RDSS2 - FAQs (Frequently Asked Questions)
 

Here are Frequently Asked Questions - and Answers about using RDSS2. Hopefully they will answer some of yours :)

Feel free to ask 'How do I ...' type questions here. I may 'tidy things up' a bit for posterity, so this can be a concise resource.

Ted

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Example Databases - Database Management tool
 

Please check out the RDSS2 Getting Started tutorial video, around the 14:50 minute mark where I discuss and demonstrate using that Database Management tool, and switching among the different Example Databases.


Let me know if that helps!


I plan to make another specific video tutorial soon focusing on using that tool, switching among databases, making new ones, retrieving new samples from online.


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Registration - Renewal Date Incorrect, NewPace Module Missing
 

If you already have an ongoing RDSS Subscription and are Registering this new update, the first time you click the Update button on the Registration Tab, your Status changes to Evaluation (Active) and the Renewal Date is extended for the normal 30 days - no Modules are shown.

To get the Status to be fully Active, the Renewal date to be the correct date and any plugin Modules (e.g. NewPace) to show up - please simply click the Update button again.

If I have never picked up your new TrackMaster account before (e.g. new Evaluation, first time registering) - the 30 days is your evaluation period and the Evaluation (Active) Status gives you access to ALL of RDSS2. As soon as I add your new ID to my RDSS Registration server, your Status will change to Active (i.e. the next time you click Update or check available cards in the Data Centre).

I know - if you're an existing Subscriber, the software should be (and will soon be) smart enough to know you the first time! I'll speak to the programmer ...http://www.paceandcap.com/forums/ima...ilies/wink.gif


The first time you click on Update Registration Info:

http://paceandcap.com/forums/attachm...6&d=1366379487Attachment 34283

The second time you click on Update Registration Info:

http://paceandcap.com/forums/attachm...7&d=1366379487Attachment 34284


.

Depending on your screen resolution, you will have room for either 2 or 3 panels (or maybe even just 1 panel on a very small tablet or netbook, perhaps in combination with Windows font magnification settings > 100%).

1024 and higher vertical resolution gives room for 3 panels (e.g. you can include an Analysis panel at the bottom). Example resolutions are 1280 x 1024, 1680 x 1050 1920 x 1080. Some common resolutions have 900 vertical or less, which is not enough to show 3 panels - you'll only get part of the Analysis or even just the Tabs and no numbers. RDSS tries to automatically configure the screen to 2 panels if it detects less than 1024 vertical resolution. If you set the Windows font magnification to higher than 100%, RDSS does get confused at the moment and can try to display 3 panels when there is actually room for only 2, with the larger fonts.

You set the Panel and Tab list layouts in the Tab and Panel Layout tool. Click on the 'gear' icon (the Layout Config Icon) at the right edge of a horse panel to bring up the tool, then choose the number of panels which works best for your screen resolution. You can also change the set of Tabs displayed on each horse PP Panel, as well as their order. The Layout Config Icon on each PP panel controls the layout for that particular panel.

Attachment 34145
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Data Missing after switching to Example Databases
 

When you switched back to your regular database, you chose the wrong file. Your Example Databases, both supplied with the software or downloaded later from the website, reside on your RDSS2 Data folder and you likely switched to a file named data.db in that folder, which is empty.

Your 'regular database' however is stored in RDSS Data (i.e. c:\rdss\data), the location for data originally for RDSS1 (V0.99.2), the older RDSS version, and shared with RDSS2. To get your data back, Switch using the Database Tool and navigate the file system from the RDSS2 Data folder to the RDSS folder, then the Data sub-folder and select the data.db file there. That's your regular data.

In fact, it is much simpler to simply leave the database RDSS2 is using as c:\RDSS2\Data\data.db (the empty one) - then exit RDSS2 and move your regular database file (named data.db) from your RDSS Data folder to the RDSS2 Data folder and overwrite the empty one there. Then, ALL your data will be in the same folder and much easier when switching among the various alternate databases.

I made a video explaining that, demonstrating how to create a NEW database, and how to recover from problems if you try to switch to a file which is not a database file (i.e. you won't be able open RDSS2).

Here's the Database Management Tool Video in the RDSS2 Videos section.

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Using Rdss example database
 

If you downloaded the ZIP file version (i.e. of the 2010 Example database), you have to extract the DB file from within it to your \rdss2\data\ folder. If you downloaded the unzipped version, or any other example database (which are not zipped), it still needs to be present in the \rdss2\data\ folder. Just move it there from wherever you downloaded it

Then, using the RDSS Database Mgmt tool on the RDSS Desktop, switch to that database file on the \rdss2\data folder, then restart RDSS using that database. Races will be found in the PAST section.

How to Export Data from RDSS
 

Attachment 34300
Attachment 34299

This is how you export data from RDSS to various file formats for use in other programs. Most people will want to select Excel, the default. If you want Excel, simply right-click on the Export Icon (instead of left-click) and the Excel export file is automatically created.

Excel files are created from the Analysis data and stored in your \Rdss22\Models\ folder. Here is the written and video documentation on exporting data to an Excel file and making Factor models:

Export to Excel

Original Release Notes: http://paceandcap.com/forums/showthread.php?t=5947
An update: http://paceandcap.com/forums/showpos...77&postcount=3 (please see point #2)
A tutorial video: http://paceandcap.com/forums/showthread.php?t=5987


Export to Older Sartin Programs

You can also export to older Sartin DOS programs either raw 3 call format or adjusted 3 call format; programs such as EXDC, Thoromation, Kgen, Synergism 2. If you don't use these programs, you don't need to think about these options.

For Synergism2, here are tutorial videos made by Bill V:

Video #1
Video #2

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After Switching Databases, can't run RDSS
 

Most likely, when using the Database Management tool to switch databases, you chose a file which is NOT a Database file (i.e. does not end in file extension .DB or type = 'Data Base'). For example, perhaps you chose a ZIP file downloaded from TrackMaster from the Data Archive (\rdss2\Data\PP\2013\ ...) thinking it was a RDSS database file (they are only 'delivery' files from TrackMaster to RDSS - not databases).

This problem is discussed and the workaround is demonstrated in the Database Management tool video, at 20 minutes 45 seconds.

In short, open your RDSS Configure file in a text editor (e.g. \rdss2\Configure\Configure.ini), search for the line which begins: DatabaseFile= and change the file named after the = sign to c:\rdss2.1\data\data.db or whichever drive other than Drive C you have installed RDSS2 on). Save and close the Configure file, then restart RDSS2. Then you can try again to switch to a different Database (a .DB file, or Type = 'Data Base').

(Note: in future versions after Beta2.6-02, the software will prevent you from trying to switch to a file other than a proper Database type file.)

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How to Print RDSS screens / Take Screen Shots
 

RDSS does not yet have a built in Print button which prints a single screen or a pre-defined collection of screens. Part of the problem is that there is an endless combination of possible screens and orderings - one size would not fit all: some would get too many printouts, some too few or not in the preferred order, etc.

Instead, you can easily create your own customized printout using the following steps:

1. On the RDSS2 Desktop, click the Screen Capture button. This loads a Windows utility named 'SnippingTool.exe' which looks like this:


Attachment 34334

3. For each race (or for groups of races) create a blank Rich Text Format (RTF) file using Wordpad or Word, or a Word format file (DOC or DOCX) if you have Word. Open the file then Paste the screen you just captured from the Windows Clipboard to your file (right-click then choose Paste, or just use the keyboard shortcut keys: Ctrl+V).

Attachment 34335

Download and use this blank RTF template file if you like, or create your own using Word or WordPad (or other RTF or DOC format editor).

4. Repeat for as many different screen captures, in whatever order you need, add notes if you like, then Print the document. Switch to Landscape page orientation if Portrait mode squashes the screens. You can also Save it to a PDF format for sharing if you are using Word, or print it to a PDF document using Bullzip or other PDF printer driver. You could have 1 such document for all races on a card, or 1 document for each race.

5. If the RDSS Desktop Screen Capture button does not properly find and load the Windows 'SnippingTool', run it manually from the Windows Start menu by typing SnippingTool.

6. You can also use other screen capture utilities like Snagit or ScreenHunterFree.

Happy Printing!

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Watching Video Tutorials
 

Video Tutorials are in MP4 format. Download and install VideoLan VLC Media Player (free) for best viewing results. When installed, VLC will associate itself with MP4 type files. Then all you need to do is click on them to view them.

Also, you don't have to download these video tutorials to the RDSS2 Data folder - they can go anywhere you like, for example your Windows Videos folder. You should download the Example Databases to the RDSS2 Data folder.

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What is 'Tote Xray' (Tx)
 

Tote Xray is a readout in the Tote group at the right side of each Analysis screen, and on the main Tote Screen for each race.

To activate the RDSS Tote Board, click the Supertote Button on the RDSS Desktop, read the message which appears, then login to the BrisNet Supertote web page presented within RDSS (you need a free Brisnet account via the link provided). Then close the Supertote web page. This establishes a connection between RDSS and Supertote to retrieve odds and pool information regularly. Now, Minutes to Post (MTP), live Win Odds and the Tote Xray will appear on the Analysis screens and various other screens.

In general, Tote Xray measures for each horse the general tilt of monies bet in the Win, Place and Show pools towards the Win pool, then the relative ranking of such tilt for all horses. The horse with the most money distributed towards the Win pool relative to the others is shown as rank #1 and 0.0% deviation from best (it is the best). The other horses are shown as a percentage deviation from this best.

Arguably, this measures relative confidence of certain members of the betting public (perhaps the 'insiders' or perhaps skilled or just 'large' bettors).

The 'xray' part of the idea is that when this ranking diverges from the Win Odds rank, there is extra information (e.g. hidden) revealed by the Tote Xray of relationships between the pools, and between the horses.

Attachment 36066

For example, when the betting favourite (i.e. Win Odds rank #1) is also the Tote Xray 0.0% ranked #1 horse, there is no extra information. But when a higher odds horse is ranked Tx #1 - near to post time - there is potentially extra or hidden information. In the above image, the #1 Tx horse was ranked 4th in Win odds at 6-1 (the winner, #8).

One of the original uses of Tx was to Dutch the top 3 or 4 ranks in the Win or Exacta pools for a high percentage hit rate. Where the Tx #1 rank agrees with the Win Odds #1 rank (i.e. the betting favourite), this can point to the horse who should be 'hedged' to get a simple breakeven return or partial loss while preserving the balance of the betting unit for the remaining Tx ranks 2 - 3 or 4. (If your ADW does not enable Dutch calculations in Win or Exacta pools, please read --> this)

However, in RDSS the Tote Xray is intended to be used as a corollary to the primary handicapping factors, just like any other supplementary factor - an extra confidence booster or tie-breaker. While the Top 4 ranked Win odds horses win a very high percentage of all races, it is possible that the Top 4 Tote Xray rankings win an even higher percent.

Admittedly lots of money flows late into the pools, and the TX ranks and gaps do fluctuate - however my anecdotal evidence is that the Tx rankings and gaps change less than the Win Odds ranks do between 1 MTP and the Off. And certainly the absolute Top 4 Tx ranks do not change much, so it remains relatively useful in Dutching despite late money flows.

Here is a short previous discussion on Tote Xray: http://paceandcap.com/forums/showthread.php?t=6257

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'Unicode Font Substitution' message when Installing first time
 

Question: When I install RDSS2 the first time on a computer, I get a weird message about 'Unicode Font Substitution' every time - then RDSS loads and runs OK. How do I get rid of it?

Workout Form Patterns
 

Q: What do Workout Form Patterns mean?

A: Workout Form Patterns Documentation (also see discussion --> HERE)


Attachment 37627

Attachment 37628


FPD - Furlongs Per Day. When there are 2 or more workouts since the last race, and within the past 30 days: count the furlongs worked including the distance of today's race and divide by days since the last race. 1 furlong per day = FPD, less is -FPD, more is +FPD. We're trying to get a coarse idea of how much public work the horse has been doing to return to racing. You can only put so much value in this info - this does not tell us how much private work the horse has done, the frequency, the speed, the pressure during (e.g. working in company, working inside/outside other horses, etc), the distance, etc. Consult other Workout Patterns for some of these.

5f / 6f - 5 or 6 Furlong Workout. The last workout within 9 days of today's race was either 5 or 6 furlongs, an important endurance distance associated with at least a certain degree of fitness, especially if combined with a good Speed Rating and coming at the end of an evenly spaced series of works (see HWL group). If the last work was within 6 days = +5f or +6f. Consider referring to William Scott's excellent book 'How Will Your Horse Run Today', some of which is now rather outdated, but including his treatise on the 5f workout, beginning on Page 42.

SRW - a Short Recent Work between 2f - 4f within 3 to 5 days of today's race

SW - Super Workout. Depending on distance and recency, a designation for the LAST workout within the past 14 days, run faster than a certain time for each distance.

GW - Gate Workout. Within the past 8 days, a workout from the Gate. Extra credit for more recent gate workouts (* ! + modifiers)

HWL1 - Heavy Workload 1. 3 or more workouts within the last 21 days. +HWL1 for 4 works in 20 days or 3 works in 16 days. -HWL1 for 3 works in 21 days

SAR - Heavy Workload 2. Between 4 and 7 workouts since the last race at *regularly* spaced intervals. Extra credit for more workouts.

SCW - Special Condition Workouts.

SCW1 - Comparing workout immediately prior to the last race within 60 days to workout immediately following that last race - the latter workout is faster and may indicate that the last race did not adversely affect the horse.

SCW2 - Comparing workouts immediately preceding and following the last 2 races with an out of the money finish (worse than 3rd), the later workout should be faster, perhaps indicating that the previous 2 races also did not adversely affect the horse's condition and it may be ready to offer at least as good an effort today.

SCW3 - the horse had 1 or more 6f or longer works since the last race (within 21 days) and finished in the money (3rd or better) in its last race.

SWG - Special Work Group. Denotes that 2 or more significant patterns were observed, consisting of: FPD, 5f or 6f workout, SRW, HWL1, SAR.

PIW - Progressively Improving Workouts. Comparing the past 3 workouts within 75 days (preferably shorter), each next workout should be run at increasing average speed.

TCW - Turf Course Work. For a horse's first Turf race, its last workout is on Turf.


Adjunct to Workout Patterns themselves are the Workout Rank and the Workout Speed Rating.

WR - Work Rank. A computation based on the average percentile of a horse's workout rank for all workouts in a day (when at least 5 workouts recorded that day), plus furlongs worked and raced - over the past 30 days. A measure of its fitness.

SR - Speed Rating. A rating of workout time, based on a parallel time chart equating times for different workout distances. Speed Ratings of 92+ may indicate the horse is extremely fit and sharp, especially if the workout distance is 5f or longer.

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PPs Odds - Bold Markup
 

Q: Whats the difference between the bold odds and the bold underline odds?

A: Bold odds in Past Performances indicate odds of 6-1 or less (likely chance the horse was in the top group, say odds rank # 1-4, which wins ~ 80+ % of the time). Bold & underline odds indicate the horse was the betting favourite.

Attachment 37772

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Error Message during Convert
 

TrackMaster Race Class (RC)
 

Q: What is the Trackmaster RC (Race Dlass )? Can we used this with race RC ranking of the race with RC class for the horse?
How reliable is this indicator?


A: The RC number - Race Class - is supplied by TrackMaster, and is integrally related to their Speed Rating, Pace Rating and by extension, their Daily Track Variant and Inter Track Variant. In other words - every final time related number they create.

Dave Siegel, president of TrackMaster explained Race Class (RC) to me once, but it has faded enough that I should let him explain it himself - which he does in the 37 minute video below.

Essentially - RC is the product of the composite of the most recent final time Speed Ratings of all the horses in the race. Sometimes the RC number for the race (e.g. in the Result Charts or in subsequent Past Performances) will change when horses are scratched - which makes sense for a number derived solely from the final times of the entrants - and not the man-made class levels such as Claiming, Allowance, etc (which might more properly be termed Race Conditions, not Race Class).

When you think about this, it's not surprising that RC numbers derived solely from final times do not strictly match Race Condition levels: final times are at the mercy of so many things including weather, the particular track involved - but probably most of all - the matchup of horses running in any given race (i.e. slow pace, fast close; multiple early runners and a torrid pace - slow close; paceless races etc, etc).

Like any given set of Speed Ratings (e.g. TrackMaster's, BRIS', RDSS' internal Adjusted SRs) - they may differ from each other but they will all be coherent within themselves because each of them uses a consistent (if different) concept and formula. So TrackMaster's Race Class number may not co-relate with Race Conditions, but it measures on a consistent basis at least the recent Final Times of the horses involved in each race.

After all - no one is surprised that any given Claiming $20,000 race at the same track, even on the same day, may run in remarkably different final times.

FWIW, I make almost no use of RC myself, and really have no advice about how best to employ it.

Anyway, here's Dave Siegel. It' fascinating if you can bear with it ...




Here is a further discussion on TrackMaster's Race Class (RC) number: http://paceandcap.com/forums/showthread.php?t=9415

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'Problem During Convert' error message
 

The following Data Centre Error Message during Convert is in the RDSS FAQ section (HERE) though some people do not think to look there for help when it occurs. Since about 75% of the tech support I do recently relates to this one problem, I am repeating it here for convenience, with an explanation following.

This means a problem with your TrackMaster account, not with the card file mentioned or with the Convert process. (Please read further, below).

Attachment 39253

Attachment 39254

Since TrackMaster's website upgrade a few months ago, the error messages TrackMaster reports when something goes wrong while downloading data files (all TrackMaster products, not just RDSS) are now being incorrectly interpreted by the current RDSS version (which is about 2 years old). Thus, that version of RDSS cannot now give a correct message to help you solve the problem - instead it basically throws its hands up and says 'there's some kind of problem with a specific file, but I don't know what it is'. That's because RDSS couldn't figure out that the file is NOT a data file but rather an HTML error message file with useful info about the problem.

Here are the types of problems it could be - all solvable by the user:

1. Your TrackMaster User Name is incorrect (as specified in the RDSS Registration Tab)
2. Your TrackMaster Password is incorrect (ditto above)
3. You don't have ANY RDSS data plan (new users)
4. The type of RDSS data plan you selected in the Registration Tab (PP Only or Bundle) does not exist on your TrackMaster account.
5. The selected RDSS plan DOES exist but is set to INACTIVE
6. Your credit card has expired or changed, or was declined (often happens after the end of the month, or after resuming downloads after a break)
7. Some other (highly unusual) unavailability of the requested card file

The way to solve ANY and ALL of these problems - if you ever get the error message shown above, it to login to your TrackMaster account, using the friendly link on the RDSS Registration Tab (or HERE) and correct anything from points 3 - 6 above. Obviously, if your TrackMaster User Name/Password combo is incorrect you can't login to your account (and neither can RDSS). After you fix that (or call TrackMaster for help 1 800 321-3343), you're likely back in business.

If none of points 1 - 6 is the problem (i.e. maybe point #7), wait a few moments then try again, or call TrackMaster for assistance. Or email or PM me. BUT - please read the next paragraph.

Please Note: to re-download a data file after correcting any of the above issues, YOU MUST uncheck the Don't Duplicate box in the Task section which otherwise causes RDSS to skip over Tasks it thinks it has already done before. You must force RDSS to re-download a correct race card ZIP file (rather than a misnamed HTML error message). When you are done, remember to re-check it again (the normal state).

Also: if you have changed (or corrected a mistaken) Password - be sure to RE-START RDSS so that the changed/new Password takes effect throughout the software before you try to Download again.

(FWIW, if anyone wants to read the error file (mislabeled as a ZIP file for a specific card), just navigate to the card file Archive Folder (\Rdss2\Data\PP\2015\XXX [track code]) and find the file with the date in question. Change the file extension from ZIP to HTML. Then open it as a web page and read it to get the error message RDSS couldn't interpret.)

I am working to fix RDSS' Data Centre error processing routines and TrackMaster is helping me make sure I've covered all possible error circumstances. This will be included in the next RDSS 2.1 release in a few months. Until then, the above points will help you figure it out.

If it's all too much, you are welcomed to PM or email me and I will help you.

Thanks for reading!

Ted

'Problem During Convert' error message (#2)
 

Normally I don't like to harp on a point too much, but ... after updating your TrackMaster account if you run into the above problem, you really do need to read the above advice - otherwise anything you or TrackMaster do to correct it will be useless for the race card you are interested in.

To re-download the same card which failed with the error message mentioned at the top of post #1 above - you must un-check the 'Don't Duplicate' box to force RDSS to download that same card again. Otherwise it will be skipped (with a clear message) - and you won't be any further ahead.

(TrackMaster personnel know about this problem and how to help with your account, but may not remember to remind you how to re-download the same card in the RDSS Data Centre.)

Ted

RDSS (does NOT run) on iPad or, Android devices
 

Q: Does RDSS run on an iPad, or Android tablet or phone, or Mac computer?

A: No. RDSS runs on Windows devices. (However, you can install Windows on a Mac using Parallels or other virtual OS tools, so then you can run RDSS on your Mac - many do). RDSS runs on Windows 10. Maybe that means you can run RDSS on a Windows Phone running Win10 (but why ...:confused:). If anyone does that, please do step up and claim your prize!

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No Data Showing in Analysis Panel Tabs
 

Q: First let me say that i really enjoy rdss2. I have encountered a problem. My analysis tab has stopped working. No data is showing. Can you give me some advice to correct?

Q: Previously, after I assembled a race for handicapping, selected pacelines would automatically show up in the Analysis Panel. Now, the Analysis screens are just empty :confused:

Q: I just installed RDSS for the first time (or on a new computer for the first time). I thought the software picked pacelines for me. Why are the Analysis Panel screens empty?

A: RDSS selects pacelines automatically (or not) depending on the choices you make in the Paceline Selection Strategy (PSS) dialog window, shown below. When you first install RDSS, the default PSS is '00 Manual (You Select!)'. With this setting, RDSS does not select any pacelines for you and when you open a race, the Analysis Screens will be empty. With this Manual setting, YOU select pacelines yourself by clicking on a line or lines in the horses' PP screens.

If you choose any other PSS (for example, the Default of 'Best Perceptor Last 3 Comparable') and you check the box 'Select Pacelines During Race Assembly' then when you open a race, RDSS will automatically also select pacelines for you according to that strategy (or any other you might choose), and your Analysis Panel screens will have data in them (selected pacelines).

You can have RDSS pick pacelines for you, or not - according to these settings.

(Note: in future versions, the Default PSS will always be the initial one, so out of the box, pacelines will be selected for you, but you can always reset that to Manual if you like - just like you can switch selections now.)


Attachment 39509

Q: Is there a timetable for the release of the new RDSS version?

A: I plan to make a fairly detailed post either later this week or early next week (e.g. March 11 - 16 period) outlining my best estimates for initial Beta release, then for the final release of RDSS 2.1 to the existing Subscribers. Also a Summary of major new features, plus the 'roadmap' (as I see it) for the rest of 2016 and subsequent releases. Also, very important, soliciting your feedback! This Summary will be followed by some initial walk-through videos, more screenshots and live handicapping using the tools, prior to a scheduled limited circulation Beta, then Final release.

Thanks everyone for your patience over almost 3 years now :eek: while I have worked out a fairly major new footing for RDSS and tried to find a way that the project continues to be exciting and enjoyable both for me (it's both my *livelihood* and my passion) and for all of you (and perhaps a few new people as well).

Update: Here is the new Forum for RDSS Version 2.1: http://paceandcap.com/forums/forumdisplay.php?f=149

Ted

Hey there, I searched the forum and looked in this thread, but I can't seem to find a basic description of the DTV. I know it is Daily Track Variant, but not sure what the numbers mean.

Does a negative number mean it was a very fast track?
Does a lower number in DTV mean the track was faster than when there is a larger number?
What is a "normal" track DTV? How do I find out what is the average number for my track?

Using Synthesis Manual Entry, I know 16-18 was a normal track using the DRF's variant. This was pretty simple to understand. Going down, every 2 points lower the DTV was, the race was adjusted 1 "length/tick" approximately as faster. Once again, this was very easy to understand and visualize. I am still trying to understand the RDSS 2, which I love btw, but I need to understand it better to really understand what the horses did on what kind of track. Any help on the DTV is appreciated, Thanks, Dan

Does a negative number mean it was a very fast track? -10 would be very fast -2 not so much
Does a lower number in DTV mean the track was faster than when there is a larger number? yes
What is a "normal" track DTV? How do I find out what is the average number for my track? 0 means track normal



I’m not a rdss user, but they come up in Val or Spec.
I think they are the same as the in pdf trackmaster file . Say –3 fast= 3 tenths or 1.5 lengths fast.
For example 0 even track.,10 .slow 5 lengths, now say –7 fast 3.5 lengths or 7 tenths fast. This is how I have used them
I have reverse engineered these variants , and think they are pretty good, mind you this is a final time variant, made from par times.
Dan, I do not know what all goes into the making of these numbers, but they much better than the DRF's variant
I’d just be wary of using lines that are to extreme. Say like +19 on a off track

Thanks Peteman, I am used to the DRF variants so the TM ones were kind of throwing me for a loop. Appreciate the help, Dan

Trackmaster DTV
 

Trackmaster uses the following formula for determining the effect of the DTV

Time Adjustment = .0125 * d * DTV where d is the number of furlongs in the paceline race.

So a -10 DTV in a 6 furlong race = .0125 * 6 *-10 = -.75. In other words according to Trackmaster this race race .75 seconds faster than the Par for this race class.

Hi Mark,
That would tighten up the numbers some.A single variant point at each distance,a minus 10 points at 6 =.75 secs fast.or say a +20 at 7 fur
would be 1.75 seconds slow final variant.Thanks for the input.This kinda makes me accept a +20 var number a little better.

Sorry word wrap makes this hard to read. key

col 1 dis 5 fur
col 2 a single variant point a 5 fur .063
col 3 what a minus 10 at 5 fur looks like .625
col 4 what a + 20 would look like in seconds 1.250

Dtv
 

Peterman,

It makes a great deal of sense. But from being right on to way off, you never know. So I don't use them. I do use ITV however.

In my view final time is completely reliant on early pace. I don't know the percentage but I believe it is a good 50%. You don't get fast final times without fast early fractions. If you have a bunch of SPs and S in a race or slow Pressers, nobody wants the lead. You see it in turf routes all the time. You see Pressers who can finish against a 1:11 but some slow E or EP grabs the lead and they play follow the leader through 1:12. There is a limit to how fast a horse can run the final fraction, they are flesh and blood.

So it makes absolute no sense to me to make final time variants that don't in some fashion take into account the early pace and it makes less sense to apply a final time variant to early fractions. It's nonsense. I don't know why some really smart guy hasn't figured a way to do this. Hell, it has been done this way since early TPR days. Pizzolla showed how he adjusted DRF speed ratings by 2nd calls off his fulcrum pace. If I was 20 years younger I might make a stab at it, but I have gotten to lazy and so I just don't use them.

peteman
 

I coded your work up for easier reading
Bill

Mark, when your doing your match up your kind of free from this ball parking of numbers, and are able to concentrate on the flow of the race.
I can’t match, but we can look to for who will be advantaged by the pace, I see there is freedom from the exact value in numbers.

Imo the final time varient does not reflect the fractional splits 50% of the time as well,I used to make pace and final time variants
Too much work, fortunately for us the first 2 fractions are not stepped on too much .by most of these programs we use.


I too wish I could up with something new,a pbs or a ppf spinoff,I think we need things that are unique,or something old we can master
I’ve tried race shapes, pace pressure gauges, running styles, pace of race to get a clue of the race the horse is coming from.
Now I’m comfortable with velocity ,as old as it and I am.

Thanks Bill, for cleaning up that number mess.

Paceline Selection
 

Peterman,

I'll be 66 next month and I am a firm believer that, "Youth is wasted on the young!" I found this website 3 years ago and have studied the Hat Check Blog til my eyes bled. After 3 years, including the time I spent figuring out how to implement the Match Up on RDSS, I am comfortable. Do I hit 50% of my wagers, I am not Jim Bradshaw. But I bet win and place so I catch enough place horses at outstanding odds to make a serious profit when I my horse runs second.
The biggest mistake I see from the handicappers that post here is that they focus on the last 3 lines. Instead of finding the line where the horse finish well, won or very close up against the fastest early pace in his pps. Now I ask you if I want to compare horses don't I want to compare what they have shown as their best? I pick lines 9 and 10 back, I don't care. Once I get them I can see who was the fastest horse in their last 10 races. There will be horses that are obvious throw outs, never finished anywhere near against these paces. So you only have to deal with a few "true contenders" as the Hat called them. Now comes the skill. Can you work your way back to that line? Are there reasons that the horse can't run back to that race? The Hat had 3: 1. horse has changed his Running Style and become a slow horse, 2) Is he still a horse? 3) Can he still get on top of his fractions. Took me quite a while to figure out what he meant. Trainers today, particularly at the mid and small tracks play too many games to darken form. So if you stick with recent lines you get beat at short odds. Most of the handicapping world does that. You have the whole story of the horse right in front of your eyes, read it from the bottom up! Remember, long layoffs are good. No one is going to put a horse away for 200 to 350 days if he is completely broken. Depending on the trainer and the reported works you can get a feeling about a horse coming back. My favorite angle is 3rd start of the long layoff. The horse has had enough work to get fit regardless of what the return races look like. If he had some snappy works all the better. Anyway, us old dogs can teach these youngsters a thing or two. But as Jim told Richie, "Hush up, your mouth can make you deaf".

Mark,


I think you are correct about never knowing just how accurate DTVs can be.

And I absolutely agree that trying to determine track variants based on just final time alone is not good enough, and absurd without context of early fractions.

However, its clearly better than no assessment of track surface speed; and the reasons why no one has figured out how to do it (what I highlighted in bold) is two-fold at minimum imo:

(1) it's almost impossible to do without handicapping each race (before and after the running) which involves more than just crunching numbers on a spreadsheet.
Even with enough man-power or software creating knowledge, extremely time consuming. and,

(2) because it seems every one who has attempted this process only views it through either: final time 1st, or just velocity alone.
Class, current form and position at each call are still very hard to piece together consistently for virtually all of us.

I've only been back into the game for just a few months, but I've been attempting to piece this all together for only a few weeks.
A sometimes frustrating process that pans out for me at the windows from time to time, which I ultimately am convinced is solvable as far as
discovering a more efficient way of determining track surface variants.

Then I ran across this thread. Hopefully, I can be one of those who become smart enough to bring the pieces together.

Q: I got an error message with RDSS. Message says: RDSS encountered a conflict with another version of the ZIP library it uses and tried to correct the problem.
Please make sure the file XCEEDZIP.DLL exists in your C:\Rdss2 Folder. Please try running RDSS again to see if the problem is resolved. If it isn't resolved please look for the file XCEEDZIP.DLL in your C:\WINDOWS\SYSTEM32 folder. If you find it, please either DELETE it or RENAME IT, then run RDSS again.

There was no XCEEDZIP.DLL in my C:\WINDOWS\SYSTEM32 folder.

Any help from anyone is appreciated. Thank-you, Brian


A: Here is what I sent you by email just now, for others' benefit:

Since the last time you successfully used RDSS on that computer, likely you installed some other software which made use of a ZIP management toolset named XCEEDZIP. Which overwrote the RDSS license info in the Windows registry for that same tool. Or -- some other change happened on your computer recently which de-registered that ZIP tool :(

Try this:

1. Go to your RDSS folder. Locate a file named REGDLL.BAT. Double-click it to run it. Usually this updates the XCEEDZIP tool to re-license it to RDSS. Then run RDSS to see if that worked.

2. If that doesn't work, uninstall RDSS. Don’t delete your database file (data.db) if asked during the uninstall! Then reinstall RDSS. This will re-register the XCEEDZIP tool to RDSS in the process. Then run RDSS to check.

Ted

RDSS Runs slowly Converting data
 

Q: I have been with RDSS for a few years, and the horse races are accumulating and slowing down my computer. I am thinking of getting an external hard drive and putting last year's races on that. Is this the way to go? Any recommendations on the type of external hard drive to purchase? Any other suggestions in this regard?


A: The size of the database file affects the speed of the Convert process in the Data Centre operations. I recommend starting a fresh, empty database file for each new year. Even if you download EVERY race card from EVERY track 365 days a year - your database file should still be well less than 1 Gigabyte in size. But it will run more slowly than with a fresh empty database file.

You should be making a backup copy of all your data anyway, every week ;). But if you prefer not to :eek:, you can simply copy your database file to an external thumb drive for deep storage. 2 Gb USB thumb drives cost about $5 in my local Staples, and 8/16 Gb thumb drives only a little more.

Look in the Data Centre, lower right box captioned 'Database' to find the file name and folder of your working database. Use Windows' folder system to navigate there and make a copy of that file on your thumb drive.

Next, in RDSS, on the Desktop, use the Data Mgmt button to create a New database file. Opening the New Database dialog box, creates a new database file named (cheekily): 'NEW Database (RENAME This Please!).db'. Scroll the list of database files displayed in your \RDSS\Data\ folder to find that file, right-click it to Rename it, then give it a meaningful name: e.g. data2017. If you see the .db file ending (a database file), DON'T change that ending part. If you don't see that .db file ending, don't worry about it - just rename it. Then single-click on it to select it.

You are then prompted to RESTART RDSS. When you restart, that newly created (and empty) database file will be the default database file for your next session of RDSS. Voilà - you have a clean, empty and faster processing RDSS database! If ever you want your old one back, or any other old ones as the years go by - simply use the Data Mgmt tool to Switch between existing databases. You could go back and rename your previous, big database file something like data2015-2017.db, or whatever. That way, you know what's what in your Data subfolder.

Most computers have LOTS of storage space these days. Your RDSS databases, even after a few years should not occupy a whole lot of space. So - keep them all on your main hard drive so you can go back to them if you want. But back them all up, please!!

Other Data subfolders you can clean up periodically to regain disk space are: the \Data\Cache\ folder and the \Data\PP\ folder. The Cache contains temporary files created whenever you Assemble a race for fast retrieval inside RDSS - also to store pacelines chosen and Contender choices made. if you know you'll never go back to resurrect an old race (e.g. with previous paceline selections), you can drill down into that Cache folder and delete subfolders according to year, track and date.

Downloaded TrackMaster data files are stored in the \Data\PP\ subfolders of your RDSS2 folder - by Year, Track, and Date. Once you have Converted these files to a RDSS database, their job is done! You can delete them (e.g. annually) or better still - move them to deep storage on your handy RDSS 8 Gb $10 thumb drive :) This also frees up storage on your main disk. (While RDSS cannot currently recreate a database out of these older TrackMaster data files, one day it will - so that's an argument for keeping them somewhere.)

The above ideas should solve your RDSS slowly Converting, plus recover some disk storage space, plus earn you a good data housekeeping award ;)

Cheers,

Ted

"Q: I have been with RDSS for a few years, and the horse races are accumulating and slowing down my computer. I am thinking of getting an external hard drive and putting last year's races on that. Is this the way to go? Any recommendations on the type of external hard drive to purchase? Any other suggestions in this regard?"

If you really want to get RDSS to snap along converting files etc., create a new database monthly. Since I started downloading all tracks a couple of years ago I keep all races in monthly databases and then delete them as I go along so that at any one time I have the past year for reference. If you want to keep more keep them as long as you wish. You won't believe the speed difference when RDSS has only at most a months worth of files in a database.

Pook

Rdss is slowing down my computer
 

Thanks Ted and POOK for your well explained responses.
Good Skill and Good Computing!

Does RDSS make adjustments to the ratings for horses coming from a faster track to a slower track

Everything but the original screen has every adjustment you can think of. So yes.

Pook

Pook is spot on. The specific adjustment is called the "Inter Track Variant" or ITV by RDSS. TrackMaster refers to it as the Track-Distance Variant. It's derived from a detailed shipper study. You can find a 33-minute video at this website about how they build their speed figures: www.trackmaster.com/articles/thr/ratings

RDSS pulls the DTV and ITV from the TrackMaster data file and uses them to adjust its data. And yes, everything to the right of the "Original" tab is adjusted and equalized for distance (except for Tandem, Workouts and Trips).

XCEEDZIP.DL Caveat
 

This morning when I tried to open RDSS I was unable to do so. An error message pop up indicated there was a conflict with the xceedzip.dll file. I have another copy of RDSS that has been renamed. I want to make some comparisons between 2 different config. settings. The same pop up error message appeared. If you read this and it sounds like gobbledygook, it is because you haven’t had a problem with the xceedzip file. I started looking for a fix and found one in the FAQ section. I followed the directions. Found the xceedzip file in both copies, but not in Win system 32 so I did not have to delete it there. I found the regdll.bat file double clicked and tried to reopen RDSS neither would open. I closed and rebooted still nothing. I think this may have happened, as Ted suggested in the fix, that a program, CCleaner, that I had downloaded earlier this morning was causing the conflict. So I went to the next step – uninstall. I tried that and got as far as the retry, ignore, ? can’t remember the 3rd option. I could not get past that part, but part of the program uninstalled. I never got to “the don’t delete the data base” option. I got a little nervous because my 2018 races were on the remaining RDSS. So I decided to do the update/install. When I finished, the reinstalls worked perfectly except all my 2018 races were gone. Boo Hoo. I don’t know what I did wrong. I have a bad habit of hitting the key board when something doesn’t work, that’s my approach to a fix :) . Also, I don’t remember everything that I tried and I roughly remember the order of my actions (my feeble 82 yr old mind). I just want to offer this message of caution to anyone having a problem with the xceedzip error message. Proceed with caution. Ted, I did get this message sometime during my button punching. I saved it thought it might be of some help to you. I will have to PM it to you if I can I don't know how to do it here.
Pat