Missing information.

[Stuart McKinney]

I notice that when looking at your games the grading page no longer shows how your grade was calculated. Will this be returning along with best win, worst loss etc?

Thanks

[Andrew McHarg]

I notice that when looking at your games the grading page no longer shows how your grade was calculated. Will this be returning along with best win, worst loss etc?

Thanks

Hi Stuart

I hope you are well.

The short answer to this is: yes, eventually.

The problem:

The current grading system is even older than the current website, and both are pretty old. With the current grading system, it's unclear how all grades were calculated (some calculations are simple, but for some the calculations shown on the website were incorrect). The trouble was, the website was outputting a template, but didn't actually do any of the calculations itself. In essence, it was making some assumptions, so the maths didn't tie up with the grading system, in many cases.

The issue with the stats is different but related. We moved the website to a new server and upgraded the PHP version, which rendered some of the existing code obsolete. That's why some of the features of the website were switched off, temporarily.

The solution:

Rather than making changes on an ad hoc basis to individual items, we decided the best approach was to rebuild the website from scratch. It takes a bit longer, but the benefits are vast. Since the website was first created there have been a lot of changes with web technologies and most people browse websites with mobile devices these days. The new website aims to address all of the existing challenges and future-proof the Chess Scotland website. We have a lot of new features coming with the new website. My hope is to have a version that can be launched by the first half of this year.

We are also working on a new grading system to complement the new website. This should hopefully be released for testing in some form later this year. The testing will initially work in parallel with the existing system and eventually take over. It was decided that the calculations of grades etc won't change, so people's grades will remain the same. But the infrastructure on how grading data is recorded from congresses and leagues etc will change. A new online interface will replace the downloadable grading program. There will also be the advent of a new blitz rating for all CS players, among other changes.

There's obviously a lot more to all this than I've written above. But, rest-assured, progress is being made with the IT at CS. 

Hope this helps. Happy to answer any other questions.

Andrew