Hello!

I’ve been working hard trying to address some usability issues with the new design launched last year. I think the changes will be very helpful.

Throughout the site, you will now see a Question Mark button that looks like this:

If you have questions about a particular page, that button should help direct you. My ultimate goal is for each help button to also link out to a more detailed page on this blog explaining how to use the particular feature on the page.

As always, please send any feedback my way – danny@forensicstournament.net

Sincerely,
Danny Cantrell

 

Wanted to do a quick tutorial on registering for a tournament on the newly redesigned ForensicsTournament.net

1. Create a new account

Due to the new site design, all accounts need to be recreated as of Sept 4, 2018.  If you haven’t created your new account yet you can do so for free on the register page:

(Note that all fields are required).

2. Once you have your new account, the next step is to add a school to your account.  Click on the trophy icon in the top right and then click where it says “Not Set”

This will take you to your current school page:

From this page you can either create your school if your school doesn’t currently exist or request access to your school from the third box.  Note that you can only do one request every 72 hours.  For more information on how to set your current school please see this post.

Once you have your school linked to your account, you’ll see that school listed when you click on the trophy:

3. You can then visit the tournament calendar to visit a tournament homepage. Once there, click on the “register” link on the left hand side.  As long as the tournament is accepting entries, you’ll see the entry summary page when you click on the register link:

4. You can then register competitors or judges for the tournament. Note that your entries will be listed on the summary page and an estimate of your fees (if the tournament director has made the fees visible) will be available from this page.

The way ForensicsTournament.net works is that the site will save a school to the system. Coaches can then be given access to this school in two ways: Granting Access or Requesting Access.

Granting Access

If you currently have access to a school (either you created it or you have been approved to access the school) you can visit your school home page.  You’ll see a page that looks like this:

Here you can edit the school information (such as name, location, etc), edit the student & judge roster, as well as control school access.  Note that the school access icon will give you a quick preview of how many pending requests you have.

Clicking on the school access button will then take you to a page where you can see who currently has access, grant access, and respond to requests:

You can search for users to add by either their name or email address. Once you find the correct person, click “update” and the user will be given access to the school. Their account will also be set to have the school be their current school which should help simply the next time they login.

You can also quickly approve or deny requests other coaches have made for access to your school. Just click the Green Approve button or Red Deny.  The person requesting access will receive an email with your decision. If you approve, the person will be given access and their account will be set to the school.

Requesting Access

A second approach involves you requesting access for the school.  If you go to your profile page you’ll see the following page:

If you click on update your current school you’ll see a few options:

 

The Current School section will allow you to create a new school in the system if your school is not currently saved.  Note that in Summer 2018 all schools were reset with the transition to the new page.

The Change your Current School section allows you to quickly switch between schools if you have been given access to different ones.  Sometimes this is helpful if a coach is involved in both a high school and college team.

Finally, the Request Access section will allow you to search for a school name and request that the current coaches for that school approve you.  Each coach with access to the school you select will get an email asking them to approve or reject the request.  Note that you may only have 1 pending request at a time.  All requests expire within 72 hours so if you do not hear back from the coaches please try to contact them before requesting again.

As of this morning (9/27/18), all previously uploaded tournament documents and result files should now be available for archived tournaments.  Thanks for your patience in getting those moved over to the new server.

Just click on the “results” link on the left hand side for your tournament.

If you have any questions, please feel free to contact me.

 

I’m very excited that after approximately 8 years with the old design, ForensicsTournament.net has a new look! I’ve been hard at work over the summer updating all the underlying code to take advantage of new web technologies which should help ForensicsTournament.net better serve students.  This blog will serve as a way to update site users on new developments and issues that are popping up.  If you need help, please do not comment here but send me an email to danny@forensicstournament.net

Thanks for your continued support of the site! It’s been fun working on it since 2006!