Suggestions for the Software

[fred]

There have lots of good suggestions of late, but some of you may be puzzled by the lack of response from the programmers (Uday and I) to most of these.

 

You should know that we read and appreciate all of these suggestions. Most of them would involve pure client changes and client programming is my responsibility (Uday is responsible for server programming).

 

The reason I have not been responding to these post is that I have been spending whatever time I have between tournaments (which unfortunately has not been much during the past few months) working on a major redesign of the BBO interface. The main goals of this project are:

 

1) To make the interface easier to understand and more welcoming for new members.

2) To make it easier for existing members to do some of the things that are hard to do now.

3) To give us greater flexibility with respect to changing various aspects of navigation without forcing people to download a new version (ie giving the server greater control over the appearance of the client).

4) To use standard windows controls in some areas in which they are currently not being used (a standard scrollbar in the lobby for example).

5) Some new functionality

 

But don't expect much as far as 5 is concerned since 1 through 4 represent a lot more work than I was expecting and since it is necessary to put a limit on the scope of this project so that we can release a new version before too long. That is also the reason why I have not been responding (or implementing) the suggestions in forums at the rate in which I normally do.

 

No doubt some (hopefully not many!) of our members will prefer the old interface. A switch will be included to allow these people to use BBO in "classic mode".

 

Hopefully we will be able to release a beta of the new version within the next couple of weeks (but no promises). I think you will like what you see. Lots of testing is going to be required before we release this to the general membership, but I am fortunate in that the forums regulars tend to be really helpful in this regard (thanks!).

 

So keep those suggestions coming and don't think they are being ignored. Once the new version is stable enough to release to the general membership, the one after that will most likely include various functional improvements that our members have suggested.

 

Fred Gitelman

Bridge Base Inc.

www.bridgebase.com