It would also be nice to have a way to cancel the challenge on the waiting page.
3 Likes
Anyone disagree with creating new games in new tabs all the time?
Re the challenge cancelation, how about prompting you to cancel the challenge if you navigate away / close the game page? (That way we avoid any extra buttons :))
2 Likes
Yes, a prompt to cancel the challenge if the tab is closed would be very nice. Thanks for replying.
Yes, opening a new game in a new tab would be amazing!
Done. Reload the page and this should be the case 
1 Like
When I create a friendly match, it doesn’t seem to open the game in a new tab. It just displays the “Challenge Created” alert box. Is this intended?
If you create a correspondence game it just gives you the box, live games should open a new tab though
I appreciate that you can’t please everyone but I don’t see any point in opening a new game in a separate tab. If I want to open something in a new tab then I should be able to either right-click and select a new tab or click some sort of symbol to indicate that I want a new tab opened.
New tabs just add clutter. Is anything gained by opening the game in a new tab?
Mainly that it doesn’t interrupt what you’re currently doing, viewing a game, chatting, whatever. If there’s enough interest to always open in the same tab we can add an option in settings for it - so anyone who wants that speak up
1 Like
I think this works. I would only have a problem with opening in a new tab if it did that with correspondence games. 
Ah, I understand. I only really play correspondence games. Thus this new tab business seems excessive. Never mind, I’ll deal with it. I would support the option of making it an optional setting, though!
An option to open observed games or games loaded from the library in new tabs would be nice, too. As well as demo games.
I’m all about every game having its own tab. Except for correspondence games, opening a new one for each would be silly. However, in a perfect world I’d want all my correspondence games to open on one separate tab, just one tab for all correspondence games, so I could go through them there while also being able to interface with chat or observing games whatever on a “main” tab that I’d keep open.
So, for playing Go, I’d have a main tab, correspondence games tab, and multiple observed games available to see on multiple tabs along with a live game I’m playing on its own tab.
Dunno if everyone would like that, but any sort of options to allow something like that to happen would make me, at least, quite the happy Go player.
The trouble with opening every game in a separate tab is that it forgets that we access OGS through a web browser. If we used a special app exclusively for OGS that would make sense.
OGS needs to focus on it’s interface as a website that allows you to see many games. It should not attempt to become a web page that can be opened many times to see many games. I hope the difference is clear?
What you’re saying confuses me. Are you saying a website should only ever be on one tab? Why? It’s part of current design that you can have a website open new tabs … it’s commonly done. Any “special apps” that have been used to play Go (I take it you mean KGS?) mimics web-design with tabs opening up for new boards. A modern server should be web based, not app based.
I can understand if you don’t want correspondence games opened in a new tab. No correspondence server ever has, I think. Well, maybe one …
But for live games, every server I can think of currently opens a new window or tab for every board. The official IGS-Pandanet client opens tabs, I think… KGS has always opened any new board in a different tab, it has always mimicked a browser but is written in Java so is limited to mimicry. Wbaduk did something like tabs for its rooms, tygem I think does, though I haven’t used these in years. As for being “a website”, Kaya was totally web-browser based, and it opened a new tab for every board. I’m not sure, but I think that includes correspondence in some manner, perhaps something like what I was mentioning, but maybe it should be looked into with someone who spent more time there, but a main draw of the site was that it was using real browser tabs for each board.
So, there’s no real line between a website that can be opened in as many tabs as needed, or that can open as many boards as needed at once, and one that only allows one single tab at a time. In fact, most websites allow many tabs to be open all at once at the users choosing, and many of us enjoy using that functionality to the point where you can’t read all the tabs anymore.
Incorporating a live-game site on OGS certainly carries with it questions about being able to view multiple games at once and multitasking on-site which must, in a web-based site, incorporate tabs. I want to keep an eye on the chat while I observe games. I want one board open to follow a title game being relayed, and another one to do commentary on that game at the same time (this one KGS did very well with the first Jubango match earlier this year, regardless of what happened in the commentary). I’d like to be able to just close my board when I’m done a game and pick up wherever I left off with my other tabs of observed games, chat, pattern searching, whatever. Because I’m doing it in a web browser seems more of a reason that the site allow me to do so rather than a reason it shouldn’t allow it. Modern browsers are made for tabs.
I’m not suggesting that use of tabs should be disallowed, merely that it is bad design to create a website which expects to be run in multiple tabs. I agree that most modern browsers work well with tabs. I would exclude from that the browser I use on my phone, where changing tabs is a bit of a nuisance.
I would also agree that many Go clients open new games in separate tabs. But these are Go clients, not web browsers. I don’t use my Go client to read the news or check my emails. I do that in my web browser. A website should thus not dictate how I use my web browser as it may interfere with these other activities.
I even find it frustrating when I click to view a user’s profile and it opens in a new tab. Before I know it I can have 10 tabs open and have to stop using the site for a moment to close them all down.
I should be able to use the website using a single tab and I should be able to do this without having to change my user settings. Good websites don’t need more than one window.
Um. Says you. I don’t agree.
If you middle click (or ctrl+click / option+click) the row in the library it will open them in a new tab 
It doesn’t open a new tab for correspondence games, only for live games
Ohhhh, very nice:) Thanks.
I realize that I’m late to the party, but I would very much like the possibility to keep OGS restricted to one tab only. I run OGS in Chrome’s application shortcut mode so that I have a minimalist window (see below) with no tabs, menus, address bars, status bars, etc. Having new games open a new tab is fairly inconvenient when playing this way because it opens a whole new browser window with tabs, menus, etc.
Can we add a user option to not open games in a new tab? When I issue an open challenge for a live game, I am almost always at the overview screen anyway since I first check for open challenges that I might want to play. If I find none, then I create a challenge of my own.
However, I still want the ability to leave the empty board and watch the list of open challenges. Sometimes I have an open challenge that nobody is accepting, but someone else creates a challenge whose terms I am willing to accept. In other words, I would like for my open challenges for live games to behave the same way as my open challenges for correspondence games.
1 Like