QUICK TOUR

This section introduces you to the basic features required to run a standard BGA 3 round tournament. We will run a tournament starting with 8 players.
Create a new tournament
Run GoDraw and choose the menu option File|New. Using the drop down list for known tournament names,choose your tournament or type a new name. Press OK. This creates a new 3 round tournament with standard SoS tie-break. See the menu option Settings|Rules if you want to change parameters affecting the draw.

Note that all data changes are immediately written to file, so you cannot lose your work.

Enter players
The grid in the left hand half of the main screen is the Register. Click on the last line. This brings up the Edit Player form. Start typing a player's Family name, or you can choose a name from the drop down list in the Name field. When you have finished editing all the player's details, press the Enter key or click the OK button to complete the edit. The form remains open so you can enter more players.

You can edit the details of any existing player - click the field of the register that you wish to change. This reloads the Edit Player form with the chosen player. The field you selected is already highlighted in the form so you can start typing to make your required changes. Press the Escape key in a field to reset the original value. Press the Cancel button to re-load the orginal player details. Finally you must press the Enter key or click the OK button to confirm your edit.

Register players
Once you have entered 8 players (call one of them the ghost), press the Start Fast-Reg button in the panel above the register. GoDraw moves to the first unregistered player, and is now waiting for you to do one of the following:

  • Press the 'r' key. GoDraw will register the player, and move to the next unregistered player in the list.
  • Press the Down cursor key to skip registering the player.
  • Press the Escape key to end Fast-Reg and return to normal editing. You can also press the End Fast-Reg button to return to normal editing.

    • Instead of doing Fast-Reg, you can also register individual players by clicking the Reg field. This will toggle the tick mark next to the player's name on or off.

    Close the register
    Press the Close button in the panel above the Register. The McMahon bar is calculated and shown in the Bars section below the Register.

    Depending on the grades of your players, you may see that the McMahon bar is the same as the Handicap bar. The purpose of the latter is to give weaker players a better tournament by allowing larger handicaps in preference to same club games. Change the bars now if you wish - after the draw for round 1 they are frozen.

    Press the Print Register button. The Register is printed in the current sort order - indicated by the hollow arrow on one of the tabs of the register column headings.

    Draw for round 1
    Press the Draw button at the top of the right hand panel. The draw is displayed in the upper right grid; results are entered in the small 5 line grid below the draw.

    A report is produced comparing the actual draw performance with a simple model, which approximates the minimum same-club/uneven game counts possible. The report also shows a list of players not playing in this round.

    Close the report, then print the draw. Note that like the screen display, the player's McMahon score is appended to the name rather than grade. You can change the draw print format in the Settings|Preferences|Printing tab.

    The tournament file is automatically copied before the draw, to a file with the same name as the current tournament file, followed by the additional extension .bak

    Enter results
    Click on the first board's Black result field. You now type a result key (hover to be reminded of the key codes), whereupon the Black and White result fields will be updated, and GoDraw moves to the next missing result. When you have completed a batch of 5, press Enter to see the next batch of 5.

    You can also enter results by clicking on the White result column. You can clear a result on a board with the Delete key.

    Enter a late player for Round 2
    Enter Zaphod O'Beeblebrox, 10k from club Magrathea in the UK remembering to type his family name first. You now have an odd number of players, so your ghost player will have to drop out of round 2.

    Click on the Rounds field of the ghost. You can now click the cell in the Playing column to make the ghost not play this round - the tick will disappear. When you have made your change confirm your edit in the usual way.

    Produce and print the Draw. Enter all results.


    Edit the draw for Round 3
    Produce the draw for the final round; however you don't like the pairing on board 2. Press the Edit button in the panel above the draw. GoDraw is now in draw edit mode and you are able to edit the draw.

    Click on the player you want to be Black, and then click on the player you want to be White. The pairing is placed on the board containing the Black player, so one or two players may have to be removed from their places. These players are moved to the Upset List which overlays the results grid below the draw. Having clicked on a player you can abandon the potential pairing by pressing Escape. You can also edit the draw by dragging the player name. The handicap field is edited by clicking, typing the handicap, and then pressing the Enter key.

    Press the Save button to save your edit. Press the Cancel button if you wish to abandon the edit and reset the original draw.

    The current tournament file is saved before the edit to the backup file with extension .bak


    End of tournament
    When all results are entered, Print the Rank list. To view the Prize list on screen, right click on the results grid. Choose View Prize List from the pop-up menu. The Prize Threshold setting is found in Settings|Rules if you need to adjust it. Print the prize list.