**FIRST EMAIL**/Updated Alliance Pairing Algorithm

[Dave Flowerday]

Originally Posted by Karthik

Kudos to the Saxton's for creating this.

More importantly, I'm glad FIRST is using it, and I'm glad they're making the process more transparent.

I do have a lingering concern, though: every algorithm that's been used for the last several years (to my knowledge) has had the option to set the minimum match spacing. Obviously this is an important parameter, however the value used is often not a good one. Many times the people setting up an event seem to choose a conservative value, especially at smaller regionals (which is where it does the most damage).

Setting the match spacing incorrectly will cause a terrible schedule, no matter what the algorithm. This one is no different, of course. To really use this algorithm effectively, I think FIRST should decide on a match spacing ahead of time, and dictate it to the regionals. Maybe even put it in ranges (something like, 20-30 teams use match spacing 3, 31-40 teams use 4, 41-50 use 5, etc). I generally don't like hard-coding things, but perhaps make the scoring software automatically choose this number as a default and put the option to change it in a hidden menu or something.

To see what I mean, take this new match generation software and plug in 30 teams, 10 rounds, with minimum spacing of 5 (from what I've seen, 5 is a commonly-chosen number for minimum match spacing at many regionals). The resulting schedule is pretty ugly and would still generate a bunch of "the scheduling algorithm sucks!" messages here on CD if it were used at an event. Even 30 teams, 10 rounds, match spacing 4 isn't too great (and would still generate complaints, I'll bet).