Help Index
Swiss Perfect 98

Introduction

Installation

Sales and Support

Development Team

List of Features

How to ...

Start a New Tournament

Enter the List of Participants

Sort the List of Participants

Pair a Round

Configure Accelerated Pairings

Bar Selected Pairings

Enter Results

Modify Pairing Manually

Test Pairing

Withdraw a Player

Add a Player

Declare a Late Entry

Assign a Bye to Player

Cancel a bye

Switch Between Rounds

Change a View

Change Fonts and Styles

Configure Tie-Breaks

Print a View

Export View

Exchange Data with Relational Databases

Import Players from Databases

Close a Tournament

Exit Swiss Perfect

Menu Commands

File Menu

View Menu

Search Menu

List Menu

Pairing Menu

Options Menu

Help Menu

Toolbar

Toolbar Commands

Documentation

FIDE Rules

Keyboard Topics

Windows Key Strokes


Start a Tournament
Creating a new tournament

1. Choose File|New or click the corresponding icon.

2. The New File dialog box appears.  Enter a new tournament name.  Click OK.

3. The Tournament Info dialog box appears.  After you have filled out the fields click OK.

4. The Player Data dialog box appears.  Enter your first player.

See also:

Entering the List of Participants


Select Font dialog

This box displays a list of fonts available on your system and a list of sizes.

Select font name (typeface) in the Face name list and the font size in the Size list.

Some of the fonts listed are scalable in which case you can specify any size you like in the Size edit box.  If you specify a non-existing size for a non-scalable font the nearest available font size will be selected.


Windows Keys

Cursor Movement Keys

Dialog Box Keys

Editing Keys

Menu Keys

System Keys

Window Keys


Assign a Bye to a Player
Assigning a bye to a player

1.	Choose View|List.

Now there are two equivalent methods to assign one or more byes to a player:

Method 1:

2.	Click a player you want to have a bye.

3.	Choose Player|Bye.  The Bye dialog box appears.

4.	Enter rounds or round ranges separated by commas in which the player has a bye.  For example 1,5-7 means that the selected player will not be paired in rounds 1,5,6 and 7.

5.	Click OK.

Method 2:

2.	Double click on a player you want to have a bye.  The player data dialog will pop up.

3.	The Byes box contains a list of currently assigned byes.  To add or remove byes from the list use Add and Remove buttons.  Select (click) a bye you want to cancel before clicking on the Remove button.

Note:	When an automatic pairing is performed for a round for which a particular player has been a given a bye that player will appear in the pairing as having no opponent (BYE will be displayed instead).  The player's result can be edited so that he/she can be given an appropriate score for the unplayed game.

See also:  Cancel a bye


Add a Player
Adding a player

1	Choose View|List of Players (if not selected already).

2.	Choose Player|Add New.

3.	The Player Data dialog box appears.

4.	Enter player's details and click OK.

You can also request adding a player from within the Player Data dialog box (clicking the Add New button).

Note:  You can add players at any stage of the tournament.  If a player is not taking part in a few starting rounds then specify the first round she plays in the Late Entry edit box in the Player Data dialog box.


Withdraw a Player
Withdrawing a player

1.	Choose View|List of Players

2.	Double click on the player you want to withdraw (or select Edit/Player).  The Player Data dialog box appears.

3.	In the Withdrawal edit box enter the number of the round before which you want to withdraw the player.

Alternatively:

2.	Click once on the player you want to withdraw.

3	Select the Player/Withdraw menu option.

4	Enter the round number.

Note: If you withdraw a player he/she will not take part in any of the rounds in or after the specified one.  If you only want to withdraw a player for a few rounds and then have him back in the tournament use byes.


Test Pairing
Testing pairings

Select View|Round Results and then Pairing|Check to test the pairing for the current round.  A window with information regarding correctness of the pairing will appear.


Modify Pairing Manually
Modifying pairings manually

1.	Choose View|Round Results

2.	Click the pair you want to modify and choose Edit|Pairing or right click the pair you want to modify.  The Edit Pairs dialog box appears allowing you to modify the pairing.


Enter Results
Entering Results

There are two ways to enter game (match) results.

The conventional way is to choose View|Round Results and then either double click on any of the pairs or select Edit|Result.  The Results dialog box appears allowing you to enter results.

If the Use Minor Scores option is on a dialog box with extra edit fields will appear allowing you to enter the minor score.

The one touch result entry feature allows you to enter scores rapidly.  Clicking on the One-touch Results icon [image] will activate the Round Results View and select the first pair for you.  Now you can either click the three small icons at the bottom of the View (the left icon is for 1:0, the middle one for 0.5:0.5 and the right icon represents a 0:1 score) or use the following keyboard keys:

1 or z 	for 1:0,

= or x	for 0.5:0.5

0 or c	for 0:1.

Z, X and C keys have been selected because they are normally placed next to each other so you can enter results fast and comfortably with 3 fingers of your left hand.

If multi-games is set to 1 then the selection bar move down by one row (one pair) every time an icon is clicked or a key is pressed.  If multi-games is greater than 1 then clicking the icons or pressing keys will increment the score until it corresponds to the multi-games setting and only then the selection bar moves down.


Toolbar
The toolbar

The Toolbar is a row of buttons at the top of the main window which represent application commands. Clicking one of the buttons is a quick alternative to choosing a command from the menu.  Buttons on the toolbar activate and deactivate according to the state of the application.

Button	Action	Menu Equivalent

Create new tournament	File|New

Locate and open a tournament	File|Open

Search for a player	Edit|Find

Repeat last search	Edit|Next

View/Edit the list of participants	View|List of players

View Round Results	View|Round Results

View the cross table	View|Cross Table

View Standings	View|Standings

View International Ratings	View|Ratings|International

View Local Ratings	View|Ratings|Local

View Pairing Info	View|Pairing Info

Resize columns	Window|Adjust Column Widths

Start fast result entry	Edit|Fast Results (available in Round Results View only)

Pair next round automatically	Pairing|Automatic

Go to round 1	View|Change Round|First

Go to next round	View|Change Round|Next

Go to previous round	View|Change Round|Previous

Go to last round	View|Change Round|Last

Print the active view	File|Print

Display help file contents	Help|Contents


Edit Menu
View menu

The View menu allows you to select a view for the main window.

The available views are:

List of Players

Round Results,

Standings,

Club Standings,

Cross Table,

Cards,

Ratings,

Pairing Info.

The View menu also allows you to move between rounds by selecting View|Change Round and then an appropriate submenu option.

See also:

The Toolbar


Installation

Swiss Perfect can be installed on any PC running Windows 95 or better.  Swiss Perfect is distributed as one executable file SETUP.EXE.  Run this file to install Swiss Perfect on your machine.  Follow the instructions on your screen.


File menu

The File menu provides commands for creating new tournaments, opening existing tournaments printing views, and exiting the application.

Open	Opens an existing tournament.

New	Creates a new tournament.

Save As	Saves the current file in a selected format

Print	Prints the current view.

Print Preview	Shows the print preview

Print Setup	Sets printer characteristics.

Close	Closes the current tournament

Exit	Exits Swiss Perfect.


Late entry

Follow the procedure described in Add a Player.


Text Dump Options

The Separator combo box specifies the character which will be used to separate fields in the same line,  The character can either be selected from the pre-defined combo box options or simply typed in.

The Formatted Output check box determines whether fields will be padded out with spaces to achieve tabulation effect.

The Include Column Headers check box determines whether the column titles are included in the text dump.


Search menu

The Search menu provides commands to locate a player in a view or identify a player by his name or start number.

Find	Find a player.

Next	Find the next player matching the search pattern


Exiting

To exit Swiss Perfect, choose File|Exit from the menu or close the application window.


Printing
Printing a view

Choose File|Print Setup to select and configure a printer device.

Choose File|Print to cause the current view to be printed.


Options Menu

Tournament	set tournament options and parameters.  This menu options calls a property sheet which allows you to set the following groups of options:

Administrative Options

Tie Breaks

Sort Criteria

Data Editor

Rating

Pairing

Club Standings

Grand Prix

Display	configure views and set display options

Font	set font and font style


Administrative Options

This dialog box allows you to enter the following tournament data:

Name	tournament name to be used in printed reports

Organiser	organiser's name

Arbiter	arbiter's name

System	system of play (Swiss or round-robin)

Rounds	number of rounds to be played in the tournament.  This can be edited for Swiss tournaments only.  For other systems this value will be calculated.

Multi Games	number of games in each match (usually 1 for an individual tournament).  This is option makes it possible to run team tournaments as individual ones (without a possibility to specify team squads)

Use Minor Scores	when this option is on it is possible to enter minor scores while editing match scores


Open File dialog box
Open/New File dialog box

This dialog box allows you to specify the name and the directory of the tournament file you want to open or create.  The only type of files which Swiss Perfect will accept is a tournament file (extension .trn).  If you are creating a new file the .trn extension will be appended automatically.


Save View As Text
Export View ...

To save a view in a selected format select File|Export View ... and then select one of the available formats.

The Text Format option allows to save a View to a text file.  After you have selected the text format, the text dump options dialog box will pop up allowing you to configure how the current view will be saved.

The FIDE Report option, available for the Rating View,  will save the view in the dBase format which FIDE has published as their preferred format (see http://www.fide.com/rtngrepo/rtngrepo.htm on the World Wide Web).  A file generated that way can be sent to FIDE instead of the hard copy of the rating report.

The To ICS Tell Buffers option will place a View in a number of buffers using the tell command format used by Internet Chess Servers (in particular the Internet Chess Club).  SP will place the buffers one at a time in the Windows clipboard.  Using an ICS communication program, the contents of the clipboard can then be sent to the server.

The To ICS Finger Buffers option operates similarly, except that it stores one line at a time in the ICS finger format.  See your ICC, ICS, FICS manuals for more details.

The HTML option allows the user to select the views he or she wants to save together as one HTML page.


File New Command

The File|New command opens a new tournament.


File Print Command

The File|Print command prints the current view.  Use File|Print Setup to select a printer, and to set printer options.


Start List
Start List  -  Another term for List of Participants


File Print Setup Command

The File|Printer Setup command displays the Printer Setup dialog box which allows you to select and configure the printer.


Search Next Command

The Search|Next command repeats the last Find operation.


Enter the List of Participants
Entering a list of participants

A list of participants is created when you start a new tournament.  To add players or modify data choose View|List of Players and then

1.	choose Player|Add New

  or

2.	double click any of the players' names

The Player Data dialog will appear allowing you to modify data or add new records.


Pair a Round
Pairing a round

Select either Pairing|Automatic or Pairing|Manual option.  The first command makes the pairing for you while the second displays a pairing for you to fill out.

Note: You can request Automatic Pairing and then modify the pairing by hand.

See also:

Check Pairing


Sort the List of Participants
Sorting the list of participants

1.	Choose View|List of Players

2.	Choose List|Sort option. The Sort List dialog box appears.

3.	Select required options and click OK to perform the sorting.

Note:	You can sort the list even if the tournament is in progress.  Remember however that it may affect pairing of the following rounds as well as change players' start numbers.


Cursor Movement Keys

Key(s)	Function

Arrow key	Moves the cursor left, right, up, or down in a field.

End or Ctrl+Right Arrow	Moves to the end of a field.

Home or Ctrl+Left Arrow	Moves to the beginning of a field.

Page Up or Page Down	Moves up or down in a field, one screen at a time.


Dialog Box Keys

Key(s)	Function

Tab	Moves from field to field (left to right and top to bottom).

Shift+Tab	Moves from field to field in reverse order.

Alt+letter	Moves to the option or group whose underlined letter matches the one you type.

Arrow key	Moves from option to option within a group of options.

Enter	Executes a command button.

Or, chooses the selected item in a list box and executes the command.

Esc	Closes a dialog box without completing the command. (Same as Cancel)

Alt+Down Arrow	Opens a drop-down list box.

Alt+Up or Down Arrow	Selects item in a drop-down list box.

Spacebar	Cancels a selection in a list box.

Selects or clears a check box.

Shift+ Home	Extends selection to first character in a text box.

Shift+ End	Extends selection to last character in a text box


Editing Keys

Key(s)	Function

Backspace	Deletes the character to the left of the cursor.

Or, deletes selected text.

Delete	Deletes the character to the right of the cursor.

Or, deletes selected text.


Menu Keys

Key(s)	Function

Alt	Selects the first menu on the menu bar.

Letter key	Chooses the menu, or menu item, whose underlined letter matches the one you type, when a menu has focus.

Alt+Letter key	Pulls down the menu whose underlined letter matches the one you type.

Left or Right Arrow	Moves among menus of the main menu bar.

Up or Down Arrow	Moves among menu items within a drop-down menu.

Enter	Chooses the selected menu item.


System Keys

The following keys can be used from any window, regardless of the application you are using.

Key(s)	Function

Ctrl+Esc	Switches to the Task List.

Alt+Esc	Switches to the next application window or minimized icon, including full-screen programs.

Alt+Tab	Switches to the next application window, restoring applications that are running as icons.

Alt+PrtSc	Copies the entire screen to Clipboard.

Ctrl+F4	Closes the active window.


Window Keys

Key(s)	Function

Alt+Spacebar	Opens the Control menu for an application window.

Alt+Hyphen	Opens the Control menu for a document window.

Alt+F4	Closes a window.

Alt+Esc	Switches to the next application window or minimized icon, including full-screen programs.

Alt+Tab	Switches to the next application window, restoring applications that are running as icons.

Alt+Enter	Switches a non-Windows application between running in a window and running full screen.

Arrow key	Moves a window when you have chosen Move from the Control menu.

Or, changes the size of a window when you have chosen Size from the Control menu.


Move Between Rounds
Changing rounds

You can change the current round choosing View|Change Round option in the main menu or clicking a corresponding button in the toolbar.


Change a View
Opening Views

Select a View from the View menu or click an appropriate icon.


Change Fonts and Styles
Changing fonts and font styles

Swiss Perfect allows you to select a typeface and a font style for the display.  The typeface selected is used for all the views and printings until another typeface is selected.  The style (regular, bold, italic or underlined) can be selected separately for most of the display items.

To select font choose Option|Font.


Configure Tie-Breaks

1.	Choose Options|Tie Breaks from the main menu.  The Tie-Breaks dialog box appears

2.	Configure the tie-break hierarchy for the current tournament and click OK.

See also:

   Tie-Breaks


Close a Tournament

Select File|Close from the main menu to close a tournament.  All open views and tournament files will be closed.


FIDE Rules

Swiss System Based on Rating

Approved by the 1992 General Assembly.

A. Introductory Remarks and Definitions

A1.  Rating

It is advisable to check all ratings supplied by players. If no reliable rating is known for a player the arbiters should make an estimation of it as accurately as possible before the start of the tournament. (to convert German Ingo or British BCF use rating = 2840 -8 x INGO = 600 + 8 x BCF)

A2. Order

For pairing purposes only, the players are ranked in order of, respectively

a) score

b) rating

c) FIDE-title (IGM-WGM-IM-WIM-FM-WFM-no title)

d) alphabetically (unless it has been previously stated that this criterion has been replaced by another one)

The order made before the first round (when all scores are obviously zero) is used to determine the pairing numbers: the highest one gets #1 etc.

A3. Score brackets

Players with equal scores constitute a homogeneous score bracket. Players who remain unpaired after the pairing of a score bracket will be moved down to the next score bracket, which will therefore be heterogeneous. When pairing a heterogeneous score bracket these players moved down are always paired first whenever possible, giving rise to a remainder score bracket which is always treated as a homogeneous one.

A heterogeneous score bracket of which at least half of the players have come from a higher score bracket is also treated as though it was homogeneous.

A4. Floats

By pairing a heterogeneous score bracket, players with unequal scores will be paired. To ensure that this will not happen to the same players again in the next round this is written down on the pairing card. The higher ranked player receives a downfloat (   ), the lower one an upfloat (  ).

A5. Byes

Should the total number of players be (or become) odd, one player ends up unpaired. This player receives a bye: no opponent, no color, 1 point. A bye is considered to be a downfloat.

A6. Subgroups

To make the pairing, each score bracket will be divided into two subgroups, to be called S1 and S2. In a heterogeneous score bracket S1 contains all players moved down from a higher score bracket. In a homogeneous score bracket S1 contains the higher half (rounding downwards) of the number of players in the score bracket.

The number of players in S1 will be indicated by "p", indicating the number of pairings to be made. In both cases S2 contains all other players of the score bracket. In both S1 and S2 players are ordered according to A2.

A7. Color differences and color preferences

The color difference of a player is the number of games played with white minus the number of games played with black by this player. After a round the color preference can be determined for every player.

a) An absolute color preference occurs when a player's color difference is greater that 1 or less than -1, or when a player played with the same color in the two latest rounds. The preference is white when the color difference is << 0 or when the last two games were played with black, otherwise black. In this case the (obligatory) color is already written down on the score card. (This rule is not in effect when pairing players with a score of over 50% in the last round).

b) A strong color preference occurs when a player's color difference is unequal to zero. The preference is white when the color difference is << 0, black otherwise.

c) A mild color preference occurs when a player's color difference is zero, the preference being to alternate the color with respect to the previous game. In this case the color difference is written down as +0 or -0 depending on the color of the previous game (white or black respectively).  Before the first round the color preference of one player (often the highest one) is determined by lot.

A8. Definition of "x"

The number of pairings which can be made in a score bracket, either homogeneous or heterogeneous, not fulfilling all color preferences, is represented by the symbol x.

x can be calculated as follows:

w=number of players having a color preference white.

b=number of players having a color preference black.

q=number of players in the score bracket divided by 2, rounded upwards.

If b >> w then x = b-q, else x = w-q.

A9. Transpositions and exchanges

a. In order to make a sound pairing it is often necessary to change the order in S2. The Rules to make such a change, called a transposition, are in D1.

b. In a homogeneous score bracket it may be necessary to exchange players from S1 and S2. rules for exchanges are found under D2. After each exchange both S1 and S2 are to be ordered according to A2.

B. Pairing Criteria

Absolute Criteria

(These may not be violated. If necessary players will be moved down to a lower score bracket.)

B1.

a. Two players shall not meet more than once.

b. A player who has received a point without playing, either through a bye or due to an opponent not appearing in time, shall not receive a bye.

B2.

a. No player's color difference will become >>+2 or <<-2.

b. No player will receive the same color three times in row.

Relative Criteria

(These are in descending priority. They should be fulfilled as much as possible. To comply with these criteria, transpositions or even exchanges may be applied, but no player should be moved down to a lower score bracket).

B3.

The difference of the scores of two players paired against each other should be as small as possible and ideally zero.

B4.

As many players as possible receive their color preference. (Whenever x of a score bracket is unequal to zero this rule will have to be ignored. x is deducted by one each time a color preference cannot be granted.)

B5.

No player shall receive an identical float in two consecutive rounds.

B6.

No player shall have an identical float as two rounds before.

Note: B2, B5 and B6 do not apply when pairing players with a score of over 50% in the last round.

C. Pairing Procedures

Starting with the highest score bracket apply the following procedures to all score brackets until an acceptable pairing is obtained. Afterwards the color allocation rules (E) are used to determine which players will play with white.

C1.

-        If the score bracket contains a player for whom no opponent can be found within this score bracket without violating B1 or B2 then:

-        if this player was moved down from a higher score bracket apply C12.

-        if this score bracket is the lowest one apply C13. in all other cases: move this player down to the next score bracket.

C2.

Determine x according to A8.

C3.

Determine p according to A6.

C4.

Put the highest players in S1, all other players in S2.

C5.

Order the players in S1 and S2 according to A2.

C6.

Pair the highest player of S1 against the highest one of S2, the second highest one of S1 against the second highest one of S2, etc. If now p pairings are obtained in compliance with B1 and B2 the pairing of this score bracket is considered complete.

-        In case of a homogeneous score bracket: remaining players are moved down to the next score bracket. With this

score bracket restart at C1.

-        In case of a heterogeneous score bracket: only players moved down were paired so far. Start at C2 with the homogeneous remainder group.

C7.

Apply a new transposition of S2 according to D1 and restart at C6.

C8.

In case of a homogeneous (remainder) group: apply a new exchange between S1 and S2 according to D2. Restart at C5.

C9.

Drop criterion B6 and B5 (in this order) for downfloats and restart at C4.

C10.

In case of a homogeneous remainder group: undo the pairing of the lowest moved down player paired and try to find a different opponent for this player by restarting at C7.

If no alternative pairing for this player exists then drop criterion B6 first and then B5 for upfloats and restart at

C2.

C11.

As long as x is less than p: increase x by 1. When pairing a remainder group undo all pairings of players moved down also. Restart at C3.

C12.

In case of a heterogeneous group: undo the pairing of the previous score bracket. If in this previous score bracket a pairing can be made whereby another player will be moved down to the current one, and this now allows p pairing to be made then this pairing in the previous score bracket will be accepted.

C13.

In case of the lowest score bracket: the pairing of the penultimate score bracket is undone. Try to find another pairing in the penultimate score bracket which will allow a pairing in the lowest score bracket. If in the penultimate score bracket p becomes zero (i.e. no pairing can be found which will allow a correct pairing for the lowest score bracket) then the two lowest score brackets are joined into a new lowest score bracket. Because now another score bracket is the penultimate one C13 can be repeated until an acceptable pairing is obtained.

C14.

Decrease p by 1 (and if the original value of x was greater than zero decrease x by 1 as well). As long as p is unequal to zero restart at C4. If p equals zero the entire score bracket is moved down to the next one. Restart with this score bracket at C1.

D. Transposition and Exchange Procedures

Example: S1 contains players 1, 2, 3 and 4 (in this sequence); S2 contains players 5, 6, 7 and 8 (in this sequence).

D1.

Transpositions within S2 should start with the lowest players, with descending priority:

a) 5-6-8-7;

b) 5-7-6-8

c) 5-7-8-6

d) 5-8-6-7

e) 5-8-7-6

f) 6-5-7-8

g) 6-5-8-7, etc.

Hint: put all numbers constructable with the digits 5, 6, 7 and 8 in ascending order.

D2.

When applying an exchange between S1 and S2 the difference between the numbers exchanged should be as small as possible. When differences of various options are equal take the one concerning the lowest player of S1.

        Exchange one player             Exchange two players

            S1                                      S1

       4    3    2                          3+4    2+4    2+3

  5    a    c    f                    5+6    j      l      o

  6    b    e    h                    5+7    k      n      q

  7    d    g    i                    6+7    m      p      r

The above matrices contain the sequence in which exchanges should be applied.

Exchanging one player: a) 4 and 5; b) 4 and 6; c) 3 and 5; etc. until i) 2 and 7.

Exchanging two players: j) 3+4 with 5+6; k) 3+4 with 5+7; l) 2+4 with 5+6 etc.

After each exchange both S1 and S2 should be ordered according to A2.

Remark: if the number of players in a score bracket is odd, S1 contains one player less than S2. So with 7 players S1 contains players 1, 2 and 3, S2 4, 5, 6 and 7. The exchanges needed in that case can be found from the above ones bydeducting all numbers in S1 and S2 by 1. The last column of the second matrix has then become obsolete.

E. Color Allocation Rules

For each pairing apply (with descending priority):

E1.

Grant both color preferences.

E2.

Grant the stronger color preference.

E3.

Alternate the colors to the most recent round in which they played with different colors.

E4.

Grant the color preference of the higher ranked player. In the first round all even numbered players in S1 will receive a color different from all odd numbered players in S1.

F. Final Remarks

F1.

After a pairing is complete sort the pairing before making them public. The sorting criteria are (with descending priority)

-        the score of the higher player of the pairing involved;

-        the sum of the scores of both players of the pairing involved;

-        the rank according to A2 of the higher player of the pairing involved.

F2.

Byes, and pairing not actually played, or lost by one of the players due to arriving late or not at all, will not be taken into account with respect to color, Such a pairing is not considered to be illegal in future rounds.

F3.

A player who after five round has a color history of BWW-B (i.e. no valid game in round 4) will be treated as -BWWB with respect to E3. So WB-WB will count as -WBWB and BWW-B-W as --BWWBW.

F4.

Because all players are in one homogeneous score bracket before the start of round one and are ordered according to A2 the highest player of S1 will play against the highest player of S2 and if the number of players is odd the lowest ranked player will receive a bye.

F5.

Players who withdraw from the tournament will no longer be paired. Players known in advance not to play in a particular round are not paired in that round and score 0.

F6.

A pairing officially made public shall not be changed unless it violates the absolute pairing criteria (B1 and B2).

F7.

If either result was written down incorrectly, or a game was played with the wrong colors, or a player's rating has to be corrected, then this will only affect pairing yet to be made.

Whether it will affect a pairing already made public but not yet played should be decided by the arbiter.

Unless the rules of the tournament state otherwise:

F8.

Players who are absent during a round without notification to the arbiter will be considered to have withdrawn themselves.

F9.

Adjourned games are considered draws for pairing purposes only.

F10.

In order to make the final standings the following criteria apply (in descending priority):

-        the highest number of points scored; should this be equal for several participants prize money should be shared;

-        where it concerns the first place: the best result in games played against each other;

-        the highest average rating of the opponents;

-        the drawing of lots.


Development Team
Swiss Perfect 98 Team

Author:

Robert Rozycki	tourney@ozemail.com.au

Consultants:

Ulrich Jahr	tournament rules, testing

ulrich@pro.logonet.com.pl


List Menu

The Sort option allows you to sort List of Participants.


Pairing Menu

The pairing menu provides commands for creating, deleting and testing pairings.

Manual	Create a pairing form for pairing by hand

Automatic	Make an automatic pairing for the first not paired yet round

Delete	Delete current pairing

Check	Test the current paring


Help menu

Provides commands for obtaining information and help on Swiss Perfect.

Contents	Displays the contents of the Swiss Perfect help file

About	Displays Swiss Perfect copyright and software version information


Player Data dialog box

This dialog box allows you to enter player's details.

DATA FIELDS

Start number	The Start Number can be an arbitrary string of up to 5 characters.  The default value is a string representation of the player's position in the starting list.  Start numbers can be edited and changed manually at any stage and can also be reassigned automatically when sorting the list.

Surname	A 25-character string.  At least one character must be entered.

First name	A 15-character string.  This field can be left empty.

International Rating	Up to 4-digits long numerical value.  In FIDE tournaments this will be player's Elo rating.

Local Rating	Up to 4-digits long numerical value.

International Id	A 13-character string.  Can be used for storing player's FIDE identification number

Local Id	A 13-character string.  Can be used for storing player's national identification number

Federation	A 4-character string designed to hold an abbreviation of the player's federation.  Note that FIDE uses 3 letter abbreviations.

Birth date	The player's date of birth consisting of 4-digit year field, 2-digit month field and 2-digit day field

Title	This field can have one of the following seven values: gm, wgm, im, wim, fm, wfm, none (.).

Sex	This field can have one of the following four values: male, female, computer or none.  Default value is none.  The value of this field may affect calculation of ratings, norms for international titles and can be used in filters.

Late Entry	Specifies a round before which the player entered the tournament.  If the players participates form the beginning, this field should be empty.

Withdrawals	Specifies a round before which the player withdraws.  If the player participates till the end of the tournament, this field should be empty.

Bonus Points	This field is used to specify a number of points you want to add to the player's score.  Although it does not comply with the FIDE rules it is quite common to add points on top of a player's result for various reason.  For example you may wish to give some extra points to a player who enters the tournament late to compensate for missed rounds.

Byes	Contains a list of rounds in which the player does not participate other than rounds before the late entry (if specified) and after the withdrawal (if specified).  To add or remove byes from the list use Add and Remove buttons.  Select (click) a bye you want to cancel before clicking the Remove button.

BUTTONS

OK	Saves the current record and exits

Cancel	Does not save the current record and exits

Next	Saves the current record and skips to the next one

Previous	Saves the current record and skips to the previous one

Add New	Saves the current record and edits one for entering a new player

Import New	Saves the current record and opens the database import dialog

Delete	Deletes the current record


View Options
View Options Dialog Box

A View Options dialog box allows you to configure Swiss Perfect's views.

Select an item in the "Columns" list box and then choose options for the selected column.  You can specify whether the column should appear at all (check/uncheck the "Show" box) and if so then what font style should be applied (regular, bold, italic or underline).

The "Options" combo box will become active if the selected item can be configured to display data in different ways.  For example a "Surname" column in most of the listings or the "Placing" column in the Standings View.

Please note that sometimes an item is mandatory and you cannot uncheck the "Show" box.  For example, the "Surname" column is mandatory for most of the views.

On the other hand some items are not really columns.  They are listed in the "Columns" list box to allow you to select a font style for them.  For example, in the "Standings" view you can specify how you want to display results obtained playing as white and how those playing as black.


Results dialog box

This box allows you to enter match results.  You can either type in the result or click an appropriate button.

Valid results for a single game are:

white wins	1:0

black wins :1

draw	=:=

black forfeits	+:-

white forfeits	-:+

both sides forfeit	-:-

white gets half a point, black gets naught	=:0

black gets half a point, white gets naught	0:=

both sides get naught	0:0

However if a tournament is configured for more than one game in each match then a valid result is one in which the sum of both (white's and black's) scores is less or equal the number of games per match.  You can still enter results by pressing 1:0, =:= and 0:1 buttons to create a required sum.

Skip automatically check box allows you to select whether you want to go to the next pair as soon as you have entered a complete result.


Sort List dialog

This dialog box contains a list of available sort criteria and a list of criteria that are currently selected.  Use Add and Remove buttons to select/deselect the criteria.  Use Up and Down buttons to change priorities of the criteria.


Edit Pairs dialog box

This dialog box contains two edit boxes and a list box.

To change a player in the edited pair, click the player in the list box and then click the White or the Black button depending on which player you want to replace.

Clicking the Swap button swaps the players.


Tie-Breaks dialog

This dialog box contains a list of available tie-break methods and a list of the methods that are currently selected.  Use Add and Remove buttons to select/deselect tie-break methods.  Use Up and Down buttons to change priorities of the methods.

See also:

   Tie-Breaks


Edit Player's Data
Editing player's data

1.	Select View|List

2.	Double-click the player you want to edit.  The Player Data dialog box appears.

3.	Update player's details and click OK.


Multi Games

Multi Games - number of games each pair of players plays in a round.

In a typical, individual tournament this value equals 1 but in some tournaments (most likely lightning) each pair may play more than one game in a round.  This option is also suitable for running team tournaments.


Cancel a Bye
Canceling a Bye

1.	Edit player's record

2.	In the Byes box select (click) the bye you want to cancel

3.	Click the Remove button


Colour for first
Colour for top seed

When pairing the first round of a Swiss tournament it is necessary to choose (draw) the colour for the top player on the player list.

All odd numbered players in the top half of the list will receive the same colour while the even numbered players the opposite colour.  For example, in a tournament with 10 players, if number one receives black, then the first round pairing is as follows:

6-1, 2-7, 8-3, 4-9, 10-5


Features

Swiss Perfect is a Windows application for conducting board games and sports tournaments.  It is feature-rich and highly configurable.

TOURNAMENT SYSTEMS

- Swiss

- Round-Robin

SWISS PAIRING SYSTEMS

- FIDE

- USCF

- Configurable options:

barred pairings

re-pairing forfeited games

colourless pairing

special rules for last round pairings,

optional manual pairing,

Testing of manual or automatic pairings for formal correctness,

Verification of manual and automatic pairings against Swiss Perfect pairing

- Accelerated pairings

ROUND-ROBIN PAIRING SYSTEMS

- Standard

- Rutsch (carousel)

LIST OF PARTICIPANTS

- Full support for late entries, withdrawals and byes

- Ability to sort at any stage of the tournament (selectable sort criteria)

- Editable start numbers (don't have to reflect the position on the starting list)

- Import from DBF and text files (including the FIDE Rating List)

- Creating tournaments from PGN files

RESULTS AND SCORES

- One-touch results entry

- All possible single-game scores supported (1:0, =:=. 0:1, =:0, 0:=, 0:0, +:-, -:+, -:-)

- Multi-game scores (combination of single-game scores) eg. 4.5:1.5 if multi-games are configured as 6.

- Minor Scores (or secondary scores - to be used for example as match scores in team tournaments)

- Configurable tie-break criteria:

Buchholz

Median-Buchholz,

Berger,

Progress,

Opponents' Rating Sum,

Number of Wins

Minor Scores

Brightwell

RATINGS

- Two Elo-based rating systems for calculating international and national (local) rating performances, expected scores etc.

- Separate configurable options (upper and lower limits) for each system

VIEWS, PRINTING, PRINT PREVIEW

- Several different views of tournament data:

List of Players

Pairings / Round Results

Alphabetical Pairings

Standings

Cross Table

Ratings

FIDE Norms

Pairing Info

Individual Cards

Ability to export (save) views in a text format, HTML and ICS buffer formats

- All views customisable (selectable columns and fonts)

- Configurable symbols for representing results in the cross table (for example W for a win, D for a draw and L for a loss)

- Configurable symbol representing a half point in Results and Standings Views

- Printing of each view (WYSIWYG)

- Print preview for each view (WYSIWYG)

Swiss Perfect can handle up to 1000 players and 60 rounds


Print Preview


Tie-Breaks

Tie-Breaks are used to rank players within point groups.  In other words to break ties between players on the same score.  The following systems are most commonly used in Swiss tournaments and are supported by Swiss Perfect:

1. Buchholz

This is the sum of opponents' scores.  The idea is that the same score is more valuable if achieved against players with better performances in a given tournament.

Looks like an ideal tie-breaking method and has been used since the Swiss system was invented.

However it has some weaknesses which are addressed by other methods (see Median-Buchholz, Progress, Berger below).

2. Median-Buchholz

Same as above but after leaving out the highest and the lowest scoring opponents.  Swiss Perfect allows configurable number of highest and lowest scoring opponents to be left out (0,1 or 2)

Its idea is to eliminate distortions in Buchholz values caused by taking into account games against run-away winners and bottom placed players.

3. Progress

Calculated by adding points from a progress table eg if your scores were: Win, Loss, Win Draw then your progressive scores are 1, 1, 2, 2.5 and your Progress tie-break value is 6.5

This is an attempt to put a higher value on scores which were achieved by scoring better in the initial rounds than by finishing from behind.  It is common knowledge that the latter is usually much easier to achieve.

The problem is that the order of the Progress tie-breaks is known before the last round (last round scores will change the actual value but not the order within a point group).  This may encourage some undesirable tournament "tactics" in the last round.

4. Berger

This is calculated by adding scores of the opponents who were beaten by a given player and half the scores of the opponents who she drew with.

This has been adopted from round-robin tournaments and is usually used as a secondary method.

5. Number of Wins

Calculated by adding a point for a win and nothing for a loss or a draw.

Intended to discourage making quick draws.  Popular in 70's and early 80's (particularly in round-robins).  These days hardly justified.

6. Opponents' Rating Sum

Sum of the opponents' ratings.  Uses the ratings ie presumed pre-tournament strength of the opponents rather than their performance in a given tournament.  Also has the same problem with the last round as 'Progress'.

7. Minor Scores

The difference of minor scores FOR and AGAINST.  An example of usage of minor scores is Othello (Reversi) where a minor score like 50-14 means that the winner finished with 50 pieces on the board and the loser with 14.  Another example is a chess team tournament where the winning team receives 2 points, the losing team 0 as the main score and the sum of board scores eg 4.5 to 1.5 in a 6 board match is the minor score.  Yet another example is goal difference in football / soccer.

Using minor scores as a tie break means that a player with a higher difference of the the FOR and AGAINST minor scores is ranked above the one with a lower difference.  If a difference is identical then the one with greater value of minor score FOR is preferred.  For example 120-100 is better than 90-70.

8. Brightwell

This tie-break is used in Othello (Reversi) and combines Buchholz with Minor Scores.  It is the value of the Minor Scores FOR (in case of Othello this is the number of pieces the player scored, disregarding the number of pieces the oponents had) plus a configurable coefficient multiplied by the sum of opponents' scores (Buchholz).


Minor Scores

In some type of tournaments you may need to enter a minor score (or a subscore) as well as the main score.  The minor score would normally be configured as a tie-break and often be the one of highest priority.

Examples of use:

In a team tournament you would often enter the match result as a sum of game results and use the minor score field to enter match points, for example 2:0 if the team on the left hand side won or 1:1 if the match was drawn.

If you use Swiss Perfect to run non-chess tournaments, for example a soccer league,  you may wish to enter scores like 3:0, 0:3 and 1:1 as the main result and the goal difference as the minor result.

To enable minor scores check the Use Minor Score box in the Tournament Admin Options dialog.

To configure Minor Scores as a tie break select it as an active tie-break method in Tie-Break configuration dialog.


Last Round Pairings

In most Swiss systems special rules apply to the last round pairings.  In the last round serious violations of colour assignment rules are allowed if they lead to achieving more pairing within point groups.

Swiss Perfect allows you to apply or ignore those special rules.

Swiss Perfect knows which round is last from the value you entered in the Rounds box in the Administrative Options dialog box.


Player Edit Options

This dialog box allows you to specify what type of automatic conversion you want to apply to the listed fields when editing participant's data.

Available automatic conversion types are:

"First Capital" - first character of each word in the field will be capitalised.

"All Capital" - all characters will be converted to upper case.

"No Conversion" - characters are left in whatever case they were entered

Note that the conversions may not work correctly for non-English characters (outside the standard ASCII set).


Symbols Dialog Box

This dialog box allows you to specify how you want results/scores displayed in your views.

The "Score Characters"  will be used to display results in the Cross Table.  They will be applied only if you check the "Use Score Characters" box and each of them is defined ie none of the three edit boxes is empty.  Also they will only be used if the Multi Games value is equal 1.

If all the above conditions are fulfilled then results in the Cross Table will be shown using those characters.  For example if the "Win Char" is specified as "W" then a win against number 5 will be displayed as:

5:W rather than 5:1

The "Draw Symbols" will be used when displaying game results.  For example, a draw will be shown as =:= rather than .5:.5 if the "Draw Symbol" is specified as "=".

The "Draw Symbol" will only be used if you check the "Use Draw Symbol" box.


Rating Options

The Rating Options dialog box allows you to configure the rating system.

The "System" combo box lists rating systems supported by Swiss Perfect:

Elo 	- international system used by FIDE

USCF 	- United States Chess Federation system

PZSzach 	- Polish Chess Federation system

Please refer to the respective Handbooks and/or Home Pages for details of those systems.

The Ignore Forfeits check box should be used to specify whether forfeits should be ignored or taken into account while calculating ratings.

The Change Coefficient (or K factor) edit box allows you to specify the factor by which rating gains and losses will be multiplied when showing in the Rating View.  The default is 10.  This option DOES NOT influence rating calculations but merely affects one column (Chg*K) in the display of Rating View

Difference Corrections  are used to adjust opponents ratings.  For example if a 2400 player plays a 2000 player and the "Down" difference is set to 350 then the opponent's rating will be adjusted to 2050.

The Apply Corrections check box indicates whether Difference Correctons will be applied or not.

Lower Threshold is used to determine whether a given player/opponent should be considered rated or unrated.  For example if it set to 2000, players rated 2000 and higher will be considered rated.


Import Players from Databases

Swiss Perfect allows import of players' data from dBase and text files.  To import a player, first open the List View and make sure that it is the active window (if you are not sure if it is active, simply click on it).  Then select Player|Import option from the main menu.  Alternatively bring up the Player Data dialog and click on "Import New ...".

If you have previously configured a database for import, SP will go straight to Import Player dialog box otherwise you will be presented with the Select Database dialog.

Note: if you want to change import configuration select Options / Import Setup from the main menu.  You can also save your customised field mappings clicking the Save Mapping As button.  That way you can quickly configure many files with the same field mappings.

The Select Database dialog allows you to select a database file to import from.  The supported file types are: dBase (*.dbf), Swiss Perfect (*.trn) and text (*.txt).

Depending on the extension of the file you have selected,  you will see an appropriate Import Player Setup dialog box for either Text or dBase/SP files.

Make sure that the options are set up correctly and click OK to proceed to the Import Player dialog box which allows you to import players from the file you selected earlier.


Import Player dialog box

This dialog box allows you to import players from a previously selected database or a text file.to the list of players of your tournament.

The two list boxes on the left hand side show players available for import.  The From-To list is handy when dealing with large database files as it allows you to select a subset of records to be displayed in the List of Players box (for small databases only one range will be shown).

To see details of a player in the Selected Player box, click on a player's name in the List of Players (select the appropriate range if more than one are available).

Click the Find button to search by Name, International Id or Local Id.  The Find Player dialog box allows to specify the search string (could be a complete string or a few initial characters) and select by which field to search.

Select one or more players using the mouse (combined with the Shift or Ctrl key for multiple selections).  Having selected the player(s) click Import to copy them into your tournament's list of participants.  You will see the result of your action in your List View immediately.


Import Player Setup dialog box

Swiss Perfect allows you to import players from dBase (*.dbf), Swiss Perfect (*.trn) and text (*.txt) files.  Different databases store data differently, for example a field storing player's name in a dBase file maybe called "NAME" or "SURNAME" while in a text file it can be the first string in a line or second or any other.  And naturally Swiss Perfect has its naming for data fields.  The corelation between database fields and Swiss Perfect fields is called MAPPING.

Swiss Perfect must know the mapping before it can import data.  The most popular dBase file with players' data is the FIDE Rating List (FRL) so as a default Swiss Perfect offers a mapping to that list.  If you want to import from other dBase files, you must specify appropriate mapping (don't forget to save it - click Save Mapping As button, you may need again and again).

Text file databases instead of field names operate with field numbers which simply specify which string in each line represents what data.

The Field Mapping box shows how Swiss Perfect fields map to the fields of the database you have selected for import.  The Edit boxes in the Field Mapping area show either field names (for dBase files) or field numbers (for text files).

If you are configuring text files you have an additional combo box which allows you to specify a character separating fields in a text file's line.  Please note that if you specify space as the separator any number of consecutive spaces will be considered a single separator.  For example in a line like this:

John  Smith

Smith is considered to be in field number 2 irrespective of the number of spaces between John and Smith.  However if you specify comma as the separator then in the following examples:

John,Smith

John,,Smith

in the first line Smith is in field 2 but in the second one in field 3 (field 2 is empty between the commas).  As you can see space functions differently to other characters.  If you think about it for a moment you will realise that this the most intuitive way for the user.

The Surname Field Options box lets you deal with situations where surnames are stored together with first names in one field.  Swiss Perfect distinguishes between surnames and first names but some databases (most notably FRL) do not.  So you may have to check the First Name is part of Surname box and then specify what character is used to separate them.  The Surname appears before First Name check box allows you to specify which one is first in the filed string.

For example if your text files database has entries like this:

Ian Rogers | AUS

you will set the field separator to the '|' character, the Field Mapping's Surname box to 1, check First Name is part of Surname box, uncheck the Surname appears before First Name box and finally set the separator character to a space.


Accelerated Pairings

Accelerated pairings are used primarily for two purposes.  One is to limit the number of perfect scores in a tournament and the other to help achieve high performance ratings by in-form players.  These goals are achieved by pairing initial rounds within groups of similar strength.  For example, in the first two rounds we may choose to pair players from the top half of the draw among themselves (rather than against bottom half opposition).  Those who win the first two games are unlikely to meet lowly rated opponents in the later rounds and due to the accelerated pairings don't meet weak opponents in the first two rounds either.

Swiss Perfect implements accelerated pairings "by added score".  The tournament director can enforce pairings within arbitrarily selected groups of the draw by assigning extra points to players in those groups.  For example, in a 20 player tournament, you can mentally assign 2 extra points to the first 10 players to prevent any "cross pairings" between top and bottom halves in the first round.  The extra points, unlike Bonus Points, are not shown in any of the Views.

To configure Accelerated Pairings, select Options / Tournament / Accelerated Pairings from the main menu.  The Accelerated Pairings dialog will pop up allowing you to declare accelerated pairings groups and the number of initial rounds in which the accelerated pairings are to be applied.


Pairing Options

System

You have a choice between the international Swiss system (FIDE) and the one recommended by the US Chess Federation.

Swiss Perfect implements the FIDE pairings as per the FIDE Swiss Rules Based on Rating 1992.  while the USCF pairings have been implemented based on the USCF Official Rules of Chess 1993.

Both system are based on the same general principles but details are somewhat different and in practice the two systems can produce quite different results.

In short, there are two major differences

1.	The FIDE rules require that floating a player in the same direction too frequently should be avoided while the USCF rules do not give any recommendations in that respect (also the terminology is different here, FIDE's floater is USCF's odd player)

2.	In both systems players' ratings are used to sort the list players before the tournament.  From then on, the FIDE rules refer to scores and start numbers never to ratings again.  On the contrary the USCF rules are very rating-aware.  The way in which odd players are selected as well as the way in which transpositions and exchanges are performed heavily depends on ratings and rating differences.

Use Accelerated Pairings

Check this option if you want automatic pairings to apply Accelerated Pairings (configured via a separate screen)

Use Ratings

As mentioned above the USCF system uses ratings for pairing generation.  You may configure Swiss Perfect to use

international or local ratings for that purpose.  You may also choose to ignore ratings.

Barred Pairings

Allows to specify barred pairings criterion

Unplayed Games

If the Allow re-pairing forfeits box is checked, Swiss Perfect may re-pair again games that have been forfeited by one or both players.

Ignore Colours

If this box is checked then colours will not be taken into account when generating pairings.  This option would be used, for example, if opponents play 2 games against each other in every round.  See the multi-game option.


USCF Official Rules of Chess
US Chess Federation's Official Rules of Chess,

Fourth Edition, 1993

David McKay Chess Library


Grand Prix Points

If you run a series of tournaments linked together as one competition you may wish to award tournament points to a number of top players.  A player who collects most tournament points wins the series.  Such series of tournaments are often called Grand Prix hence the name of this feature.

Swiss Perfect will display Grand Prix points in the Standings View if they are enabled in Options / Display / Standings configuration dialog.

The Grand Prix dialog (accessed by selecting Options / Tournament / Grand Prix) allows to you specify group of players and points awarded to the first and last player in each group.  Swiss Perfect will interpolate those values to calculate Grand Prix points for players inside the groups.

For example if you wish to award 12 points to the winner, 9 to the runner up and then from 7 points to 1 to the next seven players you should configure the groups as follows:

Group 1:  first player = 1, last player = 2, points for first player = 12, points for last player = 9

Group 2:  first player = 3, last player = 9, points for first player = 7, points for last player = 1

If you want to award 1000 points to the winner, 1 point to the lowest ranked player then you need to configure just one group:

Group 1:  first player = 1, last player = last, points for first player = 1000, points for last player = 1

As stated above points for other players will be interpolated.

Note the use of keyword last which represents the number of participants in the tournament.

The Share if Tied box allows you to select whether you want to split the points among the players who tie for a given place (have the same score).  If you enable this option and two top players in the first example tie then they receive 10.5 points each (12 + 9 / 2).


Sales and Support
Registration, Sales and Support

To purchase a Swiss Perfect license contact one of the distributors listed below:

United States of America

Swiss Perfect

105 Dell Avenue

Huntsville, AL 35802-3145

USA

http://www.hsv.tis.net/chess/swiss_perfect/

email:   dhayes@traveller.com

South America

Adriano Rodrigues

Rua Abilio Vilela Junqueira

730  CEP 13085-040

Campinas - SP - Brasil

Ph. +55  (0)19  2874635

email:   drin@mpc.com.br  (you can write in Portugese, Spanish or English)

Europe, Australia and New Zealand

Swiss Perfect International

1 Kingston St.

Mt Waverley

Vic 3149

Australia

email:   tourney@ozemail.com.au

http://www.ozemail.com.au/~tourney


Pairing Info
Pairing Info View

This view displays all information necessary to perform FIDE style Swiss pairing.  This information includes the listing of point groups (note that actual scores in those groups do not matter), lists of opponents for each player, the sequence of colours for each player and the float status.

The float status indicates whether the player was floated in the last or second last round.

D / U indicates that the player was down / floated in the round immediately before the round being paired while d / u indicates that the player was floated two rounds before the round being paired.  If a player was floated both, in the previous round and two rounds before then only capital letter indicator will be shown (eg. U instead of Uu).

For example: if round 7 is being paired and a player was upfloated in round 5 and downfloated in round 6 he will have the float status indicated as uD.


floats
A player is floated when he or she is paired with a player from a different point group.  In a pair consisting of players from different point groups, the higher ranked player is downfloated and the lower ranked player is upfloated.


Clipboard

To copy the a View to the Windows clipboard, first activate the View you want to copy and then select the Edit/Copy to Clipboard menu option.


Barring Pairings
Barring Selected Pairings

Sometimes the Tournament Director wants to bar certain pairings, for example to avoid players from the same club playing each other.  Swiss Perfect makes introducing such restrictions possible by specifying the Club or Federation fields as BAR CRITERIA.

Choose Options/Tournament/Pairing from the main menu and then select one of the Criterion option in the Barred Pairing list.  The available options are:

none 	- no barred pairings are applied

Club 	- the Club field will be used as the criterion

Federation 	- the Federation field will be used as the criterion

The dialog allows you to specify rounds between which the barrings will apply.  You can specify the "Apply from" and "Apply to" (inclusive) rounds.

How does it work:

If you selected Club as the criterion, Swiss Perfect will not pair players with the same text in the Club field against each other.  Depending on whether the option Case Sensitive is checked, names like "Manhattan" and "MANHATTAN" are considered to be identical (Case Sensitive checked) or different (unchecked).  Leading and trailing spaces are ignored so "Manhattan" and "   Manhattan  " will be considered to be identical.

Similarly if you selected Federation as the criterion.

See also: Barred Pairings Orphans


Player Cards

The Card View displays individual player's results in the form of a card where one row corresponds to one round.  The card shows opponents, results and accumulated scores for each round.

There are two types of cards supported; large and small.  Large cards are based on the FIDE Swiss Tournament Pairing Card (FIDE form E-6) while the small ones on the Report Form for Multiple Results in a Swiss System Tournament (FIDE form E-7).  Normally the large cards are shown one at a time while the small ones, ten at a time (as in form E-7).  Swiss Perfect gives you some extra flexibility by making the number of cards displayed simultaneously configurable (menu option Options/Display/Cards).  You can also resize the cards via the same menu option.

Note: unlike other views the Card View uses a fixed font size.

Hints:	- to move from one card (or one set of cards)  to another use the buttons at the bottom of the screen.

- to display a card of a particular player, you can activate the Standings or Cross Table View and double click on the desired player


Barred Pairings Orphans

A barred pairing orphan is a player who is the only member of a barred pairing group.

For example, if you use CLUB as the barred pairing criterion you may only have one player from "The Manhattan Chess Club" and such a player will be considered an orphan.  Sometimes you create orphans by mistake, mistyping the club name.  Trying to detect such mistakes, Swiss Perfect, before pairing the first round of a tournament checks if there are any orphans in barred pairings and warns the user.  You can either ignore the warning and proceed with the pairing or click the Edit button to abandon the pairing process and edit / correct orphans' data.

Note:  a player with no barred criterion value specified (for example empty Club field if CLUB is the criterion) is not considered an orphan even if he/she is the only such player.


Card View Options

This dialog allows you to configure how the cards are displayed and printed.  There are two identical sections; one for large and one for small cards.

Cards per row:  this option configures how many cards will be displayed horizontally in how many rows at a time (default for large cards is one, while for small cards it is 5 cards horizontally in 2 rows ie 10 cards at a time).

Size ratio: specifies the horizontal (width) and vertical (length) size of each card relative to its standard size.

Use rating:  cards contain some rating information.  This option determines whether to use the international or local rating.


Tie-Breaks - Advanced Options

Buchholz (Apply FIDE adjustments) - FIDE requires that the Buchholz scores are adjusted in a particular way whenever there were forfeited games, byes or pauses.  If a given player lost/won games by forfeit his score for the purpose of Buchholz calculations will be adjusted up/down by half a point for each such game.  A player who had a bye in a given round is considered, for the purpose of Buchholz calculations, to have played, in that round, against a player who drew all his/her games.

Median-Buchholz - you can specify here how many highest and lowest opposition scores should should be ignored when calculated this tie-break (defaults are 1 highest and 1 lowest)

Brightwell Coefficient - see Tie-Breaks for the explanation of this item.


Accelerated Pairings dialog

The Accelerated Pairings dialog (accessed by selecting Options / Tournament / Accelerated Pairings) allows to you specify group of players and points assigned to the members of each group for the purposes of Accelerated Pairings.

The first group must begin with player number 1 and any other group must begin with the player immediately following the last player of the previous group.

For example if you wish to assign 4 points to the first 10 players, and 2 to the next 10 the winner you should configure the groups as follows:

Group 1:  player from = 1, player to = 10, points = 4,

Group 2:  first player = 11, last player = 20, points = 2.

In the Stop acceleration AFTER round edit box, type in the number of the last round in which you wish to apply accelerated pairings.

Note the use of keyword last which represents the number of participants in the tournament.


Bonus Points

Each player can be assigned bonus points.  Bonus points will be added to the player's score and shown in the Standings View and any other View that displays players' total scores.  As a consequence, bonus points affect results of the automatic Swiss Pairings.

Note that although bonus points may influence Swiss pairings in a way similar to accelerated pairings points they shouldn't be used to achieve the effect of accelerated pairings.  Bonus points were designed as a means to allow the arbiter to adjust scores of players who enter the tournament late.  Unlike accelerated pairings points they do not "expire" after a certain round.


Exchange Data with Relational Databases
Swiss Perfect Data Exchange (SPDE)

SPDE defines a text format for tournament data that can be used for exchanging data between Swiss Perfect and Relational Databases.  Swiss Perfect can export and import lists of participants as well as round pairings and results in the SPDE format which makes it possible to synchronise data between Swiss Perfect and the database.  Additionally Swiss Perfect can export Standings which enables the database to create its own Standings table that can then be displayed or distributed across the network.

To export data select File|Generate SPDE Files, to import round results select Edit|Import Results from.  To create a new tournament from a start list in SPDE format select File|Create From|SPDE Files


Configure Club Standings

The Club Standings View shows a sorted list of "club results" in an individual tournament.  A "club" is a group of players sharing the same value of either Club or Federation field in Player Data

The Criterion combo box allows you to select which value defines a "club": Club or Federation.

The Club Standings View shows the sum of scores of players from the same "club".  You can limit the number of scores taken into account by entering a non-zero value in the Count only ... top scores text box.  Swiss Perfect will sort scores of players in each "club" and sum only the requested number of top scores.