Frequently Asked Questions

Answers to commonly asked questions about any of our products,
Workarounds and solutions to any problems you may encounter.

Have a question you don't find here? Click here to ask us a question!

ANY: Does Tournament Time handle Pool Play format tournaments?

ANY: Can I add custom graphics or Logos to Reports?

• SRC = The full path to the image file. This can be a BMP or JPG file. GIF files are somewhat supported, but need the additional parameter: FORMAT="GIF" and sometimes have color problems.
• top, left = these parameters describe where to place the image.
  The default unit is Inches, but you can follow the value with any unit you prefer: cm - centimeters or px/pix - pixels.
• height, width = these parameters allow you to set a specific size for your image. If you don't also specify the parameter ISOMETRIC, then these sizes can easily distort the shape of your image.
• ISOMETRIC or ISO - This tells WinPrint to maintain the height/width aspect ratio to avoid distorting your image.
• ABSOLUTE or ABS - This tells WinPrint that the top & left positions should be measured from the edge of the paper instead of from the margin.
• FORMAT="GIF" - If you are using a GIF image, this forces WinPrint to load it. There are some problems reproducing colors in GIF images, so BMP or JPG formats are recommended.

14.0x: Championship bracket is broken for more than 4 teams.

If your version of TT is affected, you can update here: Download TT Update

(If you need a new Registration Key to install this update, please contact tech support.

7.00: Championship Round starts scheduling before Pool Play is finished

6.00: Exception Dates don't have an effect

14.01.27: Field Definition step in Schedule Wizard has some problems.

These problems have been corrected and will be available in v14.03 when it is released: Download the latest version here

14.03.032: File must be opened exclusively error while scheduling single

7.00: Games Per Day / Minutes Rest don`t seem to have an effect.

10.00: Generating Any Report Blows Up! (Report file is invalid.)

10.00: Generating Pony Schedules Blow Up!

15: Help doesn`t work.

This problem may have a variety of causes. However, one of the most recent causes is that a component of Tournament Time fails to register properly during installation. While we have not yet determined the cause of this failure, it is very likely that Windows Vista's User Account Control prevents this administrative action during installation.

WORKAROUND: Follow these steps in Windows Vista to resolve this problem and make the help file load properly:

• Click the "Start" button
• Type "CMD"... the Start Menu should locate one item with a black rectangular icon.
• Right-click that black rectangular icon, and select "Run as Administrator" from the pop-up shortcut menu.
• Confirm any UAC dialog boxes that appear.
• In the black box that appears, type the following:
  • CD "\Program Files\All American SportsWare\Tournament Time"
  • FOXHHELP9.EXE /REGSERVER
  • EXIT

If the unregistered "FoxHHelp.exe" ActiveX server was the problem you were encountering, the Help system should now work inside Tournament Time.

15+: How do I use Tournament Time to create a Multi-Level Tournament? How do I guarantee each team a certain number of games without using "pool play"?

Multi-level tournaments are gaining popularity because they can guarantee each team at least a certain number of games, so we have started to add this capability into Tournament Time. Although, we have not yet automated the entire task (mainly because Tournament Time's schedule wizard only can deal with one bracket at a time), you can assemble such a multi-level tournament manually by following this general approach:

(Don't worry if this explanation seems long-winded... I wanted to be as clear as possible so that it is easy to see what the final tournament would "look" like)

General Approach:

We will create multiple tiers of single-elimination brackets where the losers enter a subsequent bracket, so that a team must lose 4 games in a row before it is eliminated from the tournament. Each "Bracket" is composed of several "Rounds".

If a team wins, it will naturally progress to the next round in the same bracket, and will ultimately get to play as many games as possible.

If a team loses in a particular bracket, this is how it would advance

• First Bracket:
  • the losers from the first round enter round 1 of the second bracket
  • the losers from the second round enter round 1 of the third bracket
  • the losers from the third round enter round 1 of the fourth bracket
  • the losers from the fourth round have already played 4 games, and so are now out of the tournament.
• Second Bracket:
  • the losers from the first round enter the third bracket
  • the losers from the second round enter the fourth bracket
  • the losers from the third round have already played 4 games.
• Third Bracket:
  • the losers from the first round fourth bracket
  • the losers from the second round have already played 4 games.
• Fourth Bracket:
  • the losers from the first round have already played 4 games.

Here are the steps that you would take in Tournament Time to create this multi-level tournament:

• 1) Create the first bracket with all the teams in it, configure it as a "Single Elimination" tournament without pool play, with whatever "seeding" you prefer. Generate the tournament, and close the "Tournament Wizard" window.
• 2) Create the second bracket.
  • a) Do not enter any teams directly into this bracket;
  • b) Instead, on "Step 3 - Team List", click the "Advance Team from another tournament" button, select the tournament you created in step 1, above, when you are prompted to select a "master schedule".
  • c) Select the team from the list of "Placing Teams" that is described as "Round 1 - Loser Game 1" and click "OK" to add this team to the list of teams for this second bracket.
  • d) Repeat steps "b" and "c" for each of the "Round 1 - Loser Game xxx" teams until they all have been added to the second bracket.
  • e) Go through the rest of the Wizard Steps to generate and schedule the second bracket.
• 3) Create the third bracket.
  Follow the general steps for #2 above, but instead of selecting losers from the First bracket, Round 1, select these losers:
  • First Bracket, "Round 2" Losers
  • Second Bracket, "Round 1" Losers
  • Go through the rest of the Wizard Steps to generate the third bracket.
• 4) Create the fourth bracket
  Again, follow the general steps for #2 above, but this time, select these losers:
  • First Bracket, "Round 3" Losers
  • Second Bracket, "Round 2" Losers
  • Third Bracket, "Round 1" Losers
  • Go through the rest of the Wizard Steps to generate the third bracket.

And, finally, you are finished!

You now have a Master Schedule that is named after the "First Bracket", which consists of all the games from all four brackets. Because the subsequent bracket schedules were "Coordinated" with their Master schedule, Tournament Time will ensure that the games will not overlap each other, and will try to fill in the in-between gaps with games, where it won't violate the progression order of each individual bracket.

The losers will advance appropriately as each of the preceeding rounds is completed, so that a team has to lose 4 times before it is out of the tournament. (Note that this means that the losers from the first bracket, round 1, will advance after all the round 1 games in the first bracket have been completed, not as the individual games are completed)

9.00: I can't produce a Results Collection report!

1. Anytime Before running the results report, choose HELP then ABOUT from the menu. Now, press "!" (the exclaimation point). A command window should appear (Titled "Enter Commands").
2. Type the following commands (pressing Enter after each line):

                    public p_bcll, p_bclr
                    p_bcll = CHR(192)
                    p_bclr = CHR(217)
                    exit
                  

3. After you type the last line and press enter, the command window should disappear.
   You are now back to Tournament Time... The results report will work fine! (until you close TT and start it again... Then you'll have to repeat this process to access the report again)

9.00: I Got error # 1405 Prgm:PrintRTF Message: RUN Command Failed?

ANY: I Got error # 1426 Prgm:Appttwin.Launchform ???

7.00: Number to Advance doesn`t make sense (Pool Play only)

14.04: Pool teams never advance

14.03.032: Record is out of range error while editing teams

5.00: Renumber Crashes!

7.03: Save to File opens Find

14.00: Sometimes Tournaments schedule using old schedule settings.

The scheduler module will sometimes access the deleted record instead of the new record (particularly if the new record did not overwrite the deleted one... usually because it overwrote some other deleted record).

WORKAROUND: If you change the Division name slightly before saving the division and generating the schedule, the Scheduler module will find the new name and will not access the deleted record.

This malfunction has been fixed in v14.03.

7.00: The 'Schedule Errors' Report Crashes!

        [ENTER]
        !                            (exclamation point)
        rpt_name = "MODERROR.RPT"
        retry_command = .t.
        do_reindex    = .f.
        exit
     

       [ENTER]
       !
       use report.dbw
       retry_command = .t.
       do_reindex    = .f.
       exit
     

7.00: Why can't I Edit Pairings?

14.xx: Why does the Division Wizard crash, complaining that the NEXT_ID index does not match the table? How do I re-create the index?

We're not sure why this occasionally happens on some Tournament Time installations. The NEXT_ID table is used extensively when changing the number of teams in the Tournament Schedule Wizard, and apparently there was an error in updating that list of numbers. Fortunately, TT can easily re-create the table and the associated index.

To "re-create the index", as it suggests, select [ Tools -- reIndex ] (in the top menu in Tournament Time).
It should take a minute to recreate all the data table indexes, including NEXT_ID.DBF / CDX, then everything should work fine.

16.00: Why does Tournament Time forget that I just Registered it, and complain that it is already running?

Tournament Time may encounter two problems with registration:

1) It may have the problem mentioned in this FAQ: Why does my program forget that I just Registered it?. Please follow the instructions in that FAQ first to resolve that issue.

2) The Tournament Time icon on your desktop and in your Start Menu may have the wrong "Working Directory". To resolve this problem, follow these steps:

• Right-click the Tournament Time icon, then choose "Properties"
• Change the "Working Folder" to be this, including the quote marks:

  "%USERPROFILE%\Documents\Tournament Time Data\"

• Click "OK" and confirm any dialog boxes that appear, asking if you really want to make this change.

You should now be able to start up and register Tournament Time normally.

9.00: Why doesn`t Help work?

Many users' computers have had trouble loading the WinHelp format help file for Tournament Time. This HTML Help version should work as a temporary replacement.

(Note: Tournament Time v9 does NOT know how to load this file automatically; however, if you save it as a file on your computer, you should be able to double-click it's icon to load and view the help file).

Any modern version of Tournament Time (v10 and newer) comes with the HTML Help file and should work fine.

7.07: Why doesn`t Help work?

• Go to the main menu
• Press [ESC]
• Press [Q]
• Press [!] (a blue window should open)
• Type "USE TTHELP.DBL"
• It should complain about no CDX file; Choose ignore
• Type "QUIT"
• Restart Tournament Time and the Help should be Okay!