This user guide describes how to seamlessly integrate the Roster Athletics platform with the Eagle Eye Pro timing system.
This guide is divided into a few sections below:
What do you need to do to set up the integration?
- You have already created the meet/meeting on the Roster Athletics platform.
- You have downloaded and installed the Roster/EagleEyePro data transfer program named the Roster Athletics Agent (you can download the program here: Download and install the Roster Agent).
- You have an active demo of, or a full license to use, the EagleEyePro software (note that Eagle Eye Pro only works with Windows). You can download it from the following link: https://www.eagleeyedv.com/category_s/866.htm. Eagle Eye 5.2.0.101 or greater will have native Roster support out of the box. For Eagle-Eye specific questions, email support@eagleeyetrack.com.
The Roster Agent program is a small program that allows communications between the Roster platform and Eagle Eye Pro so that they can stay in sync with each other during the competition for start lists upload from Roster to Eagle Eye Pro and results download and sync from Eagle Eye Pro to the Roster platform (and immediately in the app).
Now you should have everything ready to start the integration. Make sure you have the following three programs open:
- Roster Athletics in a browser - from which a meet/meeting configuration file is downloaded prior to meet/meeting start
- Roster Agent running - connects the meet/meeting in Roster with a live session for timing
- Eagle Eye Pro running - import start lists, time, save results to the live session
Integration
The Roster Agent shares information data between Eagle Eye Pro and Roster by using shared LIF files. You can use the same computer as the timing computer or use a shared network file folder between computers (e.g. one computer running Roster/Roster Agent and another computer running Eagle Eye Pro).
1. Download the meet/meeting authentication file
First choose participants that you want to export from Roster Athletics to Eagle Eye Pro. You can find this setting on the meet/meeting Details in the Timing system integration section.
You can export all participants or exclude participants with DNS and SCR statuses (e.g., when you already know before the competition that the athlete will not show up, but do not want to remove him/her).
In the Exported events field, you can choose an option for the category of events you want to send to the Agent for timing. You can export all events or exclude finished events.
Leave or set the Event description format field to Detailed.
On the left-hand-side, click the Agent config button and select EagleEyePro.
This will download an authentication .roster file for your specific meet/meeting that lets the RosterAgent know to use this meet/meeting to connect with Eagle Eye Pro. Save the file in a place where you can easily find it again.
Please note: It is critical that you use the LAST downloaded authentication file to load into the RosterAgent. Otherwise, the permissions will not match and you will not be able to connect to your meet/meeting (“Can’t connect - permission denied”).
2. Load the authentication file in the Roster Agent and Start the live session
Once the Roster Agent is open, select the Input directory (start list updates) for EVT files and Output directory (result files) for LIF files in the Roster Agent. These directories NEED TO BE THE SAME as the input and output directories that Eagle Eye Pro uses in order for the data to be transferred between Roster and Eagle Eye Pro (see below on the Eagle Eye Pro setup).
TIP: the input and an output directory should be folders or sub-folders on a drive (e.g., C:) and you should avoid adding the folder directly to your desktop.
Click on Load configuration and select the latest .roster authentication file (e.g., meeting-xxx-auth.roster) that you downloaded, per the above, for this meet/meeting. This will store the directory information so you don't need to enter directory settings every time).
Click Start. The live session for Eagle Eye Pro and Roster Athletics is now connected if the Result monitor status is Active and the Connection status is Connected.
Note that Stop will stop the connection, and Quit will exit the program completely. To change a configuration file or to change input/output directories, the connection must be stopped (i.e. no active connection).
If you have Show notifications enabled by default, you will see status messages such as:
You can disable notifications by pressing the Show notifications button, which will then appear as a lighter shade button.
When the Roster Agent is running, pay attention to the Result monitor and Connection statuses:
Result monitor:
- Active - normal operational mode
- Idle
- Initialising
- Stopping
Connection:
- Connecting
- Connected - normal operational mode
- Disconnecting
- Disconnected
- Reconnecting - agent will automatically attempt to reconnect
- Invalid - using outdated configuration file: try to re-download and then reload the config file
3. Time with Eagle Eye Pro
The Eagle Eye Pro system and software is configured to work with Roster Athletics out of the box. You need to make sure the Eagle Eye Pro Input Directory and the Output Directory point to the same directories as you set up in the RosterAgent.
Please note: if the directories are not the same between Roster and Eagle Eye Pro, the data will not be transferred, and you will not get the expected results. Please double-check these directories.
Once you have prepared your start lists in Roster Athletics, go to Eagle Eye Pro. Click on the Race Results tab, and when you see an option to Import.... Click on this, go to the same input directory as that of the Roster Agent, and select the .evt file created titled Lynx.
Now the synchronization setup is complete, and all available start lists are loaded into Eagle Eye Pro. Eagle Eye Pro is now ready to go, and the event can commence in the standard Eagle Eye Pro procedure. Once the event has finished and Eagle Eye Pro has the marked results, click on Race Results → Save Times.... Make sure this file directory is the same as the Roster Agent Output directory, from which you can go ahead and use the default event filename when saving.
Now you can go back to Roster Athletics web admin and see the times and rankings for the athletes updated from Eagle Eye Pro. The results are also immediately available in the Roster Athletics App.
Important note: every time you update the start list in Roster Athletics, it is automatically pushed to the Roster Agent, but you still need to Import... the .EVT file in Eagle Eye Pro to load these changes. For live field results entry, please see the Meet Mgmt App guides.
Competitor status: in Eagle Eye Pro, the status (DNS, DQ, DNF for each athlete can be set by clicking the Time field→ `right click`.
DQ rules can be added in Roster but not directly from Eagle Eye Pro.
Precision: we recommend using Thousandths as results precision in Eagle Eye Pro. Using thousandths, all results will be sent to the Roster system with 1/1000 precision, allowing Roster to assign the correct places automatically. When setting to thousandths, the Roster app and .pdf results printouts will still show hundredths except for when there is a tie in the hundredths place, in which case the thousands place will be used to calculate place and shown accordingly, for example, when two athletes from two different heats have the same result.
Troubleshooting Tips & Tricks
- Make sure you are running the latest version of the Roster Agent (please see the Download and install Roster Agent for the latest version number).
- If a "Can't connect - permission denied" message pops up while trying to connect the Roster Agent, make you have loaded the latest version of the meet/meeting agent configuration file. This file is downloaded from meet/meeting Details → Agent config.
- If you are using shared folders and your connection status is good but either a.) your start lists in Roster are not updating to Eagle Eye Pro or b.) your saved results in Eagle Eye Pro are not being updated to Roster, make sure you carefully check your paths on both the Roster Agent and Eagle Eye Pro (Import... and Save Times...) to see that both the set of input and output directories are pointing to the exact same location and that the settings described above for set-up are all followed precisely.
- The Roster Agent can queue up saved Eagle Eye Pro results if you lose connectivity (e.g. bad or very slow internet). If you lose the connection, the saved LIF files will be queued up and uploaded automatically once the reconnection has been detected and re-established by the Agent. The upload queue is visible in the Roster Agent and will normally be empty when there are no connection issues or cleared once any queued results are automatically uploaded.
- For Eagle Pro Support, contact support@eagleeyetrack.com