DOWNLOAD HERE - Newest Version of HandiFast

[UnifiedTheory]

Originally Posted by Segwin

Hello All, Is there a good starting point or general consensus of the numbers to plug into the Build Race Window?
Thanks!

I highly recommend using Handisearch to construct analysts specifically for different tracks, distances, surfaces, classes.

But in the meantime, try this:

[donmat]

Originally Posted by Unified_Theory

Here's some documentation regarding the Handifast factors.

And I highly recommend using Handisearch to illuminate the correct choice of factors and their weights.

I've had a lot of fun with Handifast since I really enjoy methods that are highly customizable and HF certainly fits that description.

Best of luck!

I processed 241 files. In the temphandi folder I see an OpenOffice spreadsheet with all the races. So how do I do a backtest?

[UnifiedTheory]

Originally Posted by donmat

I processed 241 files. In the temphandi folder I see an OpenOffice spreadsheet with all the races. So how do I do a backtest?

I think you may have need to have Microsoft Office so you can use an Excel spreadsheet. OpenOffice is good for many things but I think someone posted that it's incompatible for this purpose.

I've purchased Microsoft Office 2010 and Microsoft Office 2003 for $6 and $15 through Ebay. I'll pm you and give you important info regarding this situation.

I'm no expert regarding Handisearch and I'm fairly new to Excel. But basically once you have an Excel spreadsheet you can sort the horse race results by finish position and then remove all lines that are not lines for horses that won their race. Once you have a spreadsheet only for horses that won their race then you can do a similar procedure to group winning horses by distance, surface, class. Then go to the bottom of the spreadsheet columns and for every column that shows ranks use the Excel average function to calculate the average ranking for each ranked factor. Then you'll be able to see which factors are most important and how important each factor is relative to each other.

[donmat]

Lets say I have 500 processed races and I want to add 5 more DRF and XRD files. Do I have to process all 505 races again or can I just process the 5 new files so they're added to the spreadsheet?

[ElmerJFudd]

Hi,
First time poster. I downloaded Handifast last night and got it working. I tried to get handisearch working, and now everything is jacked up when I press the handicap title. I've read through the post before and saw that people have trouble with getting it to run smoothly. Could this be related to the analyst.fig file? "F" is the only character in it.

What about the about the scales.txt file? that looks like this:
Woods

Fibonacci

I have attached a copy of the error.log.

Perhaps that will shed some light. Any help appreciated.
Thanks,
Elmer

[UnifiedTheory]

Originally Posted by donmat

Lets say I have 500 processed races and I want to add 5 more DRF and XRD files. Do I have to process all 505 races again or can I just process the 5 new files so they're added to the spreadsheet?

I'm fairly new to Excel and I've never tried to merge two spreadsheets so I don't know about that procedure. Maybe someone else with more experience with Excel and Handisearch can chime in.

When I get more DRFs and XRDs, I just process the total amount of races again. Since it doesn't take very long to do it this way, I've yet to be motivated to look for shortcuts.

[donmat]

Originally Posted by ElmerJFudd

Hi,
First time poster. I downloaded Handifast last night and got it working. I tried to get handisearch working, and now everything is jacked up when I press the handicap title. I've read through the post before and saw that people have trouble with getting it to run smoothly. Could this be related to the analyst.fig file? "F" is the only character in it.

What about the about the scales.txt file? that looks like this:
Woods

Fibonacci

I have attached a copy of the error.log.

Perhaps that will shed some light. Any help appreciated.
Thanks,
Elmer

Try to uninstall it and then install it again. I think during installation it might ask you to delete some files, say yes if it does.

[ElmerJFudd]

When it comes to excel, Google and Youtube is your friend. I write a lot of macros, and there is a lot of code out there ready to be cut and pasted and edited to fit your needs.... The real power is in the macro.(Programs) Youtube can show you in video form how to do anything.

[ElmerJFudd]

I found my mistake. HF is little bit unforgiving.
Now I just need to figure out how to use handisearch.
Thanks for willingness to help.

[UnifiedTheory]

Originally Posted by ElmerJFudd

Hi,
First time poster. I downloaded Handifast last night and got it working. I tried to get handisearch working, and now everything is jacked up when I press the handicap title. I've read through the post before and saw that people have trouble with getting it to run smoothly. Could this be related to the analyst.fig file? "F" is the only character in it.

What about the about the scales.txt file? that looks like this:
Woods

Fibonacci

I have attached a copy of the error.log.

Perhaps that will shed some light. Any help appreciated.
Thanks,
Elmer

"everything is jacked up" I don't know what you mean by that description.

Have you read through the Handifast manual that should be included in the downloaded folder? If the manual wasn't in your download then it can be found by checking the previous pages in the HF thread. It's not the most thorough manual but it may help.

I check the analyst file regularly and whenever it has become an F I change it back to a T but I don't know what that does and my question a few months ago regarding that situation went unanswered.

The scales file is supposed to look like this:
Woods
Fibonacci

but mine is like this:
Woods

Fibonacci

but in spite of it being technically wrong this way it works just fine for me.

If I make my scales file look the technically correct way, then on the build analyst screen both Woods and Fibonacci are on the same line preventing me from using them so I leave it the spaced apart way so that it works.

Unfortunately I don't know what to make of the error logs you posted.

In my experience, Handifast requires a little tinkering to make it work sometimes, but the price is perfect and it's definitely better than many handicapping programs that cost a fair bit of money. So if I view it from that perspective then I'm grateful to have it.

Best of luck with your Handifast experience.

[ElmerJFudd]

UT,
I discovered that the Hf error was a matter of me not following processes to the letter. I will try to grab the manual and spend some time reading it thoroughly.
Thanks for your help.
Elmer

[Handiman]

Hi guys. It's been so long since I wrote this program some things are hard to remember. But as for the T and F issue. I believe the file should have a T in it when you first begin. Then it turns into an F and remains that way. Has to do with the initialization procedure in the beginning I believe.

I am working on Handifast version 12. Here are some new things I hope to get done and some that are already done.

First of all I have added a third scales item named Unified Theory. It gives the values to the top 4 horses for each factor in an analyst as follows. 100.... 75....50....25. It may not come as a surprise when you see the name, a thanks goes out to Unified Theory for suggesting this third scale.

With the new version you will be able to type in the month and day that you are playing and the program will load all the tracks and races running that day. There are I believe 43 tracks available to be downloaded. A track button will appear for each track running that day. To play a race you just click the track button and then the race number button and boom you're off to the races as they say....

Now if you accidentally scratch the wrong horse you can just uncheck the box and the horse reappears and is back in the race.

I am working on a static contender ranking based off of 5 factors. When you do a race, in the final display, the top 4 horses' total points will appear in red. Also there will be a check box, that will say Contenders only. Check that box and the final display will only show the four contenders.

I am thinking about some other ideas, but some will be in a future version of the program as my eyesight gets better and I have more time. And maybe get a little smarter...

Any way for the guys having fun with Handifast, hope you are excited about these new things. I am open to suggestions for other things. I may not be competent enough to code them, but if they make sense and I can code them, I will add them. Either in this next version or a later one.

Thanks everybody for giving Handifast a try. I have done a lot of work on this program and have had some great people help. Like Doug Woods who brought the original idea forth. Headhawg, Mike Dorn, Mike Salony for all the research he has aided me in and even Dave Schwartz who has offered some great advice over the years. I know I am forgetting somebody. When and if I remember them, I will certainly mention them in another post as I am extremely thankful to those who have helped with code and those with ideas and suggestions.

Handi

P.S. Unfortunately I am going to have to raise the price on the new version. It will now cost two smiles and a Well done Handi...

[fast4522]

Most of us who like and use it I think would prefer CSV output of some races to go where no one has gone before to take something from Star Trek. You go there and I would make a suggestion or two with that.

[mikesal57]

Originally Posted by fast4522

Most of us who like and use it I think would prefer CSV output of some races to go where no one has gone before to take something from Star Trek. You go there and I would make a suggestion or two with that.

I agree Fast....

A programs ability to produce files for research is essential to its worth....like Handisearch was to Handifast

and from what I believe your saying is to have a file produced before the days races to use in other capacities.....like loading it into Excel and devise "other" ways to use it..



Mike

[UnifiedTheory]

Originally Posted by Handiman

Hi guys. It's been so long since I wrote this program some things are hard to remember. But as for the T and F issue. I believe the file should have a T in it when you first begin. Then it turns into an F and remains that way. Has to do with the initialization procedure in the beginning I believe.

I am working on Handifast version 12. Here are some new things I hope to get done and some that are already done.

First of all I have added a third scales item named Unified Theory. It gives the values to the top 4 horses for each factor in an analyst as follows. 100.... 75....50....25. It may not come as a surprise when you see the name, a thanks goes out to Unified Theory for suggesting this third scale.

With the new version you will be able to type in the month and day that you are playing and the program will load all the tracks and races running that day. There are I believe 43 tracks available to be downloaded. A track button will appear for each track running that day. To play a race you just click the track button and then the race number button and boom you're off to the races as they say....

Now if you accidentally scratch the wrong horse you can just uncheck the box and the horse reappears and is back in the race.

I am working on a static contender ranking based off of 5 factors. When you do a race, in the final display, the top 4 horses' total points will appear in red. Also there will be a check box, that will say Contenders only. Check that box and the final display will only show the four contenders.

I am thinking about some other ideas, but some will be in a future version of the program as my eyesight gets better and I have more time. And maybe get a little smarter...

Any way for the guys having fun with Handifast, hope you are excited about these new things. I am open to suggestions for other things. I may not be competent enough to code them, but if they make sense and I can code them, I will add them. Either in this next version or a later one.

Thanks everybody for giving Handifast a try. I have done a lot of work on this program and have had some great people help. Like Doug Woods who brought the original idea forth. Headhawg, Mike Dorn, Mike Salony for all the research he has aided me in and even Dave Schwartz who has offered some great advice over the years. I know I am forgetting somebody. When and if I remember them, I will certainly mention them in another post as I am extremely thankful to those who have helped with code and those with ideas and suggestions.

Handi

P.S. Unfortunately I am going to have to raise the price on the new version. It will now cost two smiles and a Well done Handi...

I am happy and honored to have my scales idea included in the upcoming version of Handifast and named after me. Thank you very much!

All of your ideas for the upcoming update will be a sweet treat for this community. I'm definitely looking forward to it.

In many ways I think our modern era is the era of unbridled greed. For instance, my bank charges me a maintenance fee on my credit card yet it never requires oil changes. There's so many examples of this immoral nonsense in the business world these days. This results in making your programming generosity so welcome and refreshing.

I am hereby paying for the upcoming update to Handifast up front. Well done Handi!!