FA Learning Coaching Tool User Guide Ver 1.0

FA Learning Coaching Tool User Guide Ver 1.0

Software...2 Installation... 3 Application Download... 3 Application Launch... 4 The Menu...3 New Session... 5 Load Exercise... 6 Save Session... 6 Save Session As... 6 Snapshot... 6 Quit... 6 Feedback... 6 Pitch Zoom... 6 The Bench... 7 Teams... 8 Home Kit... 8 Away Kit... 9 Team Players... 9 Non-Team Players... 9 Referee... 9 Assistant Referee... 10 Goals... 10 Balls... 10 Cones and Flags... 11 Info-Palette... 11 The Timeline...12 Add Frame... 12 Add Pause... 13 Delete Frame/Pause... 14 Playback buttons... 14 Play... 14 Stop... 15 Play Speed... 15 The Pitch Hoarding... 16 2

Software Installation The software will be available to download from www.thefa.com/facalive. An executable setup application will install the application onto the coach s personal computer. Min Screen size: 1024x768 AIR Runtime base requirements: WINDOWS Intel Pentium III 1GHz or faster processor, 512MB of RAM Recommended: Pentium 4 2GHZ or faster, 1GB RAM Windows Vista Home Premium, Business, Ultimate, or Enterprise including 64 bit editions, Windows Vista SP1, Windows XP Tablet PC Edition SP2 and SP3, Windows XP SP2 and SP3, Windows 2000 SP4, Windows 2003 Server MAC OS X Intel Core Duo 1.83GHz or faster processor; PowerPC G4 1GHz or faster processor Mac OS X 10.4.11 or Mac OS X 10.5.4 and 10.5.5 512MB of RAM LINUX Intel Pentium III 1GHz or faster processor, 512MB of RAM Recommended: Pentium 4 2GHZ or faster, 1GB RAM Fedora 8, Ubuntu 7.10, opensuse 10.3 Application Download PLEASE NOTE: As part of the installation process, you will be presented with the dialogue box shown below. This box acts as certification that the software you are about to download is a bonfide Football Association product and is intended to reassure you that it has not been tampered with by any third party prior to installation on your computer. By clicking install, you agree to the conditions outlined below. The material and software on this website is provided "as is", without any conditions, warranties or other terms of any kind. Accordingly, to the maximum extent permitted by law, the Company provides you with the material and software 3

on the basis that the Company excludes all representations, warranties, conditions and other terms (including, without limitation, the conditions implied by law which, but for this legal notice, might have effect in relation to the material and software on this website). The Company, any other party (whether or not involved in creating, producing, maintaining or delivering the Website), and any of the Company's group companies and the officers, directors, employees or agents of any of them, exclude to the maximum extent permitted by law all liability and responsibility for any amount or kind of loss or damage that may result to you or a third party (including without limitation, any direct, indirect, punitive or consequential loss or damages, or any loss of income, profits, goodwill, data, contracts, use of money, or loss or damages arising from or connected in any way to business interruption, and whether in tort (including without limitation negligence), contract or otherwise) in connection with the downloading, use, inability to use or the results of use of the materials and software on this website, including but not limited to loss or damage due to viruses that may infect your computer equipment, software, data or other property on account of your access to, use of, or browsing this website or your downloading of any software or material from this website or any websites linked to this website. Application Launch On launch of the application the user will be presented with the full size pitch option in the main interface window as default. Should the coach wish to change this to another pitch option, he should choose the New Exercise button. 4

The Menu The menu is a simple toolbar across the top of the screen containing the following command buttons. New Session The New session button allows the user to create a new blank exercise based on one of five official pitch types. If there s an existing exercise already loaded then coaches will be presented with the option to save or discard it prior to continuing. On pressing the New button, the user can select one of the following pitch types. Normal Pitch Five-a-side Futsal Mini Soccer Training Selecting any of these options with a single click will return the coach to the FA Coaching Tool interface where the chosen pitch will be displayed ready for a new exercise to be created. 5

Load Exercise Clicking on the load button allows the user to open previously saved sessions. This will load the saved exercise into the main application window and allow the user to continue working on the exercise. Save Session If a session has already been saved, pressing this button will save any additions since the last save. If an exercise has not been saved previously then clicking the save button will launch a standard Save Session dialog box where the user will be given the option to save the file to a default folder or alternatively navigate to, and save the exercise in their preferred location. All sessions need to be saved as a type.442 file. For example; CoachinSession1.442 Save Session As Clicking the Save as button will allow coaches to save an additional copy of the session. Snapshot Clicking the Snapshot button will allow coaches to save a snapshot of the current step as a standard image format (.jpg,.gif,.bmp). Quit Clicking the quit button will enable users to exit the application. Should a session be loaded, users will be provided with the option to save or discard the active exercise. Feedback Clicking the feedback button provides the user with information on how to suggest improvements to the tool and also request assistance. Pitch Zoom Clicking the pitch zoom buttons allows the user to zoom In and Out of the session. 6

The Bench The Bench is the toolbar on the left hand side of the pitch area. It is split into three main sections; Participants, Equipment (includes Non-Team Players and Officials) and the Info-Palette. Players and Equipment are dragged from The Bench and placed into the exercises; the Info- Palette allows the attributes of any selected item to be edited. Participants Participants are the players and officials that take part in an exercise. Some players are part of a home or away team and are known as Team Players. Additional players are also available which are not part of a team and are known as Non-Team Players. Officials consist of one Referee and two Assistant Referees. All participants are represented by circular discs with boots to indicate the direction they are facing; they all have the following attributes (editable depending on the type of participant). Name: Name or nickname of player Shirt Colour: Colour of shirt worn by player Shorts Colour: Colour of shorts worn by player Number: Squad number of player (must be unique in a team) Number Colour: Colour of number on shirt worn by player Direction: Direction player is facing (indicated by boots ) 7

Teams There are two teams (home and away) consisting of a squad of up to16 players. Each team can be personalised and identified by the colour of their shirt, shorts, boots and squad number. Only when the relevant team icon is selected (located at the very top of bench area) will all the players in that team be highlighted and the entire team s attributes editable in the Info-Palette. Home Kit 8

By default; home team players will all display the England home kit and face up the pitch. Away Kit By default; away team players will all display the England away kit and face down the pitch. Users can select their preferred kit colours using the colour palette and there is an option to save the changes as the team default colours.. Team Players Team players are members of either the home or away teams. Each team player can be named by clicking on the individual player and editing the default text. Their individual kit colours cannot be changed (as they are part of a team) and only one of each of this type of player can exist at a time. Once a team player has been dragged to the pitch, the original space on The Bench that was occupied by that player will be greyed out; his name and player number will still be visible. If the player is on the pitch then he can also be rotated by selecting the player and clicking the left and right arrows. Non-Team Players Non-Team players have none of the restrictions of team players. Each one can have a completely different kit colour, the same number (or even no number) and there can be as many of them as the coach wants on the pitch. To speed up the design of sessions, two default non-team players are provided; one face up, one face down, all in different kits. Referee Only one Referee can be dragged on to the pitch and the only editable attributes for a referee are his shirt and number colour. 9

Assistant Referee Up to two Assistant Referees can be dragged on to the pitch, as per the Referee, the only editable attributes are the shirt, shorts, boots and number colour. Equipment The Equipment section contains the objects that can be placed onto the pitch area and used in the exercises. Equipment can be deleted from the pitch by right clicking on the object and selecting Remove. All objects are rotated in 5-degree increments to make placement and connecting to other objects simpler. Any number of these objects can be placed onto the pitch. When selected the attributes of each object are editable in the Info-Palette. Goals When dragged to the pitch area, goal types will correspond to the type of pitch that it is being dragged on to. However, the goal icon in the equipment panel will always remain the same. Balls Ball colour and power can be controlled by right clicking on the ball once on the pitch or in the info palette) 10

Cones and Flags The colour of the cones can be selected in the info palette. Info-Palette The Info-Palette displays the attributes of any selected item and allows the relevant attributes to be modified. 11

The Timeline The timeline shows all the frames that make up this exercise. The initial frame (frame 1) is just used to setup the starting positions of all the participants and equipment in the exercise. Every frame (except 1) contains the starting and ending positions of the participants and balls in that step. The starting position is the ending position of the previous frame; the coach then moves each player, official or ball in turn to its ending position for the current frame. During playback all players and balls end up at their final positions specified in each frame at the same time. Therefore players or balls with further to travel must move faster in the frame than those with less distance to cover. When a timeline has too many frames to fit on a single screen the up and down arrows become active to indicate that the scroll bars can be used to scroll the timeline up and down bringing all the required frames into view. Clicking on a frame in the Timeline displays the contents of that frame on the pitch; allowing the user to modify the Objects and Motion Lines. The Info-Palette will also be active and contain instructions on how to use frames and pauses. Add Frame 12

Each Additional new frame will be added after the last frame in the exercise series and it will only be possible to add a new frame to the end of the sequence. Once a frame has been added Players, Officials and Balls can be moved to a secondary location. When dragged from their starting positions a yellow line will be created between this and the ending position. This Motion path also indicates the path of movement in playback. When the motion path is selected, the user will have the ability to edit the path by clicking and dragging the motion icon; increasing or decreasing the curve using arrows to the left and right of the initially straight line. Once Players, Officials and Balls have been repositioned and their paths of motion determined, further steps can be added in order to build up the session for ultimate playback. Add Pause A pause is a still frame that contains written and/or illustrated comments. A pause is added to enable the user to stop the animation of an exercise in order to bring attention to a certain topic or area of interest. When the pause frame is selected, a notes area and a number of drawing tools are made activated in the Info-Palette. The drawing tools consist of a freehand highlighter tool plus a rectangular and a circular spotlight tool. Using these tools and the notes window the user can annotate a particular point in the exercise. 13

During playback the animation will stop on a pause frame and display the annotations, playback will continue when the play icon is pressed. If annotations have been added to a pause an icon will be added to the pause frame in the Timeline to indicate this. Delete Frame/Pause Clicking the relevant delete icon will delete the selected frame or pause from the timeline. Playback buttons Three playback buttons and a Play Speed selector are available to view your interactive session. Play The first playback button will provide playback of frames up to a pause. Once playback has cease at the pause, pressing the button again will enable playback to the next pause and so on. The user can also start the session at any point within their session by selecting the appropriate frame before the play button is clicked. 14

Stop The second playback button allows the user to stop the playback button. This will automatically reset to the first frame in the Timeline. Play Speed Each session can be viewed at one of four different speeds by selecting the appropriate icon. 15

The Pitch Hoarding The pitch hoarding allows the user to navigate to the following websites and gain further information on: The Football Association FA Learning The FA Coaches Association The FA Learning Shop Full Time, The FA s League Administration System 16