Bingo Sheets
	To make watching debates and State of the Union addresses a bit easier . . .

Do you feel obligated to watch Presidential debates or the State of the Union address because you are a political science student, but think it's really really boring?

Well, save that guilt for your dissertation because now you can keep up appearances and have a good time too!

Get a group of friends together, pass out the sheets, and cross your fingers that the President starts pontificating about "Renewable Energy" and the "Jobs of the Future." Easily converted to a drinking game!

Download sheets now: 30 bingo sheets created for the 2012 State of the Union Address.

To generate your own bingo sheets:

You will need the following software

• Any version of R. Available for free at The Comprehensive R Archive Network (CRAN).
• A program to compile Latex code. My preference is WinEDT, which is available for a 30 day free trial and can be downloaded on WinEDT homepage.

You will need to download the following code

• An R script file to generate the bingo sheets.
• Latex code to convert the images into one PDF file.

Instructions:

1. Open the R script file. Change the file address on line 1 to the address of the folder on your computer where you saved the code. (Note: file addresses in R need to include forward-slashes, not back-slashes. So enter "C:/Bingo", not "C:\Bingo")
2. On the second line, change the number 10 to the number of randomly generated bingo sheets you want to create. So if you want 50 sheets, make sure the second line reads nb<-50.
3. The word bank starts on line 6 of the R script file. Please feel free to change or update these words to make them more appropriate for whichever event you intend to watch. Make sure all 50 lines have one word or phrase. The bingo sheets are 5 by 5 grids with a free square in the middle. 24 of these 50 words are drawn randomly to fill out the grid.
4. Right click in the script file and choose "select all" to highlight the whole text. Then right-click again and choose "run line or selection" to run the code. A window will appear showing each bingo sheet being generated.
5. Open the latex code file with a Tex editor like WinEDT.
6. You will only need to make one edit to this file. On the 11th line, change the number at the end of the command to one more than the number of bingo sheets you wish to create. For example, if you are making 50 bingo sheets, make sure line 11 reads \forloop{ct}{1}{\value{ct} < 51}
7. Compile the code to create a .dvi file (not a PDF file yet). In WinEDT, you need to "TeXify" the file by selecting Accessories at the top of the screen, then Texify. An image will appear containing all of your bingo sheets.
8. With the DVI file open, convert the DVI file to a PDF by selecting Accessories, then PDF, then dvi2pdf. In a few seconds, a PDF containing your bingo sheets will appear. It is automatically saved to the folder where you saved to code. Feel free to print, email, or distribute the file however you wish.

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