How often did you come 1st, 2nd, 3rd in poker tournaments?

Poker Copilot doesn’t tell you how often you came 1st, 2nd, or 3rd in poker tournaments. However, if you know a bit of SQL, you can use Poker Copilot’s Database Console to work this out. Here’s how:

1. From the Tools menu, select “Database Console”

2. In the database console, enter this query:

 

select
    heroranking as position, 
    count(heroranking) as count 
from 
    tournament
where 
    heroranking is not null
group by 
    heroranking
order by 
    heroranking

 

Alternatively, use this to see a histogram of sorts:

select
    heroranking as position, 
    repeat('*', count(heroranking)) as count
from 
    tournament
where 
    heroranking is not null
group by 
    heroranking
order by 
    heroranking

 

Just want to see results for places 1 to 10?

select
    heroranking as position, 
    repeat('*', count(heroranking)) as count 
from 
    tournament 
where
    heroranking <= 10 
group by 
    heroranking 
order by
    heroranking

Poker Copilot 2.85 Now Available

Poker Copilot 2.85 is now available to download.

What’s changed:

  • The “There’s an update” dialog box now links to helpful instructions. The update process could still be better and doing this is definitely on my list of things to do.

What’s fixed:

  • A problem handling the end of summer time broke the HUD in Merge Network.
  • Cereus Network players with punctuation in their names are now handled correctly

Update Instructions:

  1. Download the latest version here.
  2. Open the downloaded file.
  3. Drag the Poker Copilot icon to the Applications icon. If prompted to replace an existing version, confirm that you do want to replace.

Now you are done and ready to hit the tables.

Poker Copilot Problems with Tournaments on Absolute Poker and UB

Some Poker Copilot users have recently reported that Poker Copilot is not picking up all tournaments on Absolute Poker and UB (the two members of the Cereus Network).

This is because these poker rooms reuse tournament IDs. Poker Copilot uses the tournament ID reported in each tournament hand history to detect which tournament it belongs to. When tournament IDs are repeated, it is hard to reliably keep doing this.

With the help of loyal Poker Copilot customer Erick I discovered that, for example, Tournament ID 5827242 has been used at least 9 times since November, including twice on the same day.

I’m trying to think of a good work-around for this problem. Ideally though, the Cereus Network team would stop reusing tournament IDs.

Why Doesn’t Poker Copilot Work With Spaces

Some Poker Copilot customers have reported that Poker Copilot doesn’t work with Spaces. More precisely, if your online poker playing setup involves using multiple spaces, the HUD won’t handle the changing between Spaces.

This is a really hard technical problem to solve. Mac OS X doesn’t give apps like Poker Copilot a chance to detect that you have changed from one Space to another. So when Poker Copilot is midway through updating the HUD panels, you might change to a different Space, and you end up with half the HUD panels on one Space and half of them on another Space.

Poker Copilot 2.84 Now Available

Poker Copilot 2.84 is now available to download. It is just a collection of minor fixes.

What’s fixed:

  • Fixed handling of winning the final level of a PokerStars step tournament
  • Fix for PokerStars tournament summary to handle commas in player name
  • Default HUD layout for Cereus Network 6-max tables now has HUD panels on the right players
  • Fix for HUD on PokerStars deep tables
  • Fix for HUD on PokerStars CAP tables

Update Instructions:

  1. Download the latest version here.
  2. Open the downloaded file.
  3. Drag the Poker Copilot icon to the Applications icon. If prompted to replace an existing version, confirm that you do want to replace.

Now you are done and ready to hit the tables.

Poker Copilot Review in Japanese

I don’t understand a word of this. With the help of Google Translate…I still don’t understand a word! I guess machine translation of Japanese English doesn’t work so well. Anyhow, here it is, and here’s an excerpt:

オンラインポーカー奮闘記

chipsandfish：あのね、新しいパソコンを…

chipsandfish妻：ねえ、今月旅行に行きましょう？

c：Windowsで3万位でだな…

妻：宿は押さえたわ。後交通費が3万位かかるかな。

c：性能もだな…

妻：でも子供の洋服も4万位するしぃ。お金足りないわぁ。

c：　…

 

 

Being Unique

I walked past a travel agency with a friend a few months ago. A sign in the travel agency’s window proclaimed themselves as “the African specialists” (or however you say that in Spanish – we were in Madrid). My friend commented that by picking a niche, they risked making potential customers think they were not willing or able to help for travel to locations other than Africa.That is, most of the world. Therefore they were scaring off potential business. My argument was that by specialising, they were lifting themselves above the fray of also-ran general travel agencies.

I run a company that serves a niche. Actually, a niche of a niche. Of a niche. Poker-playing Mac owners who are serious enough about it to want poker tracking software. So the conversation about the Madrid African travel specialists has often replayed in my mind. Is it best, I ask myself, to concentrate on the narrow niche that I serve, or to widen my potential user base?

When I explain what my business is to computer geeks, they almost always ask, “what about making a Windows version?” A little work, they argue, to gain a much bigger potential customer base. Perhaps they are right. But then I’ll lose my market position of being THE Mac OS X poker tracking application that was designed for Macs, and works as Mac users expect software to work. Instead my product would become just a poker tracking application that happens to run on Mac OS X and Windows. I’d be giving up my niche.

Some companies market themselves as the people who can serve many needs. Macy’s. Harrods. Big department stores, that promise to have just about anything you want to buy. Online, there is Amazon, which if my memory serves correctly once claimed to be the world’s biggest bookstore. Until they decided that books were not enough and that they needed to sell more, more, and even more stuff.

Conversely, many companies market themselves as being specialists for a particular niche, so that you can trust their opinions. The narrower the niche, the better they can specialise. The Internet makes it possible for these niches to be narrower than ever. If I had to run a retail shop selling Mac OS X poker tracking and analysis software, I’d never have enough customers to make the venture viable. Online, however, I can sell to people anywhere in the world. Indeed, I have, with customers in Madagascar, Christmas Island, Macao, Estonia, and Barbados. And the United States, Germany, Brazil, Greece, and Norway. “And, and, and”, as my Russian friend used to say, which here means about 80 other countries.

Both approaches can work  – the “we have everything” approach, and the “we are your New Zealand fly-fishing specialists” approach. The “we have everything” approach is typically riskier but can make more money. The “we are the specialists in your narrow niche” approach will never lead to the wealth of Croesus but can offer a healthy income with low-risk and enviable independence.

As for me: I’ll stick to the niche of a niche of a niche.