New Features in Version 5

Additions with Version 5.00/5.10

•Switch to use new API for US Chess>Update from Web Site (5.10e).

•Pairing Rule Sets have been added to control the options available at the section level (5.10d).

•A new operation (US Chess>Install from TSV...) has been added to allow for manual download of the US Chess database (5.10d).

•A "Ladder" pairing style has been added for handling pairings for weekly club meetings (5.10d).

•FIDE Mode has been added at the tournament level to control the options available under FIDE rating rules (5.10a).

•FIDE Dutch Pairings have been updated to the 2025 standard (to be used after 1 February 2026) (5.10c).

•The Define Style dialog has been expanded to allow rearrangement of the styles and deletion of unwanted ones. (5.10c).

•A new, more flexible format for tournament, master player and master team files is replacing the old, fixed format files. (Older files can still be used, but the newer ones are recommended for all future use).

•The FIDE data base can be downloaded and used to fill in rating information.

•The full US Chess database (with all ratings) can now be downloaded. This includes proper handling of the new (2025) coding for life members.

•FIDE Dutch pairings are supported.

•The FIDE rating report feature has been updated to create the required text file.

•FIDE tie breaks have been added (5.10a)

•Ratings and ID data for US Chess, FIDE, and several online chess player sites can be used.

•Number of rounds in a tournament is now unlimited.

•Almost all rules which affect pairings are now included at the section level, rather than in the preferences.

•There is a new option to control how much color affects pairings, ranging from "high" for FIDE pairings (where color correction takes precedence over ratings) down to "none" for tournaments (such as double-blitz) where there is no advantage gained in color assignments.

•Almost all rules which affect how team vs team sections are run are now included at the section level, rather than in the preferences.

•Reports>General Team Standings allows for team standings based upon club or (the new) team(2) codes, and also allows cross section team standings.

•Drag and drop to a team in team vs team tournaments is now time-stamped so first selected are (by default) ordered first in board order (if the rules allow arbitrary board orders).

•The new Edit>Standardize Name Format can be used to correct names which imported in the wrong format.

•Importing of player information, either for tournament entries or for master player lists, has been made more flexible, allowing selection of a particular worksheet off a spreadsheet file, and handling of names split into separate fields for first and last, rather than requiring them to be in a single name field.

•Section>Reset to Earlier Round deletes games beyond a chosen round to (largely) reset the section to where it was before a particular round was paired.

•The Player window now has a new available field which can be chosen to show Round+Color, such as W88w to show Win against 88, played white.

•The Pair a Round dialog has been improved to allow for downgrading teammate and/or club pairing preferences at or above a certain score.

•Tie breaks are now separately chosen for four different purposes.

•***'s for players qualifying for higher awards can now be suppressed (5.00g)

•Command line arguments have been added for FIDE endorsement purposes (5.00i)

•Team Rosters are more flexible and can be created directly from the Section window (5.00l)

•Import tags can now be up to 3 characters when using the new format (5.00p)

•Tournament info such as prize money and seed points can be adjusted for multiple players using Edit>Change Common Info (5.00t)

•High-contrast (Windows) and Dark Mode (Macintosh) are supported (5.01)

•Windows will now use the Accessibility Text Size adjustment (5.01)

Additions with Version 4.2

•The US Chess upload dialogs have been revised to use the newest upload formats.

•You can now generate local ID numbers for players in your master list.

•There is now an Edit>Find operation to locate strings within the name or team fields.

•Data import can accept XLSX files and can read data from a chosen sheet within it.

•You can e-mail or text pairings to players or coaches.

Additions with Version 4.1

•Updated FIDE norm calculations to match the new FIDE specification.

•New US Chess>Update from Website operations.

•New Edit>Convert Case operation.

•New Master(Players)>Update Grades operation

•New "most blacks" and "competition average" tie breaks.

•Widened fields on charts for team tournaments to allow matches with scores greater than 10.0

•Revised printing procedures to print wall charts and cross tables as a batch.

•Added pairing numbers to the style sheet for game lists.

•Now uses a standard dialog for handling page selections.

•Added an absolute floor to ratings calculation

Additions with Version 4.0

•Computes distribution of money prizes.

•Imports player information from a spreadsheet file, including section assignment and bye processing.

•Imports a full section from a cross table on a spreadsheet or text file.

•Allows automatic assignment of a player to a specific board number.

•Allows choice of US Chess, FIDE and 2P rating systems for posting or master file maintenance.

•Provides improved ability to maintain a master file, showing which players from a tournament aren't in the master.

•Can search US Chess database for close matches of names.

•For team tournaments, can fill in players' names on the score sheet.

•Includes a special section type for "bughouse" tournaments, which simplifies combining individual entries into teams.

•Can automatically divide players into sections of similar size, grouping by rating, or grouping to achieve similar strengths in each.

•More pairing styles including hybrid round robin Swiss and Scheveningen.

•Improved support for round robin tournaments. Cross tables can be printed in the standard RR table. Pairing numbers can be assigned by the TD. The full schedule can be shown in a convenient form for transcribing results from paper cross tables.

•Game windows can be configured to split out information for more flexible web posting.

•Configurable "please wait" message for byes.

•Printed cross tables can be sorted on a wider range of keys.

•Wall charts, cross tables and standings can be computed through a requested number of rounds, making it easier to write articles about the tournament.

•Prize list generation for non-monetary awards has been made more flexible.