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General Discussion / Re: Time for a Pairs Bridge Playing App?
« Last post by johng on October 22, 2020, 12:53:06 »It's a question of the effort involved and whether there would be a sufficient demand for the capability. At the moment we are still busy with software development to assist online bridge (i.e. BBO Extractor/BBOtoXML, Bridge Solver Chrome extension), and probably not likely to get back to doing more development on BridgePal until (if) the majority of clubs get back to playing face to face bridge.
Even when players do go back to clubs, I wonder whether it will be with physical cards or playing bridge on tablets. After playing online bridge, where bidding and card play are recorded automatically, it seems a big hassle to have to use a system where all this information has to be entered manually. It would be a lot more convenient if clubs played using tablets rather than physical cards, and there are an increasing number of online systems that will handle club bridge. The latest of these is RealBridge, which has just been launched and is being used by the English Bridge Union for their Autumn Congress. It also incorporates video/audio integration, so players can see the others at the "table" if they are playing remotely. Bridge Club Live is also rumoured to be incorporating video/audio. Perhaps BBO will do do eventually. Availability of such systems may reduce the rate at which people return to the clubs.
Just prior to lockdown I had released an initial version of the BridgeDealer app - see https://mirgo2.co.uk/bridgepal_forum/index.php?topic=197.msg555#msg555. This app is able to deal a predealt hand using the phone/tablet from camera or read a deck of cards. My intention was to integrate it with the BridgePal app, and the reading capability could be used to record the play of a hand after the hand has been completed (providing the cards are not shuffled and are stacked in the deck in the correct order). That still doesn't handle recording of the bidding though.
Even when players do go back to clubs, I wonder whether it will be with physical cards or playing bridge on tablets. After playing online bridge, where bidding and card play are recorded automatically, it seems a big hassle to have to use a system where all this information has to be entered manually. It would be a lot more convenient if clubs played using tablets rather than physical cards, and there are an increasing number of online systems that will handle club bridge. The latest of these is RealBridge, which has just been launched and is being used by the English Bridge Union for their Autumn Congress. It also incorporates video/audio integration, so players can see the others at the "table" if they are playing remotely. Bridge Club Live is also rumoured to be incorporating video/audio. Perhaps BBO will do do eventually. Availability of such systems may reduce the rate at which people return to the clubs.
Just prior to lockdown I had released an initial version of the BridgeDealer app - see https://mirgo2.co.uk/bridgepal_forum/index.php?topic=197.msg555#msg555. This app is able to deal a predealt hand using the phone/tablet from camera or read a deck of cards. My intention was to integrate it with the BridgePal app, and the reading capability could be used to record the play of a hand after the hand has been completed (providing the cards are not shuffled and are stacked in the deck in the correct order). That still doesn't handle recording of the bidding though.