Setup

Setup holds the rules of one tournament: its dates and clock, its events, its rooms, what a judge fills in on a ballot, how rounds and the break run, how standings are worked out, and who may register and for how much. Use it before registration opens, and again whenever a rule changes. It is the Setup entry in the left rail of the tournament's admin area, at /tournaments/<tournamentId>/admin/setup. The rail entry has two subviews: Configuration, which is this screen, and Printing, which opens the printing tools.

Setup has seven sections, listed down its own left rail in the order a tournament runs: Tournament, Events, Rooms, Ballot, Rounds & break, Standings and Registration. Each setting lives in one section, and other screens read it from there. Older links still work: the old Settings, Events, Rooms, Scoring and Tab settings addresses redirect into Setup, and a link that ends in ?section= followed by tournament, events, rooms, ballot, rounds, standings or registration opens that section. The older names details, scoring, round-plan and tab-rules open Tournament, Ballot, Rounds & break and Standings.

Who can use it

A visitor who is signed out is sent to sign in and returns to the page asked for. See Roles and permissions for how seats are given.

The layout of the screen

The screen has a section rail on the left, a header bar across the top, the open section in the middle and a save bar along the bottom. On a narrow screen the rail becomes a row of buttons above the section.

Each rail summary and the rule that turns its dot amber:

Saving, Saved and Not saved

Edits are held in the screen, not written, until the save bar saves the open section. Switching sections keeps what was typed in each one. The rail marks a section Not saved when it holds values that its last save did not write. After that section saves, the chip reads Saved for four seconds and then clears. A save writes only its own section, so a Standings save never writes values typed and not yet saved in Rounds & break.

A save that fails shows its reason in a red bar under the header and leaves the section as typed. A save that lands writes saved into the address, which is why a reload after a save does not announce it twice. Setup has no prompt when the page is left. A reload, a closed tab or a click on a link elsewhere discards every value that was not saved, including values held for other sections. Registration questions, the affiliation list and promo codes save themselves and are not part of a section save.

Impact review

Changing Where or Pacing on the Tournament section changes what every pairing's room offers. When Save Tournament is pressed after such a change, a panel headed Before this saves opens above the save bar and the save waits. The panel states the change in words, for example Pacing goes from Live paced to Long form, and then lists each room feature that turns on or off. Each line starts with Turns on or Turns off.

When neither Where nor Pacing changed, no review opens. When one changed and no room feature differs, the panel says Nothing in a pairing's room changes.

Tournament section

Identity and clock. Every posted time on every screen renders in the zone chosen here, and the dates bound the round windows and the judges' availability grid. The section writes the four public page fields first, then the dates, visibility, place, pacing, time zone and coordination switches.

The Coaches may strike judges switch does not strike anyone before a tournament and does not remove a judge from a pairing. A competitor in a room uses Report a conflict, and the report appears in Rounds for the tab room, which marks it and may reply. Seating changes only when the tab room makes them by hand.

When a tournament still holds the retired Hybrid pacing, neither pacing chip is pressed, the help text says so, and Save Tournament refuses until Live paced or Long form is chosen.

1. Open Setup. Select Tournament.
2. Choose Visibility, fill the public page fields and set First day, Last day and Time zone.
3. Choose Where and Pacing, then set the three Coordination switches.
4. Select Save Tournament. When Where or Pacing changed, read the review panel and select Save these changes.

Afterward the rail row shows Saved, the status line reads Saved just now · written to Records, and the public page shows the new copy.

Troubleshooting the Tournament section

Events section

What is offered. An event is a division such as Varsity or Novice. Each event can carry its own ballot and its own break depth; events use the tournament defaults until one is given its own. The section has a list of events on the left and a form on the right.

An event cannot be deleted while any entry, pairing, round or cart item still points at it. The delete also removes the event's own standings rules and cached standings. Hide the event instead when it has been used.

1. Open Setup. Select Events, then select + Add an event.
2. Enter Name and Short code, choose Speakers per side and Format, and set Entry cap if the event has its own limit.
3. Leave Active on, then select Save Events.

Afterward the new event appears in the list, the form shows it, and the rail summary adds its short code.

Troubleshooting the Events section

Rooms section

The inventory Rounds can assign. A room is added, edited or retired at once; the section has no Save, no Revert and no Not saved chip, and the save bar offers Continue to Ballot →. This guide covers the controls briefly here and in full on Rooms.

The blurb under the section title says a round cannot release with more concurrent debates than rooms. The release check does not compare those two counts; it blocks a pairing with no room and two pairings that share a room. See Rooms for the full account.

1. Open Setup. Select Rooms.
2. Enter Room, and optionally Site, Capacity and Notes.
3. Select Add room. To add many at once, paste lines into Bulk import rooms and select Import rooms.

Troubleshooting the Rooms section

Ballot section

What the judge fills in, in the order they fill it in. This is the same form as the judge ballot and the admin ballot pane, and a preview headed As the judge sees it updates while the section is edited. A ballot scope is either the Tournament default or one event. Save Ballot writes only the scope open in the chips.

The speaker range and rank scale are written to the standings rules of the open scope. An event that has its own ballot but no standings rules row of its own keeps the tournament's range and rank scale.

1. Open Setup. Select Ballot. Leave the chip on Tournament default.
2. Choose Category points or Judge-assigned rank under Scoring mode.
3. For Category points, name each category and set its range. For Judge-assigned rank, choose Rank scale and set Speaker points.
4. Fill Shown above the scores if the ballot needs instructions, then confirm Reason for decision title.
5. Select Save Ballot.

To give one event its own ballot, select its inherits chip first, set the same fields and save. Setup has no control that returns an event to the default ballot. See Ballots for what the judge sees.

Troubleshooting the Ballot section

Rounds & break section

How many preliminary rounds run, how they are drawn, who breaks and how the bracket is judged. A preliminary round, or prelim, is a round in which every entry debates. A break is the cut of entries that advance to elimination rounds, which are single-loss rounds that end in a final. A bye is a round in which an entry is not paired and receives a win. Rounds creates each round from this plan once the previous round's ballots are all in, and anything here can still be changed by hand there. Rounds & break and Standings share one standings rules record; each save sends the other section's values as last saved.

Preliminaries group.

The five draws behave as follows. Power-paired: round 1 is random within brackets and later rounds pair on record, strongest against strongest. Random draw: every round is drawn at random whatever the records, and rematches are not avoided. Round robin: every entry meets every other once on a fixed rotation before anyone meets twice, records do not decide who meets whom, and an odd field gives one bye a round. Pods: pods meet in rotation, and inside each pair of pods the strongest meets the strongest. By hand: nothing is generated, each prelim opens empty in Rounds and the tab room adds every pairing. Pods are assigned per entry in Field under Registrations.

Break group.

A break is saved as a break size in the standings rules. Top seeds saves the depth typed, with the rule label top4, top8 or top16 chosen from 4, 16 or anything else. Winning record saves a break size of half the entries, rounded, and the label winning. No break saves a break size of 2, and the section reads that back as Top seeds with 2 entries, so No break does not persist as a choice after a reload. The note under the groups reads the prelim count, the break, the byes and the number of elimination rounds, for example 6 prelims, 8 break, 3 elimination rounds: 9 rounds.

Judges group.

Judge categories and each judge's own limit of rounds a day are set in Field under Judges. On a round with a date, the allocator does not seat a judge past their limit for that day. See Judges.

Schedule group.

Save Rounds & break writes the tournament-wide standings rules, then one write for each event that has its own break depth, then the round plan: the prelim count, the scheduling unit and automatic release. An event left on inherits writes nothing.

1. Open Setup. Select Rounds & break.
2. Set Preliminary rounds and Judges per prelim room, then choose Sides and Draw.
3. Choose Who breaks and set the number. If there is more than one event, enter a Break depth per event where it differs.
4. Set the panel size for each elimination round and the two Judges switches.
5. Select Save Rounds & break.

See Rounds and pairing for how Rounds uses the plan.

Troubleshooting the Rounds & break section

Standings section

What the tab engine does with ballots once they land: how ties resolve and what gets dropped. A tiebreak is a rule that separates entries with equal records. Standings reads the ranks, points and speaker points as configured in Ballot. Save Standings writes the standings rules and then the speaker award depth.

A speaker's drop is computed against the prelim count open in Rounds & break. When the drop leaves nothing to sum, the help reads Nothing left to sum with only N prelims. Lower the drop or add rounds. Setup does not block the save in that case. Raw totals are always kept and shown. Drops change only the Adjusted lines in the tiebreak order and the speaker award ranking. The four What competitors see switches affect a competitor's own results only; admins, judges and the public page are unaffected, and a competitor with everything off still sees their pairings and rooms.

1. Open Setup. Select Standings.
2. Use ↑ and ↓ to put the tiebreak lines in order.
3. Choose the drop for Adjusted speaker points and Adjusted ranks.
4. Choose Speaker awards and Publish standings, then set the four What competitors see switches.
5. Select Save Standings.

See Standings for how standings are shown and published.

Troubleshooting the Standings section

Registration section

Who may enter, when and for how much. Field's pipeline of cart, claimed, policy signed, registered and paid reads these settings. Save Registration writes the window, status, access, fee, refund policy, compliance switch, maximum and waitlist. The questions, the affiliation list and promo codes save themselves.

Window group.

A closed status stops a registrant who is not an admin from starting a cart, adding an entry or checking out, and so does a tournament whose status is Completed or Cancelled. A director's own adds stay open.

Access and fees group.

Promo codes group. Shown to a full admin only. A promo code takes its discount off the entries it covers. Each entry a code covers counts as one use. A registrant types a code in their cart, and checkout holds the entries to it again, so turning a code off stops it at checkout too.

Capacity group.

Questions asked at registration. Each question is an entry in a list. + Add a question appends New question as Short text and optional, and opens its editor. The editor has a name field, a type select and a Required checkbox. Done saves the list, and Remove on a row saves it at once. A question added and not finished with Done is not saved. Choose one questions start with the options Yes and No, and Setup has no field for editing the options. A question marked as a pairing constraint shows shown to Rounds for room choice; Setup keeps that flag but has no control to set it.

Affiliation list. Shown only on a database that has the list column. The schools and clubs a director expects. Registration suggests these names, and Field marks an entry whose school is not on the list. Nobody is turned away. Enter one name per line, or choose a CSV or text file with the names in the first column.

1. Open Setup. Select Registration.
2. Set the window if wanted, then choose Status now.
3. Choose Who may register, set Fee per entry, choose Refunds and set the compliance switch.
4. Set Maximum entries and the waitlist switch.
5. Select Save Registration. Add promo codes, questions and the affiliation list with their own buttons.

See Registration and field for what happens after someone registers.

Troubleshooting the Registration section

Tasks across sections

Open registration:

1. Open Setup. Select Registration.
2. Confirm Fee per entry, Who may register and Maximum entries.
3. Under Status now, select Open.
4. Select Save Registration.

Afterward the header chip reads Registration open and self-registration accepts entries. The Opens and Closes times do not open or close registration.

Give one event its own ballot:

1. Open Setup. Select Ballot.
2. Select the chip for the event that ends in inherits.
3. Choose a scoring mode and set its categories or rank scale.
4. Select Save Ballot.

Afterward the chip reads as the event followed by custom, and the Events list shows own ballot beside the event.

Give one event a different break depth:

1. Open Setup. Select Rounds & break.
2. Find Break depth per event, which appears only when the tournament has more than one event.
3. Type a depth in the field for the event. The row then reads own depth.
4. Select Save Rounds & break.

Afterward that event breaks to its own depth, and an event with the field left blank keeps following the tournament depth.

Create a promo code:

1. Open Setup. Select Registration, then find Promo codes.
2. Enter a Code of 6 to 32 characters, choose Percent or Fixed amount and enter the discount.
3. Set Uses in all, Uses per account, Starts, Ends and Only these emails if the code needs limits.
4. Select Create code.

Afterward the code appears in the list with its summary and is on. It saves without Save Registration.

Add a registration question:

1. Open Setup. Select Registration, then find Questions asked at registration.
2. Select + Add a question.
3. Replace New question with the prompt, choose the type and tick Required if it must be answered.
4. Select Done.

Afterward the question is saved and appears in the list. Selecting Remove on its row saves the removal at once.

Import an affiliation list:

1. Open Setup. Select Registration, then find Affiliation list.
2. Type or paste one school or club name per line, or select Choose a CSV and pick a file with the names in the first column.
3. Select Save list.

Afterward the count beside the button reads N on the list, and the registration form suggests those names.

Discard the edits in one section:

1. Open the section that holds the edits.
2. Select Revert.

Afterward the section shows its last saved values, the Not saved chip clears and the status line reads Reverted to last save. Other sections keep what they hold.

Settings that are saved but not acted on

Each of these writes a value to the tournament, and no screen or process reads it yet. Do not plan around them.

These controls save values that other screens do read: Status now, Who may register, the fee, the compliance switch, Maximum entries, the waitlist, the break, the panel sizes, the side method, the draw, Release rounds automatically, Show the plan to competitors, the publish rule, the four competitor visibility switches and the two judge allocation switches.

Records and limits

• Every save writes a row to Records with the section it came from, and a save that changes nothing writes nothing.
• The Ballot save and the standings rules writes behind Rounds & break and Standings are each limited, for a signed-in operator, to 30 writes in ten minutes. Rounds & break writes one extra rules row for each event that has its own break depth.
• The Public screen is a hub of links. What the public sees is controlled by Visibility, Status now, Publish standings, bracket release and Finalize.