Finally found a solution for those looking for a score ticker - Page 2

Well, I would only really be extracting info specific to my project, so I doubt my application would serve anyone but me. However I'd certainly be able answer any questions if I make progress.

What I had in mind was to make something resembling the Fenway Park scoreboard and then update it live via the data from the previously posted XML. Ideally, I was even imagining LEDs for ball/strike/out powered by the PC. The problem is that I can't think of any real way to make a functioning scoreboard, other than creating an app that displays one on a monitor and then possibly having the monitor in a frame that would house the LEDs. I'm not sure how that would work. This is still in the sketched-out-on-a-cocktail-napkin phase.

I'm sorry, right there I had to giggle. I started college in Boston in the fall of 1986, and ended up as a Red Sox bandwagon fan by default. Just took my boys to their first game in Fenway...they're spoiled since we live not far from Camden Yards. I'd love to help, although my expectation was for something less ambitious.

I can see two primary ways to approach this, and both have their appeal to me:
1. Maximum analog. Traditional Fenway scoreboard is metal and wood...so at least do something that (even if digital) is trying to do it analog-style. That means yellow digits for the score when the at-bat team has scored but the inning isn't over, etc.
2. Digital with Fenway "flare". Try to do something that is essentially the 16:9 version of "what I wish Fenway scoreboards looked like". Can probably get the key features of MLB scoreboards in there, but focus is more on getting the info out.

I don't see either of the above, or anything that matches recent "desirements" above, being done entirely with analog compenents--there's going to be an LCD monitor in the mix unless I miss my guess.

I'm sure there are other (better?) ideas, so this is just to get the ideas out for brainstorming with minimal egos and pride of ideaship.

Ouch. That still hurts.


This would actually be for my nephew, but I may decide to do something similar for myself if it works out. (I'm more of a football fan than baseball.). I just enjoy tinkering (mame cabs, coding, etc).


Max analog would be amazing, but I can't think of any way to automate digits. Flip-numbers from old analog clocks would be ideal, but I don't see anything out there that would be consumer friendly... and I'm just not THAT good at this kind of stuff to hack an old clock. Coding? sure. Electronics? Not so much.


This is the direction I've been leaning, even though I know that a scoreboard that looks "kinda" like the real thing is bound to get comments. ("Hey, the REAL Fenway scoreboard doesn't look like that!"). The simplest solution would be a monitor with a realistic depiction of the wall with the numbers changing to reflect the score in real-time. There is no doubt in my mind that that can be done.

I also know that it might be possible to turn LEDs on and off from within code as well. That would be a really nice touch to replicate the ball/strike/out lamps on the real scoreboard.

What I'm trying to figure out now is where to draw the line between the monitor and the "frame". Should I just have the monitor display a scoreboard and build a frame for it and include LEDs in the frame - not a replica so much as something with the Fenway "flavor"? Or maybe the frame is more like a bezel and it covers the entire monitor except for small windows where the monitor can be used to display the numbers (MUCH more work)? Maybe some combination of both? Still in idea mode...

One of the issues is that the real scoreboard is long and narrow (especially if you include the AL and NL updates). So again, I'm left wondering if I should still try to keep it accurate (which would be a real pain), or maybe include everything on one (or possibly two) monitors that just have a Fenway-ish flair.

As I said, I'm still in idea mode, but I know this project is doable.


I appreciate the feedback. My gears are still spinning...

Great pictures! That's what I made the program for.

I am the developer of "kitchi" and I do respond to every support-request email I get. It might be possible that the earlier request mentioned in this thread was a false-positive catch by anti-spam software.

Please re-send an example URL that demos the issue to the contact on the About screen of that software and I'll take a look.

I'll look into sports-score feed sources -- I know that that data has always been hard to find -- one thing you could try is to find data feeds for older WAP based cell-phones and have kitchi parse and show those scores.

Thanks,
-Peter

Peter, thanks for the response here. I think that your product is promising for this application if we can just get the bugs out, you'll definitely have a customer in me. Are you saying you want a URL showing video of the scroll not finishing the games or the URL's we are using to get the data to the ticker? The URL's I'm using were listed earlier, but for example, here is the mlb one:

http://feeds.feedburner.com/mpiii/mlb

I'll have to get set back up and running as I was having trouble with my usb to serial connector and I'm not sure I still have the cpu with a serial port. I'll work on getting it up and running tonight so that I can show you what happens.

Sorry for the mix up,

Aaron

That RSS URL is what I need -- I'll try it out this weekend -- thanks

Aaron, I tried that link with kitchi and it worked as expected so far; (I tried once on Monday morning and a few times on Monday evening); I'll try a few more times;

One thing you can do to make that particular RSS-feed look a little better: on the application Output window within kitchi for the LED sign, set the "Show Desc:" parameter to "false" from that drop-down box.

How often do you have it update?

Thanks,
-Peter

Excellent and interesting! I'm out of town this week, but I'm back on Monday and I'll get it running. I'm glad to hear that that feed is working for you. One thing I would caution though, is that if by Monday you mean 6/27, there were only 8 games today. I'm interested to see if you get a full slate of games through a screen. For example on Tuesday 6/28 there are 16 games. Once I get back, I'll also have a dedicated computer with a serial port so I'll be able to remove the USB/serial adapter from our troubleshooting. I think I was also having trouble with my baud rate before,(I think I have one of the old signs where you can't change the rate. I believe it is stuck at 300.) but I'm not really sure how they work and if that would cause a premature cut off. I thought that the baud rate was either right or wrong, meaning either you get a feed or don't, but I could be wrong. I'm sure that once I get back, we'll be able to figure this thing out. I'm not sure about how often I was updating. Also, thanks for the setting tip. I'll try that and any others you suggest on the 4th.

Thanks again!

Aaron

p.s. for reference the sign I have is a ProLite PL-M2014R. There isn't much on the web about the sign, but the one of the pages I did find suggested:

To communicate with the ProLite PL-M2014R, you should set the baudrate* on the message board to match the computer, and use 8 bits, No Parity, 1 Stop Bit, and No Flow Control (not Xon/Xoff, not Hardware).

It says how to change the baud rate of the sign, but I haven't been able to get that to work. Do these settings jive with kitchi?

p.p.s. After poking around some more, I think the updating issue may be the problem or at least some of it. I was reading a page about sending dynamic info to the signs and it talked about the updating causing the cpu to resend the info to the sign before it had finished displaying the full message. Is the update option found in kitchi or do I change it on the sign itself?

That explains it -- the shortened messages are due to what I understood to be a limitation of the ProLite programming protocol. While that sign may have 32KB, there are many memory-files, and each can only be about 1KB -- if you program the sign with a remote, there is a way to chain these memory-files together to make a much longer message. At the time I added the ProLite protocol to kitchi, the general belief of me and others, based on the documentation that was available, was that memory-files could not be chained together when sending data over a serial line using the documented protocol. I'll do some more searching to see if that is still true for version ~5 and ~6 of the protocol, but I'm afraid that there won't be any changes found; as it is right now, kitchi can send 840 characters to ProLite signs (the other 184 characters are reserved for control codes); I don't own a ProLite sign;

The simplest workaround/fix would be for you to pick up an AMS Alpha or Betabrite LED sign which kitchi also works with; I own a few of these 1 and 2 line signs, so this protocol code is tested much better; the AMS Alpha or Betabrite LED signs also have 32KB or more memory but there isn't a limit to how big each memory-file can be; kitchi can send long messages to these signs; you can buy these from EBay, an indutrial supplier or google:adaptive micro systems

I am working on adding the protocol of other LED signs to kitchi as time allows;

Thanks,
-Peter Wallin
http://www.remote-control.net/

Does anyone know where I can get a simple scoreboard or scoring mechanism for a shuffleboard table? I'm build one and can't think of a good method for keeping score without spending a lot of money.

Thanks!

-Patrick

Saw this from slickdeals

Lithonia Lighting 17" Scrolling LED Sign - Was $149 Now $37.03 At Home Depot YMMV!!!
Grabbed one of these signs this morning at Home Depot in Delran NJ. According to the associate these are on the final clearence. Originally sold for $149, now $37.03.
Product SKU is 759423

What section in Home Depot were these signs? I went to HD at lunch and could not find them.

jpcothrenjr,

no idea, I to went to a HD yesterday and searched high and low. I am going to try to hunt down the poster and see where in the store he found them.