Gerardo

§¨©ª Testing the symbol font. Still cumbersome to get the right characters. I used the Character Map for this test. The characters in a normal font are: §¨©ª [font=Symbol] [color=green]§[/color] [color=orange]¨[/color] [color=red]©[/color] [color=blue]ª[/color] [/font] Any font works, not only the listed ones. If you use Mozilla or derivatives as your browser you won't see this, as Mozilla doesn't show the Symbol font on strict adherence to the standards. See Enabling Symbol font for Mozilla on Windows and/or Enabling Symbol Fonts in Browsers under X

I see, the only place I saw Cross IMPs was in old WinBridge, where no division took place, so I take back my comment Thanks Wayne

I think what in BBO it is called "Cross IMPs" in some places, it is just normal IMPs, not Crossed

While I don't like the idea of completely automated tourneys, this format is useful, because it reduce stress on the directors while maintaining the tourney interesting. For (almost) completely automated tourneys, timestamping as chess servers do (players time, discounts lag) would [be needed/make a HUGE difference]. Good job with sub management!

As you wish, but seems too late to me. But UNDOs are NOT automatically GRANTED, that's NOT a right. UNDOs can be refused by anyone, at any circumstance, for any reason (or not at all). " No UNDOs at all " is a nice approach (just not mine). If you play that way with me, fine ;) I'll play that way with you. Said that, in the bidding, I grant undos to the last bidder, and if not last, I refuse and offer a redeal if available. In the play, to the last player in current trick. IMO, too much info around in the other circumstances

Yes, at director's will. However, there is a lot to be said for kibs to be silent, in special if kibs talk in languages not understood by all players

I think the best way is to have a dir team, if you can unify criteria on subbing, adjusting, etc. (for example, I wait to people to actively ask for sub, and try to adjust as long as result is obvious, when I set policy, and ask what is the policy when I codirect). A problem could be people calling different dirs on the same issue, though

John, host a tourney, contact me to (co)direct [with others, maybe, not you] anytime, so we have a real tourney, and you can take screenshots freely. Maybe you should take both player and director roles, to take screenshots of director calls, and tourney edit options. Or maybe I can take a few ones. What soft are you using to take them?

Please see http://www,bridgebase.com/myhands. There is a link for they tourney results page (in the notes), and what is required to open the .lin files automatically (basically, tell your browser to open them with the NetBridgeVu program)

Richard, do you mean "BigDeal" (by HvS)? I'm running it right now in XP, no problems. Also, Kaj G Backas made a frontend for Windows, and also version for Windows, I assume based on (freely available) HvS's code. But it has different goals than Andrews's "Deal". This one is scriptable to generate hands based on customizable criteria, while "BigDeal" just generates random hands, using a strong random function. Oops, stand corrected: "Dealer" is a program, also by HvS, similar to "Deal". Richard, the dealer.exe is compiled under the cygwin environment, you need to install it for dealer.exe to work. Else, type the mdealer.exe

List management is somewhat misplaced, as you currently need tourney creation rights just to access that screen

Claus: Of course, but right now I put rude people on enemies, and having a separate list would be useful. I usually have no restrictions when I run tourneys, but keeping rude people (and possibly chronic bad conns) would be nice

Well, you can now include various types of players (friends, same language, same country, specific level(s), private club) and exclude enemies. Besides that, you can include/exclude a custom list of people.

You can't create a tourney with inclusion/exclusion based on files on your PC, as tourney get cancelled when you select a list. Also, what would happen if I want to use both lists? So far, I can select only one list, even when I selected both criteria. Update: Prompty fixed. Thanks!

Claus, please be a bit patient. As you see, the invitational tourneys definition is MUCH improved in the beta, and I think the right approach was taken on Conditions of Contest uploading, I think it will be a breeze when implemented, and without client uploading, which is a hassle. But the programmer time is limited, and the suggestions and to do list is long (I know, I have my own longish list).

Count me in, please.

What about compressing the info sent at log on? Could reduce the size a lot. zlib and bzip2, can both be used for this.

That's against the definition of Swiss I have :- (chess background, so you have to take color alternating/balancing into account, that's more important than pair similar ranked players, but paramount is no playblacks [Last round can be difficult, particularly if even number of rounds] In fact, when you get a playback [or a color problem], a backtrack is necessary to take another choice of pairings which has no issues. Of course, no playbacks can only be implemented in clocked tourneys, as in unclocked you'll always have an incomplete choice of pairings available at any point. I think you meant "pair similar ranked (players/pairs/teams [not yet :)])", sorry for being picky :) Not sure for tourneys, but maybe for matches can be handy, with competitions currently running with two sessions format, to link one match with a previous one, provided: 1) Match still available in list [for now] 2) Teams names are repeated exactly Then info about 1st session result is made available in tourney description. OTOH, that's just a bit of sugar, just low priority thing.

sorry if question is dumb, but any chance you have keyboard driven bidding/play turned on?

What about allowing TDs to set a result on playing hands? That would allow an unclocked tourney with a "CHANGE!" at some point, decided by TD, not by clock. This would solve some issues (in particular the ones you mentioned), an create others ("Director! Change pls!" "When will you do the change" "They were slow, give more time", "I was disc, not my fault", etc, ad infinitum ;D ) Procedural penalties, please! Especially for (usual) lack of alerting, missed/incomplete explanations, etc. Unbalanced scores too (they should be not too dificult, I think), and weighted would be nice (but they are tricky).

In f2f bridge, any claim finish the play of the hand, which get adjudicated (see Laws 69 and 70 in The Laws of Duplicate Contract Bridge Basically, a claim assumes perfect defense, so any doubts are resolved against the claimimg side (see footnotes though, about the difference between careless/inferior and irrational, which is subjective as depends on the claimer level of play and, to some extent, director's view of it.

If you want to compare, you have to wait (or go table after table and see the movie), but you can adjust when tourney is over. Player is gone, seat is reserved for him. No, you see chat's addressed at whatever room you are in. In a tourney table you get lobby chats (if not turned off), tourney chats and table chats from that table. Conversely, chats by default are addressed to whatever room you're in (lobby when in lobby, tourney when in tourney, table when in table). To send a private msg, you can pull down the "Chat to:" list. To answer a msg, just click on the other person's nick to have a chat windows addressed at him/her. Please, ask for help in advance! Like, "I will do a tourney at HH:MM, can you help me?", NOT in middle of tourney, thank you. Your tourney was fine, don't worry ;-) Just a few adjustments was needed, that's all.

Please make your first tourney small (like 20 tables or so), and short, get the feel first. You like it, THEN think bigger. You have to decide on few policy issues like clocked or unclocked, how to manage substitutes and how to manage adjustment requests. Clocked tourneys (how long a round is?): PRO: You know when it will end. PRO: Movements are better defined. CON: It requires directors policy on when to adjust when time runs out, and what to do with bad connections. CON: Currently NS compares only with NS, and EW with EW Unclocked: PRO: Less overhead on directors, adjustments are much rarer here. PRO: People change direction frequently, so better comparisons. CON: People usually repeat opps (heard it was fixed, or mitigated) CON: It lasts forever ;-) (slow tables take LOTS of time) Substitutes: Do you let disconnected people get seat back? (more overhead, not too fair to subs). Unclocked needs a more active approach (you NEED to sub an unresponsive player at some point). Adjustments: Will you adjust in usual bridge infractions (misexplanations, for example)? What about time issues (in clocked ones) Define your policy on these issues, make sure all players know it. Try to get at least one codirector (preferably always, surely the first time). Someone who directed here before. I mean IN ADVANCE, not in middle of tourney. Good luck, and welcome!

I think it can be managed EVENTUALLY ;) As I said, bridgetalk has a template for diagrams. Not sure about symbols though, but most probably doable

IPB allows you to change the way it looks as a whole, from different sets, provided this sets (called skins on IPB, and other software too) are available in server configuration. John, maybe you can add a couple of skins to let people see how that works?