Pairings Setup Dialog

When you make pairings for the next round you are taken to the Pairings Setup dialog in which you have the option of manually setting up forced board numbers, forced byes, forced pairs, the starting board number, whether or not to use the different pairing options such as accelerated pairings.

Some other options, such as in-depth searches, vanilla pairings, and colorblind pairings (in which color due is not taken into account) are not available in FIDE mode.

These rules can be set or reset here, since they often change from round to round.

Other key pairing rules that do not normally change during the course of the tournament, such as whether to use FIDE pairings, are set in the Rules for Pairing dialog.

In-depth pairings

The checkbox for “In-depth pairings” should normally be left on. If you find pairings are running slow you may cancel them and try again after unchecking this box.

Setting forced categories

To put players in one of the forced categories (byes or pairings), select them with the mouse (or type their names in the edit box above the player roster on the right side of the dialog). Then click the appropriate button — “Add as White/Add as Black” — in the case of forced pairings, or the button corresponding to the value of the bye you want to assign — Full, Half, or Zero — in the case of forced byes.

Board number assignment

When you force pairings, SwissSys will prompt you for the board number you want to assign. Otherwise board numbers are assigned in the usual way, with the top ranked player on the top board.

Additional options

Another of the options is to “remove players from list as you go”. If you have many bye or forced pairing selections to make, this will reduce the size of the roster list as you go, making it easier to find the next selection in the list.

If you make a mistake you can either delete a selected player from a box or clear them all. Click “OK to Pair” when you are done with this manual pairings setup.