Unknown speed rapid, cannot check challenge, please try again.

[geller]

I’ve been enjoying playing online Go for many years, almost always with/against a variety of robots. Suddenly, as of today, the software seems to have changed and when I try to play with doge bot 4, for example, which was my favorite opponent, I got the following error message: “Unknown speed rapid, cannot check challenge, please try again.” Is there any way to return to the format we used before? By the way, I am a site supporter. This is a real disappointment.

[GreenAsJade]

Thanks for the bug report - that’ll help us get it fixed.

I’m curious what it is that disappoints you, as a site supporter?

Is it that you encountered a bug on OGS, and you feel that should never happen? You’re disappointed because there’s a bug?

OGS choses “ongoing improvements and new features” over stability and stagnation. This means that a bug now and then is inevitable.

Or is it that you fear something you were able to do has been irrevocably taken away?

Very occasionally a feature really is taken away - I can think of one being debated right now, but I can’t think of any other at all off the top of my head.

In this instance, that seems rather unlikely: we’re introducing a new time setting (rapid), and it’s probably just that the bot doesnt understand it, or we accidentally gave it rapid when it should have gotten an previous time setting.

[geller]

Hi Green As Jade,

I appreciate your response. Unfortunately, my problem is not just a bug. It’s more along the lines of your question: Is it that you fear something you were able to do has been irrevocably taken away? That’s exactly what I fear. Whereas before I was greeted by a very user-friendly screen that prompted me to choose an opponent, now there are requests for settings that I frankly don’t understand. (See attachment) Before I had a permanent setting for the type of timing to be observed, now it seems to be up for grabs. I’m 73 years old and not particularly adept at doing cyber-stuff (though my wife is younger and an IT specialist and helps me with stuff like that). Still, I don’t see why I should need to reinvent the wheel each time I want to play.

As for your second question, “Is it that you encountered a bug on OGS, and you feel that should never happen? You’re disappointed because there’s a bug?” Not quite. The disappointment comes from the fact that before I could play and now I can’t.

You wrote, in kind of an interesting tone, that OGS chooses “ongoing improvements and new features” over stability and stagnation. Suppose that for at least some of your users and subscribers the improvements and new features make it impossible to do what brought us pleasure and satisfaction in the past.

All I want to do is have fun playing. I’ll never be a champion of any sort, but, like you, I love the game and feel deeply disturbed that the improvements and new features are in the process of taking this opportunity away.

I live in a rural community in the southern part of the US, where I don’t have access to any Go partners other than the computer. My games against the computer are particularly fun because there’s no ego on the other end to be upset by losing.

I appreciate your personal and thoughtful response and look forward to hearing from you again.

Jeffery

[GreenAsJade]

Thanks for you support of the site, and insightful reply.

Most importantly perhaps - I’ve been able to confirm overnight that

… what you are seeing is a bug, and a fix will be on its way

Sorry about the “interesting tone” … the intent was to be both conveying an opinion (a decision) and the reason for it.

A reason that we keep working on OGS - changing it with features and updates - at the expense of stability is to avoid stagnation. Stability is a good thing, but comes at a price.

It’s a conscious decision - a thing can’t both “improve” and “be totally stable”.

Of course, improvement comes at a price: instability and bugs . So we do the best we can to tread the line.

It is definitely annoying when something that was working stops working - hopefully disappointment about that can be mitigated knowing the bigger picture.

In respect of the wider change you’ve seen: this is definitely controversial. It is a big change, undertaken with a lot of consultation and debate:

Upcoming changes to the Play page and general time settings

Hello All, We’ve been working on some improvements to the Play page to address several issues: Our existing Play page is confusing and overwhelming to beginners Our existing Play page is confusing to many experienced players (in particular the automatch settings) The time controls were never clear as to what to expect from your game Our default time settings were not very good for a number of cases To address these, we’ve re-envisioned how things work: The Play page has been broken up into…

This is one of those rare instances where a change genuinely does take away some options (or presents them differently): not a decision that is taken lightly. You can read and contribute to the debate about that

I really hope that the bugfix you’re looking for comes in quickly and you can resume the play you have been enjoying.

[geller]

Hi again GreenAsJade,

Would have responded earlier to your last message, but forum access was impossible. Now at least that’s back or appears to be back.

I assume someone is still working on the bugfix and have resigned myself to be patient until that’s complete. In the meantime, I have been able to log in to the new Go page and am able to get a game with a different (slightly lower ranked) computer partner/opponent. However, there’s no longer an option as to whether I play white or black. The default setting seems to be that I play white. So I’ve tried it a few times and each time the computer times out and loses before making a single move. All a bit frustrating. How will I know when the bug is fixed?

Good luck.

By the way, when it comes to making progress on tech support software, I find Voltaire’s remark relevant: Le mieux est le mortel ennemi du bien. The better is the mortal enemy of the good.

Thanks again, Jeffery

[GreenAsJade]

Lol, but the Japanese offer Kaisen: “Settling for ‘good’ today is the enemy of ‘great’ tomorrow.”

Should good be the enemy of better?

[Groin]

Hi Jeffery, you can still access the bot you like to play with and customize your request. You cannot do this by using the custom game page but by going to the profile of the bot.

It’s a bit kind of labyrinth so I post again here what I wrote before.

Upcoming changes to the Play page and general time settings

Ok after a bit of search to play a CUSTOMIZED GAME with a BOT: Don’t search in custom games. You won’t find it. Go to quick games although what may look strange. Select the bot you want to play. Don’t click play. Instead click the little box with an arrow on the right Here you reach the profile of the bot. You’re half way! The next steps are easier to guess for experienced OGS users Click on its name A popup appear Chose challenge You got it! Specify your settings (unranked, komi, han…

[geller]

Thanks very much for these helpful instructions. I got to play tonight for my first time in a week.

Thanks again,

Jeffery

[geller]

What I’ve found after 38 years in academia is that whenever there’s a committee or a programmer involved the chances are pretty high that Voltaire nailed it.

My guess is that the site administrators for online-go.com were interested in something slightly different from what they were in the past, maybe monitoring traffic, building revenue, or some such, probably because international interest increased, maybe due to covid. But that’s just a guess.

Thanks again,

Jeffery

[GreenAsJade]

You don’t have to guess, you can just ask

The “site administrators” - anoek - was primarily interested in addressing feedback that the previous design was awful for newcomers, and likely a cause of bouncing from the site.

The underlying interest is of course “maintaining and growing the userbase, so that we all have a flourishing site to play on”.

“Newcomer bounce rate” was one of the primary factors identified as a way to tackle this.

[BHydden]

Not just newcomer bounce, but another big complaint also is the ability for Dan ranked players to quickly get games. An improved automatch UX helps there too. OGS has a small team (really it’s just anoek, with some help from a few regulars) so we don’t always get things right on the first try. But the effort and the endeavour is always to make a OGS a better place for all its users

[HeyHeyTaeTae]

I think the key to keeping new users and beginners is to have a more intuitive design and layout. While the previous layout wasn’t great, the new layout is much more confusing as it pummels the user with options that frankly come off as a bit overwhelming. For most users they just want to click a button or two and be in a game right away, so I think keeping the options to the bare minimum and presenting an advanced options button or tab for further customization would be better. Also as someone who enjoys playing against bots more than human players, the fact that I now have to go to an individual bot’s profile simply to play a game is horrendous. I’m not sure if that was something that simply wasn’t tested for or if that just never crossed the team’s mind but it does come off rather sloppy.

[GreenAsJade]

… which is ironic because existing users are beating us up for removing options that they previously had

@HeyHeyTaeTae

the fact that I now have to go to an individual bot’s profile simply to play a game is horrendous.

oversight.

[HeyHeyTaeTae]

If the goal really is to try and reduce beginner bounce then simplicity and ease of use is going to be the most important thing. I think obfuscating the additional options so that people that really want it have to maybe go down one additional layer is reasonable rather than throwing all the options at people and potentially overwhelming them.

[geller]

Couldn’t agree more.

[sir_husky_potato]

I agree, and there was already a fantastic suggestion on how to simplify the UX even more: Upcoming changes to the Play page and general time settings - #150 by sir_husky_potato

[geller]

Thanks to GreenAsJade and to Groin. The method suggested by Groin worked for a while - nearly two weeks - and then stopped working. Now I’m stuck with a new menu and no matter which combination I choose, I’m told that it’s impossible for the same reason as before (“Unknown speed rapid, cannot check challenge, please try again”. Is it still a bug or has the GS definitively left me behind? Jeffery