Vugraph Automation

[mycroft]

Ah, you're using the Microsoft-style zones. I can see that. The IANA standard (which linux, et al. uses) is Continent/City, using the tz_database. It's - barking huge (Wikipaedia URLs). And unless you have a way to navigate it (there's almost certainly php code out there; probably others), a bit of a pain for your users, and probably overkill for the setup, as the requester will be smart enough to do the Summer Time thinking for you. Not so sure on the commentator's end, though, but you don't seem to be having much issues with "this page shows everything in your time" on the VuGraph web page, so I guess that's worked out too.

 

As long as something works. I'm not 100% sure how I'd set up the upcoming Phoenix Regional or something like the Creston or Saskatoon Sectionals (all three places being on standard time all year), but they're used to it, I guess, so they'd know.

 

Like anything with time parsing, all I can say is "I'm glad I'm not doing it (again)"! Thanks for the work making it work.

[Walddk]

I still claim that automation is a step in the wrong direction. Because no machine can spot the following human error:

 

 

Mitravihar club Centenary State level championship 2012

Nashik , India

 

Saturday, 2012-10-27

 

00:30-02:30

 

Semi Finals 1/2 (2 tables)

 

08:30-10:00

 

Quarter Finals 1/2 (2 tables)

 

09:30-11:00

 

Quarter Finals 2/2 (2 tables)

 

 

Sunday, 2012-10-28

 

04:30-06:30

 

Semi Finals 2/2 (2 tables)

 

 

Only a human realises that you can't play one segment of a semifinal before the quarterfinals, and it would have been a no-brainer for him/her to correct if he/she had been approached by the organiser.

[Walddk]

You also have to be a machine to think it's a good idea to run a tournament like this ....

 

INDIAN Corprorate Bridge Tournament

New Delhi, India

 

Saturday, 2012-09-15

 

21:45-23:45

 

Pairs session 2 (1 tables)

 

 

Sunday, 2012-09-16

 

00:15-02:15

 

Pairs session 3 (1 tables)

 

 

06:00-09:00

 

Pairs session 1 (1 tables)

 

...

 

Nothing wrong with technology, of course; a human made the error, but this could also have been avoided before it hit the schedule page.

[barmar]

Ah, you're using the Microsoft-style zones. I can see that. '

I'm not sure what that refers to. It's just a hard-coded HTML menu.

The IANA standard (which linux, et al. uses) is Continent/City, using the tz_database. It's - barking huge (Wikipaedia URLs).

That database is needed for translating arbitrary dates in the past and future between time zones. It's overkill for this, where we're never dealing with dates more than a month or two in the future, and we don't have to worry about dates in the past at all.

Not so sure on the commentator's end, though, but you don't seem to be having much issues with "this page shows everything in your time" on the VuGraph web page, so I guess that's worked out too.

The way the schedule page displays times is totally unchanged since the old system.

As long as something works. I'm not 100% sure how I'd set up the upcoming Phoenix Regional or something like the Creston or Saskatoon Sectionals (all three places being on standard time all year), but they're used to it, I guess, so they'd know.

I don't see the problem. Select the appropriate timezone (Mountain Time for Phoenix), leave DST unchecked. The DST checkbox doesn't refer to whether the organizer is in DST now, it refers to whether DST will be in effect at the time and place of the tourney.

[barmar]

I still claim that automation is a step in the wrong direction. Because no machine can spot the following human error:

We don't even try.

Only a human realises that you can't play one segment of a semifinal before the quarterfinals, and it would have been a no-brainer for him/her to correct if he/she had been approached by the organiser.

It's the organizer who enters the times in the first place.

 

If they make a mistake, let them know. It's easy to correct. In fact, I just checked and it already has been. Looks to me like he simply misclicked on the date for the Semi-Final 1/2.

[jallerton]

We don't even try.

 

It's the organizer who enters the times in the first place.

 

If they make a mistake, let them know. It's easy to correct. In fact, I just checked and it already has been. Looks to me like he simply misclicked on the date for the Semi-Final 1/2.

 

No, the organiser from the Indian event used the correct day (entering in Indian Time, presumably) but entered a session due to start at 2.15pm as 02:15. It's actually quite an easy mistake to make if you don't always think in terms of 24 hour clocks and are not used to completing forms of this type.

 

To reduce the chances of this sort of error being repeated, I have a few suggestions:

 

1. The 'drop down box' for the start time of the session currently defaults at the top just before midnight. Is it possible for the default position to be moved to midday or thereabouts?

 

2. If more than one session is being entered, perhaps your program could recognise when (say) the session on line 2 is due to start before the session on a previous line; the program could then report this error to the person who is attempting to input the event details, suggesting (or forcing) a correction there and then.

 

3. It would be a good idea for somebody to check the vugraph schedule every few days, to identify any obvious errors.

[Walddk]

3. It would be a good idea for somebody to check the vugraph schedule every few days, to identify any obvious errors.

I did that every time a new event was listed. Desi and I spotted very few mistakes, and they were corrected immediately afterwards. Even if I wanted to, I can't do it any more, because I don't know what the organisers enter when they fill in the form. That's exactly why it was a good idea that they approached me first; not in order to determine whether the broadcasts were worthy of our attention (they all were/are), but simply to ensure that times were what they were meant to be.

 

Additionally, quite a few organisers don't speak or write English very well, some not at all, so they wrote to me in Norwegian, Swedish and German and a couple of other languages I speak. I was in a position to translate before I forwarded the relevant info. This is also a thing of the past. The latest example is a broadcast from Norway, an email I forwarded to vugraph@ (as requested by Uday) upon arrival on August 29th. This tournament has not made it to the schedule page yet, presumably because it's in Norwegian and has been sent back to the organisers for translation.

 

Finally, the fact that I received the details well in advance made it so much easier to select relevant events for voice commentary and approach potential commentators with some time to spare. So those of you who were not sure why I stepped down may understand it better now.

 

What might still have been has turned into automation, although I even offered to do it all myself if it was a burden for Desi to set it up on the web page. This point was ignored when I got replies from Uday and Rain. I tried to convince the management that full automation is not a good idea, but I did not succeed. I saw it as a "take it or leave it", so I left it.

[barmar]

1. The 'drop down box' for the start time of the session currently defaults at the top just before midnight. Is it possible for the default position to be moved to midday or thereabouts?

Sounds reasonable.

 

FYI, when I was originally designing the form, I had one menu for the time, instead of separate hour/minute menus. It had entries for every 15-minute interval, was in AM/PM format, and it started at something like 8am. But then I noticed events on the schedule that started at times like xx:20, so I split it into the separate menus. It then didn't seem right to put AM/PM in the hour menu, because it would look like "1 PM:15", which is unnatural, so I switched to 24-hour format.

 

2. If more than one session is being entered, perhaps your program could recognise when (say) the session on line 2 is due to start before the session on a previous line; the program could then report this error to the person who is attempting to input the event details, suggesting (or forcing) a correction there and then.

After seeing these errors, what I'm thinking of doing is adding a preview of the event to the request and BBO approval pages, so we can see how the event will look on the schedule before posting it.

 

I'm a little wary of adding active checks like you suggest, since there might be concurrent events within the same tournament, and I don't want to force entering them all in time order. E.g. at the NABC, you might want enter all the sessions of the Spingold, then go back and enter all the sessions of the Wagar.

[ahollan1]

I've just used the online signup mechanism for the first time.

 

Here are a few observations

 

1) There should be separate threads for comments about

a) interface for commentators

b) interface for tournament hosts

c) general discussion of the topic

d) changes that affect vugraph within BBO software [only if that activity will ever be in play]

 

2) Fred's recent post [not sure if it was this thread or the other "automation" thread hinted at some BBO goals, but as a former software engineer geek, the lack of communicated requirement/design/implementation plans restricts most comments to bandaids for the vugraph schedule interface. {in spite of gut level instinct to expand on that, i'll leave it for another day IF there is interest}

 

The rest of this tome is based on the simple[simplistic] assumption that a goal is to make it easier for BBO to ungag/gag commentators. Hopefully there is or will be more to it than that, but that is beyond the current scope

 

3) Specific to the sign-up interface for commentators

 

a) after scrolling down to entries for Buffett Cup, I clicked on a session and ...

was immediately returned to the top of the page

 

b) scrolled down again to Buffett Cup entries, noticed chosen session was highlighted then selected 2nd set ...

 

Hopefully you see where this is going.

 

Each session selection required re-scroll to locate, selection, then re-scroll to confirm

 

As an User Interface that is almost double-dummy awful

 

Requirement:

 

R1: Provide quick/easy way to get to/select specific tournament

R2: Within tournament, provide mechanism for selection of multiple sessions before entry submission

R3: Provide at least one feedback mechanism to confirm the data entry

R3a: this can be immediate that shows just selections made

R3ai: show both selections made and remaining sessions for that tourney that were NOT chosen

R3b: delayed feedback [presumably e-mail] that lists:

R3bi: name of tourney just affected

R3bii: list of sessions just affected [include date, time and session name]

R3biii: URL to tournament page if one exists

R3biv: URL to official CCs submitted for the tourney, if one exists

[oops seems i've let slip hints at requirements for interface with host]

R3bv: identification of room(s) that want to restrict commentary to language other than english

[now i've also let slip possible requirement for display of schedule and possibly with change to BBO s/w -- oh my]

R3c: regardless of immediate/delayed feedback, for each entry show the selection of written vs voice

R4: Tool must do sanity check to prevent a commentator from double booking time slot(s)

[automation should do sanity checking in other areas too, but I digress]

 

 

Without attempting to mimic a host, I can imagine a list of requirements for that interface.

But I'll leave that for another entry and only if there is interest.

 

Last note: If BBO is really going to automatically gag after completion of a set [hinted at in earlier entry for one of the threads], well ... that is easy to code and I predict doomed to fail on multiple levels. But that goes back to inability to comment without having seen real requirements/goals/plans, etc.

 

Al

[jallerton]

I'm a little wary of adding active checks like you suggest, since there might be concurrent events within the same tournament, and I don't want to force entering them all in time order. E.g. at the NABC, you might want enter all the sessions of the Spingold, then go back and enter all the sessions of the Wagar.

 

There are different types of active checks. One possibility is to refuse to accept sessions being posted out of sequential order; another is just to provide a "warning: are you sure?" type.

[jallerton]

I have another question.

 

I have just received an e-mail (from the npc of one of the teams) inviting me to commentate "either regular or voice commentary" on the Buffet Cup (the first such e-mail I have received since Roland's retirement). However, the vugraph schedule page (whether I am logged in or not) suggests that this event will not have voice commentary. Maybe the organiser failed to tick a box somewhere. Is the npc going to be disappointed?

[Rain]

Jallerton,

 

Donna knows about the voice thing. Voice was indeed not select when vugraph was set up but she definitely wants voice now, so sign up and indicate voice interest and we'll make sure you get to do voice.

[ahollan1]

Quote

I'm a little wary of adding active checks like you suggest, since there might be concurrent events within the same tournament, and I don't want to force entering them all in time order. E.g. at the NABC, you might want enter all the sessions of the Spingold, then go back and enter all the sessions of the Wagar.

 

There are different types of active checks. One possibility is to refuse to accept sessions being posted out of sequential order; another is just to provide a "warning: are you sure?" type.

 

[apologies - i couldn't figure out how to include both quotes with author/timestamp]

 

Exactly right.

 

There is a significant difference between checking for potential conflicts and preventing them.

 

With no sanity checking BBO runs the risk of things that have actually occurred and been reported as problems.

 

examples:

Host submitting information with impossible overlapping sessions of the same event

 

vugraph archive adding "commentator chat" in one room that not only doesn't match what is happening in that room but frequently isn't from same set of boards, match or even event.

 

 

The BBO response that you quoted concerns me.

 

Roland pointed out the bad entrie with overlapping start times that were visible on the posted schedule, but I didn't notice a response from BBO. But that is consistent with non-communication of requirements/design/goals/plans [and apparent failure to get input from key players before design/implementation]

 

If the only goal is to speed things up and eliminate tedious manual tasks ... go for it But that may just be a way to get faster BAD data.

 

Roland's suggestion of routine manual inspection of data was probably rejected because it just replaces one form of tedium with another. Sanity checking IS something that can be done manually.

 

HOWEVER keep in mind 2 quotes I used often back in the days of software engineering

 

1) if you don't have a good process, automation won't help

2) if you don't know where you're going, it doesn't matter how you get there

 

conclusion:

if you want useful/accurate output from automation - you have to understand ALL that was being done manually

if you want end-users to embrace the tooling, you should ACTIVELY interact with them to determine Use Cases [more s/w engineer-speak] and interface needs/desires.

and you need a communicated plan for addressing issues that aren't addressed with the tooling

 

P.S. I intentionally defined the very narrow scope of commentator data entry to avoid larger issues such as multiple concurrent matches from single venue or new event/venue starting during an already selected session.

 

But even in those cases, it would be beneficial for commentators/hosts to be aware of potential conflicts.

 

[temporary] end of this soapbox

 

Al

[Walddk]

I have another question.

 

I have just received an e-mail (from the npc of one of the teams) inviting me to commentate "either regular or voice commentary" on the Buffet Cup (the first such e-mail I have received since Roland's retirement).

You and 14 others received an email after I (among 20) got one from Donna Compton. I came out of retirement (Hi LC) and provided 15 new addresses; Donna was delighted. What bothers me is that BBO, by the look of things, does not take vugraph commentary too seriously.

 

- 1. As pointed out in an earlier post, on August 10th I offered 34 addresses to potential voice commentators. Reply: 'not needed at this point.'

- 2. On numerous occasions over the years Fred has told us that BBO loses money when we have vugraph presentations. They hijack potential users for money tournaments.

 

Donna is trying valiantly now (well done to her!). After I got the invite, I asked her a few questions. Three of those were ...

 

'Who is the coordinator, the person who directs commentators to the appropriate tables?' Reply: 'That would be me…but I don’t exactly know what I am doing…helpful hints are welcome!'

 

'Say 12 sign up for a session, how do you ensure that we won't get ten at Table 1, two at Table 2, and none at Table 3, 4, 5 and 6?' Reply: 'I want two at each table…Is there an automated way of doing this? I do wish you were coordinating - I have no clue what I am doing but will do everything I can to ensure a great show. I will be online at the start of each segment and I guess I can go into each room and tell the commentators to go to other rooms. Are there other ways? I am hoping that everyone will sign up online so I will have a list for each segment and I can send out an email and assign people to tables. But if people won't sign up in advance, then I can't do that method!'

 

'How do you ensure that commentators who like to work together are at the same table?' Reply: 'They can tell me those kinds of things…again if everyone will just sign up online, then I can send out emails a day ahead and coordinate those that like to work together and those that don’t!'

 

Dear BBO. I announced my retirement more than six weeks ago. I had no contract, I have been unpaid from the word 'go' to the word 'stop', so I thought three weeks' advance notice was fair. According to barmar I have been nothing more than an 'assistant'. Fair enough, but if that is so, then there must be someone else, the one in charge, who can answer all the questions a new coordinator has. I don't understand a word of what Al is saying in his two comprehensive posts (that is way over my head, but that is my problem), but I do understand that things worked extremely well when things were done manually. And finally, in order to avoid misunderstandings:

 

No, I do NOT want my job back!

[uday]

I'm sure that it will take a little while for people to realize that RW is no longer the 'go to' person for Vug. After all, he was just that for a long time. Not that that's an insult, any more than Barmar's term was :)

 

Nowadays, that goto person is likely 'support@bridgebase.com' and we'll route emails to whoever actually needs to get involved (currently that's usually Rain or Ara or Barry).

 

The restructuring of the whole vug thing is still under way and I'm not sure where it is going. It isn't a simple thing, but now that everyone is back from their various summer activities, it should move faster.

 

To ans. some Qs here:

 

- when in doubt, you can send vug issues to rain@, if you don't feel like contacting support@ - she is in charge, or will know who is in charge.

 

- No conspiracy here; BBO loves vug, and believes it is good for our game. that's why we're investing resources into improving it. We're not thru :)

 

U

[barmar]

3) Specific to the sign-up interface for commentators

 

a) after scrolling down to entries for Buffett Cup, I clicked on a session and ...

was immediately returned to the top of the page

 

b) scrolled down again to Buffett Cup entries, noticed chosen session was highlighted then selected 2nd set ...

 

Hopefully you see where this is going.

 

Each session selection required re-scroll to locate, selection, then re-scroll to confirm

 

As an User Interface that is almost double-dummy awful

I understand. It comes from shoe-horning the new features into the existing schedule web page, rather than redesigning it from scratch. The right way to do this would be to use AJAX to update the page in place, but the page isn't designed to be updatable like that. So instead any changes are done as a form submission, which updates the database, and then it reloads the schedule page to pick up the changes.

[ahollan1]

I understand. It comes from shoe-horning the new features into the existing schedule web page, rather than redesigning it from scratch. The right way to do this would be to use AJAX to update the page in place, but the page isn't designed to be updatable like that. So instead any changes are done as a form submission, which updates the database, and then it reloads the schedule page to pick up the changes.

 

[refer also to comments about us not knowing goal/requirements/design/plan ...]

 

This explanation is missing a very critical piece of information ...

 

Are you going to change the interface?

[barmar]

Are you going to change the interface?

Yes. I'm changing it to a combined date/time picker, and I'm adding a warning if round N starts before round N-1 ends, or if the stawrt time is unlikely (starting before 8am or after 9pm). This should be deployed sometime this week.

[barmar]

I just realized that my answer addressed a different complaint (about submitting new events with rounds out of order).

 

Regarding the schedule page scrolling back to the top, the next version will have a small improvement. When it redisplays after you submit a change, it will position the row that was changed at the top of the window. This isn't as nice as keeping the page completely still, as I could do with an AJAX implementation, but it's pretty close -- most likely the next round you want to volunteer to commentate on will still be on view or just a small scroll away.

[barmar]

The changes I referred to in the last two posts have been deployed.

[jallerton]

I'm sure that it will take a little while for people to realize that RW is no longer the 'go to' person for Vug. After all, he was just that for a long time. Not that that's an insult, any more than Barmar's term was :)

 

Nowadays, that goto person is likely 'support@bridgebase.com' and we'll route emails to whoever actually needs to get involved (currently that's usually Rain or Ara or Barry).

 

The restructuring of the whole vug thing is still under way and I'm not sure where it is going. It isn't a simple thing, but now that everyone is back from their various summer activities, it should move faster.

 

To ans. some Qs here:

 

- when in doubt, you can send vug issues to rain@, if you don't feel like contacting support@ - she is in charge, or will know who is in charge.

 

- No conspiracy here; BBO loves vug, and believes it is good for our game. that's why we're investing resources into improving it. We're not thru :)

 

I've heard and read Roland saying that he didn't know the identity of his successor. Is it the intention of BBO that there will be a successor for any of the (many) aspects of Roland's job, or are you relying purely on 'automation'?

[jallerton]

I've heard and read Roland saying that he didn't know the identity of his successor. Is it the intention of BBO that there will be a successor for any of the (many) aspects of Roland's job, or are you relying purely on 'automation'?

 

Does nobody know the answer to this question?

[jallerton]

OK, no-one is prepared to answer my question. I'll have to draw my own conclusion.

 

Automation works best for events where only one table is being shown on BBO and sufficient people are sufficiently self-motivated to sign up. When there are multiple tables, automated sign up is not good enough by itself; the commentators need to be informed which table to go to. Why? Let me give you an example.

 

Last week, I used the automated sign-up procedure for the EBL Champions Cup. This is a very strong event. Only twelve teams, but the participants included many world champions. There were four tables being shown on BBO, so I was a little disappointed to see that only two other commentators had signed up for that session.

 

I was automatically ungagged, so the software was working well in that respect, but there was nobody to tell me which table to go to. I chose the room showing Fantoni-Nunes against Upmark-Wrang as there was only one other commentator there.

 

A quick review of vugraph records suggests that other table in that match seemed to have three or four commentators, whilst the other match being shown had one commentator in one room and no commentary whatsoever in the other. This would never have happened under Roland's watch as the commentators would have been assigned to particular tables in advance; if assigning on the day, he would note which rooms were lacking commentators and approach potential commentators to join or ask people already commentating to move tables to balance the numbers.

 

Now I know that there are a few events where the organisers are trying to set up their own system (as JanM is doing for the ABC Nationals in a few weeks' time) but these events are the exception rather than the norm, but it should be noted that these assignments rely on the work done by real people, not computers.