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ACES & the Panhandle Cattle Company - or, electronics in the back woods


Hollifer A. Dollar

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There have been several threads about using the ACES scoring system, so I thought it would be a good idea to document our experiences. I had first used ACES at Ft. White's annual match last year, then again at Givhans Ferry, but only for data entry. After reading & reviewing, I decided to bring our club (Panhandle Cattle Company in Chipley FL) into the electronic fold. Here is our story:

 

Trial run

 

We gave it a short run at our February Wild Bunch match. Since I knew it would be a small match (6 shooters participated), it was a good chance to try it out. I had a 7" android tablet that I had purchased from Big Lots a while back, so I installed the ACES app, went through the match setup & used it on match day. The tablet had an external keyboard that made it easy to add shooters. Kay Sadeeya did our scoring that day & as a new ACES user had no problems getting used to the system. The only hiccup we had was after the match when we viewed the results - we chose the wrong sort method! Duh. Everyone involved was impressed, so we decided to give it a go at our monthly cowboy match 3 weeks later.

 

Hardware

 

We average 20-25 shooters & run 2 posses, so I knew we would need some more hardware. Big Lots ran a sale (timely huh) & had a similar tablet, so I purchased another. To synch up the 2 tablets, I would need a router...but...we have no electricity at our range. I had a wireless router that I keep as a spare, & I have an AC inverter in my truck, so all I needed was an extension cord. The week before the match, I tried the whole system, worked out the issues (both tablets must be connected to the same network - that can be an issue if there is more than one wireless router in range). They would find each other & synch right away. Hardware was ready!

 

Match setup

 

You do have to set up the match stages, especially if you have bonus targets. I usually write the stages 2 weeks ahead of time, so that was pretty easy.

 

In our usual match notice, I asked folks to RSVP so that I could get some of them set up in the shooter list. When setting up the shooters, there is a "Lady Shooter" check box on the information page. I also noticed that there were also lady shooter categories (e.g. 49er & Lady 49er). This is something that will have a big effect later.

 

While adding shooters, I needed to add a category - frontier cartridge gunfighter. Yes, I know it's not a SASS recognized category, but we have guys that shoot gunfighter with smokeless & some that shoot with BP. While adding the category, something odd happened & ALL the categories got deleted! I have no idea what caused it & could not get them to restore. I switched to the 2nd tablet, synched them so that the shooter info came across, then did shooter setup from that tablet. The categories were all available. An odd thing, the other tablet never got the category list back after synching.

 

Match day

 

My plan to use the router powered by the AC inverter worked just fine. I had charged both tablets overnight to be sure they had good battery life. Thankfully match day weather was perfect - I didn't have to worry about rain on the tablets.

 

Match day sign-in went easily. We did use paper scoresheets as well as the electronic version, for safety purposes. South Pacific did all the paper stuff & I did the electronic setup. One thing that is tough is viewing your posses on the tablets. I found that looking at "Results by posse" was the best way to see a whole list, then I could go back & move shooters if needed.

 

Data entry was straightforward. We had 3 folks that had used ACES before, so we took on the job of scorekeepers for our posses. Glare does become an issue - I found that turning my back to the sun helped a lot. Also, juggling a clipboard with 12 scoresheets & the tablet was a pain.

 

The tablet used by the other posse lost battery charge on the 4th stage. We solved that by putting it on the hood of my truck (I was parked 25 ft from the firing line - one of the benefits of getting there early) & left it on the charger. The tablet I used, I would turn the display off after data entry. The scorekeepers on the other posse didn't do that. Lesson learned.

 

After the match, getting results was easy. One problem that did come up, when I was doing the category winners to give out ribbons, I had lady shooters mixed in the men's categories - HORROR! This is where the selection of proper category during sign-in was important. Just checking that "lady shooter" box didn't do the trick.

 

Reporting results

 

Since we didn't have internet access at the range, I waited til later in the afternoon to distribute the results. You have to have e-mail set up on your tablet to share them. That is the only quirk about the process. I sent myself the HTML output, then created a PDF file from that. After the WB trial, one complaint was that one person couldn't open the HTML file. Problem solved.

 

Something odd that happened, the first time I shared the HTML output, there were no categories listed in the "detailed results by time" report. The column was there, but it was blank. I tried it again yesterday (same tablet, same process, same report) & this time the categories were shown. I must not have held my mouth right the first time.

 

I can't figure out how to upload the results to the ACES server. When I select that option, it brings up a screen for username/password, but I don't know where to get those. If anyone has suggestions on that, please pass them on to me.

 

Conclusions

 

I like the system a lot. It was very easy to implement & has a LOT of benefits. The problems we had (battery life, glare, category selection) are very easy to resolve. It's well worth the effort & investment needed to go electronic.

 

Recommendations

 

When you set up your tablets, set "display sleep time" to 30 seconds. That will extend your battery life a LOT. Also, turn off the display lock so that you are back into the system when you hit the on button. It's a pain to get that lock to slide at times.

 

Use a stylus for entry rather than your fingertip. It's more accurate & more consistent, especially when hitting the little + to add misses. Big Lots sells a combination stylus/pen so the scorekeeper only has to hold onto 1 thing at a time.

 

Provide a place to put the scoresheets & tablet for data entry. Juggling them is a real pain & could be disastrous (dropped tablet). We discussed building a lectern for each posse, but a little research on eBay by Captain Murphy found us some folding music stands that will work perfectly for less than we would spend to build lecterns.

 

If anyone has questions, just send me a message. I hope this information is helpful to those considering ACES. Go for it, you will love it!

 

Holler

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We had a little better success the first time, we had already been using RoundUp for years ,RoundUp & ACES are compatible so after building match in R.UP just export to ACES pretty easy(also score sheets are printed from R.UP, that way your using a laptop with a mouse to build posse's we usually have 3-5 posse's anyway, if one did want to import back to RoundUp after match they would not have too but we do.

 

Also I emailed our shooters list to the Ipad (main device) so most folks are going to be in there.

 

Our current scorekeeper does not shoot but she is stepping away so we wanted to go to something that manually inputting all the scores was not necessary.

 

Glad you wrote this, AO

 

PS we found with our kindles if screen is not locked vertical if someone turned it while scoring penalties were erased, simple fix if you know.

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We had a little better success the first time, we had already been using RoundUp for years ,RoundUp & ACES are compatible so after building match in R.UP just export to ACES pretty easy(also score sheets are printed from R.UP, that way your using a laptop with a mouse to build posse's we usually have 3-5 posse's anyway, if one did want to import back to RoundUp after match they would not have too but we do , very easy.

 

Also I emailed our shooters list to the Ipad (main device) so most folks are going to be in there.

 

Our current scorekeeper does not shoot but she is stepping away so we wanted to go to something that manually inputting all the scores was not necessary.

 

Glad you wrote this, AO

 

PS we found with our kindles if screen is not locked vertical if someone turned it while scoring penalties were erased, simple fix if you know.

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