Answers.Body: <p>You probably found all of this on your own already, but here is what I've learned:</p>
  
  <p>The "Golden Database" can be downloaded in many formats, one of them as a tab separated text file. If you have made a program already, coding the import of the file should be trivial. Each line consists of:</p>
  
  <p>LASTNAME,FIRSTNAME(S)   USCFID  EXPIRYDATE  STATE   RATING  OTHERRATING</p>
  
  <p>These files have certain limitations.</p>
  
  <ul>
  <li>Only room for 2 ratings, so 2 files is provided with either speed or 
  blitz rating as the 2nd.</li>
  <li>Fields have limited lengths, so long names might be cut off.</li>
  <li>Rating numbers can come in many variants, 1234/12 means the rating is<br>
  based on 12 games, while I forget what 1122* means. (Provisional?)</li>
  <li>Ratings can be texts as well, like 'Unrated' or 'Duplicate', etc.</li>
  </ul>
  
  <p>If not you, then I hope this helps someone else...</p>
  
Answers.ContentLicense: CC BY-SA 4.0
Answers.CreationDate: 2019-11-17T14:09:24.023Z
Answers.LastActivityDate: 2019-11-17T14:09:24.023Z
Answers.UserDisplayName: NilsR
Body: <p>I was wanting to collect some statistics about players, and also just easily update player ratings for my local club. I tried the web crawls on USCF's Member Services Area (even using the thin pages <a href="http://msa.uschess.org/thin.php" rel="nofollow noreferrer">http://msa.uschess.org/thin.php</a>), but it takes too long just waiting for the server to respond. How can I read the players from the Golden Database into a program I have made?</p>
  
Comments.ContentLicense: CC BY-SA 4.0
Comments.CreationDate: 2019-09-28T23:03:29.843Z
Comments.Text: What's the golden database?
Comments.UserDisplayName: Inertial Ignorance
Comments.ContentLicense: CC BY-SA 4.0
Comments.CreationDate: 2019-12-12T21:37:12.657Z
Comments.Text: The Golden Database lists are cumulative rating lists for all US Chess Federation current and past members. They contain all member IDs, including those without ratings, through the current (monthly calculated and published) rating supplement. They can be downloaded by affiliates and tournament directors in dBase III database format or as tab-delimited text files.
Comments.UserDisplayName: NilsR
Tags: <programming>
Title: What is the format for USCF's Golden Database?
ThreadText: # What is the format for USCF's Golden Database?
  
  (Asked by: username_0 on 2019-07-17)
  
  I was wanting to collect some statistics about players, and also just easily update player ratings for my local club. I tried the web crawls on USCF's Member Services Area (even using the thin pages <http://msa.uschess.org/thin.php>), but it takes too long just waiting for the server to respond. How can I read the players from the Golden Database into a program I have made?
  
  **Tags:** programming
  
  > **Comments:**
  > **username_1**: What's the golden database?  
  > **username_2**: The Golden Database lists are cumulative rating lists for all US Chess Federation current and past members. They contain all member IDs, including those without ratings, through the current (monthly calculated and published) rating supplement. They can be downloaded by affiliates and tournament directors in dBase III database format or as tab-delimited text files.  
  
  ---
  
  ## 1 answers
  
  ### Answer by username_2 on 2019-11-17. Score: 1
  
  You probably found all of this on your own already, but here is what I've learned:
  
  The "Golden Database" can be downloaded in many formats, one of them as a tab separated text file. If you have made a program already, coding the import of the file should be trivial. Each line consists of:
  
  LASTNAME,FIRSTNAME(S) USCFID EXPIRYDATE STATE RATING OTHERRATING
  
  These files have certain limitations.
  
  * Only room for 2 ratings, so 2 files is provided with either speed or
    blitz rating as the 2nd.
  * Fields have limited lengths, so long names might be cut off.
  * Rating numbers can come in many variants, 1234/12 means the rating is  
    based on 12 games, while I forget what 1122\* means. (Provisional?)
  * Ratings can be texts as well, like 'Unrated' or 'Duplicate', etc.
  
  If not you, then I hope this helps someone else...
  
  
  ---
  
  