We do not live in a perfect world. Mistakes happen. This is an opportunity to catch those mistakes early, hopefully before there are consequences. Mistakes can be made by registrars, team registration coordinators, meet directors, Clerk of Course, computer operators, parents, swimmers, the postal service, etc.
Consequences of mistakes can include:
- The swimmer's team can be fined. Fees are presently $100 each time an unregistered swimmer participates in a USA Swimming meet.
- The swimmer's and team's insurance is invalidated for expired registrations or unregistered swimmers.
- The meet host can be fined.
- The swimmer's performance cannot be considered for a Top 16 or other reportable swim.
- The swimmer's performance cannot be found for TAGS proof-of-times.
- The swimmer's times will be under several different name spellings in the TSA database.
- The swimmer's name may be mispelled in the newspaper or other published results.
- The swimmer can be disqualified in a meet.
- The swimmer's performances might not be usable for team points especially for relays.
- The swimmer's results may not import back into Team Manager after a meet.
Most of the consequences are against the swimmer, who has trusted his team to accurately keep records.
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USA Swimming ID's are in this format: MMDDYYFFFMLLLL
MMDDYY is the month, day, and year of the swimmer's birthdate;
FFF is the first 3 characters of the swimmer's first name (use asterisks to pad names shorter than 3)
M is the swimmer's middle initial, asterisk if there is no initial
LLLL is the first 4 characters of the swimmer's last name (use asterisks to pad names shorter than 4)
If this constructs a USA Swimming ID that is not unique (eg: twins with similar names), the first digit of the USA Swimming ID of the second swimmer registered is changed to a 2. USA Swimming will determine this.
Examples:
Alice Baker Charles, born January 5, 1990 010590ALIBCHAR Jo Kelly, born June 19, 1986 061986JO**KELL Steven Tyler, born August 4, 1982 080482STE*TYLE Stephanie Tyler, born August 4, 1982 280482STE*TYLE Su Mi, born November 11, 1991 111191SU**MI**
- USA Swimming ID's are constructed using legal names only (names on the birth certificate).
- A swimmer's information must match the USA Swimming ID -- birthdate, name.
- If the swimmer registered a preferred name, it should be in the Team Manager / Meet Manager database.
- A swimmer's team affiliation is checked against the LSC database. Unattached swimmers swimming attached are flagged, as are Attached swimmers swimming unattached or swimmers representing an entirely different team than is in the LSC Registrations database.
- Seasonal registrations are flagged.
- Registrations not current for the present year (Team Manager audits) or last day of the meet (Meet Manager audits) are flagged.
- Swimmers registered as one gender but in your files as the opposite gender will be flagged.
The data in the export file that you have created will be sent to the North Texas Swimming website, where it will be copied into a temporary file.
A program on the NTS website will read this temporary file containing your data and compares it to a copy of the LSC Registrations Database that is kept on the NTS website. The program will write a report back to your web browser of the errors it encountered.
The copy of your data on the NTS website is then deleted.
The NTS website cannot read files on your computer -- it just receives the data that your web browser sends to it when you click the "Upload and Audit File" button.
Your exported data is never accessible to anyone else from the website.
The LSC Registrations database itself is not downloaded to your computer.
The LSC Registrations database is not directly visible from the website. The only data shown from it is swimmer's name, birthdate, and team/attachment related to a single athlete, including possible matches.
- Swimmers with a preferred name containing punctuation (eg: P.J., D.J.) may not match
- Swimmers whose ID's begin with a 2 (to resolve duplicate ID's) will not match.
If you find a problem that isn't listed here, email Nancy K French ( webmaster at ntswim . org ) and we will work on it. If possible, attach the Export file that you were working with and describe which athlete and which error message you have found an error with.
First, work with your team's Meet Entries person to ensure that your own team's database is clean.
When you are doing entries for a meet, you can either individually audit the Meet Entries diskettes/files that come in from the teams or import them all in and create a Registrations export of your meet database. You can then audit the Registrations export from Win-MM and do all teams in one step.
It is also a good idea to audit your Win-MM database either between sessions or, for certain, at the end of the meet. This will catch problems with deck entries or any changes made during the meet.
Most pool decks do not have internet access to do this audit during a meet. However, you can download a ".RE1" registrations import file before the meet, then use it offline to audit inside of Meet Manager.
Overview:
- Export Registrations from Win-MM
- Audit the Registrations using the NTS webpage
- Research problems with the registrations, adjust your Win-MM database, and repeat as needed.
- Use the Athlete Registrations Report webpage to generate a zipped ".RE1" file before the meet.
- Unzip and save the ".RE1" file on the meet computer harddrive.
- Meet Manager Exception Reports have a registrations check option.
If at all possible: audit your database before you do entries for another meet. After the first time, you should do a monthly audit of your database. You should audit EVERY diskette or file of Meet Entries that you create before sending it off to a meet host.
The first audit will take some time to research and correct mistakes, so you should do it several days before you need to do entries.
Overview:
- Export Athletes/Teams from Win-TM
- Audit the Registrations using the NTS webpage
- Research problems with the registrations, adjust your Team Manager database, and repeat as needed.
These instructions are to export all active athletes in your Win-TM database. To audit just the athletes that you are entering in a meet (Meet Entries) create the entries file or diskette as you normally do.
- Start Team Manager.
- Click "File" - "Export" - "Athletes / Teams". You should get a popup window like this:
- The popup window should specify your C: drive. If it does not, change it so it does. Remember the directory path shown on the right.
- Click "OK". You should get a popup window like this:
Make sure all options are as shown above: do not Include Inactive; do not restrict by LSC or Team. Leave school year blank. (This all assumes that your database contains only USA Swimming team data.) - Click "OK". You should get a popup window like this:
Important: Note the entire "Export Filename" as shown.
( C:\HY-SPORT\WIN-TM\CFILE01.CL2 in the example above)
- Click "Close" to shut the popup window.
- Exit from Team Manager.
- Start Meet Manager.
- Click "File" - "Export" - "Roster Export"
- ... remember what the filename and directory is. (more here later)
From the main menu, select Reports - Administrative - Athletes. There is a tab for a Registrations exception report.
- Start your web browser program - Netscape or Internet Explorer - if it is not already started.
- Bring up the registrations audit webpage:
http://www.ntswim.org/cgi-bin/regaudit/registrations_audit.pl
- Click the "Browse" button on the webpage. It will bring up a popup window.
- Change the "File Types" so "All Files" are selected, not just HTML Files.
- Locate the directory and file that you exported from Win-TM or Win-MM and click on the filename to select it.
- Verify that the correct filename is showing, and click "Open" to select it.
- The popup window should close, and the name of the file that you exported should now be in the textbox
on the Registratons Audit webpage.
- Click the "Upload and Audit File" button on the Registrations Audit webpage.
- Review the results; print as needed.
Ensure that you have changed the popup window to specify files of type "All Files", not just HTML files.
"HTML Files" is the default, you have to change it each time you click the "Browse" button.
Remember to click "Upload and Audit File".
If the file you have picked is a Meet Manager "Results for Team Manager" file, it may take a long time to upload to our servers for processing. We advise zipping this export file.
There are messages at the top that show how current the LSC Registrations database copy is. That will be helpful if you just recently submitted a registration and it isn't showing up yet.
In the audit results, there are three levels of messages: "Error", "Warning", and "Information". You should take action on the "Error" messages. You may opt to do something about "Warning" messages just to get a clean audit output. The "Information" messages are usually suggestions about possible matches on swimmers whose registration info could not be matched perfectly.
If you have questions about a specific error, feel free to email Nancy K French ( webmaster at ntswim . org ) about it. Provide details.