OakinghamBridge Club Dealing Process11/4/2014

1. General Process

The club has a PlayBridgeDealer4 dealing machine and 6 sets of boards, and will use the supplied Dealer4 software for generating, analyzing and dealing hands. The website is The overall process for managing the dealt hands is:

  1. Initially 6 sets of boards are dealt. The setscoloured (2 dark green, 2 blue, 1 black and 1 orange) to aid identification. They are held at the club, ready for play. The aim is to have enough dealt boards to cover a two week absence by the Dealer.
  2. The Dealer has the dealing machine at home, attached to his own PC and produces two sets per week, delivering to the club once a week and taking the used boards back home for dealing.
  3. The Dealer uses the Dealing Process described below. After Dealing they email the new .pbn files to the webmaster as soon as possible, so that the files can be put on the website. These files will not be visible until the results have been uploaded but they will then be immediately visible. Neither the webmaster nor the Dealer must view the files.
  4. The Dealer packs each setinto a basket for delivery, together with a sealed envelope containing a printout of the hands on which they write the date on which the hands are due to be played and the colour of the boards in the format yyyymmdd <board colour> (eg “20130816 dark green”). The printout is for emergency use only, but the label identifies the session when the boards will be played.
  5. At the Wednesday or Friday session the Director locates the board set which is labelled with the current date and uses those boards:
  6. You must not open (or allow anyone else to open) the sealed envelope unless deemed necessary to reassemble a hand when cards have been dropped etc.
  7. If the date on the envelope is correct, but the colour of the boards does not match that written on the envelope, then use that set, but see also paragraph d below.
  8. If for some reason, the correct board set cannot be found, pleaseuse the set with the date which is thefurthest from the current date - so that we have time to replace that board set.latest date.
  9. If there has been a problem (b or c above), you shouldannounce that it’s possible the hand records won’t immediately match the hands being played. Youmust also inform the Webmaster and Dealer as soon as possible and tell them which boards were played so that the correct hands can be put onto the website and so that the Dealer can create a replacement set of boards for the future date.
  10. After the session the Director returns the boards to the basket in two stacks, 1-16 & 17-32, and all facing the same way. This helps the Dealer to deal the boards more easily. The envelope containing the printed hand record should also be included.

2. Dealing Process

Remove the Dealing Plate before dealing into boards

The machine is shipped with the Dealing Platform in place. This has to be removed for dealing into the boards. Lift the guard plate by turning the small silver knob at the plug-in side of the unit, on the opposite edge to the connectors. Slide out the Dealing Platform and then put the guard plate back down. You can now get the dealing boards into the space.

Set Up

This allows you to set a number of functions as default settings. From the Main Menugo to “Setup” and “Preferences” on the drop down menu. Select “Last Board in Set” = 32, “Use BigDeal only”, “Use Bo Haglund DDS”. (BO’s is the default). Leave other setting as their defaults.

Creating a Deal

  1. Click on“File”and a drop down menu appears, select“New”
  2. A new screen appears, advising the number of boards to be dealt; this can be changed but should normally be set to 32.Click the “Generate Boards using BigDeal” button. This will quickly generate the hands, telling you how many in the bottom left. Now just go to click on“Exit” which you will findat the bottom of the screen, returning you to the main screen
  3. Select the Analyze menu. It will take a few seconds for the full set of hands to be analyzed.
  4. Now fill in “Event Name”= Pairs (or, exceptionally, Teams), “Event Site” = Oakingham, “Event Date” = the date the boards are to be played in the format yyyymmdd (eg 20130816 for 16 Aug 2013). This information will be included in any subsequent print-out of the hands.
  5. Now select File/Saveand on the next screen:

a)Choose the folder where you wish to save the file in the top “Save in” box. (If you haven’t already done so, create a folder called something like “Dealer4 deals” within your “My Documents” folder before proceeding).

b)Type a filename of yyyymmdd <board colour> (eg “20130816 dark green”) in the “File name” box.

c)In the “Save as type box select “pbn” by clicking the downward arrow at the end of the box & selecting the “pbn(*.pbn)” option. (You must choose to save as a pbn file otherwise some data will be lost). Note that once selected, “pbn” becomes the default.

d)Click on the “Save” box. You now have a saved record of the deal (plus analysis) and can retrieve it by selecting File/Load at any time in the future.

More on Analysis

There are two analysing systems. The first is the Deep Finesse system which has been around for years and as a result is well trusted around the world; unfortunately it is ratherslow. The second system from Bo Haglund does a similar high quality job but much faster – We will use Bo Haglund, hence it’s set as a default.

The analysis shows itself in the bottom right corner of the Dealing Screen (assuming this has been made visible – which it should not be if you’re going to play in the session), just below the hand that is being dealt and of course appears in the same place on the Hand Record when printed.

Dealing Directly into Boards

Always ensure red packs of cards are put in odd numbered boards and blue in even numbered ones. Put 2 decks of cards in the hopper. This gives sufficient weight to the cards to allow efficient dealing. (If you are using new cards, please remove the Jokers, you would be surprised at how many people don’t.). Go to the Main Menuof Dealer4.Then:

  1. Select “Deal”at the top of the main Dealer4 screen.
  2. The next screen is the Dealing Screen, it will automatically come up as a blind deal but you can see the deal by pressing“Show Boards”. You must not view the boards if you intend to play during the session!
  3. Ensure the “Automatically start dealing when a board is inserted” and the “Check Board Number” options are ticked (at the bottom of the screen).
  4. Insert the dealing board into the machine. Dealing should start automatically. If not, click on the “Deal” button, or press the start button on the front of the machine.
  5. Take the dealt cards out and put another deck in the hopper and off you go, the second deal will appear and will be dealt when you insert the board.
  6. When the last deal of a set is finished a message will appear on the screen asking if you want to finish dealing or start the set again. Choose finish, unless for some reason we ever need to produce an identical set of boards.

Dealing Screen – other settings

Down the right hand side of the Dealing Screen you will find a range of settings, for instance Jumbo Print (for the poor sighted players) or various national card designs, just click to choose but for the majority of users you will find Standard or Normal settings are all you need.

Under the dealing section you will see a range of buttons that allow you to manually move backwards and forwards through the set of deals, these are self explanatory. You will also notice 4 green squares under NEWS, within these squares is the number 13, when you start to deal these squares turn red and the cards are counted in, when they turn green you have successfully dealt 13 cards into each hand. Under the green squares are four blue squares, these will show the High Card Points when the dealt hand is shown and will turn off if you choose to perform blind dealing.

Print Hand Record

Return to Main Menu and select “Print”. Print off one copy of the hands in case the Director needs to consult it if hands are mixed up during play. Set “Print Hand Records to printer”, uncheck “Color printing”, “Print Analysis”, “Print HCP”. Set “Boards per Page” to 18. Set “Number of copies” to 1. Once set, these settings should remain in place for the next time. Put the print-out into a sealed envelope and label the envelope with the file name of the pbn file which you saved earlier.Place the envelope in the board carrier, firmly between the two piles of boards. The Director will use the name on the envelope to determine which set of boards to use.

Website

The Dealer should email the .pbn file to the webmaster as soon as possible, so that the file can be put on the website. The file will not be visible until the results have been uploaded but they will then be immediately visible.

Common Dealing Problems

If any of the following messages are be displayed, there is usually a simple reason:

  1. “Incorrect board inserted” – Check that you have inserted to correct board. If you have, then the message can be caused by a misaligned or damaged barcode board number. (It’s the barcode which the dealing machine reads). It can also be caused if there is insufficient contrast between the barcode markings and the board itself. The black boards are particularly prone to this. In both these cases, just carry on by dealing into that board. If it’s the wrong board, put in the correct board and make sure you deal the correct colour set of cards into it.
  2. “Card Recognition Error” – This is usually caused by a card which has been inserted into the pack upside-down. To correct, lift out all the cards in the hopper and check for the bottom card(s) being face-up. Then put all the cards back in the hopper and carry on. The dealing machine will carry on successfully from the point at which it stopped.
  3. “Card Feeding Error” – This may be caused by a lack of weight in the feed hopper (eg you’ve only added one pack, not the recommended two packs). It can also be caused by a bent or damaged card; in this case try to flatten the card (especially the edge), or turn it round so that the damaged edge is away from the input slot. In extremis, you may have to replace the card with one from a new pack, or replace the whole pack.

Other hints:

  1. When you remove a dealt board from the dealing machine, make sure that no cards snag on the flip plate. This sometimes happens when the cards do not lie cleanly in the board slots. The snagged cards will remain inside the dealing machine.
  2. Before you close the lid on a dealt board, ensure that no cards are overhanging the sides of their slots, otherwise those cards will be damaged.
  3. Don’t forget to press closed the middle catch on the board cover.