The Race Boat Management System


Introduction

The Race Boat Management System is a program designed to make it easier for the Skipper of a Race Boat to manage a race program and to help build communications between skipper and crew as well as among crew members.

There are four major components to the system.

  • Boat Home Page
  • Race Calendar
  • Crew Forum
  • Email System
Boat Home Page
The home page provides all the essential contact information for the boat, skipper and co-skipper, if any. It includes boat location and a picture of the boat. If you include the address in the boat location it will also link to a map on how to get to the boat.

Calendar
The Calendar allows the skipper to post all boat related events such as races and practices on the RMS for view and printing by the crew.

For the crew, the calendar is used only for viewing.

The skipper can post, modify or delete events to the Calendar.

It also has two additional features which can be very useful.

  • Advance email emails a reminder to the crew before each event.
    • You first have to activate the auto email feature. When you activate you select the number of days before the event the email will be sent. And you can compose an additional message that gets sent with the email.

  • You can "Invite" the crew to RSVP for each event.
    • The crew receives an RSVP email which they can respond YES or No. The RMS records their response and sends the skipper and co-skipper an email. When the skipper is logged on to the RMS he or she can view the results of the RSVP.

  • Each crew member must be selected for each event before they will be emailed in the Advance Email section or Invited to RSVP.
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    Forum
    The Forum is an easy way for the crew to communicate with each other and the skipper about boat related topics. Each forum is specific to each boat in the RMS. The crew and skipper must logon to view or post to the forum. It is not a public forum.

    To start a new topic click on the "New Topic" Link at the top or bottom menu. Once on the New Topic page fill out your Name, Email Address and subject of the New Topic. In the message box enter your message. Underneath the Message Box there is a check box. If you select the check box any replies to your message will be emailed to you as well as posted on the Forum. Finally, post your message.

    You can view any message posted to the Forum by clicking on the Message Title. This will take you to a page that lists the Author of the Message and the Date as well as the message itself. Underneath a Response to message box appears that will let you respond to the message above. This will show up indented and below the original message so that it will be an obvious response to the original New Topic.

    When viewing the Forum listings you can select View Threads which will show the Title of the responses to the original New Topic posting. Once this is selected you can then Collapse the Thread by selecting that link on the top or bottom menu.

    The Skipper has the option to modify or delete any posting in the forum.

    The skipper can select the announcement checkbox before posting a message. That message will appear at the top of all messages under the banner "Announcements". That message remains at the top and no response is allowed.

    Email
    The email function is one of the most useful and saves the skipper time trying to contact the crew. This component will automatically email the crew a designated number of days prior to any event reminding them about the event and the time to be there. In addition, it will maintain an email list of crew and skipper and allows users to select the persons to email and send a message to all simultaneously. The skipper maintains the email list and can add and delete emails at anytime.

    The email feature works only if the skipper enters all the crew's email addresses in the skipper's main email menu. All the crew and skipper can then check which addressees they want to send the email to and compose one message to send to all simultaneously. You can now send attachments with your emails.

    In addition, the skipper can now "Invite", via email, designated crew to any event. The crew can "RSVP" directly from the email. The response is recorded by the RMS. The skipper can view the responses directly in the RMS.