meshO Manager

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Walkthrough: your first event ​

Audience: New users — an organiser or timing operator trying Manager for the first time.

An end-to-end tour: create a small event, add some data, download a card, and view results. Everything a real event needs, but small enough to do in an afternoon at home. Each step links to a deeper page if you want the full details.

Before you start ​

You'll need:

  • Manager installed and running on one computer (the "server"). See Installing meshO Manager if you haven't done this yet.
  • A web browser on the same computer, or on any other device on the same network. Chrome, Edge or Firefox 151+ is required if you want to download cards or read a SportIdent station's memory — both rely on Web Serial, which Safari and older Firefox don't support. For everything else, any modern browser works.
  • Optionally, a SportIdent USB reader station (BSM7-USB or BSM8-USB) and one or two cards, if you want to test card download. You can skip the download steps if you don't have the hardware — everything else works without it. Plug the reader into the server computer for this walkthrough: a reader on another laptop also needs HTTPS set up first (see HTTPS and certificates). On a Mac, install SportIdent's USB driver first — see SportIdent USB stations on macOS.

Tip: You don't need meshO Prime, radio controls, or a course in the forest to complete this walkthrough. Those are covered in Connecting meshO Prime and radios.

The modes of an event ​

Every event in Manager moves through three modes:

  1. Setup — the event is being built. You configure classes, courses, controls, competitors, and start times. The status chip reads Setup.
  2. Live — the event is running. Card downloads work, radio punches flow in, and results are calculated in real time. The event date becomes locked; everything else — competitors, classes, start times, course assignments — remains editable, so late entries and on-the-day corrections still work. The chip reads Live.
  3. Archive — the event is finished. You can still view and export everything, and Restart event takes it live again if a late card turns up. The chip reads Complete.

You move between them with a single button in the app bar at the top of the screen (Start event to begin, Finish event to complete). The current mode is shown as a coloured chip next to the event name.

Two other chips are exceptions rather than modes: Interrupted — the event was live when Manager stopped, and is waiting for you to choose Resume event — and Abandoned, an interrupted event you chose not to resume. Either can be resumed or marked finished later. See The event dashboard.

1. Open Manager ​

Open your browser and navigate to the Manager URL. If you're on the server PC itself, this is usually http://localhost:5154/manager (the default — the port can be changed in Settings → Server).

The first time Manager is opened, a short Welcome tour runs first: it asks for your language and light or dark theme, explains the one-server design, and lets you switch on meshO Prime radios and Eventor, and set an access PIN if this computer is on a network the public can reach. Click Next through it and Get started at the end, or Skip to close it — a skipped tour comes back the next time Manager is opened, until you finish it. You can replay it any time with the Welcome tour button in the top bar of the Events page. Manager then asks you to Name this computer — a name like "Admin machine" makes the audit trail easier to read. Type one and save, or choose Not now.

You'll land on the Events page. If this is a fresh install, you'll see a welcome message: "Welcome to meshO Manager" with a New event button, Restore from backup and Live standby — and, when the installation ships example events, Try a sample event.

A shortcut: add a sample event ​

If you'd rather look at a finished event than build one, click Try a sample event and then Add beside the one you want. (Once you have events of your own, the same list is behind the Samples button in the row beside the Upcoming and History tabs.)

Manager ships with complete example events — real classes, courses, competitors, card downloads and results. Adding one puts a copy in your event list, dated today, exactly as though you had run it yourself: browse the results and splits, print splits, put a screen up, or use Replay to watch the event unfold as if it were happening now (see The event dashboard). Change it or delete it whenever you like — it's an ordinary event and affects nothing else.

Adding a sample is the fastest way to see what a finished event looks like. Come back here afterwards to build one of your own.

2. Create an event ​

Click New event (and, if you have Eventor switched on, Create manually… from the menu it opens). The New event dialog asks for the Event name and Event date, both already filled in — the name after the day of the week the date falls on (e.g. "Thursday event"), the date with today — and what you're creating, as three cards: Individual, Relay or Multi-stage event.

Type something more recognisable like "Test Event" over the name, leave the date as today and the Individual card selected, then click Create. Manager creates the event in Setup with the defaults from Settings → Event defaults and takes you straight to its Dashboard.

If you want to change the name or date later, you can:

  1. On the dashboard, click Event details on the event header at the top.
  2. Change Event name (and Event date, if you want a future date) on the Details tab.
  3. Click Save.

Shortcut — import from Eventor: If your organisation uses Eventor and you've already configured the connection in Settings → Eventor, you can choose Import from Eventor… from that same button instead. Manager will fetch a list of events, let you pick one, and import classes, competitors, clubs, and start times in one step. If you go this route, you can skip ahead to step 6 (the dashboard). See Creating an event from Eventor for the full details.

3. Create a course ​

Before you start the event, you need at least one course. For this test, you'll make a short one.

  1. Open the Courses page from the left navigation menu (under Event data).
  2. Click Actions → Add…. The Add course dialog opens.
  3. On the Details tab, give the course a Course name — for example "Short". Leave Course format as it is (a line course, visited in order).
  4. Open the Controls tab. Type each control code and press Enter after each one. For example, type 31, Enter, 32, Enter, 33, Enter. The controls appear as chips that you can drag to reorder.
  5. Click Save.

You now have a 3-control course. The controls are created automatically as you add them.

Tip: In a real event, you'd typically import courses from a Purple Pen file or IOF XML rather than typing them by hand. See Classes and courses.

4. Create a class and assign the course ​

A class is a category of competitors (e.g. M21E, W18A). A class typically runs a single course — although more than one can be assigned if you need it.

  1. Open the Classes page from the navigation menu.
  2. Click Actions → Add….
  3. Enter a Class name — for example "Open".
  4. In the Courses field, select the "Short" course you just created.
  5. Click Save.

Tip: For a quick event where each course is its own class, turn on Create class in the Add course dialog, or use Auto create classes from courses… from either page's Actions menu. See Classes and courses.

5. Add a few competitors ​

  1. Open the Competitors page from the navigation menu.
  2. Click Actions → Add….
  3. Fill in First name and Surname, and choose the "Open" class under Class.
  4. If you have a card, enter its number in the Card number field. Otherwise leave it blank for now.
  5. Click Save, and repeat for one or two more competitors.

You should now see your competitors listed with their class, and a status of None (no result yet).

Tip: In a real event, competitors and their card numbers come from the entry system (Eventor, IOF XML import, or on-the-day registration). Typing them by hand is only needed for small events or late entries. See Competitors, clubs and teams.

6. Explore the dashboard ​

Navigate back to the event Dashboard (click Dashboard at the top of the side menu).

The dashboard is your central view during an event. At the top is the event header — the event name, date and status, with the Event details button and Edit dashboard, which lets you move, resize and hide the tiles below. Then you'll see several tiles:

  • Event data — how many controls, courses, classes, competitors, teams and clubs the event holds, with an Import button.
  • Competitors — counts by status: Total, Not started, Started, On course, Pending and Finished. Right now everyone is Not started.
  • Quick competitor actions — a quick-search panel where you can look up any competitor, change their card number, reassign them to a different class on the fly, or print their splits. You can also add a new competitor from here.
  • Download card — the card reader's status and the latest download. It wakes up once the event is live.
  • Spectators — once the event is live, how many people are following the event on the spectator site and kiosk.

Other tiles appear depending on your event configuration:

  • Radio controls — when the event uses meshO Prime radios.
  • Radio punch forwarding / SIRAP punch listening — when the event forwards or accepts punches over the network.
  • Liveresultat — when the event publishes to liveresultat.orientering.se.
  • Recent downloads and Pending downloads — off to begin with; add them with Edit dashboard.
  • Extension tiles — any tiles contributed by installed extensions.

Don't worry about the conditional tiles for this test.

For the full tour of every dashboard card, see The event dashboard.

7. Start the event ​

Downloads, radio punches, and live results only happen once the event is in progress. Right now your event is still in Setup mode.

In the app bar at the top of the screen, click Start event. Manager checks your event for problems first — no courses, no classes, no competitors, classes with no course assigned, competitors due to leave the start together — and if everything looks good, takes the event Live. The status chip next to the event name changes to Live, a running event clock appears, and the Start event button is replaced with a Finish event button (for later).

Tip: If Manager finds a problem, an Event validation warnings dialog lists what it found and asks whether to start anyway. Click Continue to start regardless, or cancel, fix the issue, and click Start event again.

Note: An event dated in the future asks whether to Start in test mode instead, so keep this test event's date as today. An event whose date has passed without ever being run can't be started until you change its date. A second event can be live at the same time; see Running two events at once.

8. Download a card ​

Skip this step if you don't have a SportIdent USB reader and a card.

Browser requirement: this step needs Chrome, Edge or Firefox 151+ — the SI reader uses the Web Serial API, which Safari and older Firefox don't support.

This is the core during-event action: a competitor finishes, hands in their card, and you read it.

  1. Open the Card downloads page from the navigation menu (under Event live, which appears once the event is live).
  2. You'll see a prompt: Connect SportIdent reader with a Select device button.
  3. Plug your SI reader into a USB port, then click Select device. Your browser will show a system dialog listing available serial devices — pick the SportIdent reader and confirm.
  4. The status changes to Listening (green chip). The page now says Insert SportIdent card.

Now insert the card in the reader:

  • A progress bar appears while the card is read.
  • If the card number matches a competitor you entered in step 5, you'll see a green OK banner with the competitor's name, class, and result.
  • If the card number doesn't match anyone, you'll see an orange Unassigned banner. Manager gives you the option to assign it to an existing competitor or create a new one right there.
  • If the card is missing a required punch, you'll see a Missing Punch (MP) result. You can change the competitor's class to one where the punches are valid, or later approve the missed control on their Overrides tab (see Resolving issues on the day).

The right side of the page shows a download history table with every card you've read — searchable and filterable by status.

For the full details on every download scenario, see Downloading cards.

9. See radio punches (optional) ​

If you have meshO Prime connected with radio controls in the field, the Radio punches page (under Event live, shown when the event takes radio punches) shows punches arriving in real time — a table of SI number, competitor name, control code, and punch time, with the most recent at the top.

For this at-home test you probably don't have a radio network, so feel free to skip this. See Radio punches and Connecting meshO Prime and radios when you're ready for the real thing.

10. Watch the leaderboard ​

During an event, the Leaderboard is how everyone follows things as they unfold. It updates live: every radio punch, every card download, every status change appears the moment it happens. No refreshing, no re-running a report.

While the event is live, open Leaderboard under Event live in the navigation menu to see it inside Manager (see Leaderboard). For a TV, open the Screens page and click the name of the built-in all screen. It opens in a new browser tab, showing every class: the current finishers, who's still out, and how the order changes as new results come in. This is the view you'd put on a TV at the arena, or keep open on a second screen while you work.

For more on screens and their configuration, see Creating screens and TV screens.

11. View the results ​

The Results page is the operator's view of the same data — detailed, filterable, built for checking and exporting rather than live display.

Open the Results page from the navigation menu. You'll see results grouped by class.

For each class, competitors are listed in finishing order with their time. Competitors with a problem status like MP or DNF appear below the finishers.

Use the panel on the right to:

  • Group by class or course, and pick Classes / Courses or an Organisation to narrow the list.
  • Show behind time to see the gap to the leader.
  • Include competitors who are normally left out: Provisional results, On course competitors, Status none competitors and Did not start. These change what you see on screen only — an exported results file always accounts for everyone who took part, whatever is ticked here. See What an exported results file contains.

When you're ready to share results, open Publish at the top of the page:

  • Upload to Eventor… sends results straight to Eventor from within Manager (offered when Eventor is set up).
  • Export IOF XML… downloads a results file for other systems (or to upload to Eventor by hand). Export JSON… and Export PDF… are beside it.
  • Print view… gives you a printable version.

When you've finished, click Finish event in the app bar to move the event to Archive. If competitors still have no settled result, Manager lists them first so you can settle them or finish anyway.

For the full details, see Results.

12. What's next ​

You've just walked through the core loop of meshO Manager — create an event, define its structure, register competitors, download cards, and view results. A real event adds more layers:

Before your first real competition, work through the Pre-event checklist to make sure nothing is forgotten.