World of Card Games

The server was just down for a couple minutes, to deploy a bug fix. A few people reported that they were getting sent to tables that were "frozen." This should now be fixed... many thanks to the people who reported this issue!

It has been almost a month since the "replace robots" feature was introduced to World of Card Games, only to be removed when a bug was uncovered. Today this feature was reintroduced. I think the bug has been fixed... Give it a try! And please let me know if you experience any issues with this new feature. For more info about how it works, visit the "replace robots" blog post.

[Edit Feb 14 2014: another bug occurred on the same day which caused serious problems, so the replace robots feature has been removed once again. I'll be working to fix it, and it should return in the future.]

The server was out for a few minutes this morning while it got a bug fix update.

Sometimes a blank table would appear when clicking into the Hearts game. This bug has been fixed. Please let me know if you see anything like this again!

Also, the robot strategy in Euchre has been tweaked. Previously, if a robot went alone, it had the habit of leading with a low trump card. That's a bad strategy, since the low card would be more likely to get trumped on the first round. This has been fixed.

Thanks to everyone for reporting bugs, and flaws in the robot strategy. There's still a lot of work to do, but improvements will come over time. Meantime, enjoy the games!

World of Card Games got some updates for minor bug fixes this morning. For example, a bug sometimes caused the table info to be displayed incorrectly; that was fixed. Also, if your turn times out when playing Spades, as you probably know, the computer will play a card for you. Previously, if you had bid nil, the computer's unwise choice could cause you to lose your bid. This has been corrected so that the first few times that you timeout, a better card is picked.

In addition, five new avatars have been added. Enjoy!

A few changes were applied to World of Card Games this morning. Seven new avatars have been added! There's a snowboarder, a skier, and more... Check them out by clicking on the "Avatar" link in the upper left corner.


In addition, the "Options" panel has been made a bit larger and is now contained within its own dialog. Previously, it was confined to the space reserved for each game panel. You can see the old "Options" panel in my post about the "no robots" option. Here's a screenshot of the new "Options" panel:
I hope this makes it easier to change options for those with small screen sizes. Please let me know if you have any trouble with the new dialog.

Finally, a bug fix was applied to Euchre. Several players noticed that robots never "go alone," and pointed that out to me. This has now been fixed.

Thanks to everyone who sends me feedback! I'll keep working to fine-tune the site so that it's easier to use for everyone.

Over the last couple days, a few players at World of Card Games told me that they were unable to play a game there. They'd get to the main page, and the game panels were not displayed. It was sporadic - in my case, it only happened a couple times. Turns out it was caused by a bug that was introduced in my previous update. I fixed it and the site should be working fine now! I'm sorry I had to shut down the site again - I hate to chase people away when they're playing a long game of Hearts or Spades!

Another player told me that starting last week, they were unable to play the game because their "Custom Cursor" (the green pointer) had disappeared. It turns out that there's a new version of the Windows browser out, Internet Explorer 11, and this version does not handle animated cursors like the site's "Custom Cursor." I've also solved this problem. I didn't actually fix it; I just set the cursor to the default (little white pointer) in all browsers except for Chrome, where it's working reliably.

A player at World of Card Games reported that some people were accidentally leaving tables. They would sit at a table, try to click the "chat log" link to see what had been going on, and then accidentally hit the nearby "leave table" link.


I've moved the links around in the lower left corner, so hopefully this will not happen anymore! As you can see in the screenshot above, the "chat log" link is now far away from the "leave table" link.

In addition, you can now view the chat log without it scrolling down constantly as more players chat. To do so, you will need to open the chat log, and hold onto the scrollbar with your mouse. As long as you've got your mouse down on the scrollbar, the chat log will stay where you've got it.

Finally, there was a bug which caused the screen to appear blank if the zoom level had been set low. It looked as though the site was gone! This has been fixed now.

The server was down for about 10 minutes this morning, during which time I applied some bug fixes. If you've been noticing a message about your browser "zoom" level not being set correctly, that was probably a bug. Zoom detection has been removed, since it's not working reliably in all browsers.

The site looks better if your browser zoom level is set to 100% (the default). If the zoom level is set too low (less than 75% zoom), the web page does not show up at all - you'll just see a blank page. I will look into developing a warning for such situations. Meantime, if you see a blank page when you hit the site, you should check your browser's zoom level. If you don't know how to do this, feel free to write me. My email address is marya@worldofcardgames.com.

I got a few reports that the "Custom Cursor" setting was broken. This has been fixed, and the server was updated this morning with the change. Please let me know if you have any more issues with this.

In a little more detail: the mouse pointer on your screen usually looks like a white arrow. The "Custom Cursor" is an ornate version of that mouse pointer. See the screenshot below for a look:

The "Custom Cursor" is shown inside and to the right of the green circled area.

Sometimes, this feature can cause performance problems. If you have any trouble with it, you can turn it off and switch back to using the white-arrow mouse pointer. You do this by clicking on your user name (or Guest #) in the upper right corner, which opens your profile settings. Just uncheck "Custom Cursor" to turn it off.

The related bug caused the "Custom Cursor" to turn back on unintentionally. So if you were having this problem, you shouldn't see it happen anymore.

This morning, I updated World of Card Games with a change that many people won't notice. But others may see a big difference!

The site had a bug - it consumed computer resources, but did not release them when it was done with them. In technical terms, it had a "memory leak." It was only noticeable on certain computer systems. Over the last week, I was able to isolate the problem and solve it. My tests indicate that it's now gone.

I've had reports from some players who say that the site "freezes" when they're playing - it sounds very frustrating. I suspect that their problem was caused by this memory leak. I hope this new change fixes it!

If you have more problems with "freezing" - please let me know.

I've gotten a number of complaints about the robot players at World of Card Games. For various reasons, some people would simply prefer to play at a table where robots are forbidden. (If you're a Star Wars fan, you'll get my reference when I say this reminds me of the Mos Eisley Cantina.)

Now there's a new option which will make such players happy! To use it, click on the "Options" button for your card game. The "Options" button is found in the lower left corner of each gold frame which surrounds the name of your card game. When you click it, you'll find that there's a new option called "Bots" (shorthand for "robots"). If you click the "No" radio button, you will be seated at a table where robots cannot be invited.

Keep in mind that there's a drawback to this option. It may take longer for your table to be filled with players, since some other players may have chosen "Yes," and you will never be seated at their table, even if it has openings.

The most flexible option to choose is "Either" - this seats you at any type of table (with regards to robots). This is the default option.


Aside from this new feature, there are a few minor changes.

There were some bugs related to "Going Alone" in Euchre which have now been fixed.

There are also a few new avatars, with an emphasis on marsupials, in a salute to our Australian friends!

PS - a little problem occurred during the update this afternoon which caused some players to be unable to log in. This has been fixed. Please let me know if you experience any new issues after the latest update.

Several people reported to me over the past few days that the cards were disappearing for players, so they couldn't play their hand, and the computer played for them. Frustrating!

I was only able to reproduce this problem when the browser had been refreshed. When I did that, it happened a lot!

Once I could reproduce it, it wasn't too difficult to figure out the problem, and apply a fix to the site. That happened this morning (around 6:45 EDT), which is why the server went down for a brief period.

Let's hope this bug is gone for good!

I've been working on a few new features for World of Card Games over the last two weeks. This morning, I deployed the changes to the server. You should see them live today.

First, the fun feature - there are eight new avatars! I've had a few emails from people who would like to have some different avatars - in particular female ones - and it seemed like a good idea to me, too. You can see a couple of examples to the left and right of this blog post. To see the other new ones, go to World of Card Games and click on the Avatar link in the upper left corner. In addition to the avatars shown here, we now have a Businesswoman, a Scientist, a Doctor, a Runner, a Tennis Player, and a Weightlifter.

I've also added a profanity filter. This is something that's been requested a lot, which a bummer. But it's to be expected; the internet is the wild wild west, after all. The filter is turned on by default. If you prefer your chats uncensored, you can easily turn it off by unchecking the "Profanity Filter" option under Settings. Oh yeah, you can find your Settings in the upper right-hand corner of the page - just click on your username to open this panel.

Last but not least, a user pointed out to me that there was a bug in the scoring of Euchre. Yikes! A big "Thank You!" goes out to the player who reported this. Previously, when "going alone," if a player won three or four tricks, they'd be given two points. In fact they should only have been awarded one point. These are the rules according to the Pagat page on Euchre (true for both British and North American rules).

I've got more changes in store for the site; these ones are just dipping my toe in the water, so to speak. As usual, feedback is welcome!