Electronic scouting using 7 laptops and a little mysql

[themccannman]

Here's out latest white paper on the electronic scouting system we have. http://www.chiefdelphi.com/media/papers/3037

We use tablets instead of laptops because they are considerably cheaper, smaller, and lighter. Be sure to get a high quality switch and cables if you're going to have everything wired together, we used a hardwired system in our first iteration two years ago and had constant problems with disconnecting. Using the tablet's bluetooth has been much easier and much more reliable and now people don't trip over our spider web while trying to get to the bathroom. Also, unless you tether with someone's cell phone having an offline server doesn't allow for any real time data analysis. We purchased a cheap data plan for two of our tablets which upload the data from the 6 other tablets to a virtual server. Then we can do live calculations on that server which makes the data available to be pulled down by a smart phone app made for our drive coach so that he can check team stats in real time before matches.

Most of this stuff came after a year of working on our system though so don't bite off more than you can chew, get a simple system that works well going first then start adding features.