That sounds crazy, given that the first prototype hasn't even been completed yet (ok, one very early prototype using a 128x64 GLCD has been completed - was it really nearly two months ago? - but the entire product from end-to-end is still in development). Despite this, there are already plans for an entire range of ScoreSure products...

The original idea of a digital score keeping device for boules/petanque remains very much the driving force behind the whole ScoreSure project.
This original idea quickly transformed into a digital scorecard for golf players - incorporating all of the rules for score-keeping in golf, including the some of the less well-known rules such as 4-ball worst ball and Stableford scoring.

After making enquiries with casual players of the game (regular players and golf course staff/owners tend to be familiar with all aspects of the rules) it seems that quite a few players have not had things like Stableford Rules explained fully; with the consequence that a lot of casual players are missing out on playing in the very tournaments that have been designed for them!
For example, Stableford rules allow each player to play and score according to their own handicap and are made up in such a way that one or two bad holes do not blight the score card for an inconsistent player.

The ScoreSure Golf Pro is not just an electronic score card, but also a means of enforcing these rules, so that players can participate in any type of tournament, without the need to keep track of complicated score-keeping rules.

It's a sad fact that, in this day and age, with calculators and computers on every desk and in every pocket, that mental arithmetic is suffering.
A lot of games rely heavily on mental arithmetic, albeit rather simple calculations, for keeping score. Unfortunately, a lot of players are unable or unwilling to keep their own score accurately because of poor arithmetic and/or understanding of the rules of the game.

So this has become the driving force behind a range of ScoreSure score-keeping devices: to take the pressure off the player when keeping scores, no matter how poor their mental arithmetic. The secondary function of the ScoreSure device will be to maintain a historical record of the scores recorded, which can then be stored (online) against a player's profile. Over time, the player will be able to look back over their previous scores and monitor their progress, to see in which areas they need to improve. The ScoreScore method of entering player scores should ensure that entering results:

• is simple to use
• allows easy recall and playback of games played

Games to which these principles can be applied include

• Golf
• Boules/petanque
• Darts

The ScoreSure results website will not only be a repository of players scores, but will enable users to arrange these scores to create and maintain tournament details and league tables.

There are plans for our newest addition to the range - darts - to also include an avatar-based "playback" option online, where each game of darts can be watched, just like a video-playback of a match on the television: complete with split-screen view and character animations! An exciting prospect indeed: but only possible once the first few ScoreSure devices have rolled off the production line!

Work on the Nokia 6610 display and joystick continues at quite a pace and with the eeprom-drive menu code complete, it's time to get down to the nitty gritty of actually (re)building our ScoreSure Golf Pro digital scorecard device.

One of the planned features of the device is to download golf course data from the website www.scoresure.co.uk. This means putting it up there in the first place! Which means not only an online editor, but some method of recalling and displaying the golf course information - Adobe Flash seemed a perfect choice for this, and it is anticipated that the golf part of the website will be a mixture of HTML/XML/Ajax/Javascript and Flash.

http://www.scoresure.co.uk/golf/coursedetails.asp?courseid=ABCDEFG&holeno=1

The golf course hole information has been recreated using the course guide booklet and scorecards, available from the golf shop and online.

Never satisfied until the best. Or something like that. When you've grown up with a die-hard blue-nosed Everton fan, stuff like that tends to stick in your head and pop out at the most inappropriate moments. Perhaps today it's not quite so inappropriate.

After all, the ScoreStore Game Keeping Device (see, it has a name now, thanks to Robot Steve over at BotBuilder.co.uk) is done, finished, working, tested, working, done, finished. But somehow, I feel it's not quite there...

For a start, the LCD display is big and clumsy. Secondly, it needs more than 2xAAA batteries to power it. Thinking about the enclosure - which has yet to be designed - this is going to make the device quite a big heavy thing to carry around in your pocket! A big display I can live with, but having to pump 4 x AAA batteries into something like this seems a bit overkill - a portable CD player or a torch, maybe, but an LCD display with a couple of buttons?
My game score keeping device will end up the size of a C90 cassette tape! It'd be easier to carry an A5 notebook in your pocket - there has to be some way of making the whole thing smaller, lighter, and altogether more "professional" looking.

As it turns out, this little thing appeared on eBay. It's a GLCD (graphical LCD). Look at it - it's tiny. No thicker than an After Eight mint. And, best of all, it runs at 3v (as low as 2.5v, so it still works even after a bit of battery drain!). Brilliant.


Low profile, low voltage, and 4 times bigger than a 16x2 character display.
What's not to love about this GLCD?

Luckily the Oshonsoft PIC18 simulator/compiler supports graphical LCD displays - so the commands currently used for writing data out to the 16x2 LCD can be quickly and easily upgraded to use the GLCD. And, to put the cherry on the cake, we can have some nice icons and monochrome bitmaps, just to show off how clever it all is!