The following programs have been approved by the FIDE Swiss Pairing Program Commission for use in FIDE rated events.
SWISS MASTER (Koninklijke Nederlandse Schaakbond NED) Dutch System
SWISS MANAGER (Heinz Herzog AUT) Dutch System
WINSWISS (Franz-Josef Weber GER) Dutch System
VEGA (Luigi Forlano ITA) Dubov System/ Dutch System
TURNERING SERVICE (Harald Heggelund NOR) Dutch System
Tournament Director (Neil Hayward ENG) Dutch System
The Dutch System is a method of imploying the Swiss Pairing Sytem which is by rating (basically top half versus bottom half), which is what most of us are familiar with.
There are other variations of the Swiss Pairing System (like the Dubov using ARO [average rating of a player’s opponents] or the USCF System is slightly different that the standard Dutch system used by FIDE).
I am only familiar with two of the programs Mr. Langland asked about. I’ve used Swiss Master over the last two years at the London Chess Classic. Swiss Manager is what is being used now at the Gibraltar Chess Congress.
I wouldn’t call myself an expert user of either program, but I have been given crash courses in both by experienced users, and I’ve used both programs on my own for side events.
What I like best about both programs is that it’s very easy to publish detailed tournament information to the web. The cross-linking between wall charts, player cards, and other information is very nice.
In my limited experience, I haven’t yet run across a pairing using either program that I thought should be changed, or that any player has complained about. My guess is that neither would fare as well if pairing a USCF event, but since they were specifically developed for FIDE compatibility, that’s not surprising.
Would either of those programs be able to generate the kind of files USCF requires for a ratings report? After all, in the USA FIDE events are also USCF rated.
I doubt either program could generate the DBF files necessary for TD/A submission. To be clear, I have not tried this. However, the programs were developed to be FIDE compatible, so I would be surprised if that functionality were implemented. My limited experience with them is in FIDE-only events.
They don’t however I’ve spoken to the creator of Swiss Manager and he is willing to look at what it would take to do it. I just haven’t had the opportunity yet to work with him on it.
I own Swiss Manager and have used it at some major events in the US which used FIDE pairings. It does not do the files necessary to have the event USCF rated and so I also duplicated the events in WinTD to accomplish this.
Swiss Manager in itself is not the most intuitive pairings program in the world to operate but just like most software, once you become familiar with it, it becomes easier.
I would also like to mention that Heinz has always been very responsive to any and all questions and issues I have had while using his program. For example, there was a tie-break system they wanted to use at the US Championships which was not one of the options within the program but once notified, there was an update to the program available on his website within half a day with the new tie-break available.