Q. Who is allowed to register on OFC?
A. Any one 13 year up can register on OFC. Schools, social organizations dealing with school aged children, at risk kids and trouble youths can register are qualify. 8 administrator to one registration account is allowed either upon creation of the account or at any time necessary thereafter.
Q. How do I register as my school or as an organization or student?
A. To register on OFC, one must go to “Home Page” and click on “Sign Up” on the upper right corner. A signup page would appear where you will have to fill your personal information. You may use the first dropdown button to show your category: family, school, organization etc. A single individual may use family category. You may add up to 7 more People / Administrators / family members to your registration where it is states: "ADD MORE". But this is optional and you may choose to do it at the time of registration or you may update it later any time after registration. Anyone you add must have a valid email address. After all the fields on the registration page are filled, you would be prompted to put in a code provide at the bottom of the page. That code is case sensitive so you MUST enter it as it is. If you cannot get it right just click for a new code that would be clear to you then click on SUBMIT.
Q. What happen after you submit your membership?
A. An email message would be sent to your email account wherefrom you would have to activate your account on OFC.
Q. How do I logon to OFC after my account is activated?
A. You would have to enter the User ID and password you created when filling the registration along with the main email account you used to set up the account and then click SUBMIT. This process would complete activate your account. You would now need to upgrade your membership from the code we would provide you. This code would be assigned to your school or organization and this is how we can be sure that you are a shcool or a social organization working with shcool aged children, at risk kids and troubled youths.
Q. How do I upgrade my membership account to be active?
A. All you need to do after activating your account is to send us an email from your registration account and we would send you the code to upgrade.
Q. How do I create / join a game or meet players or access other activities?
A. Click on “Gate Way to Playing Games" from “Home Page” and you will find several topics. To create or join games just click on “Our Games” and then click on “Create / Join game”. The Create / Join Game page would appear and you can fill in the field for the game or games you want to create or go to the bottom of the page to accept games that are already created by other players awaiting another player to join. You may also access any of the other topics to analyze games, find a player, join or form a team or a club, create a tournament, find a friend, change or edit your settings, engage a forum, send a message to any member or set your vacation starus.
Q. What is chess by consultation and how can school or organization play chess by consultation?
A. Chess by consultation is where a group is playing a game or series of games against another group, for example, a family playing against another family or a school playing against another school but with multiple players on each side discussing and agreeing on a move before making it. There is a chatting room for families or groups to see and to discuss their game/s so it does not matter where in the world members of the family or group are, once they have access to a computer with internet connectivity they can see, talk or chat with each other in the family chat room or leave messages for each other and together they can study chess positions and decide on their move and make moves that are decided upon. Chess by consultation means that no one member can just make a move without the others in the group deciding or agreeing or voting on the move to be made, except of course if the move made is a checkmate, in which case members of the group may not be offended.
Q. Can we also chat with members of our opponent?
A. Yes, a chat room for opponents to chat in is also available.
Q. As a school or group, how many User IDs / Passwords or email address would access our account and who controls it?
A. There is only one User ID, one Password and the email account These are the ones used to establish the OFC account. The school, group or individual account on OFC are controled by the members accordingly. They can choose to assign control of the password to as many person as possible. This means that any member want to logon would have to use the same information to log on. In this setting everyone in the family, school or group is their brother’s keeper; not doing anything especially making moves in game-in-progress without consultation and consensus.
Q. How do we get birthday or anniversary messages from OFC?
A. On the “Gateway to Playing Games" page select “Settings” and you would be prompted to put in as much information as possible and choose how you want to OFC’s recognition you for congratulatory messages etc.
Q. How do I put my family photos on the chess pieces to make each chess piece look like, and represents members of my family?
A. On the “Home Page” just click on “Members Chess Photos” and when the page would appears select what piece you want to represent any member of your family. You will be prompted to browse your picture files on your computer to select the family photo of your choice. Upon selecting of a photo the uploading page would appear automatically and you would be prompted to crop and place the photo evenly. There are two demonstration boxes showing how photos are to be uploaded. Follow the correct sample to upload and place your photos to the pieces. You can only upload six photos to one color pieces at a time: King, Queen, Rook, Bishop, Knight and Pawn. Uploading a photo on one pawn is enough for all the other pawns to be photo uploaded authomatically and so are the other pieces that are more than one. Repeat the same process for the other color of pieces. You can change the photos on each side if you want. Each time you set up a game with any of the two colors your family photo settings would appear on the chess pieces. At any time if you like you can uninstall family photos and return to normal chess pieces.
Q. How do active members take part in OFC Tournaments?
A. All OFC school competitions and tournaments are free of charge for active members. Active members only just need to go to tournament page and enter on or before the deadline of a tournament.
Q. How do active members take part in non-OFC Tournaments?
A. Active members would have to meet the requirement of non-OFC Tournaments in order to take part in them.
Q. Can a school, group or individual setup their own tournament and set parameters and requirements as to who should take part in it and the tournament system to implement?
A. Yes, a school, group or individual can set up their own customized tournament and set its own perameters and requrement as well as employing the tournament system. All you need to do is to activate “Tournament Wizard Chea” but make sure you have read and understood its Rules and Regulations.
Q. Who would do pairings and select the tournament system to conduct the tournament round after round till the end of the tournament?
A. Tournament Wizard Chea would group and pair players and implement the appropriate tournament systems: Round Robin or Swiss System, round after round until the end of each tournament.
Q. How is one qualify to organize and implement its own tournament?
A. You do not necessarily have to be an OFC member to qualify to setup and implement your own customized tournament. Any one can activate Tournament Wizard Chea by meeting the requirements (See TWC Rules & Regulation).
Q. Who is qualify to sponsor chess tournaments and competitions?
A. Any one is qualify to sponsor a chess tournament or competition. Business houses or any group can sponsor a school chess tournament for all of the schools in a particular county, city, state or country to partake in. A family, school, club or individual can do the same and set its own perameters and requirements.
Q. Is anyone certificated after a tournament?
A. Yes, all participants are certificated with the sponsor\\\'s name appearing on the certificates. All participants certification carries the position achieved in the tournament or competition.
Q. Can Tournament Wizard Chea initiate and operated or conduct a school chess league league consisting of school chess teams?
A. Yes, to create a chess league of any sort one must be a member of OFC and all who participate must be members also. As a member you are allowed to create a team or club. Just go to the dashborad to select the activities you are interested in, including creating a team or a club.
Q. Can any group, for example, school create an in-house chess tournament for its own pupils or groups within its own school to take part in?
A. Yes, but each group within the school must be atonomous and that would require independent registration to be eligible to partake in in-house chess tournaments. In-house chess tournaments and leagues can not be conducted under the same registration but the school, club or group only need one registration to participate in interschool tournaments and chess leagues etc.
Q. Who is qualified to attend OFC Annual Chess Festivals in July each year?
A. All active members are given official invitations to facilitate their travel and lodging to any city where the events are taking place. OFC official invitations would be sent out to active members by Annual General Assembly Committee forty five days before the events.