Tournament Wizard

The Tournament Wizard guides you through the process of creating or changing tournament definition.

The tournament definition records specific information about the tournament and its rules. This definition is stored in the tournament directory and must be the same on all computers in the tournament.

Be sure to have the data from your Planning Worksheet available as you use the Tournament Wizard to define your tournament. You will implement some of those plans in this process.

If you make a mistake or change your mind, don't worry. You can change most of the tournament definition at any time. The exception is the choice of score sheet, which cannot be changed after any score is entered. [If you must change the score entry mode, you will have to delete all entered scores first.]

To move back and forth through the Wizard, use the Next and Back buttons at the bottom of the windows.

Defining a tournament with the Tournament Wizard includes the following items:

Caution
The tournament definition implements policy set by the Tournament Director, and must be the same on all computers in the tournament. Consult the Tournament Director or Score Master before changing any aspect of the tournament definition.

Start the Tournament Wizard

To start the Tournament Wizard:

Select New or Current (existing) Tournament

On the first page of the Wizard (No, that's not a photo of any DI Scoring Program developer!), select the option to create a new tournament or to modify the current (existing) tournament.

When creating a new tournament, your first task is to identify (or create) the folder or directory to contain that tournament data files. After you've selected the folder, the Browse button will let you return to the list.

When you're finished, click Next.

Enter the Tournament Information

The Tournament Information page requests the following basic information about the tournament.

Set Challenge Colors

The DI Scoring Program lets you color code the non-score items in the Tournament Summary Window, the All Teams Window, the challenge level windows, and the score sheets. You can select a different color scheme for each challenge in the tournament. The colors make it easier to identify a team or a score sheet window as belonging to a particular challenge.

The color choice is included in the tournament definition to make it easy to set the colors the same on all computers in the tournament.

Most users find the color coding to be a useful aid, but you can use the Turn colors on and off preference to turn the colors off if you find them annoying. The default preference is actually to not use challenge colors.

Note
Issues are tracked by displaying the team's row in white text on a red background in the Tournament Summary Window, the All Teams Window, and the team's challenge level window. The selected item in any of these windows is identified by the use of black text on a light blue background. Avoid assigning either of these color combinations to a challenge.
Tip!
Set the colors for each challenge to match the color of paper forms and folders used to represent the challenge at your tournament.

To set or change challenge colors:

  1. Choose one of the following:
  2. To select a preset color, click the Swatches tab. Then, click a color swatch in the main box or in the Recent box to select it.
  3. To specify a different color, click the RGB tab. Then, drag the slider guides or type a value in the text box to specify the amount of red, green, and blue in the color.
  4. Use the HSB tab to adjust the hue, saturation, and brightness of the color. To adjust each element, click the circle button beside the element, and then drag the slider guide or type a value for the element in the associated text box.

    The tab also displays the current RGB values for your reference. To change these values, return to the Swatches or RGB tab.

  5. To restore the colors to the default scheme (black on gray), click OK to return to the Colors tab, and then click the Reset button for each challenge.

To Import (copy) challenge colors from an existing tournament:

If you have another tournament for which you've already set your challenge colors, click on the Import button, then select the name of the tournament (directory) whose challenge colors you want to copy. Remember that challenge colors are part of the tournament definition, not a preference - your preference is only whether to use these challenge colors or not.

When you're finished, click Next.

Set the Tournament Results (Web) Page

In this task, you specify the optional characteristics of the Tournament Results Web page.

The DI Scoring Program Web Page feature creates a fully formatted, ready-to-use Web page (in HTML format) displaying the results of the tournament. You can post the Web page on your regional Web site within minutes of the conclusion of the tournament, and distribute it in e-mail to the media or anxious grandparents.

This task implements the decision made in the Design a Scoring Room Public Policy planning task. These options should be set in accordance with the scoring room public relations policy and in consultation with the Tournament Director. (See Design a scoring room public relations policy.)

To produce the Web Page, in the Tournament Summary Window, from the File menu, select Generate HTML Results, or press Ctrl+G.

To set up the Web Page:

  1. In the Results HTML File Name box, type a name for the Web Page file. Or, leave the preset name, TournamentResults.html.

    When you produce the Web Page, the DI Scoring Program saves it in the tournament directory in a file with the name you select.

  2. In the Nbr. Places to Print in Place Order box, type the number of teams that are printed in the order of their winning scores. The remainder of the teams are listed in alphabetical order.
    Note
    This setting affects the Meet Summary Report (See the Report Reference Table) and the Tournament Results Web Page.

    Typically, in consideration of those who might fall at the bottom of the list, only 3 to 6 teams are listed in rank order. Default value of "9999" is a way of saying ALL - hope your tournament doesn't actually have that many teams!

  3. In the Report High IC Team in Final Results field, check the box to include the Team with the Highest IC score for each Challenge and Level. High IC Team will be listed immediately after the 1st place teams in reports and html files for the Web page.

  4. In the Put Scores in HTML file field, check the box to include scores in the Web page.

    Many regions consider their scores to be private and omit them from public documents.

  5. If you choose to put scores in the HTML file, then in the Suppress raw weight, laps, balls, etc. field, check the box to suppress these raw score elements if they might create controversy or ill feelings in your constituency. The scaled scores associated with these scoring elements will still be included.

  6. The final option on this Info Results screen allows you to check the box to Split HTML into Multiple Files by Challenge to possibly simplify printing these documents, especially if you want them as separate HTML files to meet your Web Page needs.

Identify the Competition Levels

Here you tell the DI Scoring Program which challenge levels or competition levels are represented in your tournament. The DI Scoring Program uses this information to configure the tournament and challenge level windows.

You can also use this procedure to add or remove challenge levels from a tournament. This might be necessary if a team moves to a challenge or challenge level not previous represented in the tournament.

To determine the challenge levels represented in your tournament, examine the team data for the tournament or consult your tournament director.

To set challenge levels:

  1. To delete a listed challenge level, highlight that name and click on the minus sign.
  2. To change the name of a listed challenge level, highlight that name and type the new name and abbreviation in the blanks below the table.
  3. To add an additional challenge level, click on the plus sign and type the new name and abbreviation in the blanks below the table.
Note:
You do not need to add the word "Level" to your new Challenge Level name - the Wizard will do that for you!
After you've added a new Level name, pay close attention to the Abbr: that's been created for you. The Program may be more helpful than you expect!

If you will have more than one site (separate competitions) for a single Challenge Level, here's a place where you can define the additional names you'll use, like "Elementary-A" or "Middle Blue." See More than one Site for a Challenge Level for a more thorough description of the process if you are in this situation!

Set Advancement Rules

In this task, you tell the DI Scoring Program how many teams advance to the next level of competition based on the number of teams competing in each challenge or level.

Advancement rules may be set by level, by challenge, or for each challenge and level.

For this task, you will need the Advancement Rule Table that you completed in the Determine rules for advancement planning task.

To Interpret Advancement Rules

Each row in the table represents the advancement rule for the indicated level and/or challenge.

To define a rule, think of it this way.

For each number of teams competing, a certain number should advance.

Here we define the smallest number of teams competing in a challenge and level for which each step increase occurs in the number who should advance. Consider this example from one affiliate:

When at least this many teams compete, this number should go on.
1 1
3 2
6 3

To express this example rule in the language of the Wizard's Advancement table, you would type:

1,3,6

In other words, just type the number of teams at which you increment the number advancing - separating these values with commas.

The Secondary line of this table represents the mandated and fundamental Destination Imagination advancement rule: "If even one team competes in a challenge level, then one team advances to the next level of competition." This is expressed by the Wizard default:

1

To Advance N Places or N Teams

You can select (for the entire tournament) whether N teams or N places advance to the next level of competition, where N represents any of the values you have established above. If you advance N teams, ties may add to that number. If you advance N places, ties may exist in each and every one of those places, further increasing the number of teams advancing. For an explanation of what constitutes a tie in DI scoring, see "When are teams tied?"

If this seems confusing, consider this situation. Three teams are tied for first place, two more are tied for second, and two more are tied for third. If you advance three places, all seven of these teams would advance. If you advance three teams, even "plus ties," only the three teams tied for first place would advance. None of those second place teams is actually tied with the "third" first place team!

The default selection is for N Teams to advance, where N is defined by the advancement rules. Check the box if you want to advance N places instead.

If your tournament has more levels than are listed

If your tournament has more levels than are listed with advancement rules, just go back through the Tournament Wizard again and you should see the existing additional level(s). The Wizard builds this table of rules based on levels that already exist in your tournament. If it's your first time through the Wizard, you'll see all five possible levels listed - RS, EL, ML, SL and UL.

Load the Team Data

Import Teams from File

In this task, you may add your teams to your tournament by importing them from a comma-separated (CSV) text file. If you're modifying the current tournament, you may choose to keep the existing teams.

You can use the Load Team feature to add all of your teams to the tournament, or to add to the teams that you typed in or loaded from another team data file. And, you can always come back to this feature to load more teams. The DI Scoring Program always adds teams to the tournament; it never overwrites or replaces existing teams.

Before you load teams, verify that your data file is formatted correctly for the DI Scoring Program. (See Prepare the Team Data.)

To load teams from a CSV file:

In the Select CSV file containing teams window, locate your file, or type the full path to the file in the File name text box, and then click Open.

First, you'll have an opportunity to map the column titles in your CSV file to those used in the DI Scoring Program. In the image above, you see the "MembershipName" column heading from your CSV file being mapped to the "Memb Name" label that the program understands.

Then, you'll have a chance to map the Challenge names in your CSV file to the standard short names used by the program. You see in the third line of the example "Operation" from your file mapped to "Cooperation" in the program. And yes, CASE is important in this operation! If your CSV file has some inconsistencies, just map both "OPERATION" and "Operation" to "Cooperation" with two separate lines in this table.

Create Empty Tournament

While creating the empty tournament, you have the opportunity to have the Wizard create "empty" Challenges and Levels that you select with these check boxes. BEWARE the "CANCEL" button at the bottom of this window - it "cancels" the ENTIRE Wizard and CANCELS the creation of your new tournament! [Oops, back to square one!]

Then Finish.

The DI Scoring Program displays a message that tells how many teams were loaded. Then the Continue button closes and reopens your tournament, which now contains all of the newly-loaded teams.

Notes:
For help with the Map Challenges dialog box, see What are the Please map dialog boxes? in the Troubleshooting topic.
If you find a mistake, or need to change team data for one team or a few teams, use the Modify Team feature (See Change Team Data).