Atropine

Atropine is the tournament administrator used to administer many FOCAL Countdown events. It is written in Python.

Atropine starts a web server on your computer, and you administer the tournament from your browser. It doesn't need internet access to work, unless you use the exaggeratedly-named live broadcast feature.

Atropine has been tested on Windows and Linux, and waved in the general vicinity of a Mac.

Prerequisite: Python 3

To run Atropine, you need to have Python 3 installed. At the time of writing (July 2024), the latest release of Python 3 is version 3.12.4, but if there's a later version on the Python downloads page by the time you read this, then install that.

Python 2 is not supported, either by Atropine or by much else any more.

Pre-release for testing: 1.3.0-pre3

This is a sneak preview pre-release of Atropine 1.3.0, which will be distributed as a Windows executable. This does not require Python to be installed, but at the moment it's here for test purposes only, so event organisers can identify any problems with it.

Note that the final version will also be released as a zip file full of Python source code as it always was before, so if the Windows executable doesn't work for you, you'll still be able to run Atropine as you did before.

Version	Date	Download link	Notes
1.3.0-pre3	2024-12-15	atropine-1.3.0-pre3-windows.zip	Windows users can run this one without having Python installed. Most of the Atropine URLs have changed. In particular, there is no more cgi-bin. We no longer have to start up a new Python process for every request. Tourney database files are now squirrelled away in Windows' "application data" folder, rather than the Atropine installation's own "tourneys" folder. There are buttons and links to get database files out of there and import them in if required. New Standings/Fixtures (Vertical) display view. Overachievers page now lists victories where the winner overcame a large seeding gap. This only applies if your players are rated or seeded. Standings page can now show how the standings table looked at the end of some past round, for example "count only games in rounds 1-3".

Download latest release: Atropine 1.2.4

This is the latest full release of Atropine.

Version	Date	Download link	Notes
1.2.4	2024-07-14	atropine-1.2.4.zip	Display the full fixture list rather than the name-to-table index when we're announcing fixtures for two-player tables, so it's clear who's Player 1 and who's Player 2. This is configurable in Display Setup. Minor cosmetic improvements to the "Accept Fixtures" screen.

Download links for earlier Atropine versions can be found below.

Instructions for getting started

Install

• If Python 3 is not already installed on your computer, or if you're not sure whether it's installed, download and install Python 3.
• Download the latest Atropine zip file from the download link above.
• Extract all the zip file's contents into a new folder of your choice. This is where Atropine will be installed.
  • This is an important step. You cannot simply run Atropine from inside the zip file! You must extract (or "unzip") its contents. On Windows, you want the "Extract all" button. Forgetting this step is the most common cause of Atropine "just not working".
• Don't move any of Atropine's files out of that folder - the location of atropine.py in relation to the subfolders must be maintained as it is. If you want to, it's okay to make a shortcut (or symlink, on Linux) to atropine.py and put the shortcut anywhere you want.

Run

• Open the folder you extracted Atropine to, and run atropine.py.
• If you didn't fully extract the zip file, or you didn't install Python 3, this will become apparent now. Otherwise, if all went well...
• Atropine will open a small web server on your computer, and give you a link to paste into your browser, like this: http://localhost:3960/cgi-bin/home.py
• Go to that link in your web browser. You are now using the web interface, and you can create and administer your tournament from there.

Further information

The file webroot/docs/index.html in the zip file contains further information about using Atropine. You can also reach this from within Atropine using the Help link in the sidebar.

Screenshots

GitHub

Atropine is available on GitHub.

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Past releases

Normally, you want the latest release in the table above. If for any reason you can't use the latest release, earlier releases are shown below.

Version	Date	Download	Notes
1.2.3	2024-04-13	atropine-1.2.3.zip	Display options profiles. Any changes you make to the options in the Display Setup page can now be saved to a named profile, visible to all tourneys in the Atropine installation. When you create a new tourney, you can specify which profile to use. Newbies. The Random fixture generators can avoid generating all-newbie groups. Players are marked as newbies either with an "N" in the initial player list or with a checkbox on the individual player's page. New Swiss fixture generator options. Optionally match players only by number of wins then random chance, rather than by standings position. Optionally consider players' performance in only the most recent round rather than all previous rounds. Player win-loss record now shown alongside generated fixtures. This makes it easier for the user to verify at-a-glance that the proposed fixtures look sensible before accepting, especially if you're using one of the new Swiss options above. Other changes: performance improvement to how the public display page requests its data, and removed dependency on deprecated Python modules cgi and cgitb.
1.2.2	2023-06-11	atropine-1.2.2.zip	On the public-facing display, the screen shown while a round is in progress is now split vertically rather than horizontally, to fit better on a modern 16:9 screen. If you're using an old 4:3 display, there's an option to change this back. When the screen is split vertically, the table of results (and not the videprinter) is now shown alongside the standings table. There's an option to revert this if you want the videprinter. Some other minor improvements to the public-facing display and the Display Setup page.
1.2.1	2022-09-04	atropine-1.2.1.zip	Prunes are now automatic. You no longer need to add a Prune player to make up the numbers or to replace a withdrawn player. Player Check-In page to aid keeping track of who's arrived before the first games are generated, during which the public display shows a list of all registered players. Export results page made slightly less awful. Fix a couple of the new ranking methods when tournament is divisioned half way through.
1.2.0	2022-08-12	atropine-1.2.0.zip	First new release in nearly two and a half years. New fonts. New standings table ranking methods. Better diagnostics for startup failure. Faster and improved Swiss fixture generator. Publicly displayed standings table now scrolls its pages faster by popular demand.
1.1.4	2020-03-07	atropine-1.1.4.zip	Improve fixture generator menu, and add fixture generator for a final.
1.1.3	2020-01-11	atropine-1.1.3.zip	Remove calls to a deprecated library function which is no longer present as of Python 3.8.
1.1.2	2019-11-09	atropine-1.1.2.zip	Fix bug introduced in 1.0.5 which stopped you from generating Swiss fixtures for a round which already has fixtures in another division.
1.1.1	2019-10-31	atropine-1.1.1.zip	Optimisation for upload feature: only upload tournament state if it's changed since the last upload.
1.1.0	2019-10-24	atropine-1.1.0.zip	Auto-upload live tourney updates to webpage (account required), standings table now takes account of any finals, lots of other little improvements.
1.0.5	2019-05-06	atropine-1.0.5.zip	Players can prefer specific table numbers, as well as requiring accessible tables; quite a few cosmetic "improvements".
1.0.4	2019-01-06	atropine-1.0.4.zip	Table numbers can be designated "accessible" for players who need them; improved player configuration page and display setup page; game results exportable to CSV.
1.0.3	2018-11-18	atropine-1.0.3.zip	Random fixture generator can now avoid rematches; option not to auto-switch to Fixtures display until all divisions have games generated; various appearance tweaks.
1.0.2	2018-08-17	atropine-1.0.2.zip	Improve Fully Manual generator, add more options to Standings/Table Results screen
1.0.1	2018-07-23	atropine-1.0.1.zip	Added Random from Seeded Pots fixture generator.
1.0.0	2018-07-23	atropine-1.0.0.zip	Ported to Python 3.

Past dependencies

pygame is no longer required

Versions of Atropine prior to 0.9.0 also required the Python "pygame" module for the full-screen public-facing display. Versions 0.9, 1.0.0 and onwards do not need this module any more. pygame's presence won't do any harm, so you don't need to remove pygame from your computer if you already have it installed, but it is no longer used by Atropine.

Where's Teleost?

The reason we don't need pygame any more is because the public-facing display is now a web page, accessed through the Atropine web interface like everything else. The old standalone program "teleost" no longer exists. Instead, in the Atropine web interface, click "Display Setup" on the sidebar and then click the "Open Display Window" link at the top.

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Legacy releases (for Python 2)

These older releases used Python 2. They are shown here for historical interest.

Please note that these releases are now many years old. There will be no more releases of Atropine for Python 2.

Version	Date	Download
0.9.0	2018-07-23	atropine-0.9.0.zip
0.8.0	2018-06-03	atropine-0.8.0.zip
0.7.7	2017-11-21	atropine-0.7.7.zip
0.7.6	2017-05-02	atropine-0.7.6-python2.zip atropine-0.7.6-python3.zip
0.7.5	2017-01-09	atropine-0.7.5.zip
0.7.4	2017-01-08	atropine-0.7.4.zip
0.7.3	2016-11-26	atropine-0.7.3.zip
0.7.2	2016-05-27	atropine-0.7.2.zip
0.7.1	2016-03-05	atropine-0.7.1.zip
0.7.0	2016-02-28	atropine-0.7.0.zip
0.6.1	2016-01-28	atropine-0.6.1.zip
0.6.0	2015-08-13	atropine-0.6.0.zip
0.5.2	2015-07-23	atropine-0.5.2.zip
0.5.1	2015-07-17	atropine-0.5.1.zip
0.5.0	2015-06-22	atropine-0.5.0.zip
0.4.1	2015-03-29	atropine-0.4.1.zip
0.4	2014-12-19	atropine-0.4.zip
0.3	2014-01-26	atropine-0.3.zip
0.2	2014-01-23	atropine-0.2.zip
0.1	2014-01-12	atropine-0.1.zip

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