Tool to auto-reject invitations

[Trumpace]

Hi,

 

I thought it would be an interesting software challenge and wrote a tool to auto-reject unwanted BBO Tourney/Team invites/Requests to join table,chat room.

 

 

The tool is attached to this post.

 

 

To use this tool:

 

Just unzip it to a particular directory

add the allowed people into allowed.txt (one per line)

Run InviteRejector.exe before/after logging into BBO.

 

You can also run it in reject mode, in which case

make sure allowed.txt does not exist.

reject.txt has the necessary entries.

Run inviteRejector.exe.

 

But I do suggest you read the Readme.txt for fuller details.

 

BBO Forums attachment rates not to work. Please visit this site to get Trumpace's addon download. http://doc.bridgebase.com/BBOer/Useful_Addons.html

DialogReject.zip

DialogRejectNew.zip

[Guest Jlall]

wow I love you

[Trumpace]

Lol. Did it work for you?

 

I forgot to mention a few things.

 

It works only on windows with the BBO client, it will not work with the flash client.

 

Eveytime you start BBO, you have to restart the inviterejector.exe.

 

Only one name per line in the allowed.txt (I might have said this earlier).

[Guest Jlall]

It didn't work for me :)

[Trumpace]

Ok then, I will ask you a few questions:

 

What do you exactly mean by not working?

 

Did the tool exit with some error message? (IF so what is it?)

 

Did you see something which said "Installed Hook Successfully" ? and yet you see invites from people not in the allowed.txt?

 

btw, What OS are you using?

[Guest Jlall]

Ok then, I will ask you a few questions:

 

What do you exactly mean by not working?

 

Did the tool exit with some error message? (IF so what is it?)

 

Did you see something which said "Installed Hook Successfully" ? and yet you see invites from people not in the allowed.txt?

 

btw, What OS are you using?

vista...

 

It said "The application has failed to start because its side-by-side configuration is incorrect. Please see the application event log for more detail."

[Trumpace]

Ok. Let me see what I can do about it. I will update this thread later.

 

Meanwhile you can perhaps try downloading msvrc80.dll and placing it in the same folder as the InviteRejector.exe.

 

You can get it here: http://www.dll-files.com/dllindex/dll-files.shtml?msvcr80

[Trumpace]

Justin, I have updated the file in the link in the first post, now you should not have to download msvcr80.dll.

 

But, I think there is a problem (this is version 0.0.0.1 anyway!). I think this won't work with Team invites, only Tourney invites for now. Look at update at the end of this post.

 

Currently, I think the best that can be done is to either reject all team invites or accept all, perhaps depending on the existence of some file which can be deleted/created as required, (so if you want to play in a game, you create a file etc...). Getting the name of the host seems harder for team games.

 

For tourney's it is easier to get the name of the person inviting.

 

Also, this will only work with English, but there is a solution for that. Maybe this will be fixed in the next version.

 

Also, can someone please provide me a screenshot of what a team game invite looks like?

 

<edit>

Note: Update again. I have added the rejection of TEAM invites. Please see the readme in the updated zip file in the link in the first post. You will have to download again the zip file again to get this one working. The old downloaded version won't work. If it does not work, please let me know.

</edit>

[georgeac]

It worked for me, it says "Installed Hook Succesfully". Although it is hard to test if you dont have someone sending you invites. lol

 

edit: I also got it to work. Thanks :)

George

[Guest Jlall]

I got the install hook thing, testing now.

 

edit: works for tourneys!

[Trumpace]

Great! Glad to know it worked for you guys. Thanks for testing this, George & Justin.

 

I am currently trying to setup a way to test team invite rejection and see if it works and help me come up with a solution if it does not.

 

Also, I plan to improve the tool to make it easier to use.

 

Will update this thread when that is done.

[Trumpace]

Update!

 

The tool now can do an automatic reject of Tourneys and TEAM matches! This has been tested on XP and Vista. It will only work with the English version of windows BBO client. (sorry, perhaps next version will add support for other languages).

 

The offender now gets an automatic reject.

 

You only need to maintain the allowed.txt file (no need of allowteams.txt file now).

 

Please find the zip file attached to first post of thread.

 

 

Just unzip it to a folder, say C:\BBORejector

 

and make sure you read the readme.txt on how to use it (and what OS/language you can use it on) etc.

 

To create an allowed.txt file from your BBO friends list (If you are a TD),

 

Start BBO, then goto Profile Setting (the gear button) -> Friends -> Save List As

 

Make sure the file name is allowed.txt, in the same folder where you unzipped the Rejector tool. (There is a sample file there already).

 

Please report any bugs you find on this thread itself.

[Sadie3]

I don't understand what's wrong with just telling someone when they invite you that you do not wish to play. What am I missing here? Seems to me that an auto reject would really hurt some people's feelings. Like they had leprosy or something bad.

[Free]

I don't understand what's wrong with just telling someone when they invite you that you do not wish to play. What am I missing here? Seems to me that an auto reject would really hurt some people's feelings. Like they had leprosy or something bad.

If you can automate something, why not do it? :blink: I prefer a tool over clicking Reject every 5 minutes and having to explain why...

[mr1303]

I guess the trouble is that many good players get invited by complete strangers all the time.

 

A problem not faced by me :blink:

[JLOL]

I don't understand what's wrong with just telling someone when they invite you that you do not wish to play. What am I missing here? Seems to me that an auto reject would really hurt some people's feelings. Like they had leprosy or something bad.

LOL

[fred]

I would appreciate it if:

 

1) You would send an e-mail to fred@bridgebase.com that explains the details of how this tool works. Please use e-mail as opposed to a Forums message or a post to Forums.

 

2) If you feel inclined to make more such tools in the future, please go through step 1 and get my approval before making any public announcements (and ideally before you even try testing such a program yourself).

 

Please don't get the wrong impression from the above. I actually think it is great that programmers are interested in creating tools to help improve the BBO experience. But as I am sure you can appreciate, I have to be concerned about the health of our servers.

 

I have no doubt that you are trying to be careful. However, but it is basically impossible for you (or any other programmer) to understand what is going on behind the scenes. There are various behind-the-scenes factors that need to be taken into consideration in order for such tools to be "safe".

 

Thanks,

 

Fred Gitelman

Bridge Base Inc.

www.bridgebase.com

[fred]

I thought I should mention that I received a quick reply from Trumpace that contained details of how his program works (thanks!).

 

I can officially certify this program as safe to use on BBO.

 

I should also note that when I saw the recent post in this thread I did not notice that the thread (and the tool itself) had been around for a while. I have no recollection of seeing this thread or hearing about the tool until recently, but apparently Uday knew about it and had already given Trumpace his approval.

 

Sorry if my previous post caused anyone to panic, but hopefully you can understand that we need to be careful (to put it mildly - paranoid is more like it) about such things.

 

Fred Gitelman

Bridge Base Inc.

www.bridgebase.com

[Chick]

Would it be possible to have this program also work for permission requests to join a table (kib or player) or a chatroom?

 

Also, it would be wonderful if it could have a choice of an "allowed" or a "reject" list.

[Trumpace]

Would it be possible to have this program also work for permission requests to join a table (kib or player) or a chatroom?

 

Also, it would be wonderful if it could have a choice of an "allowed" or a "reject" list.

 

There is already a choice of an allowed list. (Please download from the link and read the readme which should tell exactly what can be done with the tool).

 

I will update this thread if/when I am able to add what you request. Thank you for your interest :)

[Trumpace]

Ok. I have made an update to the tool. It now also tries to reject Table Reservation Popups.

 

Please find the zip attached to the first post of this thread. Please make sure you read the readme.txt file.

 

Now by default it looks for BBO version 5.2.6.

 

Also, you can start the InviteRejector.exe and then login to BBO. The tool will wait for 5 minutes, and then will exit if you havent logged in by then.

 

Unfortunately, it currently does not reject the popup you get when you login, for a table seat that was already reserved before you logged in.

 

Note: I didn't see any popups with Chatroom invites, so if you could show me how you see that, I could try updating the tool to work for those too.

 

Edit: Now I realize what you actually want! You want to reject people wanting to join your table/chatroom too. I will look into it.

[Chick]

Exactly. I have two motivations for this.

 

1. I would like to be able to give a list of allowed people who can join a table or chatroom, and have everyone else automatically rejected. This is to automatically control entry to private lessons.

 

2. I would like to be able to give a list of banned people who are auto-rejected if they try to join my table or chatroom. Similarly, I would like to auto-reject a small number of people who constantly bug me for team matches, without limiting myself to an allowed list. This is to avoid a small number of people who like to harass me by repeatedly asking to sit when they know I don't want to accept them.

 

I'm guessing that the "Permission" window would be what triggers the program in these cases.

[Trumpace]

Exactly. I have two motivations for this.

 

1. I would like to be able to give a list of allowed people who can join a table or chatroom, and have everyone else automatically rejected. This is to automatically control entry to private lessons.

 

2. I would like to be able to give a list of banned people who are auto-rejected if they try to join my table or chatroom. Similarly, I would like to auto-reject a small number of people who constantly bug me for team matches, without limiting myself to an allowed list. This is to avoid a small number of people who like to harass me by repeatedly asking to sit when they know I don't want to accept them.

 

I'm guessing that the "Permission" window would be what triggers the program in these cases.

 

Ok. I have updated the tool (the attached file to first post) to reject permissions to join a chatroom/table. You might see a flash when that happens (I have noticed that only with chatroom though), but the user should get an automatic reject and you should not have to click anything.

 

Currently only the file allowed.txt is looked at and all names not in the list will be rejected.

 

If possible, I would like your help in testing this out (i.e. please let me know how it works out)

 

Meanwhile I will try to update the tool to cater to a reject list.

[Trumpace]

 

 

2. I would like to be able to give a list of banned people who are auto-rejected if they try to join my table or chatroom. Similarly, I would like to auto-reject a small number of people who constantly bug me for team matches, without limiting myself to an allowed list. This is to avoid a small number of people who like to harass me by repeatedly asking to sit when they know I don't want to accept them.

 

 

 

btw, what happens if you mark them as enemies?

[Trumpace]

I have updated the tool to also take a reject.txt file.

 

The priority is allowed.txt first then reject.txt.

 

If allowed.txt does not exist (which is different from it not having any entries) then it will try to pick up reject.txt.

 

If allowed.txt exists, then reject.txt is ignore.

 

If both allowed.txt and reject.txt do not exist, then all invitations will be shown.