Virtual Strategy Board
You have all seen those magnetic boards with little rock magnets on them, right? They're used for discussing basic rules of play and end-by-end game strategy. They're perfect if you have three or four people sitting around a table discussing strategy. But what happens if you happen to be teaching a class of thirty people? What then? They just can't see that tiny little board.
strategy.htm (picture above)
run the demo from this web site, or right click and save locally.
It's not uncommon for an instructor to be teaching with a computer and presentation software. I won't say "power point" because you'll fall asleep immediately. So I've been able to replace the magnetic board (or flip charts, or markers and whiteboards) with a simple web application that doesn't do anything. Just start the application and it draws one end of a curling sheet. There are eight red and eight yellow rocks you can drag and drop with your mouse. That's it. There's no logic, no "save me" feature, no customization, no personalization, no adding of comments, just a playing field and some rocks.
Well, I added one tiny bit of customization in October, 2016, and one more in October 2021. The "Power Play" markers, or mixed doubles markers on the center line, can be turned off. It is a one line change for each choice on lines 67 and 68. Notepad works fine to make the edits.
With a tiny bit of up-front work on your part it will run locally on most computers or tablets. The internet is not always available, so to run this demo locally, you simply need to download the web page itself. That's all, just download it and double click it. (Hint... It also runs faster)
Warning: This page does require html5 which means that the old faithful Internet Explorer 8, on an old Windows XP computer won't work. Almost any modern browser supports html5.
Tablets? Maybe, then again maybe not. The "drag and drop" feature is slow. If it is run locally on an android tablet, the page must be loaded twice. I can't figure it out. If you run it from the web it loads properly the first time, on some tablets, but not on others. The Apple iPad seems to work best. Go for it! it might work well for you.
Other uses? It seems as if my page or code has had a snapshot taken, and embedded in a youTube video. I am delighted that somebody found another good use for it! You can see it in action Understanding Mixed Doubles Curling Starting at 1:01 into the video, and again at 2:29.