I know I'm days behind in the dicussion, but today is the first day I've
been able to catch up on my digests from back before Halloween.
As a member who has written autocrossing scoring (not timing!) software 3
times for various regions over the years, and as the guy who actually
purchased SFR's current JACircuits timing system, and lastly as someone who
has been down this road before, let me weigh in. I haven't been that active
for the last couple of years, but I do have a lot of experience with these
issues.
1) This conversation all started with asking about pre-registration. I
THINK the reason for the question was about reducing the amount of time
spent in the registration line at the day of the event. Like others have
said, I don't think that this is a good enough reason to do on-line
registration. There are a lot of hassles associated with it for a
relatively small benefit, but it's an interesting academic discussion.
2) However, pre-registration is absolutely REQUIRED for any on-site SCORING
software to work. There is no way to get on-site scoring done without all
of the entrants IN THE COMPUTER SYSTEM before their run group starts. This
is nearly impossible to accomplish with on-site registration.
3) The Nationals software, called TS96 (because this version was written for
national events in '96, and hasn't had many updates since) is basically
impossible to use unless all registration is done before the event starts,
AND if the cars run in close to numeric order within their classes (as is
done at National events). In reality to use any on-site scorign software
will require changes to the way that the flow of the event goes (no more
running in the wrong run group, we'll likely want to institute a run order
(such as, by car number), which will force the way we grid, etc. Let's not
bite off more than we can chew.
4) Years ago I proposed a way to fully automate our events, with
computerized entry, timing and scoring, etc. Boris Elpiner helped refine
the whole plan maybe 3 or 4 years ago. It involved a number of networked
computers, bar codes, bar code readers at the start line, etc. Very cool.
Very complex. A very bad idea that we were not in any position to implement
(and we still aren't).
5) So I suggest backing off of any computerized scoring plan. It costs more
than its worth (and I don't mean $$$ cost). If for some reason we could
justify the costs of doing pre-registration, that would be good, because
it's the first baby step towards doing a fully computerized events.
6) If any of you laid-off high tech programmers (I still have a job myself,
I'm happy to say) want to talk about things that I think would be
interesting prototypes, drop me a line. But don't expect the SCCA, with our
200+ entry events, to sign up to use anything anytime soon. The procedural
changes alone are too much to ask. Ask me about the time I tried to suggest
that we should do tech before registration, like they do in LA. That lasted
one event 6 or 7 years ago.
Josh
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