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 Post subject: Tech Glitches
PostPosted: Mon Feb 27, 2017 11:23 pm 
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Lotsa Posta

Joined: Mon Sep 19, 2016 9:33 am
Posts: 710
We've all experienced tech glitches in playing these quizzes, and as Buzztime's platforms have become more complex, the issues have radiated into increasingly exotic forms.

Last summer Wild Bill's Woodbury, the favored haunt of our Minnesota Brain Trust, suddenly dispensed monikers to the Final Leaderboards which were alien to the players involved. The misrepresentations were asymmetric. BACHO would show up as WOLF. GOPHER would show up as LYSS. But then, either of them or MRGONE might show up under either of those monikers or any of several others.

At the time, there were 442 LYSS's registered to Buzztime accounts. There were over 5,000 WOLF's. There was a LYSS with 3M Players+ points registered at B-52, but she's never played a game there. And may I add, Gentlemen, that we seem to have over-grazed our distaff players? Keep your hands on your playmaker. The female of the species very, very seldom actually requests a backrub. But to make a long story short, neither LYSS nor WOLF could be tied to Wild Bill's, nor could they both be traced to any other selected site.

So I went to Wild Bill's, one Sunday brunch, where, playing as GONE D, I ran one of those little 7-question Lunchtime quizzes, and showed up on the Final Leaderboard, not as GONE D, but as...BEAR!

The other 9 of Wild Bill's 10 tablets were in the hands of juvenile guests, more or less engaged in Buzztime's side games, but one by one, their exhausted parents drifted out, and I was able to reboot all 10 of the tablets. And were my heroic efforts rewarded? Ixnay. I ran another quiz and showed up not as GONE D, but as? Here a shrug of the shoulders. This was many months ago, and I was at the end of my tether.

About a week after my visit, a thunderbolt quite literally struck the roof of Wild Bill's. And the phantom handles disappeared. It was an act of God, Who was on my side. A wrathful and quick-tempered Individual, He hasn't been heard from since. At least BLZBUB shows up, on a weekly basis. (So you know where my allegiance lies.) Here I need to take a time-out. It's too late in the day to consider one handle overtaken by another, leave alone the points of two playmakers transferring conversely, to the detriment of the correct respondent.


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 Post subject: Re: Tech Glitches
PostPosted: Tue Feb 28, 2017 12:46 pm 
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Lord or Lady Postsalot

Joined: Thu Jan 14, 2010 5:30 pm
Posts: 554
That's much more involved and bizarre than the one I've noticed at BW3-Hedwig Village. I have four handles, all with the same password. Although I have no problem playing all four handles at both locations that still have boxes and other tablet locations, the tablets at this location "recognize" my handle but then refuse the password--the same password I use to sign on to the two handles it does recognize. I guess I can't hope that lightning will strike the place to resolve this minor problem, but it is annoying, especially as "AARDVK" is one of the handles not allowed to sign in.

Brooke/AARDVK


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 Post subject: Re: Tech Glitches
PostPosted: Tue Feb 28, 2017 2:07 pm 
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King or Queen Postsalot
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Joined: Mon Jan 11, 2010 11:41 am
Posts: 1745
Location: Gaithersburg MD (suburb NW of DC)
In Wild Bill's case I would say reboot the BT computer when those strange names appear. That is the first step in any glitch, be it non reporting or otherwise. We had the wrong names once a few years ago, reboot of computer made it go away. I'll guess the lightening strike cut the power long enough to force a hard reboot.

In aardvark'a case, it wouldn't hurt to reboot too but that problem seems stranger. Maybe try changing the passwords?

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BUD - Stained Glass Pub Silver Spring MD
OC BUD - Grotto Pizza DE near Ocean City MD

LET'S GO ....Caps and Os!!!!


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 Post subject: Re: Tech Glitches
PostPosted: Tue Feb 28, 2017 3:31 pm 
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Lotsa Posta

Joined: Mon Sep 19, 2016 9:33 am
Posts: 710
BUD wrote:
I'll guess the lightening strike cut the power long enough to force a hard reboot.


I'm sure you're correct, BUD. Carlsbad tried a remote fix that didn't take. Wild Bill's Woodbury keeps its server up near the ceiling, and I doubt whether anyone climbed the 15' ladder to make the attempt.

AARDVK wrote:
...the tablets at this location "recognize" my handle but then refuse the password...


The hard reboot which fixed the phantom handles has not made a log-in a Wild Bill's any easier. JOHNL reports that he sometimes has to attempt his log-in 3-4 times before it'll take. Those tablets can be fussy little buggers.

Yesterday afternoon, playing with KRISPY and JOHNL, the MICE perpetrated a hijacking far more sinister than anything described above. MICE were playing the new #6 playmaker; the number on JOHNL's playmaker wasn't known. In the 3:00 PM PST Coundown, JOHNL proposed an answer late in the quiz. The MICE disagreed (with typical stubborness) and then decided JOHNL was right and switched answers for 800 points. Whereupon JOHNL looks down at his playmaker and exclaims, "Gah! It didn't take my answer! I know I hit that key." So he hit it again, for 731 points. He ran everything else in the quiz, and so lost a perfecto to what is most commonly operator error.

Something similar, but even worse, happened in the following quiz. After some hedging, JOHNL proposed an answer, and again the MICE disagreed, but this time they stayed on their original response. As is so often the case, JOHNL was right and the MICE were wrong. But the upshot was that MICE received 976 points on the question, and JOHNL received the 236 points the MICE were able to salvage on the third clue. Again, the MICE knew they'd hit the wrong key, because they were obligated to correct themselves. JOHNL knew that he'd hit the correct key and entered only one keystroke. Somehow he ended up with MICE's score on that question, and vice versa! In both these examples, the correct response was the #3 key. The even more correct response was for both players to swap out their playmakers, pronto.

Anyone curious to know how the stubborn MICE might have crept ahead of a fine player like JOHNL in the Countdown rankings need look no further. It was a daylight robbery.


Last edited by GONE D on Tue Feb 28, 2017 11:04 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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 Post subject: Re: Tech Glitches
PostPosted: Tue Feb 28, 2017 5:16 pm 
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King or Queen Postsalot
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Joined: Mon Jan 11, 2010 11:41 am
Posts: 1745
Location: Gaithersburg MD (suburb NW of DC)
Gone D, if it takes 3 log in attempts there is surly a connection problem. It could be between the tablets and the server up by the ceiling. Maybe a neon light or other obstruction (mylar balloons, decorations) is blocking or corrupting the signal causing bad connection and the weird scoring? Neon lights are known problems to BT. Or the problem is with the bar's modem but if you are get good rankings back in that's probably not it.

Try playing a game as close to the server as possible to see if the trouble goes away. The are signal extenders that can be put into the system to get a better connection in more areas of the bar. Our BWW had to have those installed at the first installation of the tablets.

BT should be able to figure it out??? Or not.

_________________
BUD - Stained Glass Pub Silver Spring MD
OC BUD - Grotto Pizza DE near Ocean City MD

LET'S GO ....Caps and Os!!!!


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 Post subject: Re: Tech Glitches
PostPosted: Tue Feb 28, 2017 10:43 pm 
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Lotsa Posta

Joined: Mon Sep 19, 2016 9:33 am
Posts: 710
BUD wrote:
There are signal extenders...


Thanks, BUD, your advice is always received with gratitude. Jimmy's Grille in Vadnais Heights has an elaborate system of relays which seem to work, for the most part. I hope AARDVK is taking note, since she might be able to apply your advice to her own circumstances.

The Brain Trust at Wild Bill's (GOPHER, BACHO, HSNBRG, HAMMER, JOHNNY, their friends and side handles), all innately talented players, collectively can present as jaded sophisticates. Several of them place a Jag-Bomb wager on the phrasing of third clues in Countdown. And when the tiki bar opens in the summer, they go outside to play, forcing their already corrupted fiber optic feed through yet another obstacle, the glass windows, 20 feet from the bar. Wild Bill's Buzztime server, I'm guessing, is on the far side of the bar from their outside seating, since the dining area wraps in an L-shape in the other direction. What I'm trying to suggest here is that their indifference is superb.

Whether they would adopt your advice, or the advice of any other man of good sense, may depend on GOPHER, who reads these pages, and has applied to SCAR for re-instatement under his original handle, JOHNL.


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 Post subject: Re: Tech Glitches
PostPosted: Wed Mar 01, 2017 10:43 am 
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Joined: Sat Jun 18, 2011 3:26 pm
Posts: 77
Location: DeMori's (Bungalow sometimes)
Thanks for the suggestions Bud. It is something I could talk to BACHO (Jason) about. Usually when I play at Bill's it is around Happy Hour and the bar manager and staff are very busy. I also feel bad about having someone climb the 15 foot ladder to monkey with the server. JOHNNY did discover that if we move our tablets around while answering we are less likely to get a zero score when we should get 1000 points (when we play at the Tiki Bar). It must look strange to onlookers though.

John


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 Post subject: Re: Tech Glitches
PostPosted: Wed Mar 01, 2017 4:29 pm 
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King or Queen Postsalot
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Joined: Mon Jan 11, 2010 11:41 am
Posts: 1745
Location: Gaithersburg MD (suburb NW of DC)
JohnL wrote:
Thanks for the suggestions Bud. It is something I could talk to BACHO (Jason) about. Usually when I play at Bill's it is around Happy Hour and the bar manager and staff are very busy. I also feel bad about having someone climb the 15 foot ladder to monkey with the server. JOHNNY did discover that if we move our tablets around while answering we are less likely to get a zero score when we should get 1000 points (when we play at the Tiki Bar). It must look strange to onlookers though.

John


Start off by looking for something in your line of sight to the server or more likely the antenna connected to the server. There has to be something there. A new light, metal sign, metallic Mardis Gras balloons, etc.

Good luck.

_________________
BUD - Stained Glass Pub Silver Spring MD
OC BUD - Grotto Pizza DE near Ocean City MD

LET'S GO ....Caps and Os!!!!


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