I have used WinTD for several years and I like it a lot. A friend ran WinTD for a large scholastic tournament this weekend, and she had an experience that seems unusual to me. I am wondering if any other WinTD-users can give me some insight. I am trying to help her figure out what happened so we can avoid such problems in the future.
In the middle of the tournament, she shut down WinTD for some reason, and when she retrieved her tournament file, she had lost several rounds, which she had to rebuild.
The only suspicion that I have is that MAYBE she had two tournament windows open accidently, and that she might have accidently saved an older version on top of the current version. She is absolutely sure that she was saving frequently.
Does anyone else have ideas? If you are an experienced WinTD user, I would be glad to hear from you.
One source you might try is the Estima web page (estima.com). There is contact info and support for WinTD there.
One of down and dirty techniques you can use with WinTD is to select “file”-“copy tournament to” and save the tournament file with a slightly different name for each round. The “copy tournament to” option does not change or disturb the original file in any way.
Example:
I will use “mytournament” as the file name.
Step 1: Before I pair round 1 I save the file normally as “mytournament.”
Step 2: I pair round 1.
Step 3: I click on “file” – “copy tournament to”-and give the file the name “mytournament1” and save it.
Step 4: I enter all the results for the round and save it normally (it will save itself under the mytournament file name).
Step 5. I pair round 2.
Step 6 I click on “file” – “copy tournament to”-and give the file the name “mytournament2” and save it.
Well you get the idea. This technique allows you to save a copy of the file at the start of each round with a slightly different name while still not disturbing the original file (or the save routine) at all. The end of the round is always saved with the original tournament name. It also becomes routine for the operator to save at the start and end of each round.
If you want real safety every time you save the original file (I suggest at the start and end of each round) use the “copy tournament to” option and save it again with a slightly different name.
I would suggest when using the “copy tournament to” option that you save your tournament file to a floppy or flash drive as a safety measure.