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Wait no longer, the new BBO Discussion Forum is coming soon! We're planning for this upgrade next Tuesday, Oct 19. To prepare for the new software upgrade, the current forum will be closed starting from 2 AM Eastern Time, Oct 19, and lasting from 12 to 16 hours, depending on how well things go. During the conversion duration, the current old forum may be available read-only some of the time. This means, count on current forum being down or read-only, Tuesday Oct 19, 2 AM EST to 2 PM EST at a minimum.
Some of the changes to look forward to:
-BBOers no longer need to sign up for a different discussion forum username. You will now be able to use your BBO login information to login to the forum. Once again, we urge existing active forum goers who think they may have a conflict, to contact us. We think there's a way to help almost everyone switch names smoothly, but only if given notice.
-Handviewer editor and viewer is integrated into the new forum, so hands are much easier to create, and the resulting hand will look great. All old posts using the old hand code will be converted as best as we can to use the better looking Handviewer.
-The new forum is professionally designed. Really! It looks quite trendy now.
-When using your mobile phone, there's a mobile optimized skin.
-Search is updated. The forum software company called this "Powerful search". It's now much easier to use, and returns better results.
-RSS/Twitter: There's RSS capability, though we're going to start with a bare-bones version of RSS for now (calendar feed only). If enough BBOers ask for this, we will be able to easily add RSS feeds. There is also an integrated "Tweeter" thingy so your Triends will know you are busy thinking about important matters like Bridge.
-You can have a friends list in the new forum. No, friends list is not identical to your BBO friends list - this is a forum friends list.
-Reputation and topic rating - you will also be able to rate topics and users.
-Moderators - there are some significant changes in the moderator interface. It rates to be more intuitive than before, and mods can do the same things they could. PM or email please if you need help figuring out the new moderator interface.
-There are probably some other less obvious changes that may pop up in the future. The overall look is rather different, even if content is the same.
We've taken every precaution to make sure transition is smooth. But if you see bugs and weird shenanigans, please report them.
One last big change, the "new" name: BBO Discussion Forum.
Some BBO articles referred to the forums as the "Discussion Board", and some others, as "The Forum". Which is correct? Fret no more, we've decided upon the compromise solution, and the forum will now be called the BBO Discussion Forum, so whatever permutations of this name will now be correct.
We just hope you call it, your Bridge home.
