Blog

May, 2016

I’ve not taken the  time to collect and share information on new features as they have crept into the program. Fortunately, it’s because I’ve been busy programming and providing support for users. However, it’s time to start documenting features that are not obvious in Diamond Scheduler.

I’ll start with the most recent release but return to discuss features that have been created before now. So, the May 15 release has a few new features, as noted in the release notes.

Can now set time constraints for home games use as well as recurring season time and date constraints.

I have received requests to add to the capability of setting time constraints on each (or some or all) team’s play constraints. Since the first release, you have been able to specific times of the day, days of the week, or specific calendar days during the season when teams cannot play. I have added the ability to create parallel requests for a team’s home venue use. What’s the use-case? You have one venue but Team A should always play their home games using the Monday night slots, Team B the Tuesday night slots. This new feature allows you to include these specialized scheduling constraints.

Switching Game Timeslot with another Timeslot behavior has changed.

After thinking about it for some time, I decided I was making the switch game timeslots functionality a little more complicated than it needed to be for users so it’s been modified. However, I’m waiting for feedback so let me know if it works for you. I’ll update the documentation once a final decision has been made.I decided I was making the switch game timeslots functionality a little more complicated than it needed to be for users so it’s been modified. However, I’m waiting for feedback so let me know if it works for you.
To switch game timeslots, highlight the two timeslots that should switch (if you are crossing a month then click on the first one, go to the timeslot in the  next month, hold down the control key (command key for Mac) then select the second timeslot. Now the menu item for Switch Game Timeslots will be enabled and it’s a single click instead of 2 steps.

https://www.screencast.com/t/26hpNBOnV

Can set preferences to show no data by default when switching to master calendar or game list to significantly increase the navigation speed. Can still filter by division, team or venue once at the report.

I am aware as anyone that when your league gets huge, navigating to the master calendar or game list can take time as the program retrieves the data then renders each datum graphically. There is now an option under the preferences menu that allows you to initially open either of these views without any divisions, teams or venues chosen. You can then use the filter panel to determine and retain the view you want to focus on during the current scheduling session. A real time-saver, IMHO.

open_mc_gamelist_without_data

 

Added ability to switch timeslots, flip home and away, lock timeslots, send games to the reschedule list and more from game list.

To date, most of the shortcut menu items such as switching timeslots, flipping home and away and others have solely been available in the master calendar. This release extends those shortcuts to the game list.

Added ability to copy a cell, copy a row, copy selected rows or copy all rows in the game list and place the information in a tab-delimited format in the clipboard.

One requested feature was the ability to copy rows of data in the game list into the clipboard so that one could paste the data into Excel or another spreadsheet. This feature is now available with a right click on the game list.

Added ability to delete all special requests for a team.

If you have been working on a schedule and decided there’s an approach you would like to take that doesn’t involve special requests, you previously had to delete each team’s special request one at a time. You can now delete all special requests for a team.

Created ability to export a schedule’s pairings so they can be imported to another schedule for reuse.

You can now export an existing schedule’s pairings so that you can re-import them into another division’s schedule or the following year’s schedule to replicate a successful rotation.