Hi all,

Im trying to build a calculator to calculate hand vs. range equities for non-standard games. Like hilo games with a 7 qualifier, and community card games, where more than 2 hole cards can be played.

I have no real experience programming. I'm not afraid of putting in the time, but I can't seem to find the right place to start. I've been to codingthewheel.com and i've downloaded some source code from XPokerEval, and I've also downloaded Visual studio 2010. I've taken some online tutorials to learn Python.

If someone could suggest a brief outline of how to attack this problem, I would much appreciate it.

I need to know:

1) Is this even realistic?
2) What language should I use
3) What programs do I need
4) Is there existing code that would make this easier, and how do I use it?
5) Is it necessary to learn an entire language from scratch, or can I learn a few tricks to tweak existing code to meet my needs.

Sorry if this is the wrong place to ask. I'm just really confused on where to begin.

Thanks for reading.

For computaionally intense stuff such as calculators, Python might not be your best choice, since its a little sluggish. Alot of pre-existing code such as poker-eval and what you find at coding the wheel is also written in C/C++ so as far as languages go, maybe try that or a language like C# that easily connects to c++. Although to start learning how to program Python might be an easier choice.

If you take the language route of C# or C++ Visual studio is pretty much all the tools you need. In addition helpful stuff would be code already written such as poker-eval, XPokerEval and some other stuff you might find at codingthewheel.

AS far as realistic goes, it depends on your skill and/or the amount of time youre willing to spend. If you havent done any serious development before and youre looking to learn, start with a simpler problem. Think of a simpler poker variant and code for that first, for example.

Before coding just make sure you break down the game you plan to write, such that you have a clear view of what your program really needs to be able to do, break your program down into bite sized chunks and handle them one by one, to the extent its possible. For any serious project planning is everything. You start coding without a real idea of what your program is going to look like and you are virtually guaranteed to fail. Also of course before starting any coding check to see whats out there. poker-eval might for example already be able to do alot of the stuff youre looking to do.