selms12

More details of our Voice testing: - has anyone else seen this? and if so perhaps we are doing something wrong? Our test ran across a number of different devices and operating systems: • Devices: Windows PC, Apple Air 2 iPad, Apple iPad mini, Apple iPad 4, iPhone 7, Galaxy Android Tablet and Apple Mac; and • Operating Systems: BBO iOS App, Apple Safari web browser (iPhone and iPad), Apple Mac iOS, Microsoft Edge. Did not use Chrome or Firefox. Issues uncovered during testing were: • Logging into BBO via Safari on Apple products and enabling Voice crashed the session out of BBO and despite logging back in again kept on crashing. Enabling Voice via Safari does not work. We did not attempt to play and assume that this capability still works with Safari. • Logging into BBO via the BBO App on an Apple device and enabling Voice did not crash the App. However, enabling Voice took you to the next screen to select start speaking. This resulted in a wait for a connection to be made which did not happen and also received the message that there was no connection to the Voice server. In addition, the system advised “that speakers had not been enabled at the table”. • If both opponents were not logged in then Voice could not be enabled – makes sense as you should not talk to your partner if the opponents are not also listening when playing a game. This morning we did not test if Voice worked where the two hands had finished – something to test another time – but Steve was able to talk to his partner after the hands were played on Thursday and to one pair of his opponents. • Could not log in on a PC using Internet Explorer for Windows 10. From a device perspective, the results were: • Galaxy Android tablet was OK • Apple Mac was OK • Windows PC running Edge as a browser was OK • Apple iPad mini. iPhone and iPad using Safari did not work • Apple iPad 4, iPhone and iPad using the BBO App did not work We suspect that a majority of our members will be connecting using an Apple product. Voice is a key functionality that AGBC requires going forward as it is the nearest we can get to mimicking F2F play (video is another subject given bandwidth issues and is not a priority at this time). We have tested Real Bridge that has Audio and Video capability and it worked well and is being used by our Members who play with other local clubs and have asked why we are not using it. However, we are not keen at this time to move our members to another platform and for them to relearn and get accustomed to a new system.

We did a Voice test between 8 of us this morning to VERY poor results. What we found was: Galaxy Android tablet was OK Apple Mac was OK Windows PC #1 was OK Windows PC #2 was OK Apple iPad mini running using Safari did not work Apple iPad Air 4 running using the BBO App did not work Apple iPad running using the BBO App did not work Apple iPad running using Safari did not work We also tried using an iPhone running both the BBO App and Safari but again no use! Why did it work using the Apple Mac but not the latest iPad Air? Whether it is BBO, Safari or the BBO App the Voice option is not stable. Got kicked out more often than I care to remember. What we need are clear instructions as to how to use Voice, what are the parameters as to the devices that can/cannot be used and the operating systems that are being used. Certainly we are not in a position to use this in the short term.

Voice should be an attribute of a player's Profile; do I want to talk? do I not want to talk? It would then be available on all sessions. Are BBO worried about bandwidth issues? BBO seems to have released this capability with no instructions and no great conviction; it slipped in but I do not know of any club that is actually using it! We did a test last Friday 8 January and it was a unmitigated disaster when trying to use a couple of PCs, an iPad and an iPhone. Await some formal notification from BBO as to whether they really are committed to Voice capability.

We had same issue in UK last evening around 19:00. If you login via PC running Windows it was OK. But when we tried using a Mac it failed - same if accessing via Apple iPad and iPhone players got the “Could not load critical file. Please check your internet connection and try again” message. Tried again this morning and it now seems fine. Is this an intermittent issue? or perhaps an issue with the BBO App?

We were running a Duplicate event in UK and had exactly the same issues with the tournament list. Many members could not get in at all. So instead of 20 tables we had just 15. Then a couple of those who had got in had issues with being kicked off and then trouble reconnecting (which may have been internet). We started 15 minutes late and finished a round early as BBO was not its normal stable self; our director said that there had been issues the previous couple of days. Is it new BBO software? Can someone please advise.