[fred]

New features in 4.2.4 follow. If you find the first few entries in this list to be boring, please keep reading, because the last entry in the list is a big one.

- Norwegian language support added
- You can now right-click on any name in the chat area (including your own and your partner's)
- You can hit the F10 key at any time to see right-click menu for yourself
- I think I have fixed the bug that caused weird names to appear in people's friends lists. If you don't know what I am talking about, don't worry about it. If you do see weird names appear in your friends lists when using 4.2.4, please let me know!
- I think I have fixed the bug that caused BBO to behave strangely the first time it was installed on PCs with non-English versions of Windows. Some people reported this in a previous forums post, but I have not been able to test it properly. If you don't know what I am talking about, don't worry about it. If you have seen this before, please let me know if you see it with 4.2.4!
- (The big one) You will see a new button in the Play Bridge! area and on the menu that appears when you right click on your own name. This button says "Help me find a game!". Right now when you click it, nothing will happen. In a day or 2 the server will be ready to support this function. Then you will see something happen.

The biggest complaint we get from new members and from people who just want to play with random strangers is that it is too hard to find and join a suitable table in the Main Bridge Club. This new function will automate that process. To begin with you will receive 2 choices when you click this button:

1) Find a table to kibitz at
2) Find a table to play at

If you select 1) you will be taken to the table with the most kibitzers. Later we will make this process more sophisticated and given the user options that he can use to select a table to kibitz at.

If you select 2) and there is an empty seat at a table with no "permission to play" option set, you will be taken to that seat. When 4 people have selected 2) the server will automatically create a new table and sit those 4 people at the table.

Eventually we will add options like:

- what form of scoring would you prefer?
- what skill level of partner/opps would you prefer?
- what countries you would prefer your partner/opps to come from?
- etc...

None of these sorts of changes will involve new versions of the client. We can implement them on the server side as time permits without having to burden our members with new versions.

We are very excited about this new feature. Hope you don't mind waiting a day or 2 until the server is ready for you to try it.

Note to translators: There are new words and phrases that need translation!

We are hoping to do a release to the general membership by autoupgrade within the next week or so. Please help us to ensure that the version we release has no serious problems by testing 4.2.4 and reporting any bugs you find to fred@bridgebase.com. Thanks in advance for your help!

Instructions for upgrading to 4.2.4 follow.:

You can upgrade to 4.2.4 at:

Click here to update!

or download everything (including all the latest files) at:

Click here for everything!

I suggest you use the first method, but however you do this, please make sure you exit the BBO program COMPLETELY before you start the download process.

Fred Gitelman
Bridge Base Inc.
www.bridgebase.com