CubEdge

I was asked asked to be the cub scout Cubmaster for my pack. This was such a wonderful place to serve. I really like scouting. I have been doing scouts ever since I was eight year old. I participated in many derbys, many of them were pinewood derbys and only one Rain-Gutter Regotta. When I got this opportunity to serve these wonderful children I desired to make every pack meeting the best it could ever be.

This included the derbys. As an eagle scout I desired only the best for my pack so I set out to find the best way to manage a derby. It started out as using a chalk board, pen and paper. This seemed to work alright but most parents seemed to think it wasn’t as fair as it could be. There were lots of disputes as to if the pairing was fair. I also found that there were issues with who knew who was next. So I set out to find a software for the next derby. There are many options out there. I found people using excel as their selector so they could have a more fair paring. I found software that does every little detail of the event. Down to timing the cars, and even different methods of organizing the race.

I used some of these. But found that they were really complicated. Some were even so much that I had a hard time setting them up. I noticed that there were many steps. You had to chose how were going to run it, then organize it, and then even how to display it. I just had a small 30 children event and I didn’t need to have some complicated derby. I just needed a simple one and just wanted to do it by who got first, second, third, and fourth. I didn’t like using the timers because it really made things harder, and it didn’t always work. So I went looking again.

I eventually came across a derby management software called “Derby Day!” http://www.derbydaysoftware.com This software worked very well. It was really simple and used a method that was understood by all the parents and scouts. I liked it so well I desired to use it for all the derbys that I managed. I used it for one event and found out that there might be somethings that I would have liked to have that it didn’t have. For example, it only has options for Pinewood Derby so I asked the developer of this software and to add this. But I never heard back from them.

For a year I waited for a response and got nothing. So I decided to write my own. I used a lot of ideas from this software so it very simially resembles this software. I don’t have all the special features that this software has but I did write CubEgde from the groud up.

I wanted to have the liberty to select different derby pictures, like a boat, car, or space ship for the respective derbys. I also wanted to enter the cubscouts in a grid like manor because it was hard to know who was already entered. So I decided to change that way of entering the information. The other main issue I found was the way the racers were being displayed on the presentation screen was really hard to read for most scouts. It was too small and I needed it to show who was the next up so I could get the race done faster. So with all these issues I decided to write my own.

What you see today is what the result is. I really enjoy this method of managing a derby. Because we only do a derby for our pack and we really don’t do a larger derby at the district or council level. I know that this will give your boys the most fun and allow them to have the most fun racing their vehicles. While still allowing their parents to enjoy watching their boys win and race their cars.