.KEYWORD golf
.FLYINGHEAD GREAT GOLF GIFTS
.TITLE Golfing and your Palm organizer
.FEATURE
.SUMMARY If you’re a golfer (or you have a friend who is), you should read this comprehensive survey of golfing goodies for the Palm organizer. Golfing enthusiast Fred Cox looks at software for managing game play, wagering, and scoring, plus two very interesting hardware add-ons that mount your Palm device to a golf cart. If you want to win your next game, read this article.
.AUTHOR Fred S. Cox
Every year, just about this time, I start searching for the perfect holiday gift for my friends and relatives. By mid-December my nerves are a little worn and my shopping cart is still empty. Sound familiar?
Today there are over 48 million golfers in the world, 26 million in the USA and 22.7 million internationally. Chances are, if your friend, colleague, or family member owns a Palm organizer, they may also play golf. During the past couple of weeks, I’ve had the chance to review three golf products specifically designed for the Palm platform. They include Karrier Communications’ IntelliGolf Birdie edition golf software, and two new golf cart mounting systems, UniMount-for-Golf from Revolve Design and the Pro Caddy from CaddyMasters.
.CALLOUT The IntelliGolf software is complete, easy to use and provided me with immediate access to key information.
Some combination of these three products will surely make great golfing gifts for your Palm toting golf buddies. Of course, you could always decide to swipe them for yourself!
.H1 IntelliGolf Birdie edition software
The IntelliGolf Birdie edition software (from Karrier Communications) arrived in a nicely packaged CD-ROM jewel case. The company claims it contains three major components: Palm handheld software; Windows 95/98/NT-based desktop software; and Internet golf course upload/download capabilities.
As instructed, I inserted the IntelliGolf CD-ROM into my Windows 95-based computer and the installation process began. When the install finished, about two minutes later, it told me to HotSync my Palm III to my PC and that the IntelliGolf software would be downloaded onto my handheld. Sure enough, after I pressed the HotSync button, the IntelliGolf software appeared on my Palm III.
.H1 Handheld software
With IntelliGolf now on my Palm III, I was off to the golf course. At the course, I pressed the New Round button at the bottom of the first IntelliGolf screen. I entered the name of the golf course and found that IntelliGolf provided me with two options for entering course specifics (e.g. hole lengths, pars, and handicaps) for both men’s and women’s tees. I could pre-enter all course specifics, by clicking on the flagstick icon, as shown in Figure A.
.FIG A You can enter all the holes at once.
Alternatively, I could enter the information as I played each hole, as shown in Figure B. I chose to enter the information as I played each hole. It saves time if you can enter the course information before arriving at the course or by downloading it directly to your Palm III, but more on that later.
.FIG B You can enter details for each hole as you play.
Next I entered the names and handicaps of my playing partners: Don, Julie, Cindy and myself. Don didn’t have a USGA Index (i.e. handicap) so I entered Don’s average score (e.g. 92) into the IntelliGolf’s "average score" field. IntelliGolf used Don’s average score to calculate an approximate handicap index for todays round; a very nice feature.
Shortly thereafter I discovered that IntelliGolf includes 17 wagering games that can be played in any combination. It was easy to create a friendly Nassau wager (two players against two players) and a Skins wager for our entire foursome, as shown in Figure C. At the same time I also bet my long time friend/opponent that I would shoot a lower score than him (i.e. Stroke Play). A couple of stylus strokes and all of our wagers were entered. It was also interesting to note that IntelliGolf lets you wager in local currencies (e.g. Yen) for international travelers/customers.
.FIG C Showing a different foursome; you can set up your wagers.
Now it was time to tee off! The first hole was a 364-yard Par 4. I fortunately drove the fairway and IntelliGolf provided an easy way to record my "in fairway" drive. As I walked past the 150 yard marker, to where my drive landed, I brought up the IntelliGolf distance calculator. I pressed the Palm III’s scroll button, for each step I took, and IntelliGolf told me I was 126 yards from the green and had driven the ball 238 yards. With another tap on the screen, it recorded this as my drive distance. I was also able to calculate the distance to the green for my Nassau partner too. Figure D shows this with another hole.
.FIG D You can calculate your distance from the hole.
When we finished the hole, it was very easy to record everyone’s scores and putts by simply tapping on the IntelliGolf-provided numeric pad. In fact, it was easier to use than the traditional pencil and paper method. After entering the scores, IntelliGolf automatically tallied our winnings and began accumulating statistics for everyone in our foursome. IntelliGolf kept a running total of our scores and putts, calculated average drive distances and fairways hits and even presented us with on-screen graphics showing our Birdies, Pars, and Bogeys, as shown in Figure E.
.FIG E A nice graphical image shows the statistics for the game.
As we made the turn, I was even able to show the group a scorecard view of their front nine. The scorecard showed Pars in bold and Birdies in inverse video, as shown in Figure F.
.FIG F View a running score with the IntelliGolf score card.
After our round, on the 19th hole, IntelliGolf calculated our winnings and provided us with some great statistics on our round. Stats included greens in regulation, number of putts, fairways driven, sand saves, average drive distances plus more. We even poked fun at Don, as he clearly needed to take some putting lessons. Some folks may not be interested in keeping track of ALL statistics, but if you are really into watching your golf game improve, statistics are critical.
.H1 Desktop software
Upon returning home, I placed my Palm III into its cradle and pressed the HotSync button, to see how the IntelliGolf Desktop software performed. During the normal HotSync process, one of the messages read "Synchronizing IntelliGolf" and all of my new Round, Course and Player information was uploaded into IntelliGolf’s desktop (PC) database. Shortly thereafter, IntelliGolf asked me if I would like to delete old round, course, and/or player information off the Palm III. I selected both "round" and "course" data and left "players" unchecked. IntelliGolf used it’s "Selective Synchronization" technology to remove my old round and course data and leave the player information intact. Additional memory was freed up and everything worked flawlessly.
Next I clicked on the Windows Start menu and found IntelliGolf listed under Programs. Clicking on the IntelliGolf Desktop menu item brings up a very pleasing Windows-style user interface that was divided into four tabs: rounds, statistics, courses, and players.
The Rounds tab, shown in Figure G, provided information in two windows. The upper window provided historical data on all rounds played. The lower window provided a graphical scorecard for the selected (upper window) round including wagering results. Rounds can be sorted by date, score, course or player.
.FIGPAIR G There’s lots of great round data in the Windows program.
The scorecard window does a good job of using color to distinguish between under-par, par, and over-par results. By using the Windows’ File/Print functions, scorecards can be printed in color or in black and white. Round data can be saved in HTML format for easy posting on a Web page or even copied to other applications such as Excel. Round data can also be entered and/or modified on the desktop, which is great for the times I forget to take my Palm III along.
The Statistics tab, shown in Figure H, displays a wide variety of cumulative and average statistics for any player in the IntelliGolf database. I found over 40 categories of useful information including percentage of greens hit in regulation, average drive length, average scores on Par 3’s, 4’s and 5’s, percentage of fairways hit on Par 4’s and 5’s, and even Sand Saves. I could easily see my game’s strengths and weaknesses.
.FIGPAIR H Want to know more about your golf game? Check out the stats.
The Courses tab displays the golf courses that are loaded into the desktop database plus a detailed scorecard for each course entered. Course information includes slope and rating, hole yardages, par ratings and hole handicaps. Each entry can be easily entered and modified from this tab. Turning on/off the course’s "Sync" state determines whether this course will be downloaded to the Palm III during the next HotSync process.
Downloading course information from IntelliGolf’s PC database saves valuable time by avoiding the manual entry of course data on the Palm III. IntelliGolf makes excellent use of the Palm III’s strength
