blackest_k

until there is a better solution http://www.timeanddate.com/worldclock/meeting.html I think this could help. regards John

how do you make the casual room successful? it needs to be used regularly and have a high traffic or people will carry on just playing in the main bridge club, regardless of time and that will not solve this problem. A radical idea but what if you replaced the main bridge club with two doors casual and serious. each user then has to make a choice. however the casual room as a public club ,promoted on the mainpage and on tournament sign up pages, could be successful I am trying to think of this as a gathering area before the main event or a place to meet your prefered partner at least if it doesnt catch on to a great extent minimal changes will have been made. regards John

I think something simple in the discription of your table like 8+ hands is enough to alert someone that you object to players who will leave after a few hands or no tournys or "just a few" if you don't mind in the main bridgeclub you always have the option of setting your own table and setting what you expect from people joining. create a "waiting room" for tourny registrees , waiting for regular partner, 15 minutes to spare, nobody is forced to use it but playing in there you will expect a shortgame. (is that easy to impliment) I often can't sit for 2 hours but a hand or 2 can be fun if everyone knows you may not be there for long. must be a simple solution somewhere that doesn't create more problems for everyone else to keep a few happy. regards john

just a thought is it possible to break down the disconnects data grouping tournys by length. Are short tourneys less prone to this than long ones. perhaps some people enter tourneys not fully aware of how long they have committed themself for if its clearly stated this is a 2hour tourney maybe people would be less likely to enter realising they havent the time available or the bladder control to remain sat at table I can't be the only person praying my partner will get in a contract so i can get away from the table for a minute. warm regards john

there is always the option of conceding if your ops will not claim and its a forgone conclusion. Warm regards john

what i am thinking is currently as soon as someone makes a claim the hands are placed face up on the table as soon as they intend to claim but if its still up in the air as to what the result should be it's quite unsatisfying for all concerned as the person who is declaring will obviously say they would play it to their advantage. have you ever conceded a hand when your partners hand had winners or come close to it. much to your partners anoyance. perhaps the sequence should be. I wish to claim x tricks are you willing to let this hand go down. if either of the other 2 players objects play should continue as normal else then the hands go down as now. because objecting to a claim doesnt identify who objected it should still allow a reasonable chance of a fair game to continue, on the other hand if i put a claim in that was refused initially it still might be sign enough to know how the remaining cards lay. I think a simple third option play on when a claim is in doubt could be implimented without too much trouble. but is it desirable? it would be one more mouse click. would it be open to abuse more or less than the current system? now i will shut up and let everyone else speak :( warm regards John

over in the general discussion there is a debate about claiming if the claim relies on a finese or cards being in a particular hand to make. knowing they are there makes it a certainty you will play that way. Would it be better not to show the hands until everyone agree's to see the hands and allow the claim to be rejected without having the hand spoiled by the hands now being open. hence this is a suggestion for the software, warm regards John

Slashdot uses a system where all posts rank a score and you can choose to read posts based on score but then i think it needs a moderator to do the scoring unless you have the readers score posts as they read them. I suppose the current system of ohno not him again works quite well (wondering who is actually going to read this). Scoring might help thou and encourage me to be quiet :) warm regards john

I think the current system is the best way it may not be polite but it doesn't give the opportunity to be impolite either. unlike this forum :) Idea's are sometimes good sometimes bad but they all can be useful to help fred towards building an ideal software environment for us to play bridge. with a complex product like the bridgebase software there are many area's it could be grown, refined, expanded. It is natural for the focus of a forum like this to focus on the negative since these are the area's that may be selected for the next round of improvements. If someone raises a point about a negative aspect of the software it's not an attack on fred it's just something which could be refined once the current crop of bugs are dealt with if it's important enough or trivial to change. Fred is an artist, just like an author a painter a musician and he wants to create great software i am sure he appreciates the work he doesnt have to do because of this forum :) I have yet to see anything written with malice intended about the software. warm regards john

Is there a web page somebody could be directed to which would help somebody fill in a convention card? I have to admit i don't have one. the problem exists though that there is a vast number of conventions out there If anyone knows them all i salute them. when playing casual bridge it is quite possible that your partner is not aware that a bid is using a convention sometimes it would be desirable to alert them as well. ok i know that might be considered outrageous but i think the distinction should be made between a casual game with a casual partner against a tourney where all rules apply perhaps a new table type "just for fun" for those of us wanting to play and not minding conventions being explained or other infringements. warm regards john

Isn't that more a problem of how the software works ? I have never run a tourny, but there are several ways the substitution could be done which wouldn't involve a director typing in a subs nick. 1) simple queue where subbing is first come first served, subs ordered in order of registration (could allow all subbing to be done automatically) problem being it wouldn't allow for different abilitys systems ect. unless you could specify terms perhaps american, intermediate, sayc 2) present subs in a list dbl click the sub required in a list and a request would be sent out automatically. 3) something else If you don't have to type the name the problem goes away. warm regards john

it may be prettier without underscores however there is a reason why I have one I use pretty much the same user name across a number of systems which insist i log on with a user name of some sort. Its actually shortened on bridgebase but thats ok i type till i run out of space, incidently I don't use just one password I use three main passwords easy , long and difficult. this reflects the security i feel i need to apply for a particular account. It's a practical way of keeping security issues to a minimum better than having a postit note a file on my system which lists my combinations of usernames and passwords or auto logon. I have enough to remember already :D warm regards John

you are right we all have enough computing power to search and highlight features we are interested in. Bridgebase online has two components a server to which we connect and a client which is what we use on our own computers. The more server side features you add the greater the bandwidth and processing power needed for the server to cope especially as numbers of features/users increase. a client side database would minimise the traffic to the server keeping bridgebase fast. I presume as your friends list follows you round from computer to computer that when you log on its downloaded as a local copy when you log if its newer than the existing version on the computer you are using and when you make changes it gets updated on the server. We have the chance to discuss idea's here those with merit may get taken onboard we can only hope B) warm regards john

I like this Idea it shouldnt be too difficult to achieve presumably the existing friends enemys neutral flag uses at least 2 bits and possibilty a whole byte of data which is downloaded from the server. so adding further lists user1 user2 shouldnt be so hard to achieve. However you do have a practical limitation on how many lists you can highlight without getting totally confused. So perhaps you would need to have an option to choose which list you choose to highlight in the club. Currently purple is used to highlight friends if as a user you could assign this to one of your lists it would become a very useful tool for users and club organisors and by defaulting to friends it would still be useable for novice's warm regards John

Ok the beta has a number of filters and the majority like them but what filters could be useful to add? filter1 I feel it should be possible to distinguish between players with an alternative charactoristic to friend enemy and neutral. like now you can see your friends in the main bridge club this other charactoristic would also be plainly visible. This would show something else but user defined. perhaps you might use it to show people who speak your language or use your prefered bidding system or just that you enjoyed playing with them. filter2 It might be useful to have a table view that could show only locked tables or unlocked tables. filter3 It could be useful to filter players registered in a tourney so you don't sit down at a table with ops about to be whisked away. I think that if you accept there is an arguement for filtering due to expanding numbers then there is also an arguement for additional filters this is my top 3 Please contribute more suggestions and indicate your preferences warm regards John