# The Weekday Challenge — Official Rules _Doggo 108 — Rulebook_ The Weekday Challenge is the daily pattern-walking and scoring system that runs Monday through Friday. It is the shared scoring engine for both **Dognami Libre** (the free-pool individual game) and **Doggo 7s** (the managed-team competition). These rules govern the conduct of a single Weekday Challenge week. --- ## 1. Object of the Game **1.1** The object of the Weekday Challenge is for a **Walker** to record a daily Walk with their Dog that matches the **Required Pattern** published by the System for that weekday. **1.2** A Walker accumulates points across the week based on the correctness of each day's Walk. A perfect week — five correctly-matched Walks, Monday through Friday — earns a maximum of **+50 points**. A week of five wrong-shape walks earns **+25 points**. A week with no Walks recorded incurs a maximum loss of **−50 points**. The only path to negative scoring is failing to walk at all. **1.3** Points accumulated under the Weekday Challenge feed into all higher-level competitions (Dognami Libre, Doggo 7s) in which the Walker is enrolled. --- ## 2. Equipment **2.1** To play the Weekday Challenge, a Walker requires: - **2.1.1** A registered Doggo 108 account (any account type — Free, Indie, or Manager). - **2.1.2** A dog. The same dog need not be walked every day; the rules do not constrain which dog is recorded. - **2.1.3** A GPS-capable device (smartphone) running the Doggo 108 mobile application, or any third-party GPS recorder capable of producing a **GPX** file that the Walker can upload via the web interface. **2.2** A **Walk** consists of a single continuous GPS recording uploaded to the System as a single GPX file. --- ## 3. The Pattern Schedule **3.1** The **Pattern Schedule** is the sequence of five Required Patterns assigned to the upcoming Monday through Friday. It is published by the System once per week. **3.2** The Pattern Schedule is published at **16:00 UK time every Sunday** and is communicated to all Walkers by email and on the **How to Play** page on the Doggo 108 website. **3.3** Each day's Required Pattern is one of three values: | Code | Pattern Name | What the Walker walks | |------|-------------------|-------------------------------------------------------------| | `1` | **Out-and-Back** | A route to a turnaround point and back the same way. | | `0` | **Single Loop** | A closed route enclosing one area. | | `8` | **Figure-of-Eight** | A closed route enclosing two areas joined at a crossover. | **3.4** A week's Pattern Schedule is represented as a five-character string. Position 1 is Monday; position 5 is Friday. Example: `10018` denotes Monday Out-and-Back, Tuesday and Wednesday Single Loop, Thursday Out-and-Back, Friday Figure-of-Eight. **3.5** The Pattern Schedule for the current week and the following week is visible to all Walkers at all times. --- ## 4. A Valid Walk **4.1** A submitted Walk shall qualify for scoring only if it meets all of the following conditions: - **4.1.1 Minimum distance.** The total recorded distance of the Walk shall be **at least 200 metres**. - **4.1.2 Closure.** The recorded finish point shall lie **within 50 metres** of the recorded start point. This requirement applies to all three Patterns, including Out-and-Back. - **4.1.3 Format.** The uploaded file shall be a well-formed GPX file containing at least two trackpoints with valid latitude and longitude values. **4.2** A Walk that fails any condition in §4.1 shall not be recorded against the day's challenge. The Walker shall be notified by email on the first occurrence of each failure type (open route, short walk) and may then re-record and re-upload a valid Walk for the same day. **4.3** Walks are uploaded automatically from the Doggo 108 mobile application at the moment the Walker ends the recording. Walks recorded via third-party tools may be uploaded manually through the web interface at any time before the day closes (see §6). --- ## 5. Classification **5.1** Each valid Walk is automatically classified by the System into one of the three Patterns defined in §3.3. Classification is based on the geometric shape of the GPS track and is performed without Walker intervention. **5.2** The System employs a buffer-based classifier: the recorded track is buffered by **20 metres on each side**, and the number of interior enclosed regions in the resulting shape is counted. - **5.2.1** Zero enclosed regions → classified as **Out-and-Back** (`1`). - **5.2.2** Exactly one enclosed region → classified as **Single Loop** (`0`). - **5.2.3** Two or more enclosed regions → classified as **Figure-of-Eight** (`8`). **5.3** A region is counted as enclosed only if it persists after the 20-metre buffer is applied. This filters out GPS noise, near-misses, and thin out-and-back slivers that do not constitute a genuine loop. As a practical guide, a genuine Single Loop typically encloses an area of at least **2,500 m²** (approximately 50 m × 50 m). **5.4** The Walker shall not be informed of the classification result before uploading. A walk that the Walker intended as a Loop but that classifies as Out-and-Back is treated as a wrong-Pattern Walk under §6. --- ## 6. Scoring **6.1** Once a Walk has been classified, the System awards points to the Walker according to the following table: | Outcome | Points | |-----------------------------------------------|--------| | Walk matches the Required Pattern for the day | **+10** | | Walk is valid but does not match | **+5** | | No valid Walk uploaded by the day's close | **−10** | A wrong-shape Walk earns half the value of a correct one (you still walked the dog). Only failing to walk at all loses points. A wrong-shape Walk still counts as a failed pattern for the purpose of the Dognami Cascade (DOGNAMI-LIBRE §5.1.1). **6.2** Points are awarded immediately upon successful classification. The Walker may view the result on their dashboard within a few minutes of upload. **6.3** No-walk penalties (−10) are applied automatically at the end of each weekday by a scheduled System process. Walkers may not appeal a no-walk penalty after the day has closed. **6.4** A weekday's outcome is final once the day has closed in the Walker's local timezone. The System does not revise scores retroactively except under the re-upload provisions of §7.1. --- ## 7. Exceptions and Edge Cases ### 7.1 Same-day re-upload **7.1.1** A Walker may upload multiple Walks on the same day. Only the **most recent** Walk uploaded before the day's close shall be scored. **7.1.2** If a later re-upload yields a lower score than an earlier upload (e.g., a wrong-Pattern Walk replacing a correctly-classified earlier Walk), the lower score shall stand. The Walker is reminded that re-uploading is irrevocable. ### 7.2 Co-walked Walks **7.2.1** Where two Walkers (a **Principal** and a **Co-walker**) share the recording of the same dog under an approved Dog Share, only the Principal's score is affected by any given Walk, irrespective of which Walker physically uploaded it. **7.2.2** A Co-walker shall not earn or lose Weekday Challenge points for the dog they are co-walking. The Co-walker's own account remains eligible to play independently if they own or co-walk a different dog. ### 7.3 Timezone and day boundaries **7.3.1** Each weekday runs from **00:00 to 23:59 in the Walker's local timezone**, as determined by the timezone offset reported by the recording device at upload time. **7.3.2** A Walk uploaded after midnight local time is scored against the new day's Required Pattern, not the previous day's. ### 7.4 Weekend Walks **7.4.1** Walks recorded on Saturdays and Sundays are stored and visible in the Walker's history but are **not scored under the Weekday Challenge**. Weekend scoring is governed by separate rules. For Walkers on a Doggo 7s Team, weekend play follows the Weekend Challenge layer of those rules (Doggo 7s §6). For all other Walkers — Free-pool Dognami Libre Players, Indie Players, and solo Walkers — weekend Walks are recorded for history but are not scored, per Doggo 7s §6.5. ### 7.5 Walks rejected at upload **7.5.1** A Walk that fails the validity conditions in §4.1 is not stored against the day's challenge and does not consume the Walker's daily attempt. The Walker may upload again. No penalty applies for a rejected upload; only the absence of a valid Walk by day's close triggers the no-walk penalty under §6.1. ### 7.6 Account types and eligibility **7.6.1** All account types — Free, Indie, and Manager — participate in the Weekday Challenge on identical terms. The account type affects only which higher-level competitions the Walker is enrolled in, not the scoring of individual weekdays. --- ## 8. Glossary **Co-walker.** A Walker who has been granted approved access to record Walks for another Walker's dog via the Dog Share mechanism. See §7.2. **GPX.** GPS Exchange Format. The XML-based file format used by Doggo 108 to ingest recorded Walks. **Pattern.** One of three shape categories — Out-and-Back, Single Loop, or Figure-of-Eight — into which the System classifies a Walk. See §3.3 and §5. **Pattern Schedule.** The week's sequence of five Required Patterns. Published Sundays at 16:00 UK. See §3. **Principal.** The Walker to whose account a given dog is registered. Receives all points earned for Walks of that dog, including those recorded by approved Co-walkers. See §7.2. **Required Pattern.** The Pattern assigned to a given weekday in the current Pattern Schedule. The Walk must match this Pattern to earn the +10 point award. **System.** The Doggo 108 backend — the Cloud Functions, scoring engines, and scheduled jobs that classify Walks and apply points. **Walk.** A single continuous GPS recording uploaded as a single GPX file. See §2.2 and §4. **Walker.** Any registered Doggo 108 account holder who is eligible to upload Walks. See §7.6. --- _End of rulebook — The Weekday Challenge._ _Companion rulebooks: Dognami Libre · Doggo 7s._