Banana Split!

Race/Split Timer for the Palm OS

Version 3.7 – March 2002

Introduction

The Banana Split Sport timer is a full function timer that is designed to capture lap, pace, and finish times. Because of the flexibility of its completely programmable and configurable screen and databases, it surpasses the capabilities of all dedicated hardware timers and is the most sophisticated timer available for the PalmOS handheld.

It can be integrated with desktop data systems such as Excel spreadsheet, Access database, or race management software.

It accommodates interval starts (where racers start at staggered intervals) and delayed starts (where a class of racers starts after a given delay) as well as combinations of delays and intervals.

Results can be filtered and sorted in various orders and saved to the MemoPad for printing and syncing with the desktop.

You can “beam” results directly from one Palm to another to collect results from multiple timing units into one consolidated result list. You can also use this feature to collect interim results before the race is over.

Results can be edited to incorporate changes necessary due to operator error. (We realize that the real world of race timing is not the well controlled laboratory and there are numerous distractions that can lead to missing or incorrect times. Banana Split lets you correct these errors.)

Banana Split offers unusual flexibility in that you can exchange racer lists and result lists with the Palm MemoPad. The results are then available on the Palm Desktop via HotSync.

This allows you to set up multiple races (racer lists) before race day, save these lists to the MemoPad and then load them into BananaSplit just before the race starts.

You can also do the same thing with racer lists stored on a desktop or laptop computer with a serial port. You can move racer lists into and out of the Palm through a direct serial connection. You don’t even need the Palm desktop software installed. All you need is a simple terminal program such as the Windows Hyperterminal.

You can also save results (sorted in numerous ways) to the MemoPad. The result lists can be loaded back into Banana Split from the MemoPad if you want to make corrections or sort the results differently.

Results can also be sent through a direct serial connection to a desktop machine for further processing.

We’ve included an Excel spreadsheet template that you can use for registering racers on a desktop machine and importing them into Banana Split.

Features:

Unlimited number of racers

Unlimited number of laps

Displays Pace in any of seven units (/Mile, /Km, /100Yards, /100Meters, /400 Meters, Miles/Hour, Km/Hr)

Displays projected finish time for multi-lap races.

Display time in up to 1/100 second.

Racer registration with Name, Class (for competition class), and Group (for team results)

Advanced Race Management Features:

- Beam racer lists and results from one unit to another.

- Print preliminary results before all racers are finished.

- Edit start time to synchronize multiple timers.

- Add or edit times.

Special Features for Special Sports:

Interval Start Split times:

Banana Split will properly calculate split times when you have staggered or interval starts. This is particularly useful for cross-country ski races and other sports with “wave” starts.

Cross-country Running Team Scoring:

Banana Split instantly calculates team scores for cross country running races. It correctly calculates scores for full five person teams, omits runners that don’t have a full team, and will correctly calculate scores for up to two “displacers” for each full team.

You can use it to calculate the scores at the finish line and it is also handy to calculate scores midway through the race and give this information to your coaches and racers to motivate better performance.

Demonstration Version (Unregistered Version)

The Demonstration version is limited to the entry of 50 results and the maximum bib number is 50. It does not have the ability to import and export racer and result information.

When you register as a Coach or Professional version, you will receive a registration code that you enter into the BananaSplit program on your PalmOS handheld using the Menu/Show/Register selection. This unlocks all of the features of the version you have registered.

Coach Version

Coach version does not have racer and result import and export capability. In addition, you cannot add a new result or adjust the clock.

Professional Version

All features are enabled. This is the most sophisticated and easiest to use race timer for your Palm handheld. You can use this to manage multiple races and collect intermediate results via the Palm infrared “Beaming” capability.

One program performs race timing and racer management and can transfer information back and forth to desktop and laptop PCs.

You also get the ability to transfer preliminary results during the race so that you can post intermediate results before the race has finished.

	Demo	Coach	Professional
Unlimited Racers (approx 50K memory per 1,000 racers)*	50	Ö	Ö
Unlimited Results (approx 25K memory per 1,000 results)*	50	Ö	Ö
Racer Registration with Class and Group	Ö	Ö	Ö
Interval Start	Ö	Ö	Ö
Wave Start	Ö	Ö	Ö
Edit Time of result	Ö	Ö	Ö
Edit Bib number of result	Ö	Ö	Ö
Racer splits, pace, and projected finish time	Ö	Ö	Ö
Save Results to Palm MemoPad	Ö	Ö	Ö
Race Management			Ö
Racer Import/Export (MemoPad, IR and Serial port)			Ö
Result Import/Export (MemoPad, IR and Serial port)			Ö
Add new result			Ö
Adjust elapsed time and results			Ö
Cross-country running team scores			Ö

* The number of racers and results that you can store is limited by the amount of free memory on your PalmOS handheld. A race with 1,000 racers would take up approximately 100K (0.1 Meg) of memory (using typical racer names, classes, and groups). Most current PalmOS handhelds have 8 Megs of memory.

Banana Split can be used for Race Timing and Coaching.

Race Timing

The Race/Split Timer can be used to perform complete timing functions for accurate race timing and scoring. It can be used to time and score a race. It can register racers and place them in classes that can be scored separately. You can also register team groups that may have members in different classes. The groups can be use to calculate team totals.

Banana Split can perform all of the functions necessary for race administration and timing.

- It can be used for race registration to enter racer names, classes, and groups.

- During the race it can be used to enter racer times (including lap times if you wish).

- After the race it will produce reports showing overall finish order as well as breakdowns by lap, class, and group.

- You can even use multiple Palm computers for registration and consolidate the racers into one Palm that will record the results.

Coaching

Banana Split tracks laps and split times and can calculate pace and projected finish time. It records the time for each lap for as many racers as you wish and can compare racers’ performance on each lap as well as overall.

These functions make it an excellent timer for on field coaching.

Split Timing

In the sport of cross country skiing (and others) you often have an "interval start" where racers don't all start at once but start at designated intervals. Because each racer has a different start time, it is difficult to tell during the race just how a given racer is performing compared to other racers. Interval start split timing allows coaches on the track to enter times for racers as they pass a given point. The timer knows the start times of each racer and therefore can calculate the time for each racer at that point (their "split time"). The split timing display shows how the racer of interest is performing compared to the first three racers and compared to the racers just ahead and behind.

The split timing feature was designed to work with cross-country skiing races which as far as I can determine are the most complex events to time and coach. Cross-country skiing races frequently have interval starts (with one or more skiers starting at intervals of typically 30 seconds.) Interval starts are difficult for racers. Since everyone has a different start time, racers can’t easily determine where they are in relation to the other competitors. Cross-country ski races also often have multiple laps and racers on their first lap may be at the same place on the course as racers from a later lap. Racers in different classes may compete in the same race even though they will only be scored against other racers in their same class.

All of these factors add up to making timing a very complex activity. Coaches typically will position themselves on the course and capture the times of all racers as they pass. When their own racers pass, they can then give these racers accurate information on how they compare to the field of racers. The timing needs to take into account start time (which can be different for every skier), racer class, and racer lap.

In order to accommodate these complex timing functions, the Race/Split Timer allows for very flexible start times, automatically calculates interval starts, can accommodate multiple waves with time delays between waves, and allows placing racers in classes and groups so that racers can be easily compared. The timer keeps track of laps for each racer and accurately places skiers in their current lap.

Since faster skiers may start later pass the timing point after your skiers, the timer can also be used to give “back splits” which are calculated after more racers have passed the test point and can be radioed ahead to another coach further down the course. These back splits give racers a better idea of the competition since they are calculated after more skiers have passed.

The timer compares in functionality with expensive dedicated timers that perform similar timing. The advantages of this timer are that it is much easier to learn and use and there is more flexibility in display and configuration. It is also much less expensive (even if you count the cost of the Palm Pilot computer).

Fast, Easy Time Entry

The program is designed to make it easy to quickly and accurately enter racer results. In the real world of races, it is common for a pack of several racers to cross the finish line in close proximity. The timer allows you to “pre-record” up to four bib numbers in Enter buttons. You pre-load a bib number by entering it on the numeric keypad or by using Graffiti and then tapping the “Up Arrow” in the middle of the screen.

You can also enter times without a bib number and then quickly edit them after the pack has passed to add their bib numbers.

When you press the Enter button, the bib number that is on the button used as the bib number for this time. You can later go back and assign a bib number to this result.

If there is no bib numbers on the Enter button, the program will look on the bib entry line (to the left of the number pad) for a valid bib number. If no bib number there, then you’ll get a race result with bib number 0.

If you don't have time to pre-record the bib number, you can enter a racer time without a bib number and go back and enter the proper bib number once the pack has passed.

The two Palm hardware buttons on the right (ToDo and MemoPad icons) are mapped to the first two Enter buttons. You can press these buttons and enter a time. These buttons are active regardless of what screen you are viewing. This is handy if you are viewing another screen (such as a list of results) and need to enter a time. Just press the hardware enter button and the time will be entered even if you are viewing another screen.

You also have the option of keeping the bib numbers in the “Enter” list or clearing the bib number out of the list when you enter a time. You can use the “Settings” screen “KeepBib” checkbox to retain the bib number in the Enter button. Then you won’t have to re-enter the bib number for each lap. (See the section below on “Settings Information” for further information.) This is handy when you want to record a large number of lap times for up to four racers.

Show Menu

The “Show” menu has options to switch between various screens of information.

It includes:

- Settings (Set your defaults for interface and display)

- Racer Setup (Setup your Racer information)

- Racer Edit (Edit individual Racers)

- Timer (Switch to the Time enter screen)

- About (Version and contact information)

- Register (Enter your registration code)

Settings Information

The “Setup Options” screen (Menu/Screen/Settings) lets you define several options.

Display Decimals

This lets you select the level of precision that you want to display for your time values. Banana split keeps time in milliseconds internally and you can display the time with a precision of whole seconds, tenths, or hundredths. The accuracy of your time keeping is limited to the accuracy of recording times. The manual pressing of the time enter button determines the accuracy of the time recorded.

Race Distance, Number of Laps, and Pace Units

If you want the timer to display a “Pace” on the Split screen and the Results display, enter a distance. If you have a multiple lap race, enter the distance for a lap and the number of laps. The Split screen and Result Display will show the projected finish time in addition to the current lap pace.

The Number of Laps is also used to check to make sure you don’t too many laps for a racer. This can happen if bib numbers are entered incorrectly. When you try to enter a bib number for a racer who has already completed the number of laps you set, you are given a warning. However, you can override the warning and enter an extra lap for that bib number or you can enter that time with a bib number of 0. This warning tells you that you have an extra lap for that bib number which you need to correct.

You must enter a distance for the race if you enter a number of laps greater than one. (You can enter “No Pace” for Pace Units if you don’t want pace displayed.)

You can enter a Distance, the units for the distance, and the units for the pace. You can enter any combination of units. (For instance, you can enter the distance in Yards, and display the Pace in Kilometers/hour if you really want to do that).

You also have the option of entering “No Pace”. When you do this, the pace will not be calculated or displayed.

If you leave the distance blank or zero, the program cannot and will not calculate a pace.

In this case, the result lists will calculate a “% effort” where the fastest racer is 100% and everyone else is a fraction of that expressed as a percent. These numbers will all be less than 100%. The Racer Splits screen will display the lap time instead of the pace.

The Split screen and the Results by Place screen will display an average pace for elapsed laps. The Results by Bib number screen will display a pace for each lap.

Delimiter for data output

When you export data to the MemoPad, you can specify the delimiter used to separate fields.

We have found that a “tab” delimiter works well for exporting to Excel spreadsheets. You can also set this to a comma or space.

X-C Scorers and Team Size

This option lets you set the size of your cross country team for team scoring purposes. Standard meets are 5 scoring members and 7 maximum team size (i.e. 2 pushers). However, some meets may have different size teams due to local rules.

You can set the number of team members who will be counted for scoring and the number of team members who will push up the scores of other racers. The Team must be greater than or equal to Scorers. The maximum team size is 9.

Serial Speed

When you send data to the Serial Port (using the Result/SerialOutput option), you need to set the speed of the serial port here. You have options of speeds from 300 to 19,200.

The remainder of the parameters for the serial port are the default for the Palm device which is:

N,8,1,XON/XOFF

No Parity, 8 data bits, one stop bit, Xon/Xoff protocol

You should make sure that the receiving device at the other end of the serial port is set to the same parameters.

The IR port speed is always set to 9600 for infrared beaming.

Sounds

The timer has the option of playing a tone for data entry. If you check the “Sounds” checkbox, it will play various tones to indicate number input, time entry, etc. Many people find these tones useful.

If the Sounds checkbox is not checked, you will only hear a faint “click” for data entry.

Keep Bib

This checkbox determines whether or not the bib number is cleared from the “Enter” button after you have entered a time.

If this checkbox is empty, when you press an “Enter” button that has a bib number on it’s face, the bib number is cleared and the button will again say “Enter”.

If the checkbox is checked, the bib number will stay on the “Enter” button after you have pressed it to enter a result time. You can clear the bib number from the “Enter” button by pressing the “down arrow” button on the main screen.

When you have four or fewer racers and lots of laps, it is handy to check the “KeepBib” checkbox. Then you won’t have to repeatedly enter the bib number for each lap.

Racer Setup Screen

Select Function from scroll box and fill information.

This screen has a wide range of options to make it fast and easy to setup your racers. These options include:

- Add New Bib Numbers

- Class

- Group

- Interval Start

- Delay

- Delete Bib Numbers

- Store Racers in Memo

- Add Racers from Memo

- Add Racers from Serial Port

- Delete All Racers

Add New Bib Numbers

Enter starting and ending bib numbers.

Bib numbers must be positive numbers and must be greater than 0.

New bib numbers will be added if they don’t exist.

If the bib number already exists, no changes will be made to the existing information.

Class

Class is typically used for all members of a single race (such as Men’s Varsity, JV, etc.)

Members of a class compete with each other in the same class.

Enter starting and ending bib numbers.

Enter the new class. (Letters are converted to uppercase automatically).

The Class for the range of bib numbers is changed to the class you entered.

Any old class information is overwritten.

The class information is used by the program when calculating place order.

The program will only display members of the same class and only count members of the same class.

Each class will have its own place order.

Group

Group is typically used to assign bibs to Teams.

The Group can also be used to assign racers to different distance races that are being run simultaneously. (You might have a 5K and 10K race run together. Assign the 5K racers to group 5K and the 10K racers to group 10K). You can then get results for each race separately. You can also assign classes to these racers. You may have J2 and J1 running the 5K race and OJ and M classes running the 10K.)

Members of a group can compete is multiple classes.

A team can have members in more than one class.

Groups can be displayed together but their places will reflect class places, not group places

Interval Start

Enter starting and ending bib numbers.

Enter a DELAY in number of seconds (must be a positive number).

Delay is the number of seconds that will be added to the start time of all bib numbers in this range.

(Delay is useful when you have a group of bib numbers such as Junior Varsity that will be starting after a fixed delay.)

Enter the INTERVAL in number of seconds (must be a positive number).

Interval is the starting interval for each group.

Enter the number of people that will be starting in each interval (must be positive).

The program calculates a total delay in start time as delay + interval.

This calculated delay will overwrite any prior delay information for these bib numbers.

Delay

Enter starting and ending bib numbers.

Enter a DELAY in number of seconds (must be a positive number).

Delay is the number of seconds that will be added to the start time of all bib numbers in this range.

(Delay is useful when you have a group of bib numbers such as Junior Varsity that will be starting after a fixed delay.)

This calculated delay will overwrite any prior delay information.

Delete Bib Numbers

This will delete all bib numbers in the range you enter (inclusive).

Copy to MemoPad

Enter starting and ending bib numbers.

All of the information in the racer setup (bib number, name, class, group, start delay) will be copied to the MemoPad

If more than 100 racers are copied to the MemoPad, the program will divide them into separate pages on the MemoPad.

A header is affixed showing the bib number range in each page.

This is useful to have a record of your setup.

You can also use this to restore a race setup.

Store Racers in MemoPad

You can setup the races and save them to the MemoPad and then load each as needed.

You can select a range of bib numbers that will be saved to the memo pad.

You should also enter a label for the racer set. The first line in the memo pad will look like:

Racers: label Bib: x to: y Page: x

The program can save a maximum of 100 racers to each memo pad entry. If you have more than 100 racers, it will create additional Pages in the memo pad with the additional racers.

Add Racers from MemoPad

You can use this to add racers that you have previously saved to the MemoPad.

This is useful is you are using the MemoPad for multiple races with duplicate bib numbers.

You can setup the races ahead of time and save them to the MemoPad and then load each as needed.

When you select this option, the program will look through your memo pad for racer sets that you have saved. It looks for memo pad entries starting with "Racers:"

When you find the racer set you want to add, select it. It will add these racers to the racers already in the program. If you want only the racers in the memo pad set, you should delete all racers before you add the new racer set.

When you add racers from the MemoPad, the program will first ask you what to do with duplicate entries. You can choose to skip duplicates or overwrite duplicate bib number.

If you choose "Skip", the racer information from the MemoPad will not be added to the racer list.

If you choose "Overwrite", the new racer information in the MemoPad will overwrite the existing bib entry.

This option can be used to add racers that have been previously entered in the Banana Split program and saved to the Memo pad with the "Store Racers in Memo" selection.

It is also possible to use your desktop computer text editor or spreadsheet program to enter racers into the Palm desktop and synchronize the memo pad with your Palm. We have included an Excel spreadsheet template that you can use to enter racer lists in Excel, copy to the Palm MemoPad (do a “Save as…” to Tab delimited text file in Excel and then copy this text file to a new MemoPad entry on the Palm Desktop) and then load this list into BananaSplit.

Text File

In order to do this, you must carefully observe the following format. Any deviations from the format will have unpredictable consequences.

The first line of the Memo must start with the word: "Racers:" (without quotes and must include the colon). You may type anything else you wish on this line as a title or reminder. The line ends with a carriage return.

The program expects a new racer on each following line. The fields on each line are separated by "tab" characters and each line ends with a carriage return character. There should be no extra spaces in the fields. Spaces within the name field are acceptable and you may put a comma between the last and first name in the name field.

The fields are:

· Bib number

· Name

· Class

· Group

· Start Delay (in seconds)

Each field should be separated by a tab character and the entire line should have a carriage return at the end.

Spreadsheet

You may also use a spreadsheet such as Excel to record racer information and then use the "Save as…" function to save the data as a tab delimited file.

Set Excel "Save as…" type to: Text (Tab delimited) (*.txt).

You can copy this file to the desktop MemoPad, hotsync it to your Palm computer and then import it to Banana Split.

The spreadsheet should have these five columns:

Racers:Bib Name Class Group Delay

The spreadsheet tab delimited format puts quotes around any text (such as names) that has a comma in it. The Add Racers function will remove these quotes (as well as the characters !"#$%&' and leading/trailing blanks).

Note on Result Display: Pace-

If “Distance” on setup screen is zero, then results won’t display a pace column.

Add Racers from Serial Port

This option uses a direct serial connection to any computer to load racers directly into Banana Split. The computer does not need to have the Palm Desktop software installed and does not need to perform a Hotsync operation. You only need a terminal emulation program or other program that can send data through the serial port. This makes is easy to directly load large numbers of racers into your Palm.

This imports racers in same tab delimited format as they are exported to MemoPad. You do not need to have the “Racers:” as the first line of the input. It will be ignored if it is present.

Access from Menu/RacerSetup and scroll to the selection “Add Racers from Serial Port".

Press "Update" button when ready to send data from the attached computer. If using Hyperterminal - use the option Transfer/SendTextFile.

After the complete file has been received, tap button AddNew to load the receive racers into Racer db.

Will ask to Skip or Overwrite duplicates.

You’ll need to see which serial port speeds work for you. Different model PalmOS machines have different processors, processor speeds, and serial ports (USB or RS232). All of these factors influence the maximum speed at which the Palm will accept data. If the speed is set too fast, you’ll get incomplete garbled data. The baseline lowest common denominator Palm (16MHz, RS232 serial, Dragonball processor) will run at 1200 baud. Newer faster PalmOS handhelds will work at faster speeds. However, even at 1200 baud, you can load 1000 racers in a few minutes.

Step by step procedure:

1. Set your desktop serial program (i.e. Hyperterminal) to 1200, N, 8, 1

(Note: you need to exit Hyperterminal and re-start it when you make changes.)

2. Set the Banana split to 1200 baud. (Don't need to exit and restart)

3. Got to Menu/Racer Setup and choose the "Add Racers from Serial Port" option.

4. Tap the "Update" button. (Should say "Serial Ready")

5. From Hyperterminal, menu Transfer/SendTextFile

(You should see data flashing in the lines on the right and the counter on the left updating.)

6. When all racers have been received (data stops flashing and counter stops), the "AddRacers" button appears. Tap it.

7. Choose to Skip duplicates or Overwrite duplicates.

(You'll again see the counter updating as it adds racers.)

Delete ALL Racers

This is the easiest way to start fresh with a new database

This option completely clears out the racer database.

It deletes all bib numbers.

Racer Edit

You can register racers with information about their name, class, group, and start delay (for wave or interval starts). This gives you a lot of flexibility in setting up races and reporting results.

Bib Number

Each racer is identified with a bib number. This is used to link racers to results. It is possible to run the timer without entering bib numbers but then you need to manually keep track of the bib numbers in finish order.

You can easily enter ranges of bib numbers using the "Racer Setup" screen.

Bib numbers must be unique. The timer will only keep track of one racer for each bib number.

If you are running multiple races where there are duplicate bib numbers in the different races. You should set up the races separately. This is easy to do using the Racer export/import functions of the Racer Setup screen.

Name

You can enter a name for each racer, the name can be as long as 256 characters.

Class

Each racer can be assigned to a class. The class is used to sort results so that you can view results by place in class as well as overall results.

Group

Each racer can be assigned to a group. Groups are commonly used to identify teams or they can be used to identify racers in different distance races that are run simultaneously (see the Example #1 at the end on how to set up a race with racers running different distances during the same race).

Members of a group can be in different classes.

You can use the group assignment to view results for members of the group. This is commonly used to produce a list of each team’s members and their results at the end of the race.

Delay

The delay is used by the timer to calculate racer’s times when they start at different times. The program can accommodate wave starts (where there may be multiple waves of racers that start at different times) and interval starts (where one or more skiers start at fixed time intervals).

The “Racer Setup” routine makes it easy to set up these times and easily accommodate combinations of delays and interval starts. You can edit individual delay times on the “Racer Edit” screen.

Result Menu

Each result is entered with a bib number and a time which takes into account any start delay. The racers class and lap number are also stored so that the results can be calculated for their current lap and class.

There are multiple display formats that display the result data in various orders so that you can easily get the information you need.

There is also a specialized split time screen that gives detailed information on how the current selected racer is doing in comparison to the first three racers and in comparison to the racers just in front and behind the selected racer. This is very useful for cross-country skiing (where you have interval starts) and other sports with multiple laps.

The Result Menu has the following options:

- Place Order

- Bib #

- Racer Splits

- DNFinish

- XC Run Score

- Edit Result

- Add New Result

Setting Result Display Options

You can change the fields that appear on each of the results screens by setting various options in the “Settings” screen.

This table shows the various screen titles when you select pace units of “Time/Km”. If you select different pace units, the units you select will replace the “/Km” in the titles.

Laps	Result by Place Screen	Result for Bib# Screen	Racer Split Screen
1	Pl-Lp Time % /Km Racer	-Lp Time /Km Total Racer	Pl /Km Diff Bib Name
>1	Pl-Lp Time % /Km Finish	-Lp Time /Km Total Finish	Pl /Km Finish Bib Name
0 Dist.	Pl-Lp Time Diff Racer	-Lp Time Total Racer	Pl Time Diff Bib Name

Notes:

Pl This is the Place counter and shows the racers place in the competition.

Lp is the Lap counter and shows the lap number.

Time is the racer’s time at the indicated lap.

% is an indicator of effort and is derived from the formula: [1^st place time]/[current racer time]

/Km is the pace in time per Km. This will change depending on which units you select for pace. You have the option of: /Km, /Mi, /100m, /100yd, /400m, Mi/Hr, Km/Hr. If you select “No Pace”, then the pace column is omitted from the display.

Finish is the projected finish time based on the time elapsed for the number of laps completed and the total number of laps.

Diff is displayed on the split screen and is the time difference from the currently selected racer to the other racers (first three and the racers just ahead of and just behind the current racer).

In addition, the “Display Decimals” option will determine the number of decimals that will be displayed in each time display. You can set this to show whole seconds, tenths, or hundredths. The timer keeps track of time internally in milliseconds so you can display any of these selections. Of course, the final accuracy of the timer depends on the accuracy of the time entry (manually pressing the buttons or trigger signals).

Place Order

The Place Order screen gives you the racer’s order. It starts with the current highest lap. You can press the buttons at the bottom to see the racer’s order as of any particular lap. If you get to the “All” laps, it gives you all results for all racers for all laps. You also have to option of setting a particular “Class” of racer. When you do that, it will show you the results for that class only.

You can also jump to any Place in the result file by entering that number in the top right corner of the screen and pressing the “>” button.

Bib #

This option shows all results for a bib number that you choose. It’s useful for looking lap splits for a particular racer. The display shows lap split time and accumulated time for each lap.

Racer Splits

This takes you to the Racer Split screen to see how your selected racer is doing in comparison to other racers on any lap.

D N Finish

In every race, you want a list of racers that did not finish. This is useful for double checking your data entry to make sure you didn’t miss any finishers as well as a list to confirm those who did not finish the race.

The DNFinish option from the Result menu give you this list. It has a further feature for multi-lap races where it will give you the list of racers who don’t have the required number of laps.

Racers are listed in bib number order with the number of laps they completed, their Class and Group, and their Name.

You can look at the list for each lap by pressing the <Prior and Next> buttons at the bottom of the screen. This will give you results for each lap.

You can also look for a specific bib number by entering it at the bottom of the screen and pressing the Find button. If the bib number is present on that lap list, it will be displayed at the top of the list. Otherwise, the list will go back to the start.

XC Running Score

This option calculates cross-country running team scores by designating the number of racers that “score” for a team and the total number of racers that are counted on the team. The usual is a team of 5 scorers and a total team of 7 (i.e. 2 “displacers) but you can change these numbers to meet your local meet rules. The total team must be greater than or equal to the number of scorers. The maximum team size is 9.

Teams are scored by adding up points for the places of each team member. First place is one point, second, two points, etc. Lowest overall score is first place.

Team members above the number of “scorers” are “displacers” and don’t count points for the team but do displace the scores of other racers.

You must set up teams using the Racer Setup and Racer Edit screens.

You should use the racer “Group” to assign the team name.

If you want to have individual runner times in addition to team scores, you should enter each team member bib number individually. If you only want team scores, you can assign one bib number to the entire team and enter that bib number for each member of the team that passes. (If you will be using the same bib number for all of your racers on a team, set the “Number of Laps” on the “Settings” screen to the maximum number of racers that you’ll be entering for a team and enter a distance for the race.)

Make sure you have a team (Group) assigned to each bib number or they won’t count for the team.

The XC Running score shows you the scores for the complete teams with the number of runners on each team

As an example, if you had set the number of scorers to 5 and the number of racers to 7, your results might look like this:

35 North Tahoe (7 racers)

47 Truckee (6 racers)

62 Incline (6 racers)

It then shows you the incomplete partial teams:

-- Partial Teams –

South Lake Tahoe (3 racers)

Finally, it will give you the number of racers with no team (bib=0 or no team Group assigned in racer setup):

-- 3 Racers with no team

Edit Result

This menu option lets you edit any result. This is handy if you made an error in data entry and want to edit the result time, bib number, etc.

You first show the Results in Place Order, select the result you want to enter, and then choose the Menu option Edit Result.

Add New Result

Sometimes in spite of everyone's best efforts, a racer time does not get recorded. Hopefully your spotters will have recorded the racer crossing with those in front and behind in proper order. In this case it is possible to add a time to the result list. Use the menu option Results/Add New Result and enter that racer's bib number and time. Use this format for the time hh:mm:ss.s

If you are recording multiple laps, the program will renumber all of the laps for this racer and put this time in the proper lap order.

The options to edit bib numbers, edit results, and add results give you complete control over your timing to ensure the most accurate recording of results.

I/O Menu

To Memo

The results can be exported to the MemoPad for printing or synced with the desktop where it can be printed or imported into a spreadsheet for further formatting and manipulation. The advantage of sending data to the Palm MemoPad is that this is automatically Synced with your desktop. You can then easily copy the data from your Palm desktop to other applications such as spreadsheets and databases. The program gives you several options for delimiting text (Tab, Comma, Space) to make it easy to import the desktop data into different programs.

There are multiple options in exporting data to the MemoPad in terms of how the results will appear.

You start the export to the MemoPad by choosing the Menu option Results/To Memo.

You then are asked: "How should the results be sorted?"

- Time - The primary sort order is by the finish time. If you do not have laps and want to see the finish order, you should choose this option.

- Lap - If you have recorded laps, you should choose Lap sort order. This will sort results by Lap first (and then by time). You can use this option to see the order of racers on each lap.

- Bib# - This will sort the results by Bib#. This is useful when you want a list of finishers where you can easily locate their time by their Bib#.

You are then asked “Finish Line or Elapsed Time?

- Finish gives you the finish line crossing order without adjustment for any wave or interval start delay.

- Elapsed gives you each racers “net” time which is adjusted for any start delay set by the interval start or wave start.

If you have chosen “Time” or "Lap" above, you are then asked: "How should results be grouped?" Note that the terminology is somewhat confusing here in that you can "group" the results by "Class" or "Group".

- No Group - Use this when you have not assigned racers to groups or you do not wish to separate results into groups.

- Class - If you want to print results for each Class separately, choose this option.

- Group - If you want to print results for each Group separately, choose this option.

After you have made these selections, the program displays a confirmation box to show you the options you have selected and remind you of the delimiter you have assigned in the "Settings" screen. You have the option on continuing (OK) or Canceling the copy to MemoPad.

The format of the output varies somewhat depending on the options you have chosen but includes a title listing the options you have chosen and the order of the fields:

Sorted to MemoPad Formats

Sort by Time

No Groups:

Fields: Place, Bib, Time, Lap, Name, Class, Group, StartDelay, Place in Class, %Back

Group by Class:

Fields: Place, Bib, Time, Lap, Name, Class, Group, StartDelay, %Back

Group by Group

Fields: Place, Bib, Time, Lap, Name, Class, Group, StartDelay, Place in Class

Sort by Lap

No Grouping, Class Grouping, or Group Grouping

Fields: Place, Bib, Time, Lap, Name, Class, Group, StartDelay

Sort by Bib

Fields: Bib, Time, LapTime, TotalTime, Name, Class, Group, StartDelay

Notes:

%Back is calculated by this formula:
(RacerTime-1^stPlaceTime)/(1^stPlaceTime) * 100

StartDelay is used for interval starts and for start delays where you have a class that starts later than the first group. The start delay is subtracted from the elapsed clock time to arrive at that racer’s Time. The start delay is displayed in the reports so you can verify that each racer had the proper start delay entered.

Format of “Results:Time”

This assumes the first three lines are title and heading information (discards these) and then assumes that the bib number and elapsed time are in the 2nd and 3rd fields (tab delimited).

The rest of the line is ignored.

It will not add a result if the bib number is not registered in the system first. Therefore, you should load in your racer set before you load in your results set.

From Memo

Banana Split offers unusual flexibility in that you can exchange racer lists and result lists with the Palm MemoPad.

The “From Memo” option allows you to import result lists that you have previously saved to the Palm MemoPad back into BananaSplit for further analysis, editing, and sorting.

You can use this in combination with the options to import Racer lists that are on the “Racer Setup” menu to restore a complete race set to BananaSplit.

You can also save results (sorted in numerous ways) to the MemoPad. The result lists can be loaded back into Banana Split from the MemoPad if you want to make corrections or sort the results differently.

When you save results in Time Order to the MemoPad, you will end up with MemoPad records that start with the string: “Results:Time”

You can load these results back into Banana Split to make corrections and to sort them in different orders.

This is useful if you have several races and you need to clear out the results and racer lists from your Palm to prepare for the next race.

Later, you can load the racer list and results back into Banana Split to make corrections and to prepare the results in different formats.

You can also use this function to combine result lists from different Palms into one result list.

D N Finish to Memo

This option publishes the complete DNFinish list to the MemoPad where it is easy to view and will be transferred to the desktop when you HotSync.

Send Results

This option lets you send the results that BananaSplit has collected to another computer during or after a race.

You have the option of sending through the serial port to another Palm handheld or a PC laptop or desktop.

You also can use the infrared (IR) beaming capability of the Palm to send results to another Palm handheld.

We also let you send your results through the serial port to any computer that has a serial port including another PalmOS handheld running BananaSplit. This makes it easy to share information with many desktop race programs as well as BananaSplit. You don’t need to copy the results to the MemoPad and don’t need to have the Palm Hotsync software installed. You can send your results to any device that can read a serial port.

You set the speed of the serial port in the Menu/Screen/Setting screen. Set the “Serial Output” speed to match the speed of the device that will receive the information. These must be set to the same speed. You have options of 300 through 19,200 for the speed.

The remainder of the parameters for the serial port are the default for the Palm device which is:

- N,8,1,XON/XOFF

- No Parity, 8 data bits, one stop bit, Xon/Xoff protocol

You should make sure that the receiving device at the other end of the serial port is set to the same parameters.

When you send the results, it will ask you if you want all of the results or only those since the last export. It then sends these to the serial port in the format:

Place,Bib,Time,Lap,Name,Class,Group,StartDelay

Each racer result will be on a single line.

There is no limit on the number of results you send this way.

The delimiter between each field will be the delimiter that you set up on the Menu/Screen/Settings screen. You can set this to Tab, Comma, or Space.

When sending results to the desktop, you will probably want to save the results to a file. In Hyperterminal, choose the menu Transfer/CaptureText option and enter a file name. This will save the results to a text file (.txt).

You can import these results to many programs including spreadsheets, databases, and many desktop race tracking and scoring programs.

You should remember that the Palm serial port is a “Data Comm” type serial port which means that you can connect it directly to laptop and desktop serial ports. If you want to connect the Palm to another Palm, you will need a “null modem adapter” to switch the transmit and receive lines so that one Palm can talk to another.

You can use any serial “terminal emulation” program to receive the data. Windows comes with a simple terminal program called “HyperTerminal” which you can access from the Program/ Accessories/ Communications menu of Windows.

Set up a “New Connection” in HyperTerminal to connect using “Direct to ComX” where X is your serial port number. Also set the “Configure” properties to the same speed as the Palm with: No parity, 8 data bits, 1 stop bit, and Xon/Xoff as the protocol. We recommend a speed of 9600 since this is fast enough for the amount of data in a typical race and is low enough to be reliable in most situations.

Please note that we have enhanced the operation of the Send Results option so that you can continue to use Banana Split to enter results even when you are in the middle of sending results to another device. Once you start sending results, you can tap the “Timer” button or choose any other menu option and perform other actions such as entering new times. This feature makes it easy to download intermediate results to another program during a race so that you can produce results before the final racer has finished.

Receive Results

This menu option will receive a Banana Split result list from another Palm running Banana Split or from a result file that you have sent to a desktop or laptop PC via the serial port.

You can receive a result list using the infrared beam (IR) or from the serial port.

If you use the serial port, make sure that both computers are set to the same speed.

The received results will be loaded into Banana Split where they can be viewed, sorted, and edited.

Action Menu

Stop Clock

To stop the timer clock, choose the Menu/Action/StopTimer option.

We have placed the Stop function in a menu option so that it is not easy to do this accidentally. You normally will only stop the timer after all racers have finished.

Del. Results

To erase your results, choose the Menu/Action/EraseResults option. You would normally do this only after you have copied the results to the MemoPad for safe-keeping.

You can erase results when the clock is still running.

If the clock is stopped, you must erase results before you can start the clock. If the clock is stopped, the Start button on the timer screen is replaced with the Erase function to remind you that you need to erase your results before you start the clock.

Adj.Clock

You can adjust the elapsed time clock. You might want to do this if you were not able to start the timer at the exact start of the race and when you compare it to another timing source, you discover you need to add or subtract from the elapsed time counter.

When you adjust the time, it also adjusts any results that have been recorded.

You can adjust the time of the results even after you have stopped the clock. If the clock is stopped, it will not be changed but the results will be adjusted.

To Adjust Time, choose the Menu/Action/AdjustTime option.

You will be asked to enter the amount of time you want to add or subtract from results in the format hh:mm:ss.sss. You may adjust the time by a little as a millisecond since this is the internal resolution of the timer. You may enter any amount of time as long as the time adjustment will not make the first result time be less than zero. If the clock is running, you cannot set the clock elapsed time to a time less than 0.

Enter a negative number (-00:00:00.000) if you want to set the elapsed time back to a shorter elapsed time. Use this when you started the timer early. It will adjust the elapsed time clock back and it will subtract the same amount of time to any results you have entered.

Enter a positive number if you want to set the elapsed time clock ahead (longer elapsed time). Use this when you started the timer late. It will adjust the elapsed time clock forward and will add the same amount of time to any results you have entered.

The Banana Split timer display is only updated every 1-2 seconds (this leaves the timer free to process more important tasks such as entering result times). Because of this, it will be difficult to synchronize the the Banana Split with an external timer to a precision of more than several seconds if you just look at the screen. Use the method described below to gain more accuracy.

The best way to determine any offset between the Palm timer and another timing source is to have the two timers side by side and enter a result time on both at the same time. You can then compare the result on each and calculate an offset. (You can then delete this extra result from the Palm timer.) Use the time offset you calculate to adjust the Banana Split elapsed time.

Technical Notes About Banana Split and PalmOS Handhelds

Accuracy and Precision

The timer runs from the internal crystal clock of the Palm computer. This is very accurate. The basic timing meter uses a 1/1000 second (millisecond) clock. The program does have approximately 5 ms delay from the time the button is pressed to the time recorded. However, this delay is the same at both start time and stop time and therefore can be ignored.

A larger factor in the precision of time recording is the manual pressing of the buttons. Since this can’t be reliably done to millisecond accuracy, the timer limits the display precision to 1/100 second. However, even this amount of precision is difficult to achieve through manual button presses.

By the way, the button records the time when it is released, not when it is pressed down. When you tap a button, these two events take place very close together. If you are concerned about the highest precision, you can press the button just before the racer passes the mark and then release it as the racer passes the mark. The same can be done for starting the timer.

The race elapsed time clock that is displayed on the main timing screen is only an approximate indication of elapsed time. In order to keep the time recording as accurate as possible, this clock updating has the lowest priority and in many cases is updated less than once a second. The actual race timing is of course done from the internal millisecond clock and the clock elapsed time screen display is just for reference. The time start and finishing times are recorded accurately using the internal millisecond clock.

The clock keeps accurate time even when it is powered off or you switch to a different application so you can, for instance, switch to the MemoPad to record or look up information during a race. When you switch back to the timer, you may notice that the time displays "ReCal" for a second. This indicates that the internal clock is recalibrating to the high precision crystal clock of the Palm for millisecond accuracy.

We set your Palm so it will not power off automatically when Banana Split is running. You can still turn your Palm off using the power button and you can switch to another application. When you quit Banana Split and switch to another application, the automatic power off is set to three minutes. A fresh set of batteries can run the timer for more than 10 hours so you shouldn’t have to worry about running the batteries down during most events if you have good batteries.

The timer will record races up to 24 hours from start to finish.

The timer currently has a limitation in that the closest interval between two racers crossing the finish line time entries is about 0.3 seconds. This is about as fast as you can press the button.

Performance

As you enter more results into the timer, the timer software will take longer to register racers. At 500 results, the registration time will increase to about 0.5 second and increase to a second at about 1000 results. This is not a delay in measuring the time, but is the time it takes the software to register a time and the time you must wait until another time can be entered. As a race timer, this is not usually an issue.

The performance of the split timer is more critical. Once you get more than a few hundred results entered into the timer and want to view the split display screen, the software will slow down to the point where it may take 5-10 seconds to display the split screen. This can be an issue when you are trying to measure times and give racers their results immediately. One way to improve the performance is to erase the results after each class has finished. There is usually a break between classes and you don’t need the prior class information once the racers have passed. (If you want to save the results for later analysis, you can save the results to the MemoPad before you erase them from the Banana Split).

The newer models of Palm computers and the Handspring Visors are about twice as fast as the early models and will run everything faster.

Speed-up - Afterburner

If you have a newer PalmOS model that uses the Motorola Dragonball-EZ processor (i.e. Palm Vx, IIIxe, Visors), you can use the program called "Afterburner" to speed up the processor. This will improve the performance of the calculations. The speed can be increased from 16Mhz to 24Mhz (a 50% improvement). Some models will tolerate a speed doubling to 32Mhz. If you use this program, make sure that you check the setup box in Afterburner that is labeled "Adjust ticks". This keeps the Palm internal timers running at the proper speed. If you don't check this box (or if you run the speedup on an older Palm) the clock will run fast and you will notice frequent "ReCal" notices as it attempts to adjust to real time.

Hardware Limitations

I had the opportunity to “stress test” the software and hardware at the 1999 US Ski Association Cross-Country Junior Olympics in Anchorage, Alaska. During this early March event, we had one day where the ambient temperature was about +5 degrees Fahrenheit. The Palm III hardware did suffer at this temperature. The screen contrast was very low and I found I had to keep the screen warmed against my bare stomach (not that comfortable for me) for best performance. I also found the charcoal/iron catalytic heating pads worked well to keep the unit warmed. I’d recommend making provisions for keeping the unit warm if you expect these very low temperatures.

The newer screens on current models are better at maintaining their contrast in low temperatures.

The Palm worked well at temperatures above +20 Fahrenheit (you may need to adjust the screen contrast).

The Palm computers are not waterproof and we found the best protection from rain or snow was to place the unit in a zip-lock bag. This keeps the unit dry and you can see the screen and operate the touch sensitive screen through the plastic bag.

Using Banana Split for Race Timing

Before the Race

Before the race, you should:

1. Clear out any results from prior races.

2. Clear out any registered racers from prior races.
Choose “Racer Setup” from the menu and then “Delete ALL Racers from the selection box.

3. Enter Racers for this race
You can enter racers by loading a set of racers that you have previously saved to the MemoPad or you can go to the “Racer Setup” section and enter racer information as follows:

Enter racer bib numbers for this race.
Choose Menu/”Racer Setup” to get the Racer setup screen. Choose “Add Bib Numbers” from the selection box and enter the range of bib numbers. If you have several groups of non-contiguous bib numbers, you can add groups of bib numbers as many times as you need. You can also delete ranges of bib numbers if necessary by choosing “Delete Bib Numbers”.
You need to enter bib numbers before you can assign other information. It is easy to enter bib numbers in contiguous groups. If a bib number already exists, it will not be added again. You can only have one of each bib number.

Enter Class and Group information
Classes are used when you have more than one event that will be run during the day. The timer will record results for each class separately.
Groups are useful for assigning racers to teams. A group can cross classes. You can then view results for each group as one of the result views. Group members may not be contiguous and you may find it easier to enter group information using the “Racer Edit” menu function where you can look at and edit individual racers.

Enter Racer Names
You do not have to enter names but you may find it useful. You use the “Racer Edit” menu function to enter names for individual racers. You can skip forward and backward through racers one at a time or can skip to a given bib number. Any changes you make are automatically saved when you skip to another racer.

Enter any start delays (interval or wave starts).

4. If you want the timer to display a “Pace”, set this up in options. You must enter a Distance, the units for the distance and the units for the pace. You can enter any combination of units. (For instance, you can enter the distance in Yards, and display the Pace in Kilometers/hour if you really want to do that). If you leave the distance blank or zero, the program cannot and will not calculate a pace. It will, instead, calculate a “% effort” where the fastest racer is 100% and everyone else is a fraction of that expressed as a percent. These numbers will all be less than 100%.

During the Race

Operation will vary slightly depending on whether you are using the timer as a race start/finish timer or to give split information on the course:

Starting the Race Timer

The race timer should be started at the exact start of the race. Remember, the button starts recording when it is released, not when it is pressed. You can press the button just before the start and release it when the gun fires for the most accurate timing.

Entering Times for Bib Numbers

For most races, you will want to enter bib numbers as each racer crosses the finish or lap line. In order to make this fast and easy, we have included four enter buttons. Since a group a racers may pass the finish line together, you can pre-load their bib numbers into the "Enter" buttons and then press the appropriate enter button as they cross the finish line.

Use the on-screen numeric keypad (or graffiti) to enter the bib number. It will appear on the bib entry line. You can press the “<” key to backspace or edit the line directly if you need to make corrections.

Once you have the bib number correctly entered, you can press any one of the “Enter” buttons when the racer crosses the finish line and the time will be recorded.

If you have several racers approaching the finish line in a group, you will find it advantageous to pre-load their bib numbers into the enter buttons. You can load a bib number into an "Enter" button by pressing the “up arrow” button. The bib number that is on the bib entry line will be moved to the top available enter button and the label on that button will change to show the bib number. When that bib number crosses the finish line, just press the button with their bib number and their time will be recorded and the enter button label will change back to the word “Enter”. If you have an enter button where a bib number has been loaded and you find that you don’t need that bib number (it may have been loaded in error), just press the “down arrow” button and bib numbers will be removed from the Enter buttons one at a time.

You can even enter a fifth bib number onto the bib entry line and this bib number will be entered when you press any of the enter buttons that has a label of “Enter”.

If you try to enter a result time for a racer that is less that the start delay for that racer, you will get an error box that tells you that this racer has not started. The error box allows you to either enter this result time with a bib number of 0 or you can cancel this result entry completely. Use the option to enter the result with a bib number of 0 if you have inadvertently entered the wrong bib number. After you have entered this result, you can go back and edit this result to change the bib number to the proper bib number. When you edit the bib number, it will re-calculate the racer's time using the proper start delay.

If the racers are crossing the finish line too fast to enter bib numbers, just press an Enter button for each racer that crosses. A time will be recorded with a bib number of zero. You can easily edit these results and enter proper bib numbers once the wave of finishers has passed.

The two Palm hardware buttons on the right (silkscreen ToDo and MemoPad) are mapped to the first two screen Enter buttons. You can press these buttons and enter a time. These buttons are active regardless of what screen you are viewing. This is handy if you are viewing a list of results and need to enter a time. Just press the hardware enter button and the time will be entered.

If you have a race where you want to monitor four or fewer racers for multiple laps, you can set the “Keep Bib” checkbox on the Setting Screen. This will leave the bib number in the Enter button after you have pressed it to enter a time. This is handy if you have a large number of laps for the same bib numbers.

Editing Bib Numbers and Times

Editing Bib Numbers

The "Edit" button on the timer display is a fast way to update bib numbers. If you have missed a bib number (either entered the wrong bib number or no [0] bib number, you can highlight the time in the small scrolling window that displays your current entries (this keeps the last 10 results you have entered). Once you have the result highlighted, press the "Edit" button. It will display this result and allow you to enter a new bib number. When you enter a new bib number, it will update the time with any change in the start delay for the new racer.

Edit Bib Numbers and Times

You can also edit results from the Results menu option which gives you access to all results (not just the last 10). This option also lets you edit the time. Enter time in the format hh:mm:ss.s

Add New Result

Sometimes in spite of everyone's best efforts, a racer time does not get recorded. Hopefully your spotters will have recorded the racer crossing with those in front and behind in proper order. In this case it is possible to add a time to the result list. Use the menu option Results/Add New Result and enter that racer's bib number and time. Use this format for the time hh:mm:ss.s

If you are recording multiple laps, the program will renumber all of the laps for this racer and put this time in the proper lap order.

The options to edit bib numbers, edit results, and add results give you complete control over your timing to ensure the most accurate recording of results.

Split Timer

You do not need to have a precise start time since you are really interested in relative times of different skiers, not absolute times of start and finish. You can use your wristwatch to start the timer at the approximate start time of the race. You should take care to start the timer at approximately the race start time. If you wait until the first racer is in sight to start the timer, you may get into a situation where fast racers in the pack appear to the timer to have a race time that is less than the timer minus the start delay. In this situation, the timer will give you a message that the racer has not started yet.

You will be positioning yourself out on the course and recording the times of racers as they pass a mark. The best results are obtained by picking a mark five or ten seconds ahead of your position and having a helper stationed there to call out bib numbers before the racers pass. This gives you time to enter the results, read the display and prepare your speech to the racer (you are in 5^th position, 4 seconds out of 4^th, and 35 seconds out of first). It is probably best to keep you message simple and the above may be too much information. Your coaching style may vary.

To view the split time display for a racer, highlight their bib number results line in the small scrolling display on the time entry screen and then press the “Split” button at the bottom of the screen. The split screen will appear and display the split time for that racer.

The small scrolling list keeps track of the last ten racer times that have been entered. (You can view six directly and scroll down for the other four.) If you want to view a split time display for a bib number that has scrolled off this list (such as when you want a “back split” after more racers have passed), you can enter this bib number on the bib entry line using the screen keypad. (Enter the bib number as if you were going to enter a time result for the racer.) Then press the “Split” button. The split screen will appear for this bib number.

Once you are on the Split Display screen, you can look at split times for a different bib number by entering the bib number in the area at the bottom left of the screen and pressing the “GoTo” button. The split display screen shows the split times for the last (most current) lap for the bib number you select. If you want to look at split times for prior laps, press the "<Prior” button.

Screen Navigation

During the race you will find the following screens useful:

Time Entry Screen (Banana Split! Title)

This screen is the main time entry screen. It also shows you the elapsed time, the number of times you have entered, and a running list of the last ten times you have entered.

You can reach this screen by selecting Menu/Screens/Timer or by pressing the first hardware button (silkscreen Appointments). You can also reach this screen from the Racer Split screen by pressing the screen button marked "Timer" or from the Results Place Order or Results Bib Order by pressing the “Time” button.

Split Screen (Racer Splits title)

This screen shows the selected racer time compared to the first three racers, the racer immediately in front and the racer immediately following along with the number of seconds time difference with each of these other racers.

You can reach this screen by selecting Menu/Results/RacerSplits or by pressing the second hardware button (silkscreen Contacts/Telephone). You can also reach this screen from the Time Entry Screen by pressing the screen button marked "Splits".

Results - Place Order

This screen shows the results in Place (time) order. If there are multiple laps, you can view the results for each lap. If you have defined multiple Classes of racers, you can view the results for each class.

You reach this screen by selecting Menu/Results/PlaceOrder or by the “Place” button on the Time Entry Screen.

Results - Bib Order

This screen displays the results in bib order. It is hand if you want to look up a particular bib number and see how they are performing. If there are multiple laps, it will show the time for each lap as well as the place order in each lap.

You reach this screen by selecting Menu/Results/Bib# or by the “Racer” button on the Time Entry Screen.

QuickBeam

The Menu option Results/QuickBeam lets you beam the results you have collected to another Palm computer during the race. You have the option of beaming All results or only the New results (results recorded since your last beam).

The QuickBeam function uses the built-in Palm infrared communications to send results to another Palm. It will typically take only about 15 seconds to beam 100 results to another Palm. A complete list of 1000 results takes about 60 seconds. This provides minimal interruption to recording results.

On the receiving Palm, you then start up the Banana Split timer. You have the option of adding the results to the receiving Palm Banana Split result database or of saving the results directly to the MemoPad.

You can use the receiving Palm as a the master results recorder or you can use the MemoPad export function to transfer the results to a desktop spreadsheet or database.

The QuickBeam function lets you collect results and print them before the race is finished. You can give the early finishers preliminary results to satisfy their anxious pleas.

Hardware Time Enter Buttons

The two Palm hardware buttons on the right (silkscreen ToDo and MemoPad) are mapped to the first two screen Enter buttons. You can press these buttons and enter a time. These buttons are active regardless of what screen you are viewing. This is handy if you are viewing a list of results and need to enter a time. Just press the hardware enter button and the time will be entered.

After the Race

Editing Start Delays

You should take care that subsequent waves of racers are started at the intervals you have pre-recorded so that they will have accurate times. In the real world, this may not be possible and you can adjust the start delays of pre-registered racers if they don’t start on time. The result times will be adjusted when you change the start delay for individual racers using the “Racer Edit” screen.

Because of the potential for having "negative times", it is currently not possible to use the batch "Racer Setup" function to change the start delays or intervals for racers once results have been entered for a race.

Viewing and Saving Results

After the race, you can view your results on the Palm in finish order, in bib order, sorted by class and several other views. Let me know if you would find any additional views of the results useful.

You can also export these views to the MemoPad and from their they can be synced to a desktop for printing, further manipulation, and storage or you can use one of the Palm printing applications to print directly from the Palm (either a serial cable or using an infrared printer).

The Options section of the program allows you to specify a delimiter character when you export to the MemoPad. You can change this to work best with whatever software you are using to import and display, manipulate, print the results.

Miscellaneous Notes:

Fields in Result Display

Racer-

Place Time Seconds(behind first) Bib Name

Should be...

Place-Lap Time Seconds(behind first) Bib Class Group Name

Place-

Time % Place-Lap Bib

Should be...

Place-Lap Time %(Pace) Bib Class Group Name

(each lap and class should have its own place counter)

Bib#-

Lap Time Total Place-Lap Bib

Should be...

Place-Lap Time %(Pace) Bib Class Group Name

TimeEntry Screen

Time Bib Lap Class Name

Laps

When you add or edit a bib number and/or time, the program automatically recalculates laps by going through the results.

If you miss a lap for a racer and want subsequent laps to be numbered correctly, you can enter a new result for that racer bib number with the approximate time for the missed lap. Banana Split will renumber the laps for that racer so they will have the proper number of laps.

Race Timing Example #1 – Multiple distances and classes with results for each class and distance

We want to time results for a race. The race is 15km long but the junior racers only race a 7.5km course. These juniors start 5 minutes after the main racers start. We want to record overall results for the 15km and the 7.5km courses plus calculate places for each age group for men and women.

We first delete all racers and erase all results (to clear out any old data).

We then choose menu Screens/Racer Setup/Add new bibs to add the entire range of bibs we will need for the race. If the juniors have a different non-contiguous range of bibs, these can be added separately. In our case, we had bib numbers 1 to 100 assigned to the 15km race and bib numbers 201 to 250 assigned to the 7.5 km race.

We will use the "Group" characteristic to assign the race. Use the menu Screens/Racer Setup/Group option to assign Group "15k" to bib numbers 1 to 100. Then use this same option to assign the Group "7.5k" to bib numbers 201 to 250. When we want results, we will sort by the "Group" category to get results for the 15k race separate from the results for the 7.5k race.

Use the "Delay" assignment in Racer Setup to assign a delay of 5:00 minutes to bib numbers 201 to 250. Note that if the second group does not go off exactly 5 minutes after the first, you can use the same section to assign a new delay to this group of racers before any results have been entered. Once you have entered any results, you can't use this batch update Racer Setup to change the delay, you must adjust the delay for each racer individually using the "Racer Edit" section.

Every racer is assigned to an age category. These were for the juniors: J2, J1, OJ and for the seniors: M1, M2, M3, M4, M5. Since we want separate categories for male and female, we add the letter M or F to the age class.

Registering racers

As racers are registered and assigned bib numbers, they are entered into Banana Split using the menu Screens/Racer Edit function.

You can move through the individual racers using the "<Prior" and ">Next" buttons or if you need to skip a number of racers, enter a bib number in the text field below the "GoTo" button and press it.

Enter the racer's name and use the "Class" assignment to give them the proper age and sex category such as M2F (for female Master 2) or M2M (for male Master 2). When you enter information, avoid using the comma character if you want to load the results into a spreadsheet. If you choose a comma delimiter in setup, additional commas that you enter in names, etc. will confuse the spreadsheet program and your columns will not be aligned.

After you have registered the racers, you will find it useful to print a list of the racer registration information you have entered. This list can be used to double check your entries to make sure names are spelled correctly and that everyone is in the proper Class. The list is also useful to pass around to coaches and race announcers and officials.

Choose the Racer Setup/Store Racers in Memo option to save a list of racers to the MemoPad. You can select the range of bib numbers that you want to store. These racers are then copied to the MemoPad. You can HotSync and print the memo entry from your desktop machine. (Or, if you have an infrared printer and printer driver program, you can print the MemoPad entry directly from your Palm.)

The Race

Start the Timer

Start the timer when the race starts (and adjust the second start time for the juniors if necessary after they start but before you have entered any results).

Enter Results

Enter results for each bib number. You can enter the bib number as the racer approaches the finish line and press Enter as they cross. When you have a group of racers at the finish, you can enter up to four bib numbers in the Enter buttons and press them as they cross the finish line. If you do not have time to enter pre-load the bib numbers, press the Enter button for each racer that crosses. When you press Enter with no bib number, the timer will record the bib number as "0".

Edit Results

You should have a team recording the finish order of the bibs (as a backup check). After the group has passed, you can highlight the recorded time in the small scroll window and press the Edit button. This allows you to enter a new bib number. You can change the "0" bib numbers to the proper bib numbers. You can also change the bib numbers if you make an error and enter the wrong bib number or the wrong order. You can also delete an extra time that may have been entered in error.

The important thing is to make sure that you record a time for each racer that crosses the finish line. You can edit their bib numbers (or delete extra times) after the times have been entered.

Add New Result

Sometimes in spite of everyone's best efforts, a racer time does not get recorded. Hopefully your spotters will have recorded the racer crossing with those in front and behind in proper order. In this case it is possible to add a time to the result list. Use the menu option Results/Add New Result and enter that racer's bib number and time. Use this format for the time hh:mm:ss.s

If you are recording multiple laps, the program will renumber all of the laps for this racer and put this time in the proper lap order.

After the Race: Results

You can view the results in the menu selection Results and view them by Place, Bib, and Racer Splits. You can scroll through the list of results and also look at individual Class results. The Lap and Racer Split options are not really relevant in this case since we are recording only one lap (the finish time) for each racer.

If you discover errors in recording times or bib numbers, you can edit the bib numbers, the time, and even add a missing time and bib number.

After you have corrected the results, you will want to print them. Banana Split will put the results on the MemoPad. You can then HotSync to a desktop machine and print the MemoPad results. Or, if you have an infrared printer and driver, you can print the MemoPad results directly to a printer.

You will want overall results for each of the two races (15k and 7.5k). Choose the menu option Actions/Copy to MemoPad and then choose to sort by Time and then choose to group by Group. This will give you two lists of results, one for each race. (If you have more than two races, you can assign additional groups). The results will give you overall place for each Group as well as "Place in Class" for the classes within each Group.

You will also want results in time order for each racer Class (in this case we assigned age and sex classes). Choose the menu option Actions/Copy to MemoPad and again choose sort by Time and then choose to group by Class. This will give you results for each class.

Race Timing Example #2 – Race Registration Options

Using multiple Palm computers for race registration

If you have a large number of racers to register, you may want to use more than one Palm computer to gather entry information. You can use multiple Palms to register racers and consolidate the racer entries on one Palm before the race and use that Palm for race timing.

(If you’d like to use more than one Palm for race timing so that you’ll have a backup system, you can also transfer the entire registration list to another Palm and have two timing systems.)

Banana Split can import and export lists of racers to the MemoPad. Racers are exported by bib number. You can export any range of bib numbers from one Palm, beam this MemoPad record to another Palm, and import the racers into Banana Split.

Each Palm that is used for registration should register a certain range of bib numbers. This range of bib numbers does not need to be pre-determined and can be changed during registration consolidation.

You can set up each Palm with the entire range of possible bib numbers at the start and then instruct the registrars to each register a certain range of bib numbers.

Consolidation

When you are ready to consolidate your registrations into one Palm to be used for timing, each Palm that has registered racers should export (using Menu/Racer Setup – Store Racers in Memo) the range of bib numbers that it has registered. This option will save the range of bib numbers that you specify to a MemoPad record.

You then beam (using the IR beaming feature) the MemoPad records from each of the Palms that was used for race registration to the primary timing Palm.

After the primary timing Palm has received each of the MemoPad records, it imports the MemoPad racers into the Banana Split program (using Menu/Racer Setup – Add racers from Memo). It is important to note here that the Add Racers function will either skip or overwrite duplicate racer bib numbers so you should be clear about (use the Menu/Racer Setup – Delete bib numbers to delete a range of bib number if necessary).

After you have consolidated all of the registered racers in one Palm, you can export the entire list of racers to one or more other Palms to use as backup timers using the same procedure.

Registering Racers on your Desktop Computer

It is possible to use your desktop computer text editor or spreadsheet program to register racers. You will end up with a text file in the proper format that you can copy to the MemoPad on your Palm Desktop. This will be transferred to your Palm when you Hotsync.

You then use the Racer Setup option "Add Racers from MemoPad" to load those racers into your timer.

Text File:

In order to do this, you must carefully observe the following format. Any deviations from the format will have unpredictable consequences.

The first line of the memo must start with the word: "Racers:" (without quotes). You may type anything else you wish on this line as a title or reminder. The line ends with a carriage return.

The program expects a new racer on each following line. The fields are separated by "tab" characters and each line ends with a carriage return character. There should be no extra spaces in the fields. Spaces within the name field are acceptable and you may put a comma between the last and first name in the name field.

The fields are:

· Bib number

· Name

· Class

· Group

· Start Delay (in seconds)

Each field should be separated by a tab character and the entire line should have a carriage return at the end.

Spreadsheet

You may also use a spreadsheet such as Excel to record racer information and then use the "Save as…" function to save the data as a tab delimited file.

Set Excel "Save as…" type to: Text (Tab delimited) (*.txt).

You can copy this file to the desktop MemoPad, hotsync it to your Palm computer and then import it to Banana Split.

The spreadsheet should have these five columns:

Racers:Bib Name Class Group Delay

(Note that it is crucial that the first line start with "Racers:". Anything else on that line is ignored. You may enter additional identifying information such as the race name on the first line.)

The spreadsheet tab delimited format puts quotes around any text (such as names) that has a comma in it. The Add Racers function will remove these quotes (as well as the characters !"#$%&' and leading/trailing blanks).

Race Timing Example #3 – The Great Ski Race

The Great Ski Race has been held annually for 25 years. The race runs 30km from Tahoe XC ski center in Tahoe City, California to the Hilltop Lodge in Truckee, California. Annual participation is approximately 800 racers. The race attracts the top national and international cross-country ski racers.

Due to the retirement of an extremely dedicated individual who had organized manual data entry from Tag timer tapes, we moved the timing to an automated system based on the Banana Split timer for the 2001 race.

The system worked extremely well. It required only one person to download the results from the Banana Split timer and we were able to provide timely progressive results as competitors finished over a four hour period.

Registration

We used a Microsoft Access database for registration since we had historical registration information in that format with complete mailing address, age, and prior race participation information.

We downloaded racer name and age/sex class information to one Palm by creating a text file from the Access registration database, copying the files to the Palm MemoPad and then importing the racers to Banana Split.

The Finish Line

We used two Palms to record times at the finish line. One was our main timing unit and the other was a backup for use if there were any problems with the main unit. We also had a third timing team with the Tag tape printout timer as a backup. The backup units were not needed but because of the importance of the race, you can never have too many backups and we felt it was important to have three redundant timing systems.

The finish line timers were set up to register racer bib numbers 1 through 900 (there were actually 847 racers registered).

During the Race

As racers would cross the finish line, the timing teams would enter bib numbers along with times in the timers. Since the finish was at the bottom of a hill, it was frequently difficult to see bib numbers before the racer crossed the line. In that case, the ability of Banana Split to immediately edit the result to enter a bib number after the time had been recorded was a valuable aid in collecting complete accurate results.

After every 25-50 racers and during a short break in finishers, the main timing Palm would beam new results to another Palm which would be used to transport the results to the finish headquarters. The Banana Split “Beaming” function would take approximately 15 seconds to transmit the new results to the transport Palm and would then be available to continue recording results.

The transport Palm would start the Banana Split program, copy the new results to the MemoPad, and HotSync with the desktop. These new results were then pasted into the Access “Finish” database.

We could have dispensed completely with the Access desktop system and done everything on the Palm by using the “transport” Palm to accumulate all of the results. Banana Split produces results in various formats including overall place finishes and finish results sorted by class.

Assessment

This system gave us the ability to post intermediate result updates during the race. This is much appreciated by the early finishers who are always anxious to see how well they did.

This example illustrates the capabilities of the Banana Split timer to record and present results. It also illustrated the data communication abilities of the program which make it easy to move data around between Palm computers and to the desktop into Access database and Excel spreadsheets.