New Go Server, with Ladder Tournament - Looking for Feedback

[Ravi]

Happy New Year to Everyone. I would like to announce a new Go Server -- http://www.funnode.com/games/go

The server, although still in beta, has been online for several months now. We have accepted a lot of feedback over this time to improve the user experience and the site as a whole. We are at a point where the server is stable and ready to take on a substantial load. Thus, we would like to invite anyone and everyone to play a game or two on the server and let us know what you think about the site -- We appreciate all comments/criticism.

Here are a few things http://www.funnode.com/games/go has to offer:

- Ladder Tournament!
- Totally free (no premium / pay-to-play garbage)
- Easy signup (although you don't need an account to play!)
- Completely HTML5 / CSS3 / Javascript
--- i.e., nothing to install and works on most smartphones and tablets
--- i.e., "instant play" (no refreshing or opening new tabs/windows)
- Play Humans or Bots (fuego and GnuGo)
- 9x9, 13x13, and 19x19 Boards
- Chinese and Japanese scoring
- Handicaps from 0 to 9
- "Undo Move" and "Offer Draw" options available
- Personalized Player Pages to keep track of Ratings and Ranks
- Fully functioning Review System
- Private Games (useful for teaching)
- All games are Saved - Reviewable and Downloadable in SGF format
- Chatting allowed Globally, In-Game, while Spectating, and while Reviewing
--- offline and private chatting also available

Please feel free to leave comments/criticism either here, in the chat windows, or the forums (http://www.funnode.com/forums). Thank You!

[msgreg]

It looks like the correct link is with lowercase "go"

[Ravi]

It looks like the correct link is with lowercase "go"

Oops .. sorry. Thanks for pointing it out msgreg - I fixed the link.

[EdLee]

Ravi, thank you! Feature requests:

- Option to enlarge the board to full-screen (not the zoom-in feature in browser)
- Sound clicks for the stones (Firefox)
- Change chime sound to regular stone click sounds (on Chrome and IE8)
- Canadian Time control (example: 1 minute + 30 minutes/20 moves)
- Much longer time control for Byoyomi (much longer than 30 min + N*10 seconds; there should be no limit)
- Allow both upper- and lower-case letters in "your message" (currently, everything is forced to be lowercase)
- Option to toggle co-ordinates
- Remove the letter 'i' from the X co-ordinates (standard on IGS,KGS,MultiGo,SmartGo,L19,Kaya...
...but the Korean and Chinese servers keep 'i', and they also number 1..19 the opposite direction)
- After the final scoring result, there is no "OK" button to close the results window -- I had to refresh the tab to get out.
- After 'Start new game', there is also no way to close the window. No "Close" button to back out of the New Game window.

[Ravi]

Thanks for the suggestions Edlee .. we've made substantial changes to the server since your last visit. As for your suggestions:

- (In Progress) Option to enlarge the board to full-screen (not the zoom-in feature in browser)
- (Done) Sound clicks for the stones (Firefox)
- (Done) Change chime sound to regular stone click sounds (on Chrome and IE8)
- (Considering) Canadian Time control (example: 1 minute + 30 minutes/20 moves)
- (Considering) Much longer time control for Byoyomi (much longer than 30 min + N*10 seconds; there should be no limit)
- (Done) Allow both upper- and lower-case letters in "your message" (currently, everything is forced to be lowercase)
- (Considering) Option to toggle co-ordinates

- We're going to leave the letter 'i' in the X co-ordinates for now -- we don't really see it being an issue atm.
- The popup divs can be closed by clicking anywhere outside of those divs -- this applies to the final scoring result and the 'Start new game' divs

[daal]

It would be nice if the board didn't jump around after each move.

I didn't get a score at the end of the game (with a bot), and after passing I was disconnected and couldn't get back to the game.

[Ravi]

Thank You for your feedback daal ..

- (Done) Option to enlarge the board to full-screen (not the zoom-in feature in browser)
- (In Progress) The board jumping is a bug that only seems to happen in Google Chrome - we are trying to resolve this ASAP.
- (Done) We have fixed the bug with the end-game score. The disconnect was because the server was restarted after your game for some updates - Sorry about that.

[Ravi]

Some more updates ..

- (Done) longer time control (increased max from 30 min to 60 min)
- (Done) The board jumping bug that was occurring in Google Chrome is now fixed.

We have also added a Requests Page that will allow players to request features/games and report bugs -- http://www.funnode.com/requests

[Tommie]

- make it possible to delete a game with a wrong (i.e. unwished) timesetting before the first move (has been played).

- "Too many active connections already" is the message I do see since 24 hours.

- "Players Waiting: 1" BUT I cannot join the game, probably because the other player is long gone already (24h). Hence, I suggest to cancel such 'open games' after a deliberate time.

- "Players Online: 5" - can I see them ? Who are they ? Make it click- or hoover-able.

- the screen with the automatic score (i.e. computer opponent resigned) cannot be clicked away. How to go back to the game? How to review it? By opening a new tab (?) and searching for the website funnode... again? [firefox under windows]

- how to view and evaluate other people's play? The only clickable item is the red game number. Clicking results in a frozen tab.



- a day hereafter, the "Too many active connections already"-message has gone, but a "Could not find username .. try refreshing the page?." persists (despite being already logged-in persists.

[Ravi]

Thanks for the suggestions Tommie ..

- The "Too many active connections already" is a message you receive if you have more than 3 active connections (tabs) for the same game. We've also noticed that older versions of Internet Explorer lose connection to the server when the tab/window isn't active.

- If you click on "Players Online" beside the Leaderboard, you can view the list of online players.

- All popups can be closed by simply clicking outside of the popup. This applies to the end-game popup with the score.

- You can watch and review games by click on the appropriate buttons.

[Ravi]

Thanks for the suggestions Tommie ..

- The "Too many active connections already" is a message you receive if you have more than 3 active connections (tabs) for the same game. We've also noticed that older versions of Internet Explorer lose connection to the server when the tab/window isn't active.

- If you click on "Players Online" beside the Leaderboard, you can view the list of online players.

- All popups can be closed by simply clicking outside of the popup. This applies to the end-game popup with the score.

- You can watch and review games by click on the appropriate buttons.

- (Considering) make it possible to cancel a game before the first move has been played.

[Ravi]

We have just finished redoing the entire Go Board from scratch! It is crisper-looking, faster-to-load, and an overall improvement from the previous board .. Enjoy

[Ravi]

Hey Tommie ..

- (Done) Games that end with less than 3 moves played are cancelled, and do not affect either player's rating.

[Ravi]

We have invested in a bigger and better server to host FunNode. Come check us out now! http://www.funnode.com/games/go

[palapiku]

Three things caught my attention because they suggest that funnode programmers are not very familiar with the game:

* Letter 'i' on the board
* Lack of proper Go ranks
* Chess-like format of the "Review Game" record, although I'm assuming that's just a placeholder.