The Poker Copilot Blog

Playing on Entraction Network?

2012-01-28T14:53:00.001+01:00

Loyal Poker Copilot user Jarek asks whether I'll add Entraction Network support to Poker Copilot. Are you playing on an Entraction Network room, such as 24h? If so, let me know in the comments that you would like to see Poker Copilot work with the Entraction Network.

Unofficial Update for Ongame Players

2012-01-27T18:54:00.001+01:00

I've spent some time today looking into some problems Poker Copilot has been having with Ongame. Notably, I had misunderstood how preferred seating worked in Ongame. I've adjusted Poker Copilot to handle this. Now you are required to set a preferred seat in your Ongame software for Poker Copilot's HUD to work.

You can download this unofficial update here: http://pokercopilot.com/downloads/pokercopilot2.102_rc13.dmg

One Person with Two Accounts Playing on Ongame?

2012-01-27T18:45:00.001+01:00

I suspect a person can create an account with one Ongame partner, create a second account with another Ongame partner, and play on both accounts at the same table at the same time. I'm not certain as I didn't want to test this and get my accounts banned.

In trying to understand how the different Ongame Network clients prevent hand history files from interfering with each other, I played on two Ongame partners at once: bwin and Betfair. I signed in as notasteve on bwin, and as stevoski222 on Betfair.

I went to the play tables, and played on two different tables, one per account. However I noticed that I could see the same tables, and - potentially - play at the same table with two different user accounts.

Same IP address, same computer, same tables, different Ongame partners, different accounts. I think Ongame ought to fix this quickly.

Small Tweaks in Poker Copilot Preferences

2012-01-26T16:40:00.001+01:00

Showing Hand History Folders in Finder

In Mac OS X Lion, Finder doesn't show the "Library" folder anymore(although there are several ways to access it). Some online poker rooms supported by Poker Copilot store their hand history files within Library, so to help you get to these files, I've added "Show in Finder" to Poker Copilot's list of hand history folders:

This will force the folder to appear in Finder.

Incomplete Language Packs

Some of Poker Copilot's translations are quite incomplete. I think it may be jarring for some people to use half-translated software. So I've categorised several of the translation packs as "incomplete". They are currently Spanish (Spain), Russian, Polish. Portuguese (Portugal), and Portuguese (Brazil). From the next update, Poker Copilot won't use any of these translations until I mark them as complete. However you can override this:

This is a temporary preference, which I'll remove once all the translations are complete enough.

Ongame Network and Poker Copilot

2012-01-25T14:00:00.001+01:00

Poker Copilot is now working with the following Ongame Network partners:

HeyPoker
BwinPoker
RedKingsPoker
BetfairPoker
GDPoker
Bet24Poker
PAFSpadePoker
BetssonPoker
GoalwinPoker

I haven't yet released the Poker Copilot update with this improvement. But you can try out this unofficial early-release which supports all the poker rooms listed above: http://pokercopilot.com/downloads/pokercopilot2.102_rc11.dmg

Buy Poker Copilot via Bank Transfer

2012-01-25T11:33:00.001+01:00

In some European countries, bank transfers are a popular way to buy electronically. Until now you couldn't buy Poker Copilot with a bank transfer, except on an informal basis. Now it is available as a purchase option for everybody:

Our reliable, professional, successful e-commerce partner is FastSpring and they just added this new option.

Improvement to Appearance of HUD Popup

2012-01-23T14:12:00.001+01:00

When you click on a player's HUD panel in Poker Copilot, you see a popup panel that shows all the stats for that player. I've tweaked this to be more compact, and to use the statistic colour-coding. The left-hand side is how it is currently; the right-hand side is how it will appear in the next Poker Copilot update:

Besides the colour-coding, the text is in a slightly smaller font and the line spacing is smaller.

If you want to try this out already, you can download an unofficial update that includes the new-look popup: http://pokercopilot.com/downloads/pokercopilot2.102_rc9.dmg

Improvement for Poker Copilot Translators

2012-01-22T18:52:00.001+01:00

If you are one of the volunteer Poker Copilot translators, then you'll appreciate this new feature:

Now you can see your translations immediately in Poker Copilot without needing to wait for the next release. The workflow goes like this:

1) Make some modifications to the Google Docs translation spreadsheet for your language:

2) Wait a few minutes for Google Docs to make the updates visible here.

3) In Poker Copilot, from the Tools menu, select "Download Language Pack Updates". They'll be fetched live from Google Docs:

4) Restart Poker Copilot

Now you'll see the updates directly in Poker Copilot:

You can get hold of an unofficial early release of Poker Copilot already with this feature here: http://pokercopilot.com/downloads/pokercopilot2.102_rc8.dmg

Coming in the Next Update: HUD Layout has an extra row of stats

2012-01-21T17:42:00.001+01:00

An extra row of stats. You can now show up to 16 stats at once:

Pre-emptive comment: "That's nice, Steve, but what we really need are more stats, not just more room to show the stats that are already there". I hear ya. I'll be looking at some stats soon.

Unofficial Poker Copilot Update for Ongame Network

2012-01-20T15:37:00.001+01:00

Ongame Network updated their Mac OS X software two days ago. This new software doesn't work with the current Poker Copilot release. So I've made some adjustments to fix these problems.

But this is more than just a fix. Finally, Poker Copilot's HUD works with Ongame Network, although for now, only with BetFair:

Download this unofficial update here. Feedback welcome.

Please let me know what other Ongame Network Mac software you use so I can add Poker Copilot HUD support.

Poker Copilot Demo Video in French

2012-01-20T14:41:00.001+01:00

Over on the French version of the Poker Copilot website, I've updated the video to have a French-language voiceover.

Madeleine at FrenchVoiceOvers.com did the translation and voiceover. I want to praise Madeleine's professionalism and responsiveness. Thanks also to loyal Poker Copilot customer Christophe for advising on French poker terms.

Reason I Like My Mac #17,823

2012-01-18T14:13:00.001+01:00

I read up on the new features in Mac OS X 10.7 (Lion) some months ago but I still encounter pleasant surprises:

Yes, Lion, "Duplicate and Revert" is actually exactly what I want. Nice.

Updated Poker Copilot Demo Video

2012-01-17T15:07:00.001+01:00

In preparation for Poker Copilot 3, I've updated the demo video. This needed to be done - many of the HUD improvements weren't there.

I've noticed that for many people, Poker Copilot's HUD is _the_ reason to use Poker Copilot. So the demo focuses on the HUD.

Poker Copilot 3 Coming...

2012-01-16T15:21:00.001+01:00

Here in the lab, Poker Copilot is now branded as "Poker Copilot 3":

This is simply a change of version number. The current update of Poker Copilot 2 is 2.101 and it is a vastly improved product from Poker Copilot 2.00. So it seems right to reflect this in an update of the major version number.

Before I make this the official update, there are some things to do: I want to get the translations up to date; I plan to update the user guide; I need to update the demo video.

If I was a good businessperson, I'd be releasing a new major update every year and charging current users an upgrade fee. This is common practice in the software business. However I'm not a good businessperson, so there will be no upgrade fee for any existing customers of Poker Copilot, no matter when they bought it. Partly this is because I can't think of an appropriate date in the past to nominate as the cut-off purchase date to receive a free update. Partly it is because I'm too lazy to handle the extra work created by the upgrade-versus-new-customer process. Note that I do reserve the right to change the free upgrade policy in the future, even though I most likely won't.

News for Poker Copilot Translators

2012-01-14T17:51:00.001+01:00

I've made the spreadsheets for translating the Poker Copilot strings a little better. You can now see the English text that you are translating all the time. I've added a column in which you can write "Yes" once you are done downloading. This makes it possible to filter out the strings already translated:

You can also now see the total number of keys, and the number already translated. I figure seeing an updated counter makes it easy to see if much has happened since you last checked the spreadsheet.

Updated Poker Copilot Translations

2012-01-13T19:25:00.001+01:00

Thanks to the volunteer translators who have already started on the updates I made two days ago to the list of strings to be translated. I've put up a unreleased build that you can use to see how the strings you've translated look in place. Download it here.

New Poker Copilot Screenshots Reveal How Version 2 Changed

2012-01-12T19:11:00.001+01:00

Updating the website screenshots has been on my to-do list for a year or so. Today I did it. The screenshots show just how much Poker Copilot 2.101 differs from Poker Copilot 2.0.

The HUD as it was:

The HUD now:

There are now player icons, colour-coded statistics, and table stats.

The hand replayer as it was:

The hand replayer now:

It is now sexier, it shows odds of winning, it shows the HUD stats, you can record the hand as a video, you can jump straight to the flop, turn, or river, there are keyboard shortcuts, and you can get the hand history text formatted.

Here is the bankroll chart as it is:

And now:

The bankroll chart has barely changed, but the screenshot lets you see how the whole interface has developed.

Poker Copilot Translation Project: Update

2012-01-11T17:15:00.001+01:00

Hi Poker Copilot translators (current and future…),

The following Poker Copilot translations have 60 or so new text fragments that need to be translated:

Hungarian
Spanish (Latin American)
Italian
Dutch
French
German

The new strings are at the bottom of each translation spreadsheet.

If you've helped out in the past or want to volunteer to help now, I'd be grateful.

More information is here.

PokerStars now has built-in Auto-Hotkeys

2012-01-11T15:59:00.001+01:00

I didn't notice that addition to PokerStars last October: Hotkeys built-in. Although we've had the free BlazingStars to help with on Mac OS X, it is even better when Hotkeys are part of PokerStars itself.

You'll find Hotkeys in PokerStars' Options menu:

I think they've done a nice job in the user interface for defining Hotkeys:

Reflection on the PokerStars Update that Broke Poker Copilot

2012-01-09T11:14:00.001+01:00

As is now clear, PokerStars released an update on Saturday that broke Poker Copilot. Fortunately I was able to quickly release an update that fixed the problem. (Download Poker Copilot 2.101 here if you are still affected by the problem).

I woke up on Saturday morning and checked my emails before getting out of bed. Bad habit, I know. My Poker Copilot inbox was overflowing so I knew something was afoot. I read the first few messages and they were all variations of this:

"help! after the PokerStars update, my HUD is not working!"

Okay, I thought…let's do this right. Shower first and have some breakfast - including a nice strong café con leche. I had a suspicion of what the problem might be, due to something I had encountered and fixed for the new PokerStarsDK (Denmark-specific PokerStars) a few days earlier.

Before doing any coding and answering any emails, I read through all the emails and the Poker Copilot discussion forum. I have some clever users who often work out the problems for me. And there it was: a clever user indeed posting as 'nerd' had found the problem: a slight change to the first line of each PokerStars hand in the hand history file.

I had already fixed this in the latest unofficial Poker Copilot release. I updated PokerStars, tested it with Poker Copilot, and found it worked as expected, so I could simply make the unreleased 2.101 update the official update.

However there was another problem: a flaw in Poker Copilot's 'auto-detection of updates' code. It thinks that 2.101 is an earlier release than 2.99, because mathematically, 2.101 < 2.99. So nobody is being automatically informed that there is an update. This means that I've received a steady flow of emails reporting the problem. I've been doing a lot of 'copy & paste' emailing.

The variety of tone in the emails is fascinating. A few are slightly panicking. One or two people are rather demanding, some are apologetic as if it is their fault, others admit they've become addicted to playing with the HUD. Most people are warm and civil.

Secretly I like these emergency problems. They are highly motivating and they give me a chance to demonstrate speedy support. In the first year or so of Poker Copilot these situations happened often and I always seemed to have a uptick in sales afterwards.

Poker Copilot 2.101 Now Available

2012-01-07T12:53:00.001+01:00

This fixes a problem caused by today's PokerStars update.

This was supposed to be version 3 but PokerStars forced my hand.

Poker Copilot 2.101 is now available to download.

Unfortunately existing updates of Poker Copilot will mistakenly not recognise this new update's availability, so please don't wait for Poker Copilot to tell you to update.

What's changed:

Two HUD layouts - one for ring games and one for tournaments.
Much better Merge Network HUD support (table sizes now detected correctly in all cases)
Search tournaments with free text search
The bottom bar now includes more info - # of tournaments and database size
You can view the all-in equity chart in currency ($) or in big blinds (BB)
Searching for players and tournaments tells you how many matches you have
You can use Poker Copilot in any available language without changing your computer's language

What's fixed:

Now works with today's PokerStars update.
Now works with PokerStarsDK (Denmark)

Update Instructions:

Download the latest version here.
Open the downloaded file.
Drag the Poker Copilot icon to the Applications icon. If prompted to replace an existing version, confirm that you do want to replace.

Now you are done and ready to hit the tables.

Poker Copilot Website in French

2012-01-05T14:32:00.001+01:00

The Poker Copilot website is now available in French. See it here. If you are a native French speaker, your feedback is welcome. Some of the poker terms may need modification.

A few things I've learnt from the French and Spanish translations:

Outsourcing is wonderful - if you find the right supplier. You give someone a task. You answer a couple of emails seeking further information. You spend a few days with your visiting friends enjoying Barcelona over New Year's Eve. You receive the finished work. You do a few small changes. You upload, pay your supplier, and you are done.
French domain names (.fr) are expensive compared to .com, .es, and .co.uk
Changing language can lead to unexpected layout problems
Translating a website involves more than just changing the text. You also need to think about where off-site links lead, about which currency to display, and whether additional information needs to be translated or changed.

Spanish Website Translation

2012-01-05T13:17:00.001+01:00

As I wrote yesterday, the Poker Copilot website is now available in Spanish. The translation was performed by Monica at Liquidlanguage, and she'll happily take enquiries for translation projects from English to Spanish. Contact: monica@liquidlangue.com

Y ahora en Español: Traducción realizada por Liquidlanguage. Contacto: monica@liquidlangue.com

Poker Copilot Website in Spanish

2012-01-04T16:46:00.001+01:00

A friend and professional translator translated the Poker Copilot website into Spanish. See it here. If you are a native Spanish speaker, your feedback is welcome. Some of the poker terms may need a small tweak as the translator is not a poker player.

Update for PokerStars Denmark Users (PokerStarsDK)

2012-01-03T12:33:00.001+01:00

Denmark's new online gambling laws came into effect on January 1st. In response PokerStars has released a Denmark-specific client, PokerStarsDK.

If you are playing on PokerStars in Denmark, you'll need this Poker Copilot update. Thanks to loyal Poker Copilot customer Steen for helping me with this fix.

This update includes all the currently unreleased recent improvements. It also works on Mac OS X 10.5 (Leopard). In the next few days I'll be officially releasing this update as Poker Copilot 3. This will be a free upgrade for all existing customers.