Frequently Asked Questions

How can I make players pass the disc? How can I make players hold the disc?

See the section Making Passes on the help page.

I forgot my password. Can you send it to me?

Sorry, I can't. Not because I'm mean or lazy, either. Your password is never stored on the site, so even if someone broke in—inconceivable!— they wouldn't know your password. (Instead an irreversibly-encrypted version is stored, which is used to check against when you log in to see if you have the right password.)

In a future version, I will provide a mechanism by which you can retrieve a token via email which will allow you to change your password. Until then, your only recourse is to contact me from the email address you stored with your team, and convince me that you are who you say you are.

11 seconds isn't nearly long enough! How can I make longer plays?

Sorry, you can't, yet. In order to get v1.0 out the door I had to choose some features to cut, and unlimited Timeline duration, with zooming in/out of the timeline and scrolling around within it was one of them. Look for this in v1.5 (very tentatively scheduled to be done by April 2004)

Update: OK, I've added a gross hack to make it possible. If you find that you need a longer time:

  1. First, save what you've done so far, and then edit the diagram again.
  2. Edit the url for the page. Change it from something like this:
    admin.asp?playID=12&.svg
    to:
    admin.asp?playID=12&d=20&.svg

    The d parameter stands for duration, and indicates the total time to display, in seconds.

If you have a big screen and want to make the timeline wider, put &w=800 on the url as well. (The number is the number of pixels for the timeline; the normal/original size is 550.)

Everyone's running at the same speed. Can I make people go slower or faster?

Nope, not yet. I've added this as a requested feature for v2.0 (no scheduled completion date). Not only does much of the simulation code assume a single, flat-out speed (something like 11mph) for each player, but adding this to the admin interface is going to kinda be messy. (Not sure how I'll make it clear that a short bar on the timeline is short because the distance is small, not because the player is running at 100mph.)

Sweet! Can I use this for football? Soccer?

I'm glad it excites you. Sorry, you can't...yet. You may notice on the home page that expanding this to work for various sports is part of the planned v2.0 revision. I can't make any promises (or even predictions) as to when this will be done, but since people have expressed interest in it I have been planning the framework to allow for this relatively easily.

Why SVG? Why not Flash?

Because. (Right vs. Wrong. Good vs. Evil. Open source, standards-based vs. greedy proprietary capitalistic formats. Stuff like that.)