I come before you, 5 days after the birth of this beast, with a ton of new updates just in time for week 2’s madness. For those of you that missed last week’s post, SOAP GameDay is an in-browser event viewing portal. Event information, embedded webcasts, scores, rankings, awards, and alot more are all displayed in real time, at the same time, so you never need to rummage through dozens of URLs to get your daily FIRST results. And to top it all off, Meebo’s embeddable chat is included for all of those watching to chat it up before, during, or after events. Everything is automated, so it will take care of itself and move onto the next week when the time comes. That being said, it is time to move onto the new features and updates.
Backend/Automation: First of all, the main backend function set went from 317 lines to 964. Alot of the original code exists with alot more built on top of it. Although there is much more to the system, it is still just as quick and efficient as before. Automation of some of the newer features took a slightly different approach to the way information is updated, but there is no noticeable change in performance.
Dashboard Updated: Moved the webcasts to the right pane, which is 20% wider than the left. All video streams are floating so they should rearrange themselves in a better fashion. There are still some resolutions where things get funky. It looks great at 1280x1024.
Regional Specific Sections:
Info: Added resource links to event agenda, event website, and the CD thread for that event.
Matches: You’ve asked for it, we’ve answered. Elimination ladder. Yes, it finally exists! Once elimination matches begin, the ladder will appear between the qualifying and elimination matches. It will fill itself out as the eliminations go on. Also, after speaking with Bob Spitzer of 4FX, the match schedule will be available as soon as matches start. I have adjusted our code for these changes, and you will notice them as soon as the event begins. The match times are also no longer static. They will self-adjust and estimate the proper time for each remaining match.
Rankings: The rankings have stayed the same for the most part. The teams are now linked to their team page. This includes all matches and awards.
Awards: Awards are now available. Team numbers are also linked.
Teams: A team selection page for the selected event. The dropdown is populated by matches, so only teams that have played will appear.
Ticker: I spent a lot of time developing this. It is a very extensible ESPN-like ticker built entirely from scratch. It will populate itself once matches begin, and will continue to update after the last data set is exhausted. It shows the last 5 matches from each event. Expect this little guy to see lots of updates over the next few weeks.
SMS Alerts: This is what I’m most proud of this week. The service will allow you to manage your own list of favorite teams and will send you a text message each time one of those teams play a match at any official FIRST event. The message will include the teams in both alliances, final scores, and an updated ranking for your selected team. You are able to enable and disable the sending of messages at any time. SMS messages will go live tomorrow. If you have unlimited texting and want to be a tester, let me know. I have it running today, but wanted to get the kinks out.
Browser Support: Tested and working in Firefox, Opera, and Internet Explorer. IE7 users need to resize the window once for the layout to fix itself. Microsoft is silly. I will try to fix this asap.
Layout: There were some changes to the overall layout and the theme. Nothing too major.
GameDay’s Future:
Display Issues: I have google analytics wired in to get a better idea of what kind of browsers and resolutions everyone is using. I may have to develop resolution-specific layouts in the near future.
Chat: Next week we are looking to use a jIRC client in place of the meebo flash chat. This will solve alot of issues all around. If you plan on spending lots of time in GameDay and want to become a mod, let me know.
Alerts: We are currently looking into expanding alerts beyond text messages. Email and IM messages are in the mix among others.
So that’s this week’s version in a nutshell. I’m sure I am forgetting a few things, but the major things are all there. Please give any feedback you may have… bugs, features, etc. I would really appreciate it. My goal is to make this as big as possible, and I couldn’t do that without your help. Thank you so much to all of those who have given me feedback thus far. Enjoy! 
Seriously, I’ll probably be using this even at the competition. CD for team discussion in one tab, TBA for team stat tracking and previous-year performance in another, and SOAP in the last (for up-to-date scouting). You guys are amazing.