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07-08-2010 , 11:45 AM
orly? Sweet!

Is that on by default?
07-08-2010 , 01:02 PM
Yep! It's always on. It's actually handling the "check instead of fold" box when you press fold, but you'd never be able to tell because Hjälper handles that dialog very, very quickly. So yeah, pretty much what Jecht said:

Fold = Check.
07-08-2010 , 01:36 PM
That's great, thanks! One other question, actually two more questions.

Firstly, I only have a very very bog standard GFX card (8400GS). I'd really like to jack down the tournament closing time to as low as possible but I don't want to risk system stability. With a basic card of this type, is there a lowest recommended setting?

Secondly I tried running Hjalper again on a set of $1 DoNs and it crashed halfway through with an error message pertaining to the Microsoft .Net framework. I've just performed a completely clean install of Win7 on a new HD, installed the latest version of Hjalper, and after setting up I went to quit the application and got the same error message. Any idea what's going on here? I've just gone and bought an XBox 360 controller to really give this app a chance to shine, but I'm hesitant to load up a new set of games while I'm still unsure whether or not I'm going to get that .NET framework error again.

Note: I've run all Windows updates since the new install, but haven't specifically gone online to download anything relating to the .NET framework. Do I need to do this?
07-08-2010 , 02:35 PM
Quote:
Originally Posted by Gazillion
That's great, thanks! One other question, actually two more questions.

Firstly, I only have a very very bog standard GFX card (8400GS). I'd really like to jack down the tournament closing time to as low as possible but I don't want to risk system stability. With a basic card of this type, is there a lowest recommended setting?
I've got an ATI Radeon 3600HD and I'm running 125ms. I barely notice a game closing. As far as I know 125ms is pretty tits across the board, I know gnum was doing 50ms for a bit but ran into the odd problem with it so started using 100 or 125 I think (gnum confirm?). 125 is fairly impressive fwiw.

I'll let HG answer the rest.
07-08-2010 , 04:42 PM
Thanks - 125 it is then!

OK, I just ran a test set of $1 games with the controller and no glaring issues - felt pretty good in fact and once I get used to the less-used controls I think I'm gonna love it!

A couple of observations though: the "call" button doesn't work when facing an all in, and I am forced to click the bet button instead. It would be nice if this could get fixed. The check instead of fold option does indeed work as described, but I do see a momentary flash of a dialogue pop up - I know it sounds super nitpicky but it would be one less thing to get tilted about during a bad set if it could be taken out of the picture altogether! Also, when playing stacked, the only table cycle control that seems to work is "switch to table right" and all that appears to do is to alternate between 2 tables. It'd be really nice to have this fully working as a proper table cycling feature, as right now it's pretty useless for anyone playing stacked as far as I can tell. I can't be certain of this next one, but it seemed at certain points the controls would get confused between incrementing/decrementing amounts when I tried to change my bet in SB increments. I'll have to try to reproduce it to be certain, but it seemed like sometimes it started to shift in BB chunks instead. I'm not 100% on that so I'll report back if I experience it again.

Also, the more I get to like this, the more inclined I am going to be to buy it, but let's face it, $140 (or even $100 for that matter) is a lot of money. I appreciate that you obv need to get paid for your hard work HG, so if I jump in I'll def do so for $100 and I won't begrudge paying that at all (will no way pay $140 though!). So if I'm going to drop more $ than I did on a full license of HEM, what sort of guarantees are there going to be regarding regular and free updates? Will the asking price cover updates for life? Will you only guarantee updates as far as v2? Do you plan on maintaining an active development schedule with the software? Not wishing to put you on the spot but the last thing I want to do is drop 3 figures on a piece of software that isn't going to make it past v1.1 with no support. Hope you can appreciate the concern

Edit: oh and one other little thing while I'm at it - would it be possible to have the Hjalper window remember its last screen position after OKing it? I have it set off to the side of my screen out of the way of my tables, and if I make changes to it I have to hit OK to apply them (an Apply btn would be rly nice fwiw), and then I'll sometimes want to reactivate it to check some mappings while I'm still learning the controls. However, when the window reappears, it does so in a spot which is right over my tables, and not where I last opened it. It would be really cool if it was able to remember where it previously was and just restore itself there

Last edited by Gazillion; 07-08-2010 at 05:06 PM.
07-08-2010 , 08:43 PM
Quote:
Originally Posted by JechtSphere
I know gnum was doing 50ms for a bit but ran into the odd problem with it so started using 100 or 125 I think (gnum confirm?). 125 is fairly impressive fwiw.
Confirmed 100ms, sir.

(4gb of decent ddr2, 8800GTS, Q9550 @ 2.83GHz)

Quote:
Originally Posted by Gazillion
A couple of observations though: the "call" button doesn't work when facing an all in, and I am forced to click the bet button instead. It would be nice if this could get fixed.
This is intended. Instead of thinking of the hotkeys as fold, check/call, bet/raise, think of them as Left, Middle, Right (the positions of the buttons when they pop up). So, when you're calling an all-in, you'd actually be pressing the bet/raise button by your definition (since the call button is on the right in that case).

Quote:
Originally Posted by Gazillion
The check instead of fold option does indeed work as described, but I do see a momentary flash of a dialogue pop up - I know it sounds super nitpicky but it would be one less thing to get tilted about during a bad set if it could be taken out of the picture altogether!
Try disabling window animations for now. It may stop that flicker.

http://hjalper.com/animation.png

Quote:
Originally Posted by Gazillion
I can't be certain of this next one, but it seemed at certain points the controls would get confused between incrementing/decrementing amounts when I tried to change my bet in SB increments.
This sounds like it's just thumbstick sensitivity. Oh, analog controls.

Glad you seem to be having a good experience overall, so far. Like Jecht, I'll let HG address the rest of your questions.
07-08-2010 , 10:25 PM
Quote:
Originally Posted by Gnumsploitz
This is intended. Instead of thinking of the hotkeys as fold, check/call, bet/raise, think of them as Left, Middle, Right (the positions of the buttons when they pop up). So, when you're calling an all-in, you'd actually be pressing the bet/raise button by your definition (since the call button is on the right in that case).
Understood. Thanks for the clarification.


Quote:
Try disabling window animations for now. It may stop that flicker.

http://hjalper.com/animation.png
Actually, I'd already done this


Quote:
This sounds like it's just thumbstick sensitivity. Oh, analog controls.
Yeah, that's what I eventually figured it was. I might just disable the left/right controls and leave it set for just up/down, and then use the shoulder button modifier for the BB increment/decrement.

Quote:
Glad you seem to be having a good experience overall, so far. Like Jecht, I'll let HG address the rest of your questions.
I am, but I got some really weird performance issues during my set which are puzzling me. It's a clean install of the OS so I can't completely write off the possibility that something else is going on, but I noticed some big performance issues once I hit about 18-20 tables. My whole system froze on me 3 times for about 20 seconds a time - no mouse cursor movement or anything, and at one point I also started experiencing that weird issue that manifested when I used the Auto Refresh Info Tab option (which is disabled in the current build). Trying to drag the HEM window was *really* sluggish too, but strangely I had task manager open the whole time and no process was registering on the CPU meter. Whether or not the freezes and sluggishness have any connection to Hjalper I don't know yet, and I'm seeking advice in CTH over those performance niggles, but one thing I'm pretty sure is Hjalper is that I don't think the MTT focus stealing fix is fully working yet? I played about 65 games, and about 10-15 times during the set I'd see some dialogue or other briefly flash up before being dismissed (I'm assuming it was the "You have been moved to another table" dialogue because I don't recall my table count changing at all) and right after that the XBox360 controller would lose "contact" with the tables. I'd have to grab my mouse and click on one of the tables again to re-activate them and get things back to normal. Also, I got another Microsoft .NET framework error, giving the option for me to quit the application or keep using it - with the caveat that the program may not respond properly if I kept going. Well, I was stuck in the middle of a set with 20 turbo tables open so quitting would have been a disaster for me. I kept going and didn't really notice any adverse effects, but the error is worrying nonetheless.

Finally, for the sake of completeness I ought to point out that I also had TN running - but it was doing nothing apart from setting some default betsziing for me.

Hopefully some of this info will be useful - if HG needs any more info from me or if there's log files I can provide to help, then just ask and I'll post them.
07-08-2010 , 11:56 PM
Quote:
Originally Posted by Gazillion
The check instead of fold option does indeed work as described, but I do see a momentary flash of a dialogue pop up - I know it sounds super nitpicky but it would be one less thing to get tilted about during a bad set if it could be taken out of the picture altogether!
FWIW with my system and using Win7 I don't see any sort of flash; I 32-40 table regularly. Could be a graphics related issue but I'll let HG decide that himself.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Gazillion
Also, when playing stacked, the only table cycle control that seems to work is "switch to table right" and all that appears to do is to alternate between 2 tables. It'd be really nice to have this fully working as a proper table cycling feature, as right now it's pretty useless for anyone playing stacked as far as I can tell.
You're looking for select urgent table. For my Xbox controller I have this set to depressing the Left Thumbstick. I'm able to cycle through all tables requiring action using this. (Not sure if you're familiar with 360 controllers or not, but the control sticks can be depressed for further functionality/hotkey, so Left Thumb/Right Thumb refers to the depression of those control sticks).

Quote:
Originally Posted by Gazillion
I can't be certain of this next one, but it seemed at certain points the controls would get confused between incrementing/decrementing amounts when I tried to change my bet in SB increments. I'll have to try to reproduce it to be certain, but it seemed like sometimes it started to shift in BB chunks instead. I'm not 100% on that so I'll report back if I experience it again.
This is confirmed a sensitivity bit with the 360 controller.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Gazillion
Edit: oh and one other little thing while I'm at it - would it be possible to have the Hjalper window remember its last screen position after OKing it? I have it set off to the side of my screen out of the way of my tables, and if I make changes to it I have to hit OK to apply them (an Apply btn would be rly nice fwiw), and then I'll sometimes want to reactivate it to check some mappings while I'm still learning the controls. However, when the window reappears, it does so in a spot which is right over my tables, and not where I last opened it. It would be really cool if it was able to remember where it previously was and just restore itself there
I think this is a cool request and something I'd personally like to see also

Quote:
Originally Posted by Gazillion
Finally, for the sake of completeness I ought to point out that I also had TN running - but it was doing nothing apart from setting some default betsziing for me.
I understand your wish to get some default bet sizing, but I do encourage you to try Hjalper on its own if possible to see if you experience any of that flashing/etc. without it. Hjalper will have default bets, auto-reg, and more for final of course.
07-09-2010 , 02:30 AM
1.0.0.17 is out.

Just some minor changes like I said.
  • Synthesize keys now enabled
  • Allow setting of hotkeys that are normally captured by EDIT control, ie ctrl+A
  • Fixed (hopefully) a couple collections-related crashes
  • Other internal change
Still catching up on PMs and threads.
07-09-2010 , 04:27 PM
Thanks for the reply

Quote:
Originally Posted by JechtSphere
FWIW with my system and using Win7 I don't see any sort of flash; I 32-40 table regularly. Could be a graphics related issue but I'll let HG decide that himself.
It probably is - my GFX is fairly out of date and was incredibly basic at the time (got it cos it was passively cooled and wanted a quiet system). So much so that I have found I can often tell when a new table has loaded due to the briefest of flickers on the screen. This looks like something I can probably fix myself just by adding a more modern video card to my system.



Quote:
You're looking for select urgent table. For my Xbox controller I have this set to depressing the Left Thumbstick. I'm able to cycle through all tables requiring action using this. (Not sure if you're familiar with 360 controllers or not, but the control sticks can be depressed for further functionality/hotkey, so Left Thumb/Right Thumb refers to the depression of those control sticks).
Actually, I already use urgent table extensively and have it mapped to the same control that you do (the default I believe) I'm referring more to a feature that would be the equivalent of the cycle tables forward/backward function in TN. I don't use it a huge amount, but every now and then some action will happen in a big pot or something similar that I might just want to go and check on while I have a spare second. I would use TN to quickly cycle through the tables until the table in question popped up. It wasn't ideal but it was useful (and I'd often just use TN's move table hotkeys to monitor any situations I really wanted to keep an eye on). The other thing I'd use it for was just as a quick paranoia check after a particularly heavy spell of activity - I'm sure you know what it's like when all your tables require an action from you at the same time and you have to really fly through them to act on them all without timing out? Well, after that period has relented somewhat I like to quickly flick through the tables just to check that the auto "never sit out" feature has done its job and something hasn't gone awry. In that respect I can't get Hjalpers controls to replicate this behaviour, as they were probably designed squarely with tilers in mind, or at least people who can always see at least some part of every table they have open. Not being a programmer I'm not sure how difficult it would be to modify the code so that the behaviour would also serve as a "cycle all open tables" feature. Maybe the start time of the tournament could be parsed from the HH, so that cycling "up" would take you to the earliest game and "down" down would take you to the latest, with left and right simply moving forward and backward chronologically through the tables? Maybe I'm the only person on earth who would find this useful, so I won't lose any sleep if it doesn't happen. It's certainly nowhere near as desirable to me than other features that will be coming in the future (namely auto bet sizing).




Quote:
This is confirmed a sensitivity bit with the 360 controller.
Yeah, I finally figured this one out! I guess my thumbs just aren't too accurate these days, so I've just changed the mapping so that stick up/down increases and decrements by 1SB, and when used with the left shoulder button it performs the 1BB increment/decrements.

Last edited by Gazillion; 07-09-2010 at 04:32 PM.
07-09-2010 , 11:45 PM
Quote:
Originally Posted by Gazillion
I'm referring more to a feature that would be the equivalent of the cycle tables forward/backward function in TN.
The command you are looking for is Alt+Esc. It's an option available in the list of 360 commands (Default for it is set to DPad Up). Use the Alt+Shift+Esc command to go the other way. This is the best solution for stacking atm until HG can come up with a better way for us to cycle through tables.
07-10-2010 , 12:15 AM
^^^ I'm pretty sure that cycles through application windows: so like it'll pull up my browser window, my HEM window, and all that other stuff that I'm not interested in. Pretty much like hitting alt+tab, but without the previews.

Anyways, played another set of 45 mans tonight with hjalper and the controller, and I've narrowed down the occasional focus problem I was having. It seems to kick in once I have a number of tables open and a new table loads. Whether or not the new table has to load at the exact moment another table is popping in to focus I'm not sure yet, but the net result is that I lose focus from all tables and have to click to activate a table to regain control. I was going to record a video of me playing to illustrate, but I don't think running camtasia alongside everything else would be the best idea on my system right now. It mightbe that I only start to notice the issue with more tables open because the chance then increases that a window is going to be called into focus at the same moment that another table loads, idk.

Gnum/HG: sorry for effectively taking over and semi-spamming this thread. I really want this app to work perfectly for me, and I'm definitely looking to buy - I just want to establish whether some of the remaining niggles are known issues or whether I'm running under a very specific set of conditions that haven't been too extensively tested yet. If my constant diatribes can help to fine tune Hjalper to perfection, then hopefully they've served a purpose
07-10-2010 , 04:22 AM
Quote:
Originally Posted by Sprayed
I am noticing that hjalper is closing pop-ups but I can't cycle through the lobby with the dpad nor can I register using the back button.
Yeah, I just realized that earlier today. I changed some of the lobby-related code to cache the handle of the lobby instead of looking for it every time it's needed. That's all well and good until you've quit and reopened PokerStars. It's an easy fix, it'll be in next build. In the meantime, just quit and reopen Hjälper if you've closed PokerStars since initially running it.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Gazillion
this seems to be something of a known issue with the auto refresh info tab.
I was really caught off guard by that one. All I was doing was refreshing the info tab as soon as your turn to act came up on any table (including background tables) so it would already be updated when the table popped up. I didn't expect that to cause tables to steal focus. It bit me in the ass, too. So I either have to refrain from refreshing it until the table actually has focus (which means you may have to wait for it to refresh, which is usually a fraction of a second at most, but it still annoys the **** out of me, tbqh), or make yet another work around for Stars' careless behavior. I'll get one or the other.

FWIW for many months now the info tab has automatically refreshed for me at dons (always) and sometimes at MTSNGs. That's why I resisted implementing it, since I thought it was obsolete. I've not yet figured out a pattern for the erratic behavior with MTSNGs; if anyone figures it out, I'd be interested in knowing.

Quote:
Originally Posted by K F
Is there a "sit out all hands" option?
I should probably add that at some point. Using up all your timebanks and immediately sitting back in only to time out again is a pretty dick move. (Quoting that comment to remind me about it later.)

Quote:
Originally Posted by Gallopin Gael
Pee bottle FTW!!!

That's why hjalper has a one handed mode.
That is the absolute truth and I'm not ashamed to admit it. Just for the record, I highly recommend 32oz Gatorade bottles. They were recommended to me by another player who I won't embarrass by naming. The fairly wide opening at the top makes it easy to use without looking (keep your eyes on the tables imo) and the wide body makes for good stability so it won't get knocked over easily. One-handed mode is also useful for eating and drinking, but those were secondary concerns.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Gnumsploitz
while my timebanks all run down.
Dick.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Gazillion
Is there any likelihood that a "check instead of fold when checking is free" option is going to be included in any future update?

I've gotten so used to just using the fold button to both fold and check since using TN that I'm not sure I can get myself out of the habit too easily. Being able to carry this behavious over to Hjalper if I decided to make the switch would probably save me a ton of really bad open folds postflop
Jecht & Gnum already chimed in that, but you're not the only one to have trouble with the paradigm shift. Before writing Hjälper, I wasn't using anything, except for a timebank script, so I designed things as they made sense to me. I really think that the 3 buttons on screen lining up with 3 buttons on gamepad is by far the most intuitive way of doing things. That's just straight-up eye/hand coordination without requiring the middle step of processing an action to a specific button.

Sure, the one keyboard shortcut = one command follows convention (Ctrl + C = copy, Ctrl + V = paste, etc.), but I think what I'm doing with Hjälper is more efficient (and certainly easier to code—and eliminating unnecessary complexity reduces the likelihood of bugs), especially when using a gamepad. I only bring that up because I'm a bit curious how others feel about this.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Gazillion
Firstly, I only have a very very bog standard GFX card (8400GS). I'd really like to jack down the tournament closing time to as low as possible but I don't want to risk system stability. With a basic card of this type, is there a lowest recommended setting?
Just set it to 0ms (type it in, as the up/down arrow stops at 25ms) and work your way up. It doesn't crash PokerStars or make anything unstable. You just get an annoying dialog box (screenshot of it is in prefs window) to dismiss. It doesn't even impact the grind since it's not preventing other tables from popping up. Just an annoyance.

I have an 8600GTS, not a modern champ by any standards. I was running at 0ms for a long time, but would occasionally get that error when I was running over 30 tables. Now I use 10ms and it hasn't come up since.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Gazillion
The check instead of fold option does indeed work as described, but I do see a momentary flash of a dialogue pop up - I know it sounds super nitpicky but it would be one less thing to get tilted about during a bad set if it could be taken out of the picture altogether!
You may find yourself adapting and just actually hitting the middle button instead of thinking of left as check/fold (see tangent above). That's why I like the gamepad; the range of motion required to move between X and Y is practically nothing. My default thumb state is rested between the two and I just rotate it left or right to press either button.

That being said, I can't recall the last time I even saw that dialog box. So, it's graphics related. When I say that I don't see dialog boxes pop up, I'm not exaggerating. I truly do not see anything pop up, including the tournament registration window, unless I have a super high load of tables. And even then, it's just a blink of an eye.

Moving on to the actual issue, whilst exploring the MTT table-change focus crap, I think I've uncovered methods to prevent these dialogs from even being created. That's basically the holy grail. I'm not going to promise that, since I'm not positive that I can deliver. And it's not anything I'm going to work on now, since I have a lot of other more important things to implement first. But, I just wanted to say that I think it is possible to eliminate it entirely.

Another thing I can do is make Hjälper smart enough to see if you're in a situation where checking would be free and making the decision to click the middle button instead. That adds complexity, but I'm going to need the relevant code to implement some other features (and it's partially written already), so I may go that route in the future, too.

Or, you could just adapt.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Gazillion
Also, when playing stacked, the only table cycle control that seems to work is "switch to table right" and all that appears to do is to alternate between 2 tables.
Switching to tables in a certain direction (up/down/left/right—potentially 45° increments, too) doesn't make sense when you stack. I know that switch right switches back and forth between two tables, but I don't see that as a bug, since those controls are useless if you stack. Make sense?

Quote:
Originally Posted by Gazillion
Also, the more I get to like this, the more inclined I am going to be to buy it, but let's face it, $140 (or even $100 for that matter) is a lot of money. I appreciate that you obv need to get paid for your hard work HG, so if I jump in I'll def do so for $100 and I won't begrudge paying that at all (will no way pay $140 though!). So if I'm going to drop more $ than I did on a full license of HEM, what sort of guarantees are there going to be regarding regular and free updates? Will the asking price cover updates for life? Will you only guarantee updates as far as v2? Do you plan on maintaining an active development schedule with the software? Not wishing to put you on the spot but the last thing I want to do is drop 3 figures on a piece of software that isn't going to make it past v1.1 with no support. Hope you can appreciate the concern
That's a perfectly reasonable concern for both of us. I'll comment on that at a later date when I've made more concrete decisions.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Gnumsploitz
This sounds like it's just thumbstick sensitivity. Oh, analog controls.
There's a certain amount of calibration you can do in the Windows gamepad control panel. It's worth a try. FWIW when my controllers get start acting funny, I just toss them and replace them. $25 is nothing when you're depending on its proper operation for your source of income. Hell, I deduct it on my taxes.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Gazillion
Edit: oh and one other little thing while I'm at it - would it be possible to have the Hjalper window remember its last screen position after OKing it? I have it set off to the side of my screen out of the way of my tables, and if I make changes to it I have to hit OK to apply them (an Apply btn would be rly nice fwiw), and then I'll sometimes want to reactivate it to check some mappings while I'm still learning the controls. However, when the window reappears, it does so in a spot which is right over my tables, and not where I last opened it. It would be really cool if it was able to remember where it previously was and just restore itself there
Yep, the saved position thing is easy to add. I'll do that. With respect to Apply, I'm not sure what to do about that. Right now when preferences are open, all of the keyboard hotkeys and whatnot are disabled and don't get reenabled until you click OK. The Xbox bindings aren't affected by that, though. Perhaps it's good enough for now if I just implement the saved position part? Then you can check the bindings and I don't have to worry about the keyboard hotkey implications.

Also, to let everyone know, I've pretty much given up on anything nice or friendly coming out of that preferences window in its current form, so I'm not going to mess with it too much. I'll add in more tabs to cover the coming features and it will be ugly, but it will work! Preferences window will get a complete rewrite eventually.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Gazillion
I am, but I got some really weird performance issues during my set which are puzzling me. It's a clean install of the OS so I can't completely write off the possibility that something else is going on, but I noticed some big performance issues once I hit about 18-20 tables. My whole system froze on me 3 times for about 20 seconds a time - no mouse cursor movement or anything
That's bad. Finnisher is having (what sounds like) similar issues, which go away when HMHud isn't running. We've not yet been able to figure out a solution. Are you using the live tracking feature? If you are, I'd try disabling it and see if that improves things. It's also nice to know if the issue goes away entirely if HMHud isn't running, but I know it's difficult for anyone to play without it.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Gazillion
one thing I'm pretty sure is Hjalper is that I don't think the MTT focus stealing fix is fully working yet? I played about 65 games, and about 10-15 times during the set I'd see some dialogue or other briefly flash up before being dismissed (I'm assuming it was the "You have been moved to another table" dialogue because I don't recall my table count changing at all) and right after that the XBox360 controller would lose "contact" with the tables. I'd have to grab my mouse and click on one of the tables again to re-activate them and get things back to normal.
This is with v1.0.0.16 or v1.0.0.17? I guess it has to be. I'm feeling very confident about that particular focus fix, but I admit it does need more testing. (And it is so ridiculously time consuming to test. ) Since you mentioned actually seeing the dialogs briefly, it could be that I need to increase a timeout value for slower systems. I'll see if I can stick that into preferences somewhere so you can crank it up higher and see if that fixes it.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Gazillion
Also, I got another Microsoft .NET framework error, giving the option for me to quit the application or keep using it - with the caveat that the program may not respond properly if I kept going. Well, I was stuck in the middle of a set with 20 turbo tables open so quitting would have been a disaster for me. I kept going and didn't really notice any adverse effects, but the error is worrying nonetheless.
Try .17; I fixed what I think is the main cause of those particular errors. Also, in the future, you should be able to kill it via the killswitch key combo (default is ctrl-alt-shift + F12), reopen it from a desktop shortcut, and at a total time cost of 1-2 seconds. Obviously I don't want any errors at all, but the killswitch is there in the event of **** hitting the fan and Hjälper's time from open to ready for action is very fast.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Gazillion
In that respect I can't get Hjalpers controls to replicate this behaviour, as they were probably designed squarely with tilers in mind, or at least people who can always see at least some part of every table they have open.
I tiled briefly at the beginning; the directional table switching is basically untouched from that period. I've been stacking for well over a year; Gnum, Jecht and the other long-time private users all stack, too. Pretty much everything is designed with the assumption that the user is going to stack.

Quote:
Originally Posted by LukeNuk3m
The command you are looking for is Alt+Esc. It's an option available in the list of 360 commands (Default for it is set to DPad Up). Use the Alt+Shift+Esc command to go the other way. This is the best solution for stacking atm until HG can come up with a better way for us to cycle through tables.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Gazillion
I'm referring more to a feature that would be the equivalent of the cycle tables forward/backward function in TN.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Gazillion
^^^ I'm pretty sure that cycles through application windows: so like it'll pull up my browser window, my HEM window, and all that other stuff that I'm not interested in. Pretty much like hitting alt+tab, but without the previews.
This has been brought up before. I use the Alt+Esc/Alt+Shift+Esc buttons all the time for this and don't have any problems. Jecht just told me the same thing. If you're not giving focus to other apps, you have to cycle a long way through the list before you'll hit anything that's not PokerStars, so it's never been an issue for any of us. That being said, it's not a problem to implement something that just switches between tables. The hold up is: how do I order the tables?/How do I determine which table is next or previous? Please, give me ideas and I'll code it up.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Gazillion
It seems to kick in once I have a number of tables open and a new table loads. Whether or not the new table has to load at the exact moment another table is popping in to focus I'm not sure yet, but the net result is that I lose focus from all tables and have to click to activate a table to regain control.
I'm sure this is related to the graphics yet again. Are you running with Aero turned on? That helps tremendously and, honestly, I'm surprised that an 8400GS isn't keeping up. I'll make the timeouts configurable and we'll see if raising them helps with this on your PC.

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Originally Posted by Gazillion
Gnum/HG: sorry for effectively taking over and semi-spamming this thread. I really want this app to work perfectly for me, and I'm definitely looking to buy - I just want to establish whether some of the remaining niggles are known issues or whether I'm running under a very specific set of conditions that haven't been too extensively tested yet. If my constant diatribes can help to fine tune Hjalper to perfection, then hopefully they've served a purpose
No, I appreciate the input a lot. I want it to be perfect for you and me and most everyone in the target market, i.e. true grinders. (I'm okay with it being imperfect for a few outliers with really strange requests—I can't please everyone). I don't accept good enough—at least in the long term. Pragmatism forces me to accept it in the short term, but I'm not happy about it!

Last edited by _dave_; 07-10-2010 at 05:30 AM. Reason: fixed QUOTE tags
07-10-2010 , 05:37 AM
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The hold up is: how do I order the tables?/How do I determine which table is next or previous? Please, give me ideas and I'll code it up.
random idea. ahk's winget will return a list of hwnds sorded by z-order, I expect .net has a similar function. pull a list of tables ordered by Z, step thru them front ->back or back -> front depending on button press?

also, XP GDI >>> aero >>> Win7/Vista GDI imo, lol

Played my first session today with a working hjalper, pretty slick!
07-10-2010 , 11:39 AM
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Originally Posted by HAY GUYS

The hold up is: how do I order the tables?/How do I determine which table is next or previous? Please, give me ideas and I'll code it up.
Make the most recent active tables the first ones in the cycle. For example, you call an all-in on table A, followed by another all-in call on table B, and then table C pops up requiring an action. You act on C, and then want to cycle back to see what happened. B would be the first in line, then A. Then cycle the other way and it takes you back to B, then C. Make sense?
07-10-2010 , 11:53 AM
Ok... so I have been using the software for a while now and i have gone from playing 18 to playing up to 24 tables at the time.... Im not 100% sure its actually Hjalper doing it, but i was having issues with TN trying to do more than 18. SO kudos to Hjalper.

One issue has presented from time to time tho. Sometimes when my connection isnt the best and the cpu starts lagging, i would time out from some tables. Hjalper doesnt seem to recongniZe this tables and leaves them sitting out. A couple of times i have found that one of the tables has been sitting out w/o me or the software noticing it. That scares me. I dont like to have to toggle thru all my tables to make sure im indeed sitting in all of them.... Thats what i used to do with older scripts.....
This happens every once in a while and could be an issue that only happens to me, but i just have to point it out.

I think its awesome how these guys are constantly working on making this software better and better. Havent seen anything like this, not even from Table Ninja. Its gonna be very hard for it to be perfect and have everything all players want for their everyday grind, but the Hjalper crew its really working on making it that perfect dream....

Thanks alot!
07-11-2010 , 12:52 AM
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Originally Posted by _dave_
pull a list of tables ordered by Z, step thru them front ->back or back -> front depending on button press?
Went with this. It's the easiest. Switching to "next" table requires sending the current table to the bottom, which always annoyed me a bit when tiling, but I'll get over it, especially since I stack now.

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Originally Posted by Sly Caveat
Make the most recent active tables the first ones in the cycle. For example, you call an all-in on table A, followed by another all-in call on table B, and then table C pops up requiring an action. You act on C, and then want to cycle back to see what happened. B would be the first in line, then A. Then cycle the other way and it takes you back to B, then C. Make sense?
Should effectively act like this now. Actually keeping track of action order gets complicated for certain scenarios.

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Originally Posted by juandadi
One issue has presented from time to time tho. Sometimes when my connection isnt the best and the cpu starts lagging, i would time out from some tables. Hjalper doesnt seem to recongniZe this tables and leaves them sitting out. A couple of times i have found that one of the tables has been sitting out w/o me or the software noticing it. That scares me.
If your hand history directory is set correctly, the "backup" method should find it as soon as a hand is written that matches
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Seat X: Superdonk (YYYY in chips) is sitting out
That should sit you in within 2 hands. That's why it's the backup method!

I can add a "sit in on all tables" command and optionally try to detect a disconnect and execute that when the connection is back up. I can't wait to test this one!

Without further ado, I give you Hjälper 1.0.0.18.

Changes:
  • Fixed bug where lobby wasn't getting detected if PokerStars was closed and reopened
  • Added basic next/previous table commands (these are new commands that you'll have to assign to buttons/keys; the alt+esc/alt+shift+esc commands are still there)
07-11-2010 , 02:26 AM
HG, thanks for your very detailed reply. You're obviously busting your ass to get this ready to roll out for a 1.0 release, so I really appreciate you stopping by to comment in between coding.

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Originally Posted by HAY GUYS
I was really caught off guard by that one. All I was doing was refreshing the info tab as soon as your turn to act came up on any table (including background tables) so it would already be updated when the table popped up. I didn't expect that to cause tables to steal focus. It bit me in the ass, too. So I either have to refrain from refreshing it until the table actually has focus (which means you may have to wait for it to refresh, which is usually a fraction of a second at most, but it still annoys the **** out of me, tbqh), or make yet another work around for Stars' careless behavior. I'll get one or the other.
Yep, the behaviour largely dissipated with the update which temporarily disabled this feature. However, on one occasion since then I have experienced this behaviour for a short burst, although I can't recall right now what was happening in order for me to try to reproduce it. If the behaviour recurs I'll be sure to try to grab as much info as possible about my config and the state of my games and post ITT.


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FWIW for many months now the info tab has automatically refreshed for me at dons (always) and sometimes at MTSNGs. That's why I resisted implementing it, since I thought it was obsolete. I've not yet figured out a pattern for the erratic behavior with MTSNGs; if anyone figures it out, I'd be interested in knowing.
I've noticed it *occasionally* do this too, but it's definitely still the exception rather than the rule for me. Maybe Stars just sends out a periodic "update info" command on MTT tables that forces a refresh? I'm no programmer so I honestly couldn't guess with any kind of accuracy.


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Jecht & Gnum already chimed in that, but you're not the only one to have trouble with the paradigm shift. Before writing Hjälper, I wasn't using anything, except for a timebank script, so I designed things as they made sense to me. I really think that the 3 buttons on screen lining up with 3 buttons on gamepad is by far the most intuitive way of doing things. That's just straight-up eye/hand coordination without requiring the middle step of processing an action to a specific button.
Yeah, this does actually make a ton of logical sense. Where I struggle when trying to apply this in game is that I have a semi-hardwired association with buttons and actions that does not reflect the state of the available buttons on a given table. Basically, I mentally break down all possible actions into three groups - passive actions that don't involve putting chips in the pot (checking and folding), passive actions that require putting chips in the pot (calling), and aggressive actions which obviously require putting chips in the pot (betting and raising). Basically during my time with TN these notional distinctions got hammered into my mindset as I would have 1 key which acted as check/fold, 1 for call, and 1 for bet/raise. This had the advantage of me never accidentally calling a bet when I mistakenly thought it had been checked round to me but I was actually facing some sort of action behind me. It's for this reason that I prefer to associate checking with folding rather than calling. Hope that makes sense.


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Sure, the one keyboard shortcut = one command follows convention (Ctrl + C = copy, Ctrl + V = paste, etc.), but I think what I'm doing with Hjälper is more efficient (and certainly easier to code—and eliminating unnecessary complexity reduces the likelihood of bugs), especially when using a gamepad. I only bring that up because I'm a bit curious how others feel about this.
See above


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Just set it to 0ms (type it in, as the up/down arrow stops at 25ms) and work your way up. It doesn't crash PokerStars or make anything unstable. You just get an annoying dialog box (screenshot of it is in prefs window) to dismiss. It doesn't even impact the grind since it's not preventing other tables from popping up. Just an annoyance.

I have an 8600GTS, not a modern champ by any standards. I was running at 0ms for a long time, but would occasionally get that error when I was running over 30 tables. Now I use 10ms and it hasn't come up since.
Thanks - I'll definitely give this a go.



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You may find yourself adapting and just actually hitting the middle button instead of thinking of left as check/fold (see tangent above). That's why I like the gamepad; the range of motion required to move between X and Y is practically nothing. My default thumb state is rested between the two and I just rotate it left or right to press either button.
Yep, for the most part the default mappings are really intuitive, especially as far as the 4 buttons are concerned. For my own tastes I've changed the defaults somewhat to something better suited to me (eg left shoulder + 'B' to shove, dpad up/down with no modifier goes straight to the lobby and right thumb press registers, along with a few others). I'll probably still think of left as check/fold though (although I have now completely gotten used to calling a shove with 'B' so I'm getting there!)


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Moving on to the actual issue, whilst exploring the MTT table-change focus crap, I think I've uncovered methods to prevent these dialogs from even being created. That's basically the holy grail. I'm not going to promise that, since I'm not positive that I can deliver. And it's not anything I'm going to work on now, since I have a lot of other more important things to implement first. But, I just wanted to say that I think it is possible to eliminate it entirely.
Sounds exciting! I'm not a programmer as I may have mentioned, and only have a layman's understanding of how one would go about coding something like this, but in my "head in the clouds" world of guessing how you may accomplish something like that I'd guess that maybe you could write some sort of firewall or sentry app that monitored all the packets coming in from Pokerstars. Once you had established the correct pattern to look out for every time it sent a table change notification, you could effectively block those packets from reaching the client app and therefore the dialogue box would never even be drawn. I may be a million miles off with my understanding of how all this stuff works so I don't even know if Stars sends that kind of data downstream, or if so whether it would be even remotely decodable. I'm guessing "no" because no doubt their whole data stream in encrypted

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Another thing I can do is make Hjälper smart enough to see if you're in a situation where checking would be free and making the decision to click the middle button instead. That adds complexity, but I'm going to need the relevant code to implement some other features (and it's partially written already), so I may go that route in the future, too.
Great!

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Or, you could just adapt.
And miss out on my chance for a Darwin award?


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Switching to tables in a certain direction (up/down/left/right—potentially 45° increments, too) doesn't make sense when you stack. I know that switch right switches back and forth between two tables, but I don't see that as a bug, since those controls are useless if you stack. Make sense?
Look like you've already covered this in the latest beta release, so it's kind of redundant of me to say that I'd still see a function similar to the one I described as having a purpose even when stacking. Thanks for going to the effort of coding it!


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That's a perfectly reasonable concern for both of us. I'll comment on that at a later date when I've made more concrete decisions.
Cool. I've no doubt that whatever you decide shall be perfectly reasonable - it'd just be nice to see a few things in black and white before committing to buy



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Yep, the saved position thing is easy to add. I'll do that. With respect to Apply, I'm not sure what to do about that. Right now when preferences are open, all of the keyboard hotkeys and whatnot are disabled and don't get reenabled until you click OK. The Xbox bindings aren't affected by that, though. Perhaps it's good enough for now if I just implement the saved position part? Then you can check the bindings and I don't have to worry about the keyboard hotkey implications.
Thank you!


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That's bad. Finnisher is having (what sounds like) similar issues, which go away when HMHud isn't running. We've not yet been able to figure out a solution. Are you using the live tracking feature? If you are, I'd try disabling it and see if that improves things. It's also nice to know if the issue goes away entirely if HMHud isn't running, but I know it's difficult for anyone to play without it.
Hopefully I can set your mind at rest somewhat on this. I believe the system freezes were a result of some weird SATA issue I was having while a GPT drive was connected to the system. I am still noticing some general system sluggishness however in terms of window redraws - not only is dragging a window quite a laggy affair, but with >16 or so tables open I'm physically seeing the buttons being drawn on the tables - they kind of "swipe" into existence in a left>right motion that takes about 300-500ms. I'm assuming once again that this is just the result of me having an older GPU, but tbh I don't remember experiencing this pre-Hjalper either. Of course, this could just be because I'm now playing a few more tables thanks to Hjalper, so idk.

Also, I'd just like to re-iterate that I was still experiencing some weird focus issues that would occasionally require me to click on a table in order to restore control to the Xbox360 controller. As of right now I think the most likely culprit is a table popping up requiring action at exactly the same moment that a new game is loaded. I'll keep an eye out for it in my next set and try to confirm.



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This is with v1.0.0.16 or v1.0.0.17? I guess it has to be. I'm feeling very confident about that particular focus fix, but I admit it does need more testing. (And it is so ridiculously time consuming to test. ) Since you mentioned actually seeing the dialogs briefly, it could be that I need to increase a timeout value for slower systems. I'll see if I can stick that into preferences somewhere so you can crank it up higher and see if that fixes it.
Yeah, after upgrading to 1.0.0.17 I have yet to re-experience that problem , so hopefully your fix worked. Thanks!


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I'm sure this is related to the graphics yet again. Are you running with Aero turned on? That helps tremendously and, honestly, I'm surprised that an 8400GS isn't keeping up. I'll make the timeouts configurable and we'll see if raising them helps with this on your PC.
Yep, Aero is on. Desktop Composition enabled. Window animation and window shadows disabled.


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No, I appreciate the input a lot. I want it to be perfect for you and me and most everyone in the target market, i.e. true grinders. (I'm okay with it being imperfect for a few outliers with really strange requests—I can't please everyone). I don't accept good enough—at least in the long term. Pragmatism forces me to accept it in the short term, but I'm not happy about it!
Cool - glad we're on the same page with that one

Thanks again for the latest Beta release - can't wait to give it a try and see what happens!!
07-11-2010 , 07:01 PM
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Originally Posted by _dave_
Played my first session today with a working hjalper, pretty slick!
Glad we got everything sorted out and got you on board! (FWIW if anyone has a file named "PokerStars.log" (not .0 or .1) sitting around from 2005, delete that; keeps Hjälper from finding "PokerStars.log.0")

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Originally Posted by HAY GUYS
Yep, the saved position thing is easy to add. I'll do that.
I knew I forgot something easy in the last build. It's in .19 now.

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Originally Posted by Gazillion
Sounds exciting! I'm not a programmer as I may have mentioned, and only have a layman's understanding of how one would go about coding something like this, but in my "head in the clouds" world of guessing how you may accomplish something like that I'd guess that maybe you could write some sort of firewall or sentry app that monitored all the packets coming in from Pokerstars. Once you had established the correct pattern to look out for every time it sent a table change notification, you could effectively block those packets from reaching the client app and therefore the dialogue box would never even be drawn. I may be a million miles off with my understanding of how all this stuff works so I don't even know if Stars sends that kind of data downstream, or if so whether it would be even remotely decodable. I'm guessing "no" because no doubt their whole data stream in encrypted
Pure fantasy

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Originally Posted by HAY GUYS
Just set it to 0ms (type it in, as the up/down arrow stops at 25ms) and work your way up. It doesn't crash PokerStars or make anything unstable. You just get an annoying dialog box (screenshot of it is in prefs window) to dismiss. It doesn't even impact the grind since it's not preventing other tables from popping up. Just an annoyance.

I have an 8600GTS, not a modern champ by any standards. I was running at 0ms for a long time, but would occasionally get that error when I was running over 30 tables. Now I use 10ms and it hasn't come up since.
Don't set it that low if you're using HMHud. I've been reprimanded for suggesting 0ms.

I've just released Hjälper 1.0.0.19.

Changes:
  • Location of preferences window is saved and restored just for Gazillion
  • Fixed bug where mouse binding with "Over Active Table Only" selected did not work if the cursor was over a child control (i.e. chat control, bet slider, etc.) (thanks Bobix; cool bug report, bro)
07-11-2010 , 09:50 PM
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Originally Posted by HAY GUYS
Should effectively act like this now. Actually keeping track of action order gets complicated for certain scenarios.
What hotkey setting do I use for it to act like that? None of Table left/right/up/down are doing it for me.
07-11-2010 , 11:08 PM
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Originally Posted by Sly Caveat
What hotkey setting do I use for it to act like that? None of Table left/right/up/down are doing it for me.
Two new commands: switch to next table and switch to previous table.
07-12-2010 , 08:38 AM
do we have rough timeline yet on when a final product is going to be launched yet? last i heard was 7/1 any new dates? thx....
07-14-2010 , 07:55 PM
ok here is an easy one, allow the left shoulder to be assigned a command and create a command to assign to the left shoulder (or any button?) to be the modifier?
07-15-2010 , 06:37 AM
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Originally Posted by pokerpurfect
do we have rough timeline yet on when a final product is going to be launched yet? last i heard was 7/1 any new dates? thx....
I'm not going to pull a Duke Nukem Forever with this, but I'm not entirely sure at what point to declare it final. I still have some features to implement that users requested be included in a final release.

If you're holding off to try it until then, I'd encourage you to try it in its current state. As far as I know, the current version, 1.0.0.19, is perfectly stable. The only reason it's still "beta" is because not all of the features are there yet.

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Originally Posted by BillytheKidd
ok here is an easy one, allow the left shoulder to be assigned a command and create a command to assign to the left shoulder (or any button?) to be the modifier?
OK, I wrote part of the code with this kind of flexibility in mind, and then totally dropped the ball with it later. The choice of modifiers is completely arbitrary, but what I have written at the moment isn't flexible enough to allow it. But, it is something that I should do, and hopefully it's something that can be done when I rewrite the awful preferences window.

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Originally Posted by HAY GUYS
Moving on to the actual issue, whilst exploring the MTT table-change focus crap, I think I've uncovered methods to prevent these dialogs from even being created. That's basically the holy grail. I'm not going to promise that, since I'm not positive that I can deliver. And it's not anything I'm going to work on now, since I have a lot of other more important things to implement first. But, I just wanted to say that I think it is possible to eliminate it entirely.
Um, yeah...I've got this now. And it's beautiful. But it's a lot more complex than what is already in place and I need to test it more before I'm going to stick it out in public, even as a beta. So, it'll be a bit.

So, I'm still working on the remaining features and I'll ship those out when I've got something worth testing. I'll also probably crank out a 1.0.0.20 in a day or two with just a couple minor changes.
07-15-2010 , 09:45 PM
Hjälper 1.0.0.20.
  • Fixed crash with clicking "sit out" at regular speed cash tables when asked to post BB (thanks crazyfist)
  • Removed arbitrary maximum highlight border thickness
  • Added "Check for Latest Version" to context menu

      
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