I think Party, and similar type companies, really only have two concerns about such software:

1) Is the presence of such software 'talked' about a lot, to the extent that the amount of talk could hurt their market (ie. scare players away)

2) Does the software provide some level of unfair advantage?

Their publicity material talks about their disliking companies who sell such software (or related services), but it is not at all clear that Party mean that giving it away for free is any better. Possibly the idea of someone giving something useful away for free never occured to them!

I wouldn't put too much reliance on Party's written word ("We do not scan your hard drive or take screen shots from your machine.").

Your program, whether it is free or not, will increase the likelihood of Party responding to its type, because it, and your releasing it, suffers from both #1 and #2 above.

The question is whether you see Party's increased likelihood of responding as a positive, or negative, consequence to your action?

If you want the technique blocked (if you see this as beneficial to poker), then you've done the right thing, and should continue to do so.

If your issue is to do with people selling products that you could write for free, so you do it, and undercut their market, then I don't really understand this. The world is full of people who can do things I cannot (eg. make shoes, give lapdances, etc), and I am happy to pay for their services - if I want them. Or not to pay for them if I don't (as I chose with HHSmithey and PHT).

As skilful and knowledgaable as you are, you're going to be a very busy person if you don't like people charging for anything you can do.

In the event that you agree with me Juk, please do not change your behaviour until after you have written a quality replacement for Windows, a spam blocker, and a totally effective virus blocker. I'd be very appreciative

Hi

I'm having some issues with the import part of this, partially because I'm retarded, I'm sure. what's the best method for getting these imported into party poker? the Party auto import or the lightning bold auto import?

It wont let me unzip the file. It tells me its not a valid archive. Any ideas?

I'm also retarded..can anyone give us a crash course on how to get this up and running.

No idea why but... Download it from Internet Explorer and it seems to work. From Firefox the archive is invalid.

Try copy and pasting this into your browser.

http://freewebs.com/jukofyork/FreePHG_v0_01.zip

worked for me.

Now on to T&C issues. Is it true that party will give you a warning for this before doing anything else, assuming they were ever to crack down (and were somehow able to).

It is one thing to say that software should be free and to claim that you can build an equivalent app in half a day - it is quite another thing to follow through and do it. Well done!

rvg

I honestly cannot predict how they will react to something like this, but I think that many others could have just as easy have done what I have (and I am sure many others have but won't admit it or release their code).

Yes, I could have just kept my version hidden, and until today I pretty much planned on doing this. For example: I had written a Pacific Hangrabber type utility quite a bit before the commercial version was released, but the difference was the Pacific Hangrabber author didn't try to make such a huge profit ($5-$10 was a very fair price for the work required IMO). The comments today in the other thread by the PHT author just didn't go down well with me and my belief system, so this is my way of rectifying it as best I can

No I don't want it blocked, but I think whether their is a commercial version or a free version in circulation will most likely make little difference. I could have kept this quiet and 'underground', but I think at worst this may accelerate their decision making process and force them to clarify their position on applications like this (free or payware).

Maybe this is just my belief system, but I have always believed in the benefit of sharing knowledge and skills, and if others take advantage of this and don't return the goodwill, then so be it. Others may have a different viewpoint on life and different goals, and everybody is welcome to their own personal ideals, these are just mine...

I have lived through pretty much the whole era of home computers, and all I can say is that a "replacement for Windows" really wouldn't be such a bad thing and if I had multiple lifetimes (and was a more motivated person), yes I would try to right this wrong also, but sadly I don't and this is a different story...

Juk

juk could you help with that above question?

Yes, sry this same problem has hit me multiple times now. Its either something to do with my free host or my copy of winrar makes corrupted zips?

If anybody can re-host this, then plz do and feel free to repack the archive (the license notice is only to protect myself from problems, not to stop the code from being redistributed...).

Juk

I appreciate your work to get something free but I really think you are doing more harm here than good. The more apps like these are used the more likely Party will do something about it. So while you did some good I think you've done more evil. Just being honest. If you want to do something like this; fine. However, like others have said, please keep it more underground and not available to the entire public.

Best regards,

APerfect10

Hmmmm... I moved to using a different utility called PokerManager, and don't use PT much anymore. You could try this if the PT code has been altered to not allow importing of HHF's:

In the run.bat file, alter this line to say:

start /low FreePHG.exe -e txt

This will make the output file a .txt rather than a .hhf, you should then be able to import these files in the same way as you import your own hands.

Juk

Try using the -e option to set the output as .txt, and then import them as you normally import you own hands (see my reply to the question for details). I don't use PT anymore, so I not the best person to ask when it comes to PT problems

Juk

alright someone else take it.... what steps do I take to get the files from the folder into the auto import of poker tracker?

I don't think anybody can answer this for sure, but I think they state in their T&C that they will always give a warning before taking further action (even if you use one of the predefined "banned applications" they list in their "Unfair Advantage" policy page). I think only outright cheating/collusion results in a instant ban, but don't take my word for it.

Juk