Generate schedule

Allowing the system to generate a game schedule makes it very easy to create new rounds. You spend some time setting up the first round. But if nothing changes to the rounds after, you create your game schedule in seconds.

It is important to remember that if the round is published, and calendar bookings are turned on, then the emails are sent immediately. But if the round is not published then nothing is sent until the round get published.

Before you can generate the game schedule, you must add all players or teams in each division. You do this in the Manage tables menu in the Control Panel. What you can prepare before this is to save all recurring times.

Choosing the number of competitors

If it is important that the courts are distributed equally within the division, you should select an uneven number of competitors. There will always be exactly equal distribution of times and courts, provided that you have reserved the recurring time for the divisions. If you choose an even number, it will be distributed as evenly as possible.

The exception is if you select an even number of competitors, consisting of 4 or 10, 16, 20, 28, 34 and so on (6x + 4). In these cases, the courts will be evenly distributed among all competitors except one. This one will get all the same times on the same court.

The dates of the round

In order for the game schedule to be on the correct date, you need to start by specifying the start and end date of the round. Start date is important so that the first date in the schedule is correct. The end date you can easily adjust later, although you may get a warning if some matches are to be played after the end of the round.

Settings

There are some settings that have to do with the game schedule.

Scoring system / Number of meetings per game

The starting point is that everyone meets everyone once during a round. But it is possible to specify that everyone should meet everyone up to 20 times per round.

Match settings / Locked match times

With locked match times, players can only reschedule their matches at times set by the administrator. For example, say you have a match time at 6pm and re-book at 7pm, which is available. Then that time at 18 o'clock will not be removed but left for someone else to choose.

When generating the game schedule, you can choose to add some extra times that will be unbooked. It is then these times that players can choose if they want to reschedule matches. You can also add these unbooked matches afterwards after the game schedule is created.

Scheduling / Sorting game schedule

You can choose between Random and Ranking. Random means that the order which who plays at the beginning or end of the round is random. Each time you preview, a new randomization is made. When you choos Ranking, the layout is such that the competitor at position 1 meets position 2 in the final meeting of the round. Position 3 meets position 4 and so on.

Recurring times

A recurring time is times and courts that are repeated at a certain interval. For example, you can schedule matches to be played each week at 7pm on court 1.

Add recurring time

• Day and Time: Enter the day and time of the recurring time

• Interval: Specify whether the matches should be played each week or if there should be one or more weeks between matches.

• Offset: Without offset, the matches start the first week. If you offset a recurring time, it starts a few weeks later. For example, if you have two recurring times at intervals every two weeks, you can offset that time one week ahead. In this way, one time gets the first week and the other time the second week.

• Location: Choose the location or court. If you only have one court, you do not need to enter this.

• Reserved to: Specify which division should have access to the recurring time. If you do not specify anything, all divisions have access to this time. It is recommended that all times are reserved for a division. The advantages of this are that the times are distributed more evenly over the courts and that you can generate game schedule only for certain divisions.

• Comment: Enter a comment at the time booked. Please note that the comment will appear on every booking for the recurring time.

Number of recurring times

How many recurring times are needed depends on how many players or teams are in each division. You can calculate how many recurring times you need by the following formula:

For even number of competitors: Number of times = Number of competitors / 2 For uneven number of competitors: Number of times = (Number of competitors + 1) / 2

So if you have 5 competitors in each division with 10 divisions, you need 3 * 10 = 30 recurring times.

The system will help you showing a tip at the top of the Generate schedule page:

Exception

An exception is when you want to indicate deviations from the regular game schedule. If you have matches every week then you can enter an exception on, for example, a leave or if the location is closed for a few days.

• Start Date and End Date: Specify between which date the exception should apply.

• Applies to: You can specify that the exception should apply only to a particular division.

• On exception: Here you specify what will happen after the exception has ended. Keep pattern or Next available. If your recurring time has intervals Every week then it does not matter what you choose here. Keep the pattern means that the pattern that the recurring time has created remains. Suppose you have matches week 1, 3 and 5 but add an exception all week 3. Then the matches will instead be week 1, 5 and 7.

• Next available means that the pattern will start over as soon as possible. In the same example as above, matches will be at week 1, 4 and 6.

Preview schedule

Once you have added all players or teams in each division and added all recurring times and perhaps some exceptions, you can preview the game schedule by pressing the Step 1: Preview button.

If you are happy with the game schedule and want to create it, just press the Step 2: Create booked matches button. Then all booked matches are created according to the game schedule.

If you have set it to send out calendar bookings, they will start sending as soon as the round is published. The matches are then sent out in batches with the earliest matches first.

Generate game schedule for some divisions

It is possible to generate game schedules only for certain divisions. For example, if something is wrong in the schedule, you can generate only one or two divisions instead of changing all the booked matches. It may also be that more competitors have been added at the last moment and therefore you need to re-generate some parts of the game schedule.

If you have already generated booked matches and do so again, the booked matches will be overwritten with the new ones. If the round is published and set to send out calendar bookings, then a cancellation email will be sent out first and then the new booking.