Separate but (nearly) equal versions are available for the Macintosh and Windows operating systems. The display above is the screen for the Windows version of the program that allows you to enter declarations, the one below is for the Macintosh.
Besides the usual pop-up menus and dialogs typical of those systems, their user-friendly features are enhanced by the use of on-screen buttons with detailed descriptions of their functions to guide you through the usual procedures.
For examples of the services you can perform with ARJ software, see our home page, which contains links to examples of the events we service. ARJ also sells software for road races, triathlons and cross country meets.
For the typical intercollegiate/interscholastic meet, you would open up a folder/directory in which to store the various files used by the software (rather than store all the data in one file, several "linked" files are used, to save space; for example, rather than include the full name of each athlete's team in their records, a "team number" is stored and used as a key to a file of team names). Inside the meet folder separate folders are opened for each division of the meet (men/women, boys/girls). A program called OpenFiles is then used to create meet files big enough for your purposes, in the process choosing as to whether or not you track the entrants' age/year in school (possibly) and sex (probably not, since men and women do not compete against each other) and deciding as to team scoring (how many places, what points for each place, and whether teams are limited as to the number of scorers), if any.
Your first step is to enter the names and types (running, vertical jump, other) of the events of the competition. You can track up to four different types of records for each event (for example, meet record, venue record, host team record, and conference or national record) and adjust the point scoring for specific events (relays, e.g.) or eliminate it for "exhibition" events. Optionally you can enter the time schedule, details of who set what record and when, and advancement procedures. Such data are put in a text file that can be edited with a word processor if necessary, and is read by other ARJ programs for listing in the meet program and heat sheets they output.
Entering these data is rather tedious. Fortunately, once you have done it for one meet, you can import the data for another meet from one you've already done, delete or insert events as may be necessary, and edit the meet (and possibly other) records.
For the typical seeded, inter-team meet, you will get, from each team, declarations of their athletes, their intended events, and seed performances. Your first step is to enter the names of the participating teams. A program called SetField would then be used to enter these data "by team." After you click on the name of the team whose entries are in front of you, an "entry form" appears on the screen. You type the name of an athlete, tab past the filled-in "Team" box, and start typing the name of his/her event. If you type "1" the program may assume you want the "100 METER DASH." If the athlete wants to do some other event beginning with "1," continue typing the event name. A second "1" would bring up "110M HIGH HURDLES," a "0" the "10000 METER RUN," etc. In other words the software include a built-in "natural" coding system that considerably accelerates data entry.
The process is further speeded if you have the entries submitted either by event or by athlete. In the former case, you can have the program remember the event from one entry to the next, and tab past the "Event" box except when the event name changes. When an athlete comes up whose name is already entered, type "?" in the "Name" box and then start typing the athlete's last name. As in entering an event name, the program goes through its file of athlete names and, when it finds one on the team you're working with whose last name begins with what you've typed, pulls up his/her complete name. If the entries are by athlete, and an athlete is entered in more than one event, typing "<" recalls the name of the last athlete entered.
When the declarations are in, you can proofread them on screen in batches, in the order you entered them. Athletes can be listed by team (with their events and seed performances) and by event (in ranked performance order). You can scratch by performance (keep the first N or all those whose seed performance meets a specified minimum).
Working from the ranked performance list, you decide how many heats and flights are required for each event. Program ScoreMeet asks for the number of lanes on the track and so suggests a number of heats, but you can override it (putting more runners in a distance event or fewer in an indoor 200 or 400). Distribution of the athletes in heats or flights can be purely random, "evenly" (left to right then left to right), or with the best performers in either the first or last heat or flight. You can fine tune the distribution by clicking on entrants' numbers in a display of their rank and heat or flight, shifting them from one spot to another.
Assigning lanes can be random or with the best performers in the best lanes, the ranking of preferred lanes changing from one event to the next if you like. You can also put the top N performers randomly into the best N lanes and the rest randomly into the remaining lanes, as is required by USATF rules for finals and is often a good idea otherwise.
As events are set up recording sheets are printed. If you entered the time schedule, that's shown on the sheets, as are any records you entered. Once the meet is set up completely you can print out a meet program, with the events listed in chronological order and the various records included. With a Windows or Macintosh printer it comes out in two columns under a three-line centered title, looking good enough to be salable.
Late additions to the meet are easily accommodated, even while the meet is in progress. Select the event (by clicking on its name) and specify the lane and heat in which the addition is to be put. If you know the athlete's ID number, put it in. Otherwise click on his/her team, which brings up a display of athletes already entered for that team, in alphabetical order. If the name appears, click on it. Otherwise hit
As results come in from the field/finish line, you call up the event in program ScoreMeet (by clicking on its name) and specify the heat or flight. A display appears with the entrants listed in exactly the same order as on the recording sheet. You enter their (best) performances in the appropriate boxes. Places are computed for you; all you need to enter are the performances. In the example shown above, the eighth-place finisher's time was not automatic, which is accounted for by the "-" sign.
Ties can be broken "manually" (by typing the actual place into boxes on the screen). For field events, in which athletes often achieve the same performance as their competitors, the software helps you (and the officials) resolve the ties. For each athlete who had the same best throw or jump as another, a dialog asks you about misses or next-best performances, as is appropriate, and either breaks the tie or preserves it.
Results are printed heat by heat, flagging any records tied or broken. In events with more than one heat or flight, after the last heat/flight is scored a dialog asks whether you want to combine the results and score the event on the basis of results already turned in or whether you want to advance the best performers to the next round. In the latter case, for track events you are asked how many advance from each heat and how many others on time, and as to whether or not places are significant in setting up the next round.
Teams can be scored during the meet; it is fast enough to do it after every event, if you want. You can list just the team names and points, or include a detailed list of who scored what in what event(s).
Check out the demo disk to explore these options in full.
Program SetField allows you to maintain lists of the performances of your athletes in all your meets, whether or not they are scored with Apple Raceberry JaM. It's easier when they are so scored, of course, but even if you're just working off a printout of someone else's results the ARJ lookup facilities for event and athlete names make the process go quite fast. If the results come by email or on a disk you can suck them up without retyping. You can also use SetField to maintain all-time performance lists, and to track season's bests of each athlete, speeding the declaration process for future meets.