Atlas / tournament documentation

Standings

The Standings tab: how entries are ranked, what each tiebreaker means, how drops and adjusted totals work, who sees standings, and every control on the screen.

Standings is the tab room's live ranking of every entry in an event. The tab room is the group that runs the tournament's results, normally the director and the tab seat. The screen is the first of four tabs under Standings in the left rail: Standings, Break, Awards and Announcing. It lives at /tournaments/[id]/admin/standings, and the other three tabs open on the same route with a view setting. Use the Standings tab during the preliminary rounds to see who leads, to check how close the cut for the break is, to find out why one entry ranks above another, and to export the table. The Break tab is described in Breaks and elimination rounds, and the last two tabs in Awards and announcing.

Every number on this screen is computed again each time the page loads, from the ballots that have been entered. Nothing is stored as a ranking, so a ballot that is corrected in Ballots moves the table the next time the page is opened. The screen counts results that have not been released to the public yet. The public tournament page counts only released results, so the two can differ for a while.

Who can use it

Role	What it can do on this screen
Platform admin	Everything: read the table, change the break rule, publish the bracket and export.
Organization owner or admin	Everything, for tournaments the organization hosts.
Tournament admin seat	Everything.
Tab seat	Everything on this screen. The screen has no money or announcement controls, so no control is withheld from a tab seat.
Compliance seat	Cannot open the screen. A compliance seat is read only and is sent to Records with a read only notice.
Organization role Settings only	Cannot open the screen. The tournament consoles turn this role away.
Coach, competitor, judge, observer	Cannot open the admin screens. Each sees standings only through the public tournament page, the competitor dashboard or the coach dashboard, under the rules in Publishing rules below.

What the header shows

A row of four figures sits above the title. The first word of the first label follows the event: Teams for an event with two debaters on a side, Competitors for an event with one, and Entries when the events shown differ or the size is not set.

Control	What it does	Default or limit
Teams ranked	The number of entries in the table. The line under it reads Through Round N of M, where N is the highest round number with a result and M is the planned number of preliminary rounds.	M is the preliminary round count from Setup, or the highest preliminary round that exists when the draw has run past the plan.
Prelim ballots	Decided preliminary pairings over all preliminary pairings that are not byes. The figure turns red while any ballot is out, and the line under it names how many are out and says the standings will move. With none out it reads All in.	A pairing counts as decided when its status is completed or its result names a winner.
Rounds included	The number of rounds that have at least one result, over the planned preliminary round count. The figure turns amber while it is below the plan. The line under it reads Elimination rounds included or Elimination rounds excluded.	Follows the Include elimination rounds checkbox.
As of	The clock time at which the page was computed, as hours and minutes in the tournament's time zone. The line under it reads Recomputed on every ballot.	Uses the Setup time zone, and a default zone when none is set.

Controls

The controls sit in the header under the title, in four rows.

Control	What it does	Default or limit
Events	A row of buttons, one per event, that switches the table to another event. The current event is filled. While the next event loads, its button adds the word loading and the table dims.	Shown only when the tournament has more than one event. The first event, by display order, is open until another is chosen.
Tiebreak order	A row of numbered chips showing the order in which ties are broken, top first. A chip with an accent border is a tiebreak that has its own column in the table. A chip with a plain border has no column. The Adjusted speaks chip also carries the word drop and the number of high and low speaker points dropped.	Read only. The order is edited in Setup, in the Standings section.
Configure in Tab rules	A link beside the chips. It opens Setup.	The link opens the Ballot section of Setup, and the tiebreak order is in the Standings section. See Known mismatches.
Sentence under the chips	States how many tiebreaks have a column and names the ones that do not. The shaded cell in a row is the tiebreak that separated that entry from the entry above it.	Rewritten from the saved order, so it always matches the chips.
Find a team or school	A search field. It keeps the rows whose entry name or school contains the typed text, ignoring capital letters. The word team changes to competitor or entry to match the event.	While a search is active, the break line and the explanation rows are hidden. An empty field shows the whole table.
Break	A group of four buttons that set the break rule: Top 4, Top 8, Top 16 and All winning records. The chosen button is filled. The choice is saved at once for the event shown, and the same rule is what Rounds breaks to.	See Break rule below.
Include elimination rounds	A checkbox. Ticking it reloads the page with elimination results counted as well. Clearing it reloads the page with prelim results only.	Off. The setting lives in the address of the page and is not saved.
Export CSV	A download link for the table. See The CSV export below.	Follows the event and the elimination checkbox in force.

The table

One row per entry, best first. A column header that stands for a tiebreak starts with that tiebreak's place in the order, for example 2 · Speaks. A measure that the order does not use shows its bare name.

Column	What it shows	Default or limit
#	The entry's place among active entries, which is also its seed in the break. The number is accent colored while the entry is inside the break. An entry that is not active shows its status in place of a number, such as Dropped or Waitlisted, and is never seeded.	An entry with no status and no place shows a plain hyphen.
Team, Competitor or Entry	The entry's name, with the partner's name after an ampersand for a two person entry. The name links to that entry's registration page.	Names longer than the column are cut with an ellipsis.
School	The school or organization recorded at registration, or the club answer when no school is recorded.	A hyphen when neither is recorded.
W-L	Wins, a hyphen, then losses. It is the one column shown in darker text. The header gains a place number when wins are in the tiebreak order.	A bye counts as a win. A forfeit counts as a win for one side and a loss for the other.
Speaks	Total speaker points, to one decimal place.	Includes the padding described under How a record is counted.
Adjusted	Adjusted speaker points, to one decimal place: the total with the highest and lowest values dropped.	The drop count is the Adjusted speaker points setting in Setup.
Opp wins or Opp W%	The opponent measure that the order ranks by. The column shows opponent wins when the order contains opponent wins and not opponent win percentage, and the percentage otherwise.	Percentage to one decimal place.
Aff/Neg	How many rounds the entry debated on each side, written for example 3A/2N. Aff is the affirmative side and neg is the negative side.	A bye is not counted on either side.

Reading the break line

A heavy line is drawn under the last entry that is inside the break. It names the rule, either top N advance or all winning records advance with the count, and then states why the first entry outside the break missed. The wording depends on how the cut was decided.

When a column shows the deciding number, the sentence names the entry that is first out and gives the tiebreak with both values, after listing any earlier tiebreaks on which the two were level.
When no column can show the deciding tiebreak, such as head to head or the coin flip, the sentence names the entry that takes the last place and the tiebreak that decided it, and the row for the first entry out repeats the reason.
Under the rule All winning records the sentence states that the first entry out has one loss too many for the cut.
Between any two rows whose separating tiebreak has no column, a small row reads Separated from the team above on, followed by that tiebreak.

The break line and the small explanation rows are hidden while the search field holds text.

The bracket beside the table

On wide screens the elimination bracket sits to the right of the table. On narrower screens it stacks under the table. It draws the seeds that the current break rule would produce, with a Locked or Provisional label, and carries the Publish bracket button. Its controls and rules are in Breaks and elimination rounds.

The footer

A line at the bottom of the screen has a colored dot and one sentence, and a link, Open Elimination rounds, to the elimination view in Rounds.

State	Dot	Sentence
Preliminary ballots are out	Red	Names the number of prelim ballots outstanding and says the standings are incomplete.
No ballots out and rounds left to run	Amber	Names how many prelims are left and says the break can still change.
No ballots out and no rounds left	Accent	Says all prelims are complete and the break is final.

Tasks

Check who leads during the prelims.

Open Standings in the left rail. The Standings tab opens.
Read the four figures. If Prelim ballots shows a red figure, open Ballots and finish the outstanding ballots first.
Select an event button if the tournament has more than one event.
Read the table from the top. The shaded cell in a row shows the tiebreak that separated it from the entry above.

The screen then shows the table, the bracket seeds and a footer that says whether the break can still change.

Find out why one entry ranks above another.

Find the lower entry's row and check which cell is shaded.
Compare that column with the row above. If the shaded column shows two different values, that tiebreak decided the order.
If no cell is shaded, read the small row under the entry. It names the tiebreak that has no column, such as head to head.
Compare the tiebreak chips with the order in Setup if the result is a surprise. Setup is the only place the order changes.

The table gives the same answer on every load, because the coin flip at the end of the order is fixed.

Choose the size of the break.

Open Standings and select the event.
Select Top 4, Top 8, Top 16 or All winning records beside Break.
Watch the heavy break line move in the table, and read the sentence under it for the entry that is first out.
If a red message begins The break rule was not saved, read the reason and select the button again.

The setting is then used by Rounds and by the Break tab. Choose the rule before the last preliminary round so the cut is known.

Include elimination results.

Open Standings.
Tick Include elimination rounds. The page reloads.
Clear the checkbox to return to prelim standings.

The bracket beside the table is seeded from the table as shown, so ticking the checkbox can change its seeds. Generating a break always uses prelim standings.

Export the table.

Open Standings and select the event.
Set the Include elimination rounds checkbox as wanted.
Select Export CSV. The browser downloads the file.

The file opens in a spreadsheet with a few comment lines above the header row.

Troubleshooting

Message	What it means	What to do
Standings unavailable, The standings could not be loaded. The tournament data service returned an error. Try again, and contact a tab director if the problem continues.	One of the reads behind the page failed: entries, tab settings, rounds or pairings.	Select Retry. If the message returns, report it to a tab director.
Standings unavailable, The standings could not be loaded. The standings calculation failed. Try again, and contact a tab director if the problem continues.	The ranking itself could not be computed, for example because the saved tab settings could not be read.	Select Retry. The ranking is never shown from default rules when the saved rules cannot be read.
No rounds have been tabulated yet.	No entry has a result to rank, or the event has no entries.	Enter ballots in Ballots, then reopen Standings.
No team matches that search.	The search text matches no name or school. The word changes to competitor or entry for other events.	Clear or shorten the text in the search field.
The break rule was not saved: followed by a reason	The save was refused, for example because the session expired or the database rejected the write.	Read the reason after the colon. The button returns to the previous rule. Select it again.
Unknown break rule.	The rule sent was not Top 4, Top 8, Top 16 or All winning records.	Reload the page and select a button again.
N prelim ballots outstanding, these standings are incomplete	The footer is counting pairings without a decided result.	Open Ballots and finish them. The break is not final until this clears.
Unauthorized	The export link was opened without a signed in session.	Sign in again and download again.
Forbidden	The signed in account is not a platform admin, an organization owner or admin, or an admin or tab seat on this tournament.	Ask an admin to grant a tab or admin seat.
Could not check your admin access. Try again.	The access check could not run, which says nothing about the account's permissions.	Try the export again in a moment.
Could not verify your session	The sign in could not be confirmed during the export.	Reload and try again.
Could not export standings right now. Try again.	Reading entries or computing the standings failed during the export.	Try again. If it repeats, report it to a tab director.

Break rule

A break is the group of entries that advance from the preliminary rounds into the elimination rounds. The four buttons choose how large it is.

Button	Cut size	Notes
Top 4	4 entries.	Saved as the size 4.
Top 8	8 entries.	Saved as the size 8.
Top 16	16 entries.	Saved as the size 16.
All winning records	Every active entry with more wins than losses, counted when the button is pressed.	The count is saved as the size, with a floor of 2. It is not counted again when later ballots arrive, so pressing the button again refreshes it.

The button moves at once and moves back if the save is refused, with the reason beside it. The save writes the rule and the size to the event's tab settings row, creating that row from the tournament wide row when the event has none, and logs the change to the audit trail shown in Records. Rounds reads the same size, so a change here changes what Rounds breaks to. Only active entries are counted and seeded.

Tiebreak order

Entries are sorted by the first tiebreak in the order. Only when two entries are equal on it does the sort move to the second, and so on down the list. The order is set in Setup, in the Standings section, where each line moves up or down. A coin flip is always added at the end if the saved order lacks one, so two entries level on everything still rank the same way on every load. A new tournament uses wins, speaks, adjusted speaks, opponent wins, head to head and the coin flip, in that order.

The ranking engine knows twelve tiebreaks. The first column below is the name Setup shows, and the second is the chip name on this screen.

Setup name	Chip	What it compares	Better is
Wins	Wins	Number of wins, byes included.	More wins
Fewest losses	Losses	Number of losses.	Fewer losses
Total speaker points	Speaks	Sum of the entry's speaker points over all rounds counted.	More points
Total ranks, lower is better	Ranks	Sum of the ranks judges gave the entry. A rank of 1 is the best.	A lower sum
Adjusted speaker points, drop high and low	Adjusted speaks	Speaker points after the highest and lowest values are dropped. See Drop high and low.	More points
Adjusted ranks, drop high and low	Adjusted ranks	Ranks after the same kind of drop, using the ranks setting.	A lower sum
Double adjusted speaker points, drop 2 high and low	Double adjusted speaks	Speaker points with the two highest and two lowest values dropped. The drop is always 2 and does not follow the Setup setting.	More points
Double adjusted ranks, drop 2 high and low	Double adjusted ranks	Ranks with the two highest and two lowest values dropped. The drop is always 2.	A lower sum
Opponent strength, total opponent wins	Opponent wins	The sum of the wins of every opponent the entry met. An opponent met twice is counted twice.	More opponent wins
Opponent strength, opponent win percentage	Opponent win %	Opponents' wins divided by opponents' rounds debated, across every opponent met.	A higher share
Head to head result	Head to head	Wins of the entry against the other entry in the pair being compared. It decides only when the two met and one won more of those meetings. Two entries that did not meet are treated as level.	More wins in the meetings
Deterministic coin flip	Coin flip	A fixed pseudo random order built from the two entries' internal ids. The same two entries always come out in the same order, and the order does not change when unrelated entries are added.	Whichever the fixed order puts first

Head to head cannot be computed for the public standings, because the public page cannot read pairing results. The public table therefore skips that tiebreak, while this screen uses it.

Drop high and low

Dropping removes the most extreme values from an entry's list before the list is summed. This softens one harsh or generous judge. Two settings in Setup, in the Standings section under Adjusted totals, control it: Adjusted speaker points and Adjusted ranks. Each offers None, Drop 1 high 1 low, and Drop 2 high 2 low. Both default to 1.

With a drop of N, the N highest and N lowest values are removed and the rest are summed.
A drop only takes effect when the entry has at least 2N plus 1 values. An entry with fewer values keeps its plain sum. With a drop of 1 the entry needs 3 values, and with a drop of 2 it needs 5.
A drop of None sums every value.
Raw totals are always kept and shown in the Speaks column beside the adjusted figure. The drops change only the Adjusted tiebreak lines and the Adjusted column.
Adjusted ranks use their own drop setting, saved beside the speaks setting.
Setup shows a warning when the drop leaves nothing to sum across the planned preliminary rounds.

How a record is counted

A pairing counts once it has a winner. A pairing with no result yet is left out, and its round does not count under Rounds included.
A bye is a round in which an entry is not paired and receives a win. It counts as a win and as a round completed, adds no opponent, and counts on neither side.
A forfeit is a round in which one side does not debate. The side that is present wins and the other loses. The round counts as completed and as a side round for both entries, and the forfeit is recorded as given by one entry and received by the other.
An entry that received a bye or a forfeit win is given its own average speaker points and ranks for each such round, so its totals and its drops stay on the same footing as an entry that debated every round. An entry with nothing yet to average is given a baseline of 28 speaker points and a rank of 2 for that round.
A recorded speaker point score of zero counts as a score. A rank of zero or a missing rank counts as no rank recorded.
Elimination rounds are left out unless Include elimination rounds is ticked. The head to head record follows the same rule.
Entries that are not active keep their row and their record in the table. They are never seeded.

Publishing rules

Two settings in Setup, in the Standings section, decide who sees standings outside the tab room. Both are separate from this screen, which always shows the full table to the tab room.

Publish standings holds the public tab sheet back until a chosen moment. The same rule governs the competitor and coach dashboards, so a rank is never shown on one surface before it is public on another.

Setting	The public page shows standings when	Message shown before that
After every round	Results are posted. This is the default.	None.
At the break	At least one elimination round exists for the tournament.	Standings are published at the break.
Manually	The bracket has been published. The Publish bracket button on this screen is the switch.	Standings are published when tab releases them.

The public table counts only released rounds. For a round whose reveal mode is winner only, set in Rounds, the public table counts the result but leaves out that round's speaker points and ranks, so the totals cannot be used to work them out.

What competitors see is a second group of four switches in Setup. It controls what the people in a room see of their own results. The switches are The tab sheet, Their record, Speaker points and ranks, and Judge comments. A competitor sees their own rank only when both Publish standings and The tab sheet allow it. Administrators, judges and the public page are not affected by these switches. A competitor with every switch off still sees pairings and rooms.

The CSV export

Export CSV downloads the table as it stands for the event shown, with elimination rounds included when the checkbox is ticked. The file is named standings followed by the tournament id and, for a single event, the event id. It is computed fresh, counts unreleased results, and is allowed only to platform admins, organization owners and admins, and admin or tab seats.

Four comment lines come first, each starting with a number sign: when it was computed, which event, whether elimination rounds are included, and the number of rounds included. The columns then follow.

Column	Content
Rank	The entry's place in the full table, counting every entry.
Team	The entry's name.
School	The school or organization.
Status	The registration status, such as active.
Record	Wins and losses.
Total Speaks	Total speaker points, one decimal place.
Avg Speaks	Total divided by rounds completed, two decimal places.
Adj Speaks	Adjusted speaker points, one decimal place.
Opp Wins	Total opponent wins.
Opp Win %	Opponent win percentage, one decimal place.

The address of the export also accepts format set to legacy, which produces a Team Data layout for older spreadsheet macros. No button on the screen chooses it.

Known mismatches

The link Configure in Tab rules opens Setup on the Ballot section. The tiebreak order and the drop settings are in the Standings section of Setup, so select that section by hand after the link opens.
The Break buttons offer only the sizes 4, 8 and 16 and the winning records rule. Setup allows any break size, but when it saves a size other than 4 or 16 it saves the rule Top 8 beside it. With a saved size of 6, this screen shows Top 8 as chosen and draws eight seeds, while generating the break uses the saved size 6. Select the button for the size wanted, or check the size in Setup, so both agree.