Tutorial - Post start list from file to Webscorer.com
OVERVIEW
Introduction
- While you can create the start list on the Webscorer PRO app, a large start list can be uploaded as an XLS, XLSX, CSV or TXT file to Webscorer.com
- If your online registration is hosted on a site other than Webscorer.com, you'll need to import the registered racer list to Webscorer PRO
- If you’re using Webscorer online registration, there’s no need to post the start list (the registration list is the start list)
- Posted start lists can be viewed on Webscorer.com and downloaded by the organizer to the Webscorer PRO app
Two ways to import start list to Webscorer PRO
- Webscorer PRO supports importing start lists to the app via 2 methods:
- You can upload the start list file to Webscorer.com from your computer and then download it to Webscorer PRO from Webscorer.com
- You can transfer the start list file from your computer to Webscorer PRO via iTunes for the iPad / iPhone, or via the Android file system
- When posting the start list file to Webscorer.com, the file type can be XLS, XLSX, CSV and tab-delimited TXT
- When importing the start list via iTunes or via Android’s file system to the app, the file type must be tab-delimited TXT
- Reasons to transfer the start list to Webscorer PRO via Webscorer.com:
- The upload to Webscorer.com supports native Excel file types
- The transfer via iTunes (to an iPhone or iPad) requires that you are at your own computer (and have access to your own iTunes)
- The start list posted to Webscorer.com can easily be shared with racers, spectators and coaches
- The reason to transfer the start list to Webscorer PRO via iTunes or Android file system is if you don’t have access to the Internet from the race site
Start list file format
- The start list file can be XLS, XLSX, CSV or in tab-delimited TXT format
- The start list file must have column headers that match those supplied in the sample start list files
- Use of Excel as the authoring tool to create the start list file is recommended but not required
- When using Excel, you can save the start list file as XLS or XLSX for uploading to Webscorer.com
- When using other tools, you can choose to use CSV or tab-delimited TXT format
Pricing / licensing
- Posting start lists from file to Webscorer.com is free
- All you need is to sign up for a free Webscorer account to so we can keep track of your own races under your user ID
- To sign up for an account, you just need to supply an email address and pick a password
- Downloading start lists to the Webscorer app requires the PRO subscription
FILE UPLOAD TOOL
Introduction
- To post start lists to Webscorer.com, you'll need to first sign in to Webscorer.com with your email address / password
- If you don't yet have a Webscorer account, you can sign up as follows:
- Click on the Sign in link on the top right corner of Webscorer.com
- On the next page, click on the green Sign up now button
- Type in your email address and choose a password (minimum of 6 characters)
- Click on the Race organizers section and choose the My start lists option, and then click on Post start list from file menu button
- When your start list file is ready, first click on the Browse... button to locate the file on your computer
- Once located, click Upload to transfer the contents of the file from your computer to the web page
- Thereafter, fill in the required field on the page and finally click on the Post start list menu button
Input fields
- Race name (default name is the name of your start list file)
- Race date
- Race time (enter start time of the race)
- Time zone (GMT+0 is the standard time in England)
- Race location (locate the race site on a map)
- Sport type (this is required to easily find your race on the website, app)
- Start type (how you plan to start the racers – you can change this on the app later)
- Race visibility (public races are searchable by anyone, Private races are accessible only by knowing the URL)
- Organized by (enter club name or race organizer name - optional)
- Race website (enter your own website, e.g. www.webscorer.com - optional)
- Race photo (upload a custom photo to be displayed on the start list page - if no photo is supplied, a stock sports photo is used)
- Race notes (enter up to 2000 characters to describe the race, course info, start instructions etc. - optional)
Additional notes
- Note that after posting the start list, you can click on the Edit race info button on the start list page to make changes
- If you make changes to the start list file, click on Edit race info, upload the updated file again and click on Save changes
- You can delete your own posted start lists via the Race organizers section, under the My start lists option
- If you accidentally delete a posted start list, it can be recovered by emailing us at support@webscorer.com
VALID COLUMN HEADERS AND DATA
Valid column headers
- Bib
- Bib (alphanumeric)
- Name
- First name
- Last name
- Team name
- Team name 2
- Distance
- Category
- Wave
- Age
- Gender
- Year of birth
- Info 1
- Info 2
- Info 3
- Info 4
- Info 5
- Chip id
- Chip id2
- Email
- Handicap
- Predicted time
- Start time
- Leg 1 / Leg 2 etc. (applies to relay races only)
Additional column notes
- Most of the columns are optional, the only required fields are as follows:
- Name or First name / Last name (if both are provided, the Name field is used)
- Team name, Name and Leg 1 / Leg 2 etc. are required for relay races
- A wave start without the Wave column requires Distance or Category (or both)
- An interval wave start requires the Start time column
- Column data issues:
- The column headers must have the exact same text as shown on the sample files
- If you're not using an optional field, you can leave the column header in the file, with no data in the column
- Or, you can delete the column altogether
- The order of columns does not matter
- The uploaded file can have additional columns, they will be ignored during the upload
- You can leave some columns empty and configure the data on the app (such as bib numbers, start times)
Valid data
- Bib can be any number from 1 to 99999
- Duplicate bib numbers are not allowed
- Either all racers must have an assigned bib, or none have an assigned bib
- Duplicate racer name is ok if the assigned bib is different
- Bib (alphanumeric) can contain letters and numbers (maximum of 15 characters)
- Gender can be Female, Male, Female/Male - or F, M, F/M
- Age is a number from 1 to 100
- Year of birth is a number from 1915 to 2015
- Start time can be any clock time from 00:00:00 to 23:59:59
- Handicap can be any number from 0.0001 to 999.99
- If you enter names that are longer than the specified limit, the names will be truncated from the end:
- Name, Team name and Team name 2 fields can be maximum of 40 characters
- Distance, Category and Wave fields can be a maximum of 40 characters
- Info 1 through Info 5 fields can be a maximum of 256 characters
- Email field can be a maximum of 255 characters
- Chip id amd Chip id2 fields can be a maximum of 50 characters
- Info 1, Info 2, Info 3, Info 4, Info 5, and Email are not shown on the website, but are downloaded to Webscorer PRO
Excel tips when using tab-delimited TXT format
- When saving the file as Unicode text, Excel may give two warning popups - answer Yes / OK to each:
- The [Race name] may contain features that are not compatible with Unicode text. Do you want to keep the workbook in this format?
- The selected file type does not support workbooks that contain multiple sheets. To save only the active sheet, click OK.
- When reading in a .TXT file into Excel, the columns with times must be specified as type=Text (with the default type=General will lose the hh from hh:mm:ss
- If special characters (e.g. ä, ö) are not showing properly, the TXT file was not saved as Unicode text
- If you're using Excel as the authoring tool, use file type = Unicode text in Windows Excel and UTF-16 Unicode Text (.txt) in Mac Excel
- If you are using some other tool, the easiest way to convert the file to UTF-8 is to open the saved .TXT file in Windows Notepad or Mac Text Edit
- Once loaded, do a Save as and choose the Encoding to be UTF-8
- On Windows Notepad, the Encoding option is next to the Save button
SAMPLE START LIST FILES
How to use the sample files
- Go to Webscorer.com / Help resources / Sample files / Start lists
- The sample files are offered both in .XLS and tab-delimited TXT file formats
- There are 2 sample files that cover the various race setup options available in Webscorer PRO:
- Sample start list for individual races
- Sample start list for relay races
- Load the sample file into Excel (or another authoring tool) and replace the sample racer data with your own
- Or modify your own start list file by modifying the column headers to match with those in the sample files
- Note that for additional sample files, you can download the start list from any race posted on Webscorer.com:
- Click on the Download start list menu button on any posted start list page
- Click on the Start list menu button on any posted results page to download the start list for that race
Sample start list for individual races
- You can download the samples here
- The sample file includes all possible columns, delete the ones you don't need
- Note that the start type is defined after uploading the start list file
- The racer name can be supplied in 2 ways:
- Name column, or
- First name / Last name columns
- If both are supplied, the Name column value is used
- The Start time column applies only to the following start types:
- Interval start
- Pursuit start
- Interval wave start
- The Wave column can be used with the following start types:
- Manual wave start
- Interval wave start
- Wave is used to determine the starting wave of racer regardless of distance or category
- The sample shows how you can set up an "early start" for a few racers
- You can also setup a "Fully custom" wave start by assigning custom wave to all racers
Sample start list for relay races
- You can download the samples here
- The sample file includes all possible columns, delete the ones you don't need
- Team members can share the same bib, or use a different bib number
- If members of the same team uses different bib numbers, the bib numbers must be listed in the Bib column, separated by a comma
- The Leg 1, Leg 2 columns are used to denote which order the team members race
- The same team member can do multiple legs (repeat Name)
- Start time column can be used for interval start, pursuit start or interval wave start
- Team name column is used as the relay team name
- Team name 2 column is optional and can be used for hometown, sponsor etc.