autoplay of singletons

[djeast]

delay autoplay action .5 second

[diana_eva]

You can disable the option to autoplay singletons - go to the Options button > more options > advanced options.

[1eyedjack]

I am sure djeast knows that. Perhaps he would prefer autoplay+delay over disabled autoplay.

[barmar]

What I'd like is fast auto-play when playing against bots, slow or no auto-play when playing against humans. I keep forgetting to change the option when I change species of opponents.

[Tola18]

slow or no auto-play when playing against humans.

I think autoplay of singeltons against humans is useful (preferably a relatively slow one). Not necessary of singeltons as such, but - of the last card...

 

As everyone know, it is not unusual people do leave sometimes before the hand is over. A quite big share of these is, they leave when there is 1 card left.

I suspect it is they believe the hand is over, "NOW they can go".

 

But it is not over, the declarer and pard gots stuck.

 

 

Although it is possible to change seats and play out the hand, but it IS a nuisance. And stressing - somebody may come and occupy my seat while Im on move, and so we must ask them to move because I want to play with my pard.... etc.

As said, a bl...y nuisance.

[fred]

The next version of the web-client will include a short delay of random duration when there is at least one other human player at the table who is not the dummy (and no delay if robots are in the other 3 seats or if the only other non-robot is dummy).

 

Fred Gitelman

Bridge Base Inc.

www.bridgebase.com

[1eyedjack]

Tola18's suggestion has some merit but only in a fairly rare set of circumstances, and it is sligthly different to the OP scenario in that what Tola18 would like is for the table host to have the right to autoplay an opponent's singleton (on last trick)

 

I am not sure what situation Fred is addressing. Last card only? or any situation where there is a singleton? and if the latter, presumably only when the user has set his preferences to autoplay?

 

I think autoplay singletons on last trick should be mandatory or if not mandatory should be a separate option in the user's config, possibly overridable by table host. And in that situation there is no benefit to a delay.

[helene_t]

Thanks, Fred, that is really cool!

[fred]

I am not sure what situation Fred is addressing.  Last card only? or any situation where there is a singleton?  and if the latter, presumably only when the user has set his preferences to autoplay?

Only if the user has "autoplay singletons set":

 

1) Before trick 13 there will be a delay as I described

2) During trick 13 there will be no delay

 

Fred Gitelman

Bridge Base Inc.

www.bridgebase.com

[Ant590]

The next version of the web-client will include a short delay of random duration when there is at least one other human player at the table who is not the dummy (and no delay if robots are in the other 3 seats or if the only other non-robot is dummy).

Brilliant, a superb addition.

 

All we need now is an option to "activate" screens, i.e. show the SW and NE bidding in pairs.

[barmar]

A small problem with fast auto-play on trick 13 is if 4th hand on trick 12 wants to request an undo. But I'm not sure this is worth worrying about.

[1eyedjack]

Maybe add an option to the user's configuration settings: Autoplay trick 13 (perhaps set as on by default), independent of other autoplay singleton settings (set as off by default). And trick 13 is autoplayed from an empty seat.

[barmar]

Maybe add an option to the user's configuration settings: Autoplay trick 13 (perhaps set as on by default), independent of other autoplay singleton settings (set as off by default). And trick 13 is autoplayed from an empty seat.

That seems like preference bloat. And I'm pretty sure Fred is not a big fan of having lots of preferences, as they tend to overwhelm many users.

 

It's a delicate balancing act -- power users want full customization, but casual users don't want to be confused.

[1eyedjack]

Maybe add an option to the user's configuration settings:  Autoplay trick 13 (perhaps set as on by default), independent of other autoplay singleton settings (set as off by default).  And trick 13 is autoplayed from an empty seat.

That seems like preference bloat. And I'm pretty sure Fred is not a big fan of having lots of preferences, as they tend to overwhelm many users.

 

It's a delicate balancing act -- power users want full customization, but casual users don't want to be confused.

Autoplaying trick 13 from an empty seat should not be a preference. It should be mandatory. As, indeed, should automatically following suit with a singleton at trick 12 from an empty seat when it is the only missing card in the suit. There could be a case for automatically following suit with a singleton from an empty seat at an earlier point in play but I don't see how that would progress the game as it would stall at some point until a player sat.

 

Where an option is provided, intelligently setting the default preference in favour of the most popular choice should not confuse newcomers - they may go for years without even knowing a choice exists, and would be no worse off than if the choice were not presented to them. Whether there is any point in providing the option is more a function of how many users would want to disturb the default.

 

Autoplaying a singleton generally is a preference already available, so there is no additional bloat in that regard.

 

Apart from that, I take your point.

 

[Edit]

Come to think of it, mandatory autoplay of any singleton, at whatever the state of play of the hand, whether from an empty seat or otherwise, might not be a bad idea in the situation where that card is the only missing hidden card in the suit. Maybe build in a 0.5 second delay (before trick 13) to cater for the possibility that opponent has not been keeping count and does not know that it is the last card.

[barmar]

Where an option is provided, intelligently setting the default preference in favour of the most popular choice should not confuse newcomers - they may go for years without even knowing a choice exists, and would be no worse off than if the choice were not presented to them. Whether there is any point in providing the option is more a function of how many users would want to disturb the default.

What's confusing is when they go into the options screen and see a zillion options, and get overwhelmed by all the potential choices.

 

For an example of this, go into IE's Tools->Internet Options on Windows, with several rows of tabs and dozens of options within some of the tabs. Just trying to find the options you want to select can be difficult.

 

BBO addresses this (in the Flash client, at least) by having the most common options right in the Options menu, the next most common in "More Options", and finally some more options in "Advanced Options". But even with this hierarchy, it's obvious that Fred is going for a minimalist design, only creating options that many users are likely to want.

[1eyedjack]

As you said originally, it is a question of balance. On your IE analogy, I personally use IE and I found it worked fine right out of the box. Only after I had been happily using it for months did I bother to explore the options menu. There was only one occasion when I really HAD to go into there, and that was because our HM Revenue & Customs, in their wisdom, have done something very odd with their secure gateway that prevents you downloading certain PDF files unless you change a default setting. And I could not have done that without an hour's phone call to the helpdesk anyway.

[Bbradley62]

The next version of the web-client will include a short delay of random duration when there is at least one other human player at the table who is not the dummy (and no delay if robots are in the other 3 seats or if the only other non-robot is dummy).

 

Fred Gitelman

Bridge Base Inc.

www.bridgebase.com

This worked great today!

 

Were there other changes implemented that users might want to know about? I don't see any documentation of this one on the BBO site.

[fred]

The next version of the web-client will include a short delay of random duration when there is at least one other human player at the table who is not the dummy (and no delay if robots are in the other 3 seats or if the only other non-robot is dummy).

 

Fred Gitelman

Bridge Base Inc.

www.bridgebase.com

This worked great today!

Thanks!

 

Were there other changes implemented that users might want to know about?  I don't see any documentation of this one on the BBO site.

During the past month of so we have silently released several new versions of the BBO web-client (including V40 that was released yesterday morning). The changes in these new versions consisted almost entirely of bug fixes. Unless there is a particularly important or delicate bug fix that we want users to know about, we tend not to announce new versions that do little more than fix bugs.

 

The recent versions also contained some changes associated with a new type of tournament that Uday has been working on. He has been running tests of these tournaments during the past week or so. I believe they are entitled "Experimental Individual" (or similar) and are hosted by "bbolabs". You rate to hear more about these tournaments (in the lobby news for example) in the weeks to come.

 

I expect that the next version of the web-client will contain some more substantial changes, but it is unlikely that I will get much serious work done in this area until after the World Championships ends in mid-October.

 

Fred Gitelman

Bridge Base Inc.

www.bridgebase.com

[tsankaR]

the delay for auto play singletons must be increased. recently i played in acbl tourney. the opps were humans and i would easily make out the singleton, it was fast. so please increase the duration of auto play singleton

[diana_eva]

the delay for auto play singletons must be increased. recently i played in acbl tourney. the opps were humans and i would easily make out the singleton, it was fast. so please increase the duration of auto play singleton

 

Autoplay singleton works only for your own hand, it won't auto-play opps' cards.

[1eyedjack]

That seems like preference bloat. And I'm pretty sure Fred is not a big fan of having lots of preferences, as they tend to overwhelm many users.

 

It's a delicate balancing act -- power users want full customization, but casual users don't want to be confused.

Apologies for the necro-response, but as the thread has already been resuscitated anyway ...

 

It seems to me that for the most part both power users and casual users can be accommodated. At least, there is scope for applying intelligence to the design of the interface to accommodate both, acknowledging that there is no black and white, only degrees.

 

I can think of three key elements to a good design (there are bound to be others)

 

1) Attempt to identify settings that have no clear majority preference, or have significant minority preferences, and concentrate on providing choices for these settings.

 

2) Attempt to predict the most popular settings, where choices are to be provided, and make them defaults.

 

3) "Nest" the options so that the user is not presented with excessive detail unless deliberately chosen by the user.

 

As to the first item, it may not be obvious at the outset which settings would have diverse popularity. But at least given time you could gather data in retrospect based on actual settings chosen. But that of course requires you to provide the choice, so there may be an element of Catch 22 there, depending on how the choice is presented.

 

As to the second item, the problem here is that many users of the casual variety may never experiment with settings, so measuring their popularity could distort the impression as reinforcing the justification for the default settings. I, for example, have a lot of difficulty understanding why "pictures of cards" mode should be provided at all, let alone as the default, and yet if casual users never swap to diagram mode it will perpetuate the myth that there is merit in the pictures mode.

 

But the third item is the master key, and I think of relevance to this thread.

 

How much more "bloated" would the interface become if, on the question of autoplay singletons, the options were

 

(1) On

(2) Off

(3) Advanced (opens submenu)

 

than

 

(1) On

(2) Off

 

A casual user presented with either menu would probably choose between (1) and (2), and would not be bothered by the presence of (3)

BUT, if they choose to drill down to option (3), that in itself would be evidence that, even if casual users, in this case neither of options (1) and (2) "cut it" for them. That would justify the inclusion of option (3) however bloated you might predict it to be.

 

That would be an example of how to design an interface that caters for the power user without bloating it for the casual user.

[tsankaR]

Autoplay singleton works only for your own hand, it won't auto-play opps' cards.

 

i know that. but what i said was that if the opps had set auto play singleton ON, i could easily make it out. And I also gave an example saying it in a recent tourney, some cards played by opps were normal speed, but some cards were fast. on analysing that i saw that the "fast" cards were singletons. I thought I need not elaborate so much.

[barmar]

the delay for auto play singletons must be increased. recently i played in acbl tourney. the opps were humans and i would easily make out the singleton, it was fast. so please increase the duration of auto play singleton

The delay is randomly adjusted, with a minimum that isn't supposed to be too fast to be obvious. In my experience, it's often slower than I would play by hand.

[Wainfleet]

if I have 'autoplay singletons' set to 'on', does it just autoplay MY singletons. or everyone's?

[Vampyr]

1) At. I, for example, have a lot of difficulty understanding why "pictures of cards" mode should be provided at all,

 

I don’t know either, but my guess is that it is what most people prefer. I would not be surprised if a large majority had a very strong preference for “pictures of cards”.

 

Of course, I am writing this during the COVID-19 pandemic, when a lot of people are using BBO as a substitute for live bridge. No actual bridge table that I have ever sat at provided cards in diagram form.