - New (Players)
By selecting the 'New Players' option, you are taken
directly to the Edit Players routine for player x, where x
is one greater than the total number of players entered into
the wallchart. You will only be able to add players to the
tournament if the current round is round #1. For more
information on the Add Players routine, see below.
CHESSTD page 10
Edit - Format
There are only two types of tournaments supported by
CHESSTD, the Swiss and the round robin. One difference
between the Swiss and round robin formats is that the Swiss
format shows a cumulative score for each round and the round
robin simply shows the resulting score for that round. A
second difference is in how CHESSTD does the pairings. If a
tournament is defined as a round robin, CHESSTD reads a
datafile called CHESSTD.RND to determine the pairings.
Otherwise the pairings are made based on the Swiss system.
Although I don't know why you would want to, you can switch
the tournament format from Swiss to round robin, and visa
versa, at any time.
Note: Regardless of the format, CHESSTD assumes each
pairing/game is worth one point.
Edit - Tourney
This routine is used to edit tournament header information
such as the tournament name, number of rounds, date,
section/class, location of the tournament and the sponsoring
affiliate information. These are detailed below.
Tournament name
Here you are prompted for the tournament name. This CANNOT
be left blank as this will quit the edit routine and NOT
clear all the old tournament information. If you decide you
didn't want to create a new tournament at this time, press
the ENTER key. If you do want to create a new tournament,
which is the whole reason for this program, enter the name
you (or others) have bestowed on this tournament.
Number of Rounds
If the tournament format is a Swiss style, you must enter
the number of rounds. The number of rounds for a round
robin tournament is set by the number of players.
In a similar manner to the tournament name, the number of
rounds CANNOT be blank, since a tournament of zero rounds is
undefined! The default is 5 rounds since the 5 round Swiss
is fairly common. To change the number of rounds, backspace
over the 5 and type in the number of rounds played.
Currently CHESSTD cannot handle any tournaments over 25
rounds. (And that's a long time to play chess me boyo). If
you are interested in more rounds, drop me a line and I'll
send you a modified program.
CHESSTD page 11
Date
Next you are prompted for the date. This is self-
explanatory. Although any ASCII data is accepted, if none
is entered the program will shove the current date into this
spot. (OW, THAT HURT!) Since the 'date' will show up on the
USCF report, I recommend you use the starting and stopping
dates for the tournament.
Section/class
Next you are prompted for the Section/class for this
tournament. An example is the RESERVE section of the
NATIONAL OPEN. As with the date, this is a pure ASCII
variable and you may elect to enter data at this point that
is not section/class data! If no section/class is entered,
CHESSTD sets the Section/class to 'Not applicable'.
City, State, Zip
The next prompt is for the city, state, and zip where the
tournament was held, again another ASCII variable. However,
it is used in the USCF report so you might want to enter the
data, otherwise you may have to write this in at a latter
date.
Sponsoring affiliate and ID#
The sponsoring affiliate is the name of the USCF affiliate
sponsoring the tournament. Again, used primarily for the
USCF report as is the ID #, which is USCF's affiliate number
for the club or organization sponsoring the tournament.
(Gosh Mr. Wizard, this sounds real tough!!!!)
TD's
This routine is used to edit/enter the data for the
tournament directors. CHESSTD allows up to 9 assistant TD's
in addition to the chief tournament director.
The first prompt is for the name of the chief tournament
director. As with the tournament name and the number of
rounds, this CANNOT be left blank. In fact in this case,
you are not allowed quit or continue in CHESSTD until you
enter something for a chief TD's name. (This is most likely
you yourself!) After entering the name of the chief
tournament director, you are prompted for his/her ID number.
For the chief tournament director, you are also asked for
his/her level. This is for the USCF report. Currently
(1990) the levels are CLUB, LOCAL, SENIOR, and then on to
the national levels!
CHESSTD page 12
The names and ID numbers for the assistant tournament
directors are next requested. By pressing an ENTER
(entering a blank) or 'END' for the name of an assistant TD,
CHESSTD assumes you are finished.
Edit - Cards
After selecting this command you are given the option of
editing a player's card, editing a specific round results,
adding a player to the tournament, and deleting a player
from the tournament. These latter two commands should only
be done in the first round since they reshuffle the player's
pairing numbers. More about this latter.
Edit Player's Card
After selecting this command, a list of players is
displayed. Select the player you wish to edit, the program
will then present you with the player's data (if any).
You may select the last option (all) to edit all of the
players. The program will present you with the data for
player 1 and proceed one player at a time until you reach
the last player in the tournament.
Note: Under the edit function, the escape key can be used to
'tab' through the players. During the player's name, rating
and color information the escape key, or entering a 'Q' as
the last letter, will jump from the current player to the
next player to be edited. At other times the escape key
will append the letter 'Q' to the data being entered!
Name
The name should be input with last name first, followed by
first name and middle initial. USCF would like you to use
the name exactly as it is recorded in their records. This
is probably a GOOD idea especially if you have two or more
John Smiths. If you press the ENTER key with no data
present (i.e. enter no player name) CHESSTD assumes you are
finished entering data for now and will exit the editing
routine!
USCF number
The ID number should be the USCF number assigned to each
player. If a player has no USCF number, then typing in NEW
is acceptable as is most anything else you wish to type.
Bear in mind though that the reports were set up to display
a maximum of 9 letters, so if you type in data with more
CHESSTD page 13
than 9 letters you risk screwing up the PRETTY REPORTS THAT
I HAVE WORKED SO HARD ON SO WATCH IT BUSTER!!!!!
Rating
The rating is a number! Usually it is the official rating
being used for a particular player for this tournament.
Since some players are fairly active, their current rating
may not reflect their true rating. This screws things up in
trying to generate an exact copy of the rating report you
receive back from USCF. Not to worry, after you find out
their true ratings, you can edit their ratings and
regenerate the USCF crosstable exactly! (Well maybe not
EXACTLY, but pretty durned close. It seems USCF does a few
fudgy things I haven't figured out yet.)
For unrated players, I have been using the value of zero for
their ratings. Therefore, zero is translated in CHESSTD as
'Unrated' or 'UNR' depending on the routine.
During the edit modes, the rating value may be 'entered' by
pressing the escape key at the end of the rating. The
rating will be set correctly, but the program will skip
input of round data.
Round information
The round information is the data that will be used to
generate the Swiss pairings, wallcharts, and crosstables
(the latter using CHESSRPT). The data input is set up to
accept what is usually shown on my pairing cards. I'm sorry
if this seems a little egotistical, but hey I'm writing the
program not YOU. Seriously, if you have suggestions as to
what you might like to see accepted as round information,
drop me a line and I'll try to get it into the next version
of the program!
The screen shows pairing card cells for five or less rounds.
More rounds are shown when needed. In each of these pairing
card cells you must input the color, opponent, and the
result. The exception is byes and forfeits which are
handled a little differently. If the information relates to
another player on the wallchart, his data will
SIMULTANEOUSLY be entered without your having to bother with
it.
The simultaneous entry of data means that if player 1 played
player 22 in round 1, the data you enter for player 1 will
be interpreted and entered for player 22 at the same time.
You will get a chance to review the data at a later time,
i.e. when you are inputting data for player 22! Since
pressing ENTER will accept the data displayed, when you come
CHESSTD page 14
to player 22 you only need double check the data and press
the ENTER key three times to accept the color, opponent, and
result!
Example: If you put in the color W for player I against
player J with a result of 0.5. The player J's data will be
set for the color B, opponent I, and a score of 0.5.
Color
You must enter alphabetic data in this box. This could be
either W for white, or B for black or any of the following
legal round descriptors:
W - white
B - black
BYE (or B--)* - bye
FW or F - forfeit win
FL or X - forfeit loss
FD or Z - forfeit draw
U - unplayed game
WD - withdraw
esc or Q - quit entering data
*The dashes are necessary to distinguish from the color
allocation black.
This command WD will immediately exit from entering round
data and set all remaining rounds to U--, for unplayed
games.
The forfeits, withdrawal, and unplayed games will
automatically compute the appropriate scores and continue to
the next pairing card cell. Byes automatically skip the
opponent, but still request a score for that round as they
may be full point or half point byes.
Entering a Q, or any text ending with a Q, or pressing the
ESCAPE key will immediately exit you from the round input
data and proceed to the next player leaving the original
data unchanged. This is handy, if you are editing round 1
and all the other rounds are OK.
If the data you enter is illegal, then the program will beep
informing you that YOU DID SOMETHING WRONG, NAAAAA.
Opponent
The opponent number is a non-zero, positive number and the
pairing number of the opponent!? (Does that make sense or
what!) This number will be used to determine what other
player's data will be altered besides the player currently
CHESSTD page 15
being edited. The opponent number cannot be equal to the
current player since USCF and I frown on player's playing a
game against themselves!
Result
The result is the result of the specific round and must be
equal to 1, 0.5, or 0. If an incorrect value is input, the
program will again beep at you and allow you to put in the
correct result. As you enter the result, the cumulative
score is displayed under the column Tot.
Edit Round Information
This routine is useful in editing the round information
directly, skipping editing the full player's card. However
note, the round information can also be entered below under
the Enter Results subroutine in the TD routine.
After selecting this command you are requested for the round
to be edited. Simply position the cursor over the
appropriate round and press the return.
As with the Edit Player's Card above, you are prompted for
the player to edit. You are then shown the player's pairing
card with the cursor positioned on the round you selected
above. All cautions above relating to "Round information"
are applicable here as well since you are using the same
routine.
Remember, whenever you change a player's information you
will be changing his/her opponent's information as well.
Add Player
WARNING: You should only add players to a tournament during
round one.
As you add players to the tournament, the player you add is
assigned a pairing number based on his/her rating. You
needn't worry about what order you add players to the
tournament as CHESSTD will determine where the player fits
in and adjust all pairing numbers appropriately. The
advantage of this is that you can add players of disparate
strength and CHESSTD will AUTOMATICALLY keep track of the
pairing numbers. The disadvantage is that if you add
players to a tournament after the first round, you may have
to do some shuffling.
CHESSTD page 16
Delete Player
WARNING: You should only delete players from a tournament
during round one. If a player has already played one game
in the tournament, you should NEVER delete that player from
the tournament.
You needn't worry about what order you delete players from
the tournament as CHESSTD will adjust all pairing numbers
appropriately. The advantage of this is that you can delete
players of disparate strength and CHESSTD will AUTOMATICALLY
keep track of the pairing numbers.
Adding/Deleting players after the first round
If in spite of the warnings above you decide to add or
delete a player during the second or subsequent rounds,
there is actually a way around the safeguards I've put in.
First reset the default round by redoing the first
round pairings and having CHESSTD rebuild the pairings
(See Pairings later).
Next add/delete the appropriate player.
If you added a player, assign that player a bye in each
round that he/she did not play in.
If you delete a player, assign a bye to each opponent
of the deleted player depending on the result of the
game.
Physically redo the pairings for each round until you
get to the current round. This step will reset all the
opponents pairing numbers to the new pairing numbers.
I can't emphasize enough the importance of taking care in
using these commands after the pairings have been made for
the first round. Since adding and deleting players from the
tournament rebuilds the pairing numbers, and since the
pairing numbers are what designates the pairings, it is
highly important to insure these numbers are accurate.
Edit - Pairings
You enter the Edit - pairings routine either through the TD
routine or the edit routine. The Edit - pairings routine
will present you with a list of the current pairings. At
this point you can manipulate the pairings in any manner you
care to. In fact, it is possible to assign every single
player byes, five blacks in a row, pair a 0 with a 4, etc.
CHESSTD page 17
My philosophy in putting this routine together is to allow
the TD the ultimate in flexibility and yet maintain a well
ordered approach to the pairing process.
You have several options in the Edit - pairings routine,
which are described below. These commands will be executed
at the point where the cursor (highlight) is positioned.
Thus, if the cursor is positioned on player C and you
execute the Cut command, player C will be cut.
All of the commands below have key equivalent on the IBM
keypad. Paste=Ins, Cut=Del, Add=+, Subtract=-, and
Black/white=*.
Quit
Executed by clicking on the command, pressing the Q key, or
the escape key. Any player not assigned a pairing or a bye
at this point will be assigned a full point bye.
Paste
The paste/cut commands are used to move single players
around the Edit - pairing screen. This command can be
executed by clicking the mouse cursor on the command,
pressing the first letter of the command, or using the Ins
key on the keypad.
The result of the paste command will be to present the TD
with a list of players who are not currently assigned a
pairing for this round (non-paired player's list). If there
are no available players, no list will be presented.
If you press the escape key after being presented with a
list, no changes will be made. Otherwise, the player who is
highlighted will be pasted into the current cursor position.
If there is a player already at that position, that player
will be placed in the non-paired player's list.
If the player you selected has already played the opponent,
a warning beep will sound and you will not be allowed to
make the pairing. If you really want to pair two player's a
second time in a tournament, you can go out and edit the
pairing cards and rebuild the pairings.
Cut
The cut command is used to remove a player from the pairing
routine and place him into the non-paired player's list.
Once here, the player is available to be pasted anywhere on
the pairing screen. This command can be executed by
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clicking the mouse on the command, pressing C, or using the
Del key.
Add
This command is used to add a blank pairing line to the
pairing screen. This is used if you have two players on the
non-paired player's list and wish to pair them. The pairing
line will be added onto the bottom of the pairing list
regardless of the position of the cursor.
Activate this command by clicking on the command, pressing
A, or the plus key on the keypad.
Subtract
This command is used to delete a pairing from the pairing
screen. If there are players on this line, they will be
added to the non-paired player's list. This routine is used
primarily when CHESSTD couldn't pair all players and
generates two players with one point byes. When this
happens, the TD must go in and decide what pairings need to
be made and shuffle the players around. After making the
pairings, it is a good idea to subtract the blank pairing
lines on the pairing screen.
This command is activated by clicking on the command,
pressing the S key, or the minus key on the keypad.
Black/white
This command is used to toggle the color assignments for the
players on the pairing screen. Activating the command once
will reverse the color assignments. Activating the command
a second time will toggle the color assignments back to the
original assignments.
This command is activated by clicking the command, pressing
the B, or the asterisk key on the keypad.
Print
After selecting the print option, you are prompted for the
output device. Previous versions, required you to select
the output device prior to each printing request. I felt it
seemed more logical to request the device only once and not
get in the way.
If you select the screen (the default), the results will be
displayed on the screen along with the tournament header
information. If you select a printer or file as the output
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device, the results 'printed' will be identical. Thus, you
can output your wallchart to a file and print it latter.
If you select a 'file' as the output device, you are
prompted for a filename in standard DOS format including
directories and extensions. If you press the enter key
without entering a filename, the output file will be set to
TEMP.PRT in the default directory. All subsequent print
requests will print to the output file. To print data to
multiple output files you will have to exit the print
routine and reenter it specifying a new filename.
Print - Wallchart
Printing of the wallchart is used if you want to print out a
copy of the wallchart to be posted. If you print the
wallchart to the screen, you will be prompted to continue or
to Break.
Print - Pairings
This command will print out a copy of the pairing chart in
the form of board number, player playing white, and player
playing black. There will be spaces to mark the results for
each player.
Print - List
This command will print out a copy of the pairing list. My
definition of the pairing list is a list of players starting
with player one and proceeding to the last player. For each
player the color assignment, the board number, the
opponent's pairing number and a spot for the result is
listed.
Print - Cards
This routine will print a copy of the pairing cards. You
are prompted for the round and this round will be the last
round on the card unless more rounds will fit.
Although this command can be used to print out copies of the
pairing cards for each player, it seems a little silly since
the pairings can all be done by CHESSTD. However, for those
people who want a hardcopy of the pairing cards, here it is!
Tie Breaks
The additional two columns on the pairing cards are the tie
breaks. These are recalculated each time the card is
printed to the screen so they represent an accurate snapshot
of the current situation. Column A represents tie breaks
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based on the Solkov system where the final scores of the
opponents are added together. Column B represents the tie
breaks based on the cumulative system. This latter can
easily be checked by summing up the Tot column.
TD
The TD command includes the routines to pair a round, assign
byes, enter the results, forfeit players, and withdraw
players, i.e. the majority of functions of a TD during a
chess tournament.
Pair round
After selecting this command, you are prompted for the
round. After selecting the appropriate round CHESSTD will
make the pairings based on the tournament format. The
specifics are detailed below.
If the pairings have already been made for a given round,
the information should be listed on the pairing cards. In
the event of CHESSTD encountering previous pairings, you are
presented with the option to redo the pairings for the round
or to rebuild the pairings from the information on the
pairing cards. Unless you are wanting to recreate the
pairings from a previous round, you usually will want to
have CHESSTD redo the pairings.
Swiss pairings
As mentioned elsewhere, CHESSTD will pair a Swiss style
tournament following the pairing rules in "USCF Official
Rules of Chess". CHESSTD recognizes the odd-man rule,
pairing conflicts, score groups, color equalization, color
alternation, and will assign full point byes (preferably to
the lowest rated players in the lowest score group).
All things being well behaved, you will never have to modify
the pairings that CHESSTD will make for you. However, not
all things are well behaved, which is the reason I built the
powerful pairing editor routine above.
For the first round, CHESSTD will arbitrarily assign colors
for the first board based on a random number generator. The
colors are then alternated through the rest of the pairings.
For subsequent rounds, CHESSTD computes the color allocation
and maximizes the color equalization, and alternation.
If CHESSTD finds that two players have already played,
CHESSTD will attempt to switch the lower ranked player with
the lower ranked player from the next pairing. If this
works out, well and good, if not, CHESSTD may assign both
CHESSTD page 21
players full point byes and have the TD work out the
specifics of pairing these two players.
For cases where color allocation is not optimum, CHESSTD
will again switch the lower ranked players attempting to
solve the problem. If no solution is found, CHESSTD will
assign the higher ranked player his/her due color.
Round robin pairings
The round robin pairings are located in a file called
CHESSTD.RND and are taken directly from "USCF Official Rules
of Chess". CHESSTD will not modify the pairings in any
fashion from those presented in the rulebook. If players
withdraw from the tournament, you should consult the
rulebook to determine if color allocations may switch.
The file CHESSTD.RND MUST be in the same directory/floppy as
CHESSTD.EXE. If CHESSTD can't find this file, it will give
you an error "Can't find file". If this happens, Shell out
to DOS and make sure CHESSTD.RND is present in the default
directory.
The file CHESSTD.RND contains the round robin pairings for
tournaments up to 24 players. If you want to hold a round
robin with more than 24 players, you can edit CHESSTD.RND
and add the appropriate pairings.
Edit pairings
This is another entry into the Edit pairings routine
described above.
Assign byes
This routine is used to assign, or deassign, byes for
players. If you want to assign a given player(s) byes, you
should enter this routine and assign the byes PRIOR to
pairing the round. Assigning byes to a player will remove
the player from being automatically paired by CHESSTD.
After selecting the round, you are again presented with a
list of players. Those players that already are assigned
byes will be printed in a different color from the rest of
the players. You can clear this by selecting the player and
assigning the player a "Clear bye". This will clear the
pairing card entry for the sected round and free up the
player for CHESSTD to pair.
Other options after selecting a player is to assign the
player a 1, 0.5, or 0 point bye. The latter option is for a
player who is skipping a round.
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Pair as...
This routine was included to allow you to change the score
of one player without affecting the score of his/her
opponent. As the command indicates, the routine is used to
pair a player as a win, draw, loss. This routine would be
used to assign "results" to players in the middle of an
adjourned game to allow CHESSTD to pair the next round.
Example: Say player one and player five have an adjourned
third round. To make the pairings for round four, you have
to have scores for these two players. If you use the normal
routines, then every time you change player one's score you
adjust player five's score.
Now player one thinks he's winning and player five think's
it's a draw. Enter the Pair as... routine, select round
three, and select player one and player five assigning them
the provisional scores based on their expectations of the
adjourned game. Now you can pair round four.
Enter results
After selecting the round, you select the player and the
result for the player. Player's whose results have already
been entered will be displayed in a different color. If
you're unsure whether the results have been entered, reenter
them as this will cause no problem at all!
The opponent's results will automatically be calculated
based on a total of one point per game.
Forfeit player
Select the round and the player to be forfeited. You have
three options, a forfeit win, forfeit loss, and a forfeit
draw. The opponents results will automatically be updated.
Withdraw player
Use this routine to remove a player from a tournament. The
player will continue to appear on the non-paired player's
list.
CHESSTD
This routine will take you to CHESSRPT, the sister program
for CHESSTD. CHESSRPT is used to print wallcharts,
crosstables, and USCF reports using CHESSTD wallchart files.
If you use CHESSTD to direct a tournament, you needn't do
anything with CHESSRPT except print the reports out.
CHESSTD page 23
DOShell
DOShell is nothing more than the SHELL you may or may not
have heard so much about. After shelling to DOS you can run
commands and even programs just as if you were at the
command line right after boot up. To get back into the
CHESSTD program at the point you stopped, type in 'exit'
followed by the ENTER key.
If you have problems
If you have problems try to work them out yourself!!!!
All kidding aside, I have tried to address all problems you
might have in the manual above.
I am associated with the two major BBS systems with the
following addresses and would be glad to help you out any
way.
GENIE S. WHARRY
COMPUSERVE 71531,3125
or even the mundane address
Stephen Wharry
4842 Clearview Circle
Bartlesville, OK 74006
Drop me a line, electronically or otherwise, an I'll try to
solve your problem. I must admit there are most likely
still bugs in this program as I have NEVER found a program
that has reached the released stage that does not have bugs.
For future releases of CHESSTD or other chess related
software, drop me a line. I already have what I consider an
excellent chess editor/personal database program (CHESSEDT),
a good program for keeping track of ratings for your club or
organization (CHESSCLB), and a chess tournament director
(CHESSTD).