The New Zealand Chess Federation Inc. has purchased Vega www.vegachess.com for New Zealand wide use in all chess tournaments. You are encouraged to use Vega as chess tournament software for all tournaments. This includes unrated small school/fun tournaments right through to the highest level Grandmaster tournaments that need to comply with FIDE regulations. NZCF has licensed Vega so that everyone is allowed to use it within New Zealand. There are no other charges for using Vega. Current latest version is Vega 6.4 Download latest version of Vega and manual from http://www.vegachess.com/tl/index.php/downloaden.html Print out the 70 page manual and read it to avoid common problems. The NZ registration file data should be downloaded from http://www.newzealandchess.co.nz/ and copied into a file called regcode.txt Save this file into the same folder that Vega6.4 (or later) is installed in. Some NZCF specific things: There is only one field for player name. In order for player names to be submitted correctly for NZCF ratings, please enter name in ", " format. It is important that the surname is the leftmost word and immediately followed by a comma(,). The easiest way to enter players is by loading them from the NZCF alphabetical rating list that is provided in Vega format. These lists (standard and rapid) are available for download from http://www.newzealandchess.co.nz/ look for the links to the .csv files under "Lists in Vega-friendly format:" You should also load the latest FIDE rating list into Vega and then update player FIDE ratings automatically. Player's FIDE IDs are already entered from the NZCF ratings list and these would be used to update their FIDE ratings. Please refer to the Vega manual for more details of such database operations. While Vega can generate the NZCF ratings report for submission under the "Rating Report", you should send the entire contents of the Vega tournament folder for ratings. This way, any errors can be easily corrected by the ratings officer, Rowan Wood. Similarly, all FIDE tournament reports, and player norm certificates can be produced by Vega. You should also send the entire Vega tournament folder for FIDE rating submissions. Note that you can still continue using all previously NZCF approved software (eg. Swiss Perfect) for NZCF rated tournaments. FIDE rated tournaments with computerised swiss pairings must use Vega as tournament software. When using Vega for computerised swiss pairings, you must use Dubov swiss pairings as that is the only one currently endorsed by FIDE. FIDE has just approved Vega for the more familiar Dutch swiss pairings using JaVaFo but has not yet officially endorsed it. Expect endorsement in early 2013. A New Zealand Vega manual covering NZ specific settings or subjects is currently being compiled. When available, it would need to be read in conjunction with the Vega manual. It is highly recommended that you try out Vega to get familiar with it before running a critical tournament. Feel free to ask me any questions. These questions would help make the NZ Vega manual more useful and relevant. Regards, Keong. FA Keong Ang (FIDE ID: 4303660) Secretary, New Zealand Chess Federation.