SRM v2.50 is finally here!
Click "read more" to see all new features!
Read More...

Last week I found out that the News section was all mixed up! Headlines and stories were completely out of sync, so I had to retrieve a backup file and manually copy and paste all stories to the current version of my website. Strange thing, but it seems to be fixed!

Well, today was a good weekend! I locked myself in my room to get some solid coding done :-)

Last week, I had some race events on my Corvette Speedway track and that was a good moment to do some testing on the last beta version 6 of SRM 2.50. I found some bugs, as did some of the beta testers, and was able to fix them. There was also a lot of other work to do...
Read More...

Thanks to Dave "Pepsikid" Klein, here is a very comprehensive manual to build your own Timing Tree. He carefully documented his own building process with pictures and text, so you can all enjoy this extra SRM functionality!

Click here to download the Powerpoint Presentation file.

Finally it's here: SRM 2.41, the release version! It's just a small update for the 2.40 Beta3 users, but for users of the last release version 2.30 there will be lot's of new stuff.

New from 2.30 to 2.40B3:
- Speed Trap for speed calculation on a predefined piece of track,
- Top Speed saving per car and per driver,
- Multiple sensors per lane for interval times and Speed Trap,
- Track Power stays off when leaving timing screen,
- Fixed printing bug (woops),
- Exported/printed reports are now saved in their own REPORTS directory and with comprehensive names,
- Each different report has it's own name so it will not overwrite other reports,
- New report added in Print Menu: Driver Ranking,
- Improved Race Results screen and Race Report after a race,
- Correction option in Championship mode: you can manually add/subtrackt time, points or (portion of) laps as penalty or bonus after each heat,
- Last Starting Tree light duration is user selectable: random or 1 second,
- Sound at end of race can be switched off (saves frustration when testing with programming too ;-) ),
- You can choose to show Fastest Lap or Track/Driver/Car info on timing screen.

New from 2.40B3 to 2.41 (and already completed):
- fixed bug with storing times (screenbug)
- fixed bug with calculating speeds in MPH during timing
- Removed the "Press a button to begin" at the beginning of a heat (timing now starts right away)
- Non used lanes are not shown during timing
- Updated multiple help files and main manual
- Minimum value of a track's MinLap can now be set as low as 0,5 second
- Parallel Port OUT settings now in PIN number instead of Pin value (so no more conversion needed)
- PARPORT program can now be called from within SRM (in the Parallel Port setup screen).

Most people use SRM to store fastest laps and ofcourse SRM does that in a great way: not only for you and your friends, but also for your cars.

What a lot of you might not know is that SRM can also store fastest times for a preset amount of laps!

Let's assume you often race 15 lap heats and you want to keep record of the fastest total times achieved. To do so, do this:

- Go to the Track screen, you will see your current track.
- Go to Notes with F7.
- Somewhere in the Notes field you must enter (RACE15). Do it with the brackets, just like it's displayed here.

From now on, if you race 15 lap heats, SRM will also ask you to store the times for the total heat.

Often I get the question if SRM supports external call buttons. Well ofcourse it does! :-)

SRM supports call buttons, external and internal. You can use the spacebar as a call button, but you can also connect external call buttons.
 
The external call buttons can be any "short circuit" button (like a doorbell button or a button of an old joystick). Connect this button to a GROUND pin and one of the DATA IN pins (10, 11, 12, 13 or 15) of the parallel port using a 200k resistor in line to prevent a short circuit.
 
So in other words:
 
GROUND PIN --- BUTTON --- 200ohm RESISTOR --- PIN 10/11/12/13/15
 
Installing SRM on a computer is not that difficult, but you will need a TRUE MS-DOS machine. If you have a Windows machine, you can achieve this by creating a small second partition on which you can install MS-DOS and SRM. Install a boot selector that will allow you to choose what you want to boot: Windows or MS-DOS.
 
if you have any more questions, feel free to e-mail me!

On and off I worked on SRM 2.41 now and I fixed quite some bugs already! Most of them are small ones, but still.

I will also introduce a small new feature in the Championship mode that some people requested: a template for setting up a championship. With this TEXT based file, you can start up a Championship without all the hassle of inputting lots of contestants and their cars, if you often race with the same competitors. You can just set up a template file, that you can use over and over again. You can manually change the file, if some parameters change, but you can also start up a new Championship the old fashioned way and then SAVE it as a template for future use. The template contains all important info about the Championship: mode, amount of rounds and laps/time, all contestants and their cars. You can quickly add or delete contestants in this file and then fire up the Championship in just a few minutes.

For some time now, I wanted to make changes to this website. Well, here it is!
Read More...

It has been a long time since I worked on SRM, but recently I started picking up where I left off a couple of years ago...

The slot racing bug is back again. Well, actually it never left, but other non-slot racing projects took all my time. I am in the process of building a wooden, 3 lane track and timing that will again be crucial ofcourse.

I was wondering how many of you guys are still using SRM Slot Race Manager 2? Ofcourse a lot of you will have moved to digital racing and SRM does not support this, but to my surprise many still race analog tracks and have lot's of fun doing so. I still frequently receive requests for SRM, to send the program or if I still add new features. Well, as most of you probably know, development of SRM has withered and died somewhere in 2005, freezing the program in the middle of version 2.40, leaving only a Beta version of that one. For some time now I have had the plan of completing this version and to maintain a proper bugfixing status. Adding new features is not on top of the wishlist at this moment, but who knows what the future brings?

After the support forum got used less and less and the forum code was so old, it got hacked and spammed on an almost weekly base. When a succesful hacking attempt destroyed the forum, I decided to terminate it perminently. Sorry for this!
Read More...