Bid Central  Information page:   for Delta PBS Bidding!

Bid Central does not run natively on the MAC;  however, you can run it under Windows on the MAC.  If you are running Bid Central on Windows 7 or Windows 8, or 10 please do the following after installing:

I've tested BC under Windows 10 on my own laptop.  If you do the following it will run like a champ:

  1. After installing, right-click on the Bid Central 10 icon on your desktop and select "Properties"

  2. In the "Properties" window select the "Compatibility" tab

  3. Click the box that says "Run in Windows Compatibility Mode" and then select "WinXP SP3"

  4. Click Apply. 

  5. When you start Bid Central, depending upon your Windows security setting, you may get the question to run BC as administrator.  Just click "yes" to that question and BC will start normally.  You can lower your security so that you don't get that question on startup.

 

Current Release:   Version 10.0 Rev 111 released  11/07/19 @ 1215 cst.

Bid Central is the choice for any pilot wanting the best possible monthly schedule with the least time and effort.  No other software does even close to what Bid Central will do!!  And this is battle tested software folks.  Bid Central will pay for itself in just a month with time saved and improved schedule.  This is the "must have" application for all Delta Pilots.  Test fly it free for 30 days and find out for yourself what you've been missing!!

Click here to download now

New Features in Bid Central

  •   If you install the "Send-It-Up" application, you can upload your bid script into NavBlue directly from the Bid Central Bid Script Display window.
  •   Ability to process Delta trip rotations (pairings or patterns) from their .zip files
  •   Option to display and print pairings in either the Delta format or a format very similar to former NWA patterns.
  •   New Pairing Processing options that determine what information is shown in the optional NWA pattern format.
  •   New Warpdrive Bid Bucket Bid Creation Screen - Extremely powerful and great for pilots who are not senior on their equipment.
  •   Ability to generate a Delta PBS compatible bid script in either the Ramjet or Warpdrive..
  •   New fully html context sensitive help with many keyword links and screen shots.
  •   New "one-click" ability to process month-end transition pairings.
  •   Print Flight Attendant (Flight Leader) briefing forms for each segment on your flight schedule or for any specific FC trip for which you can now add the other pilot name so you don't have to write it down for each flight segment.
  •  Print a pilot segment form for each segment of a pairing that is very useful in the cockpit.  See screenshot in the revision info  below.
  •   FFDO flight segment output for all domestic segments on your Flight Calendar for easy one-click copy into the FFDO web page.
  •   and many more improvements and features to improve this part of your airline life......

Because of the huge effort required to develop Bid Central, the registration for Bid Central has been changed to a yearly model, and the software will keep track of your expiration date.  The cost to register and subscribe to Bid Central is only $84/year.

  To register Bid Central click here

If you have installed Bid Central and are getting error messages:  Click this link for instructions

 If you continue to have problems, you can call Softmica at 952-484-5356.

     To download Bid Central 10.0 Rev 111 click the following link and select the [Run] option.

You will see the following icon on your desktop after installing Bid Central.   

Click here to download Bid Central    Select the [Run] option in the window that opens after clicking.   Revision info is below.

Hit Counter

Click here for visual instructions for downloading pairings into BC for VISTA and Windows 7.

NOTE:  If you are running Bid Central under Windows 7, 8, or 10-  you likely need to follow these steps for Bid Central to run:

  1. After installing, right-click on the Bid Central 10 icon on your desktop and select "Properties"

  2. In the "Properties" window select the "Compatibility" tab

  3. Click the box that says "Run in Windows Compatibility Mode" and then select "WinXP SP3"

  4. Click Apply. 

  5. When you start Bid Central, depending upon your Windows security setting, you may get the question to run BC as administrator.  Just click "yes" to that question and BC will start normally.   You can lower your security so that you don't get that question on startup.

Revision Information

Rev 111

Please read the notes for Rev 109 and follow instructions.  This revision is designed to work with Rev 78 of SIU.  This update finally fixes the problem in the optimized "followed by" bidscript where the days off in the generic bid group were being truncated at six.  Now all selected days are in the bid.

Rev 109

Revision 108 would not run properly as a clean install due to a bug in the code that creates the Flight Calendar data table for the number of years specified.  If you did a clean install in 108 and it didn't work, please do a clean install for Rev 109 and all will be well.  If you are installing from Rev 107, make sure you re-process pairing for Dec after installing.

Rev 108

 

  1. Delta slightly changed the pairing format for Dec which broke Bid Central.  This update fixes that problem.  This update is backward compatible with the previous pairing format (you can process pairing for pervious months) but assumes the new pairing format going forward.
  2. Updates the Auto-Find feature in the Pairing Acquisition Screen.  It should now work properly.
  3. Updates Bid Central so that the "International" selection in the PA screen works properly.

If you didn't install Rev 107 and do that clean install, I recommend you do it on this revision as there seemed to develop a problem with the Flight Calendar data file that could cause a lot of problems up the road as you added new years.

Rev 107

Adds bid month dates for 2020 and 2021.

Fixes issues with fresh install startup.

Recommend that all users do a "clean install"

Rev 103

  1. Fixes a bug that would cause error messages when using "Autofind Pairings after Download" in the pairing processing screen.
  2. Adds the option to save the "Pairings by Op Day" report to an html file that you can then review as needed.  This file is saved in the "C:\BidCentral\html" folder.
  3. Improves the Pilot Segment Form to include a place to enter RTOW.

Rev 102

  1. Fixes a problem introduced in the last update that would eventually result in getting a "file too large" error when opening BC
  2. Fixes a problem adding the logo icon for BC on your Windows desktop

Rev 100

  1. Fixes a problem which limited the number of days off the ramjet would include when generating your bid script. 
  2. Improves the Pilot Segment Form

Rev 98,99

Fixes a problem printing the F/A briefing form for any trip leaving between May1 and May 17.  I had misnamed the custom .jpg file that displays an image appropriate for the time of year for the trip. Left out the .jpg file for Mothers Day.

Rev 97

Disables the ability to bookmark schedules in the Warpdrive Schedule Generator Screen.  This feature was generating error messages and it was never intended that you could bookmark schedules from that screen as the purpose of the Warpdrive is to build schedules with conforming pairings and then generate the bid script on the Warpdrive Bucket Bid screen.

Rev 96

I noticed that the Trip Day Limit directive in the Ramjet 2018 was not working correctly.  This update fixes that issue.

Rev 95

The last release introduced a bug that I obviously did not intend.  This would cause BC to essentially break and be unable to function.  This update fixes that bug.  My apologies to all!

Rev 94

  1. Fixes a problem printing pairings in enhanced format.  Eliminate the "no logpage2.dbf" error.
  2. Fixes a problem with the bid month dates in the Nov 2019 Calendar.

Rev 93

  1. Fixes a problem with the bid month dates for August 2019 which would result in an unrecoverable error if August 2019 was selected in the FC
  2. Fixes a problem with broken web links to the BC registration and information pages.
  3. Fixes a problem in the Ramjet2018 which would not correctly limit the number of trips on your ramjet schedules to the number you selected on the SG directives screen.

Rev 91

    Fixes a bug introduced in Rev 90 that occurs when you try to print the pairings on your schedule in enhanced format.

Rev 90

  1. Improves both the F/A briefing form and pilot segment form.
  2. Updates base/aircraft combination available in the User Profile screen to reflect the most recent and projected realities.
  3. Fixes some minor bugs.
  4. Adds protections when creating the bid script if you are creating a "followed by" script and there are more than six pairing in a given bookmarked schedule.

*** Note:  Rev 88 and 89 were for internal testing and not released ***

Rev 87

  1. Adds a new version of the Ramjet Schedule Generator (Ramjet SG 2018).  This ramjet provides improved legality checking and more comprehensive schedule generation.  The old ramjet is still available in the menu.  The new ramjet is able to find a few more schedule combinations that the old ramjet was missing.  It incorporates a new recursive algorithm for combination checking.  Legality checking is also improved in a way that could not be improved in the previous ramjet due to the way it functions.  There is also a new option for viewing schedules in a very brief format.  If you encounter any issues with the new ramjet, the old ramjet is always available to use.
  2. Fixes a few minor lingering issues that could create error conditions.

Rev 85

  1. Fixes an error condition that would occur when displaying bookmarked pairings from the "Manage BM Pairing Set" screen.

Rev 84

  1. Fixes an issue displaying the next month's pairings in the Other Pilot Names form.  Remember, these names will automatically be populated by Send-It-Up after you get your future schedule in SIU.

Rev 82

  1. Fixes an issue that could cause an error messages when closing BC when Send-It-Up is open.
  2. You should now be able to upload your Bid Script into NavBlue directly from Bid Central if you have installed and tested SIU.
  3. Fixes an issue which would show the red eye background part of the eye when viewing trips in some modes even when the trip did not include a red-eye segment. 

Rev 81

  1. Fixes an error condition that would occur in the Ramjet if you saved/recalled bookmarked schedules when there were more than 80 schedules bookmarked.
  2. Saves a list of the pairings on the flight calendar for the Pilot Segment Forms and F/A Briefing Form every times you save the FC.  This is so Send-It-Up can automatically add/update the other pilot names after getting your current or future schedule.
  3. Fixes the bid script parsing problem for uploading your bid script from BC that was also causing problems with the generic script upload in Send-It-Up.

Rev 80

  2. Adds integration with Send-It-Up so you can upload your bid script into NavBlue directly from BC.
  3. Fixes a problem with a "Numeric Overflow" error when creating a non-followed by bid script.
  4. Fixes a problem preventing integrated help from coming up when pressing the [?] buttons or the [F1] key.
  5. Fixes a problem where in some categories, BC would not automatically identify the downloaded pairings .zip file.
  6. Adds all holidays for the years 2018 and 2019.  I had forgotten to do that before the year began.

Rev 78

Continuing on the same theme as the last update, I discovered something that wasn't working as designed in the legality checking logic which could result in the triggering of an illegality that didn't actually exist.  After a deep-dive into the code I discovered the problem and corrected it.  Also fixed a problem where the trips list in the Ramjet would freeze after you dropped a trip and a legality message was triggered.

Rev 77

After extensive testing I found that 30 hr FFAD in 168 hours elapsed legality checking was still not working properly.  This issue is now fixed!  Also made some other changes on how the print bid script screen works.

Rev 76

  1. Fixes a problem checking 30 hr FFAD in 168 hour elapsed in all calendars.  Problem introduced in last fix which would allow some combinations to slip through the cracks.
  2. Fixes a problem updating pay rates in the user profile screen when changing aircraft/position.

Rev 75

  1. Fixes an error condition that would occur when displaying bookmarked pairings in the PA screen.
  2. Fixes a problem calculating FDP for some conditions in the FC, Ramjet, and Warpdrive.  This could result in not being able to build schedules using some pairings.
  3. Improves the Pilot Segment Form.
  4. Improves the F/A briefing form.

Rev 73

  •   This is a critical update.  You must re-process pairings for this update to be effective.  There was an issue in pairing processing which could cause release times and FDP times to be incorrect by as much as 30 minutes.  This was due to the fact that release time for the purposes of crew rest is different from release time for the purposes of calculating FDP.  The upshot is that sometimes BC would allow trips to be placed back-to-back that were not legal, and BC could slightly miscalculate total FDP.
  •   Updates base/city pair combinations in the "User Profile" screen.
  •   Adds some cosmetic improvements including showing a "redeye" in pairing displays which have at least one redeye flight segment.

Rev 72

    Adds Bid Month dates for the years 2018 and 2019.  To add a new year to the Flight Calendar, select "File".... "Add Year".

Rev 71

    Adds several improvements to both the PA screen and the Post Award Analysis functionality.

Rev 69

  1. Adds a new selection option in the PA screen.  This option is for the percentage hard fly versus credit in each pairing.  This option will only be enabled if you process pairings after this version is installed.
  2. Fixes a problem in Post Award (Composite Report) Processing.  I thought I had this licked in the last update but apparently not.  It's now fixed and will work properly as long as you process the .txt version of the file.

Rev 68

    Fixes a problem with a syntax error in code that I corrected in the Ramjet, but forgot to correct in the FC, and Warpdrive.

Rev 67

  1. Adds the trip award restrictions referenced in the PWA 23.11 to Ramjet, Warpdrive, and Flight Calendar legality checking.
  2. Improves the Trips-by-op-day report.
  3. Fixes a problem with the Ramjet not filtering for the min days off between trips directive.
  4. Fixes a problem with Post Award (Composite Report) processing.  Delta changed the format of the report so I had to change the Post Award processing routine so it would work correctly once again.

Rev 66

This update removes some debugging commands that could bring up windows containing background data or messages you don't need to see.

Rev 65

This update fixes an issue in the Ramjet and Warpdrive that could cause problems building the correct schedule combinations and properly reporting the schedule stats when displaying the schedules.

Note:  For anyone wanting a Bid Central report in PDF format, when you print the report, select "Microsoft print to PDF" as your printer.  The report will go to a file that you designate.  Then go to that file and click on it and it will display the PDF output for that report.

Rev 64

  1. Fixes a mistake in the A320 FO year two pay rate
  2. Fixes a minor bug when using [Cancel Set] when entering a "user defined" activity onto the FC

Rev 63

  1. CQ days are now labeled "CQ" in the ramjet and warpdrive instead of SVT
  2. Holidays for years 2017 and beyond are now back on the Ramjet and Warpdrive
  3. Corrects a problem with version numbering.

Rev 62

    Fixes an issue which was causing the holidays to not appear on the calendars for years 2017 and above.

Rev 61

    Fixes a problem adding and removing CQ days from the FC in a bid month where you have not processed pairings.  Also fixes a problem when changing the training credit when adding CQ days to the FC.

Rev 58/59

  1. Adds Bid Month Dates for calendar year 2017
  2. Add a new Pay Comparison Calculator that incorporates the Contract 2016 pay rates and aircraft.  Also adds a new feature called blended pay rates based upon the percentage of flying  you assign to a certain aircraft (.e.g. 321) in your category.
  3. Rev 59 adds A330 FO pay rates which I neglected to include in Rev 58

Rev 57  (Critical Update)

The reason for not many updates for a while is that I have been extremely busy flying and haven't had the energy to work on Bid Central.  This is a very complex application and when I get into the guts of this software it takes intense patience and concentration to figure out why something isn't working as it should. 

*** First one note.  Please don't install this update right after an abnormal BC shutdown.  If you get an abnormal shutdown, run BC first and shutdown normally and then install this update.

During testing of Rev 56, I temporarily disabled some needed code and forgot to re-enable it.  This code is necessary for proper trip overlap and legality checking.  It's re-activated in this update.  This update also fixes another problem in the Ramjet that could produce a different legality checking result depending upon the order the trip was put on the calendar.    It also adds inter-theater legality checking in the FC that I forgot to add previously.

Rev 56

    This is my biggest update in a long time.  Here are the changes and improvements included in this update.

*** First one note.  Please don't install this update right after an abnormal BC shutdown.  If you get an abnormal shutdown, run BC first and shutdown normally and then install this update.

  1. Fixes several problems with "Fixed Trips" in the Ramjet Schedule Generator.  There were actually four different issues that could occur that could cause problems.  I don't want to go into great detail here but all four issues have been fixed.  In testing I also found an issue that could effect normal schedule generation and fixed that as well.
  2. Added the ability to bookmark up to 150 different schedules in the Ramjet.  This is particularly useful given the bid optimization included in the Ramjet.
  3. Adds the ability to calculate when you need to depart from home for each pairing.  This time will appear as the first line of the first day of the trip when you put it on the FC, and also appear in many pairing displays and reports.  To get this to calculate properly, you need to go to the User Profile Screen and enter the number of minutes it takes you to get from your home to the airport, and the number of minutes it takes on the Delta Crew Bus.  Currently, the assumption is that the bus leaves every 15 minutes on the hour, but I will add other options with your input.  The depart home calculation assumes you will take the last bus that gets you to the airport at or before your check-in time.  I will add options based upon your input.  If you want this time on your FC, you will have to remove any existing trips and then put it back on the FC.
  4. Fixes a bunch of other issues to improve how BC operates.

Rev 55

Doubles the space available for entering other pilot name(s) in the pilot segment form and f/a briefing form, enabling you to enter two other pilot names if you so desire.

Rev 54

  1. Updates BC so that it can process the new "Composite Reasons" report for Post Award Analysis.
  2. Improves both the Pilot segment and F/A briefing forms.

Rev 53

1.  Fixes another problem I discovered in "30 hr FFAD in 168 hours consecutive" legality checking on all calendars.

2.  Changes the Preview window in the Pairings-by-op-day report so that you can resize it as big as you want.

Rev 52

This is a Critical Update

  1. Fixes some legality checking issues in all of the calendars- particularly 190 FDP hours in 672 consecutive hours, and 30 hr FFAD in 168 hours consecutive.
  2. Fixes problems in the Ramjet when using "Fixed" trips.  Anytime you would remove a "Fixed" trip from the Ramjet all subsequent FFAD legality checking could be and probably would be incorrect due to problems with data that was inadvertently changed when you removed that "Fixed" trip.
  3. Automatically renames the pairings.zip file if you get it using the "Locate Downloaded Zip File" button so that BC can correctly work with that file and you won't get any errors when you process pairings.

Rev 51

This is a Critical Update

Due to the changes in Detla-Net, Bid Central was inhibited from processing the pairings.zip files as they were named because of the space included in the file name.  This update corrects that issue.  You can download the .zip file and Bid Central will now properly identify and process it.  I've also updated BC so that it will properly find the .zip file for all base and aircraft combinations.

The second change is updating the Bid month dates to reflect the actual Bid Month dates for the rest of the year.

Sorry I couldn't get to this sooner, but I was on a trip when all of this went down and I just got home this morning!

Rev 50

  1. Updates base/aircraft combinations available in the user profile screen
  2. Updates the bid month dates for April and May to the correct date ranges.

Rev 48

The bid month dates for Feb and Mar were incorrect in the last release.  You can change them manually in "Pairings"...."Get and Process Pairings" in the upper left corner, or you can install this update which corrects the dates.  If you processed pairings with the incorrect dates, make sure you re-process pairings after installing this update so that all pairing operating dates are available in processed pairings.

Rev 47

  1. Improves the way the startup Profile screen operates when you run BC for the first time.
  2. Makes significant improvements to the "Warpdrive" to eliminate the possibility of some error conditions from occurring.   I reiterate here that the Warpdirve is very powerful for junior bidders who know the days they want to fly.

Rev 46

  1. Fixes problems where legality checking would trigger on legality situations that were ok.  This mostly occurred on pairings 10 days and longer.
  2. Adds legality checking for "P" & "A" adjacent pairings to be sure there is 24 hours off between those pairings.
  3. Fixes a problem where help would not come up in Win 7 and greater.

    All fixes apply to the FC, Ramjet and Warpdrive.  There is no need to reprocess pairings for this update.

Rev 45

    Adds bid month dates for calendar year 2016.

Rev 44

  1. Fixes a problem doing the legality checking for  60 hrs on duty in 168 hrs elapsed.  This issue was addressed in the FC, Ramjet, and Warpdrive.  You must re-process pairings for this part of the update to take full effect.
  2. Fixes an error condition that would occur if you attempted to print the FC with no pairings available for that month.
  3. Fixes and error condition that could occur in the Ramjet if you saved and Ramjet Calendar to html with more than 6 pairings on the calendar.

Rev 43

This is a "critical" update.  This update fixes a problem identifying carryout pairings in the Ramjet.  It also fixes a problem correctly identifying FFAD periods of 30 hours.  For the second problem fix to become active, you will need to re-process pairings.

Rev 42

Fixes a problem adding and/or removing pairings (either fixed or normal) from the Ramjet Calendar.

Rev 41

  1. Fixes a problem manually removing trips from the ramjet calendar
  2. Fixes a legality checking bug that would not correctly perform 168 hour legality checking.   Please let me know if you find anything that you think is not working correctly.

Rev 40

Fixes an error that could occur when optimizing your bid.

Rev 39

Fixes a problem in the Ramjet anytime CQ (SVT) was on the ramjet calendar and you dragged and dropped trips.  BC was identifying trip conflicts that didn't exist. Also might have caused a problem with fixed trips on the ramjet when you created schedules.

Fixes some problems in the "followed by" bid script optimization routines.  There were some problems with this code that I hadn't recognized before.  This update corrects those problems and provides improved optimization that will further reduce the number of lines in the optimized bid without compromising bid integrity.  Please try- I think you will like.