tsh Commands

The basics of how to operate tsh.

Updated Thu Jul 21 21:48:45 EDT 2005 for tsh 2.975.

Starting tsh

Once you have installed and configured tsh, you’re ready to run tsh. Now tsh is a Perl script that runs under many different operating systems, and each operating system has a different way of starting programs. Broadly speaking, we can divide them into graphical methods and command-line methods. With the graphical methods, you need to find the icon appropriate for your operating system and (typically) double-click on it with your mouse to launch tsh, which will behave as though it was run from the command line with no “arguments”.

From the command line, you should in general enter some sort of incantation necessary to persuade your operating system to run tsh, followed by an optional “argument” giving the name of the subdirectory (folder) that contains the files for the event with which you want to work. If you do not specify an event, tsh will look first for the most recently updated configuration file it can find, or if none are available the oldstyle “tsh.config” file.

In Mac OS/X, you may either open a Finder window to your tsh folder and double-click on the ‘osx-tsh.command’ icon, or follow the generic Unix command-line instructions.

I have not supported Classic MacOS since 2003. If you need to use tsh with MacOS 9 or earlier, please contact me and I'll fix a number of compatibility issues and create a double-clickable icon for launching tsh.

With Unix, open a shell (terminal) window, cd to your tsh directory and enter “./tsh.pl” (or just “tsh.pl” if your path permits) followed by a space and the name of the subdirectory with your event files. For example: “./tsh.pl toronto-2005”

Under Windows, open a window to your tsh folder, then double-click on the “tsh” icon (if you have a properly installed version of Perl and a modern version of Windows) or “dos-run.bat” icon (otherwise). You can also type “perl tsh.pl” in a DOS command window (Choose “Run Command” from the Windows Start menu, then enter “command”), if you prefer. If you want to override tsh’s choice of event directory, enter it on the same line: “perl tsh.pl myevent”

If you use an operating system not listed here, please contact me and I’ll add more instructions to this section.

If you get a message complaining that the configuration file can’t be found, make sure that your ‘.t’ files and ‘config.tsh’ file are together in one subdirectory, of the main tsh directory.

When you successfully start tsh, you should see a sequence of messages something like the following.

Welcome to tsh version 2.975
Loading configuration file.
Configuration file loaded.
Loading external(s): update nssc high-win high-loss low-win low-loss show12 tuffluck
Loading division A.
Loading division B.
Loading division C.
Loading division D.
Loading division E.
All divisions loaded.
tsh>

The “tsh>” is your main prompt. When you see it, you can type a command, about which much more will follow. The most important commands to remember are “help” and “quit”. After typing a command, don’t forget to press the return key.

Using tsh

tsh is a command shell. If you’re familiar with using shells such as any Unix shell, OS/X Terminal or even DOS, you can probably skip this paragraph. A command shell is a no-frills way of interacting with a computer. In a large window, the computer displays a prompt, inviting you to type in a command that the computer understands. When you do so and then press the “return” key (analogous to hitting your clock in Scrabble), the computer takes some action based on what you’ve entered, then prompts you for your next command. Sometimes your command is modal, causing the computer to prompt for and expect a different set of commands until the mode is complete.

Pay attention to the changing prompts, which indicate what information tsh needs. Don’t forget to press the “return” key to confirm each command.

All currently available tsh commands are listed below in tables for reference, grouped by function. Most users will not use most of these commands. Each command has a name which verbosely describes its purpose, but which can be abbreviated to the portion shown in capital letters as shown in its example. Most commands must be followed (on the same line, before pressing “return”) by one or more arguments. These arguments are represented in examples by names, which must be replaced by actual values. If you don’t enter correct arguments, tsh will tell you what the correct ones should be, and where it stopped understanding what you were typing. Within modal commands, the syntax of what you are supposed to type varies, but is usually shown in the prompt.

To take one case, the example for the “RoundStandings” command, which displays standings in a division as of a specified round, reads rs r d. This means that “RoundStandings” can be abbreviated to its capitalised letters “rs”, and that it must be followed by a round number and a division name. You would enter “rs 5 b” and press the “return” key to ask for Division B standings as of Round 5. If you have only one division in your tournament, you may omit division names as arguments to commands. In the preceding example, you would just enter “rs 5”.

tsh Command Reference

The following commands are used for entering tournament results, as well as checking and correcting them:

The following commands generate reports based on tournament results:

The following commands are used for manually pairing rounds. You will need to know about them if you are configuring tsh before a tournament, or if you encounter an unexpected pairing situation and want to override automatic pairings.

The following pairing commands are deprecated, but are listed in case there is anyone who is still using them. All of these commands have been replaced by NewSwiss, which produces much better quality Swiss pairings.

And here all the commands which don’t fit into one of the above categories:

There may also be external (plug-in) commands installed in your particular copy of tsh. These will be in a directory called ‘bin’, and listed in a configuration file there called ‘tshxcfg.txt’. They have been tested with OS/X (and should therefore work with most other flavours of Unix) and Windows XP, but may not work with more primitive operating systems. If not, you may still be able to use externals by running them separately from the command line. The following externals are part of the default distribution.