GIB FAQ

• The new bid explanations sometimes refer to "8421" points. What are they? They're points in a particular suit, with Ace counting 8, King 4, Queen 2 and Jack 1. This method has the advantage that if you know partner's holding, you can tell exactly what his honors are.
• You said that GIB comes with prepackaged hands from human tournaments, but I can't find them. Where are they? They're in the Deal Library. Go to "load deal" under the file menu, and then select the Deal Library. You'll find them. After you're done with a library deal, if you click on any of the players' names, you'll get the bidding and play record from their table.
• Can I use GIB to play over a network, or to have two people play against two GIBs? Yes.
• Is there a demo version of GIB? Unfortunately not. It would be difficult to distribute because GIB itself is fairly large. In addition, we would rather spend our time working on making GIB better than producing a demo version!
• How does the GIB version numbering scheme work? The first number changes when we make very substantial changes to the program. The change from 2.x to 3.x, for example, involved the introduction of an entirely new bidding database and associated algorithms.

  The middle number changes when we run out of stock and make more CDs. Thus the appearance of 2.7 means that all of our 2.6 CDs have been sold. The 2.7 CD includes all of the 2.6.x patches.

  The last number changes when we release a patch of some sort.

• Is there any documentation for the basic bridge.exe bridge engine that comes with GIB? Yes.
• What happens if I don't like GIB? Can I return it? The short answer is: sort of. We deal with all of our customers on an individual basis, trying to avoid two things: unhappy customers, and people who install GIB and then return the CD for credit.

  If GIB somehow doesn't work on your machine, we'll happily take it back. If there's something about GIB that you don't like, we'll work with you to fix it. If you give us a reasonable shot at helping you but you're still unhappy, we'll generally take it back but reserve the right not to in individual cases.

• How can I found out what a bid means before making it? If you right-click on a bid in the bidding box, you'll get an explanation.
• Can I get patches for GIB? Yes. The GIB patch directory contains a description of all of the problems we know of, and free patches that will fix them. Just follow the instructions there.
• How can I tell if my GIB CD already includes the patches? If you look in the upper lefthand corner of the GIB window, it will tell you the version number.
• Are there electronic mailing lists for GIB? Yes.
• GIB is playing really slowly. Is it supposed to be like that, or is something wrong? GIB is supposed to play about as quickly as you do. If it's playing substantially more slowly than that all the time, something is probably wrong. Here are some possibilities:
  • Not enough memory. If you are running other applications, exit them and see if matters improve. Alternately, if you have been playing GIB for several hours, quitting and restarting GIB may help; you can use "Save Game" and "Load Game" to pick up where you left off.
  • Not enough CPU. Microsoft has taken to installing a program called "Find Fast" with some of its software, and that program can use enough of the CPU that GIB runs poorly. Look in Windows\"Start Menu"\Programs\Startup to see if you are running this program; if you are, double-click it, select "close and stop", and see if performance improves. If it does, you might want to change its settings or remove it from your startup folder, as it can degrade the performance of non-GIB applications as well.

    GIB's performance can also be degraded by the presence of virus checkers that examine modified areas of memory. This is because GIB writes to many segments of memory in analyzing any particular position. If GIB is playing slowly and you have such a virus checker, you'll need to turn it off before starting GIB.

  • Old GIB bridge processes may be cluttering up your system. This will only happen if you manage to crash GIB. Quit GIB and press Control-Alt-Delete to see what tasks are running; if a "Bridge" task is present, select it and press "End Task" to get rid of it.

• GIB generally plays well, but sometimes does really dumb things. How come? GIB's algorithms have been designed to play the best bridge, but not to play like a person does. In situations where human-like decision making leads to a disastrous result (e.g., leading from an "obvious" sequence against 3NT doesn't work out), we don't think much of it. In situations where GIB's inhuman methods cause it to do something bizarre that doesn't work out, it's easy to attribute it to stupidity. In reality, the same thing is happening in both cases: The algorithm being used is poorly suited to the problem at hand. Even if GIB were "perfect", this would still be an issue; an odd opening lead might theoretically have the best chance to beat the contract, but on hands where it's wrong, we'll still feel like GIB is playing badly.
• GIB can take a long time to play an obvious card, sometimes even a singleton. What's up? What GIB finds obvious and what you find obvious are very different, for much the same reasons as discussed in the previous item. So GIB may spend some time deciding whether to follow with a 3 or a 5 after you lead the 7 and dummy plays the ace. GIB also does not play a card until it understands what's happened before. If you play the heart 7, for example, GIB won't play until it thinks it understands why you played it. A lot of times, the heart 7 is a pretty obvious play for you, and GIB will respond quickly. But in situations where the heart 7 is a surprise, GIB will spend some time thinking about it before playing -- even if GIB has a singleton.
• Why does GIB sometimes make a different bid or play if I ask it to rebid or replay? GIB decides what to do by dealing out a sample of hands consistent with what's gone on so far and then taking an action that works well for that sample. When you ask it to repeat a decision, it may deal a different sample, and that may lead to a different choice of action.
• Some programs let you have the computer replay the hand and compare your results to theirs. Does GIB do this? No. The reason is that it would take GIB about 5 minutes to replay the hand, and we figured you wouldn't want to wait. You can get a feature like this by playing the library deals and comparing to human opponents; a future revision of GIB will let you have GIB play some deals in advance so that it's ready with comparisons.
• How does GIB store deals? Can I use that format? GIB uses Portable Bridge Notation (PBN) to store deals. You can make PBN files using any text editor.
• I have a problem that isn't addressed by the FAQ. How do I get help? You can send email to GIB support, or contact us by phone at 541/302-3979. Please leave a message, and we'll call you back. You spent your money on the program; we'll spend ours making sure you enjoy it.