Author Archives: Mark

Coaching Staffs v1.4

While staying at home I got a bit crazy and decided to revisit one of the early MSTW plugins, Coaching Staffs. Although I was a bit chagrined by what I didn’t know about WordPress then, it’s actually a pretty cool plugin. It’s aimed at high school coaching staffs, where the same coach had different roles on different teams, e.g, Varsity defensive coordinator and JV head coach.

Anyway, the new release makes it much simpler and cleaner to customize the front end displays with custom CSS stylesheets. It also makes the use and deployment of the single coach profile/bio page and the coaching staff gallery page easier and more flexible.

So if you want to recognize your coaching staffs on your site, version 1.4 will be available soon on WordPress.org. But you can check it out right now on dev.shoalsummitsolutions.com.

MSTW Team Rosters 4.2

I hope this note finds you all well during these trying times. I’ve been writing a little code while sheltering in place without spring sports, and MSTW Team Rosters release 4.2 will soon be available on wordpress.org and on your Installed Plugins admin screen. The primary upgrade is a long-requested feature – the capabilty to sort roster tables by number and name in the same way tables can be sorted by column on WordPress admin screens, e.g, All Posts or Team Rosters -> Manage Players. You can try it out on dev.shoalsummitsolutions.com.

Given that I’ll be holed up a bit longer, upcoming improvements include additional enhancements to the front end displays [shortcodes], improved integration with the MSTW League Manager plugin’s features, and the ability to manage team rosters by year. If any of you have requests for Team Rosters features please send them to me as soon as possible.

MSTW League Manager 2.7 Fixed

I believe version 2.7 of League Manager is fixed and posted in the wordpress.org plugin repository. I did not change the version number, so you will not get a notice on your plugins page that it’s been updated. If you have previously installed it, deactivate it, delete it, and add it again. You can search for ‘MSTW League Manager’ on your site admin plugin screen, and it should pop right up.

I hope this is that last post on this subject, but if you encounter any other issues, please let me know and I will address it ASAP. But hopefully you won’t have to hear from me again until tournaments (MSTW Bracket Builder) are updated, and tournament games can be displayed in the League Manager schedules.

BTW, some of you have asked, and yes, the format for the [mstw_league_schedule_table] shortcode did change to better accommodate ‘meets’ in that schedule table. You will only see this if you are using the extensions in the MSTW League Manager Add-ons plugin.

Problems found in League Manager 2.7

Users have alerted me to the following problems with MSTW League Manager 2.7. If you haven’t installed it yet, WAIT a bit while we sort things out. I’m confident there are not significant issues, just some mistakes, but before I get to the specifics of the 2.7 builds, here are a couple of general pointers:

  • If you use the extensions in the MSTW League Manager Add-ons plugin, you should always install the SAME VERSION of League Manager and the Add-ons. I forgot to mention this in my release announcement/email.
  • If you expect to see the output of a plugin, maybe a pretty schedule table, and instead you see some text like [mstw_league_schedule_table league=league-slug season=season-slug], it’s always because the plugin code is not found. (This applies to all WordPress plugins, not just MSTW.)

As for the specifics:

  1. If you are using the MSTW League Manager Add-ons plugin, and you install the MSTW League Manager plugin version 2.7 but don’t install version 2.7 of the Add-ons, you may see a text message just like the one above. Install MSTW League Manager Add-ons version 2.7.
  2. If you see a text message like [mstw_team_schedule team=team-slug season=season-slug], it’s because I made an error packaging the build. I’m testing a patch tonight. I will post/email a message when the patch is available on wordpress.org.

I apologize for any inconvenience caused to plugin admin/users, and want to thank those who have helped me sort this out.

MSTW League Manager & LM Add-ons v2.7

New in MSTW League Manager – “Meets” with shortcode and template support. Watch more about meets …

Also in version 2.7 an “All Sports” sport concept intended for sites with a large number of teams, sometimes the high schools in an entire state. Watch more about All Sports:

“Local” sites generally track a manageable set of local leagues and teams – schedules, league standings, team rosters, highlights, and so forth. However they must manage a large set of teams on the site for non-league games and state playoff games against local teams. These sites don’t store any information about these non-local teams other than including them on local team schedules, tournament brackets, and meets. In particular, the site has no interest in tracking these teams’ leagues.

But here’s the problem: when creating a non-league game, all teams playing league’s sport so up in the drop-down list of teams for the game. But leagues, not teams, are attached to sports. So admins would create a “generic” league for a sport, and put teams in it. This works, but a non-local school may compete against local schools in many sports, and they have to be added to a “generic” league for each sport. This becomes a significant maintenance burden for literally hundreds of ‘non-league’ teams.

“All Sports” is one solution: In version 2.7 a “generic” league can be created as an “All Sports” league. If school A has 10 teams in 10 sports, one school A team can be created and placed in the “All Sports” league. That team will then appear in the team dropdowns for all leagues, regardless of the league’s sport.

All Sports

“Local” sites generally track a manageable set of local leagues and teams – schedules, league standings, team rosters, highlights, and so forth. However they must manage a large set of teams on the site for non-league games and state playoff games against local teams. These sites don’t store any information about these non-local teams other than including them on local team schedules, tournament brackets, and meets. In particular, the site has no interest in tracking these teams’ leagues.

But here’s the problem: when creating a non-league game, all teams playing league’s sport so up in the drop-down list of teams for the game. But leagues, not teams, are attached to sports. So admins would create a “generic” league for a sport, and put teams in it. This works, but a non-local school may compete against local schools in many sports, and they have to be added to a “generic” league for each sport. This becomes a significant maintenance burden for literally hundreds of ‘non-league’ teams.

“All Sports” is one solution: In version 2.7 a “generic” league can be created as an “All Sports” league. If school A has 10 teams in 10 sports, one school A team can be created and placed in the “All Sports” league. That team will then appear in the team dropdowns for all leagues, regardless of the league’s sport.

LM: Managing “Meets” (v2.7+)

This tutorial shows how to manage “meets” on the admin screens and how to display them on the front end using the [mstw_league_schedule_3] and the [mstw_team_schedule_3] shortcodes. It is long, but it is a very thorough walk-through of the entire meet management process. This functionality requires the MSTW League Manager Add-ons plugin. https://youtu.be/4lJmcZXxzRw Back to Tutorials…

This content is for MSTW Gold Support and League Manager Add-ons members only.
Log In Register

Meets – Front End

As of their introduction in release 2.7, meets are supported by two shortcodes on the front end: mstw_league_schedule_3 and mstw_team_schedule_3. The screenshot below shows an example of the mstw_team_schedule_3 shortcode for a schedule with meets.

When you click on the 2020 NCAA Track & Field Championships, you see the following “meet template” (or page).

Note that the YouTube video was entered as the Meet Media Link and automatically embedded in the Meet Information box.

Admins can also view the meet template by clicking the meet permalink on the Edit Meet screen.

Meets – Admin Screen

A “meet” is a multiple team event; common examples are track meets and swim meets. The admin page allows the user to set up a meet and enter the results as described below. In version 2.7 two new shortcodes support meets – mstw_league_schedule_3 and mstw_team_schedule_3. They provide all the funtionality in the mstw_league_schedule_2 and mstw_team_schedule_2 shortcodes plus the ability to display meets.

  1. Title & Permalink.These fields are for your use in organizing the site and the admin backend. Neither field appears on the front end.
  2. Meet Data.All this data appears in front end templates and shortcodes. Don’t forget the Long Name; it appears on the front end, unlike the title. The Location must be selected from the MSTW League Manager’s Venues database.
  3. League & Sport.If a league is selected, (a) the sport will be that league’s sport and will not be changeable, and (b) only teams in that league can be added to meet. (See the screenshot above.) Use this for league meets. If no league is selected, then a sport may be selected. Use this for invitationals or state championship meets. You really want to set these before adding any teams. If you change the League/Sport after teams have been entered, will likely have to re-enter the teams.
  4. Season. THE SEASON MUST BE ENTERED. It does not default to one of the selected League’s seasons. It is up to you to select a season that matches up with the selected league or leagues in the selected sport. Otherwise the meet won’t appear in the front end shortcodes.
  5. Media Label & Link.The media label may appear in schedule tables, depending on the configuration. The media link will be accessible in many shortcodes (tickers, sliders, etc) and the game and meet templates. Note that if the media link is a YouTube URL, it will automatically be embedded in the information box of the game and meet templates.
  6. Team Name.A team name should ALWAYS be selected. If you add a team (really a row) with the Add Team button, then don’t select a team from dropdown, you’re front end may display some janky stuff.
  7. Team Rank/Place & Points/Score.The Rank/Place and Points/Score for each team are generally added when the meet has ended, not when it’s initially added to the database.
  8. Add Team.Click this button to add a new team row to the list. After doing so, be sure to add a team in the Team field to the row.
  9. Meet Information.Add whatever information you’d like about the meet, individual event winners, stats, etc. including links, images, and videos. If a YouTube video is provided in the Media Link field above, it will be embedded into this field automatically when the meet is displayed on the front end. You don’t need to embed the YouTube video here (unless you have more than one to display).

League Manager & Add-ons 2.6 Released

Versions 2.6 of both the MSTW League Manager and the MSTW League Manager Add-ons plugins have been released. There are three main enhancements:

  • Added support for BYEs (or open dates). BYE games can now be created in Add Games and Manage Games screens, and then displayed in the shortcodes. This will support a much improved display of brackets with an “odd number of teams” in next release of MSTW Bracket Builder. Read more here.
  • Added the option to link game time/result to a media URL in the Settings screen, schedules tab. If there is a media link for a game, the link will be added and a media icon will be displayed in the time/result field AND YouTube links will be automatically embedded in the single game page content. Read more here.
  • Added a new multi-team schedule shortcode [mstw_multi_team_schedule], which behaves much like the multi-league standings and schedules shortcodes.
A number of minor bug fixes and JavaScript upgrades are also included.

There were no major upgrades to the MSTW League Manager Add-ons, it was simply updated to support the changes in MSTW League Manager, for example, support for BYEs in its plugins.

MSTW League Manager update should come up on your admin Dashboard -> Plugins. If you have purchased the add-ons, you should be able to access the update using the same link you received originally. If not, just let me know.