[jandrew]

We have just upgraded the BBO system to reunite the Casual area with the rest of BBO.
What does this mean?
When clicking on the Casual button you will no longer land on a different server.
----Snip------ (from the BBO Blog)

Does this mean:

• That you will see the same list of friends, whichever 'area' you are in?
  
• That, if you are in the 'Casual Area', you will now be called into a tournament for which you have previously registered?

[paulg]

I've not seen the announcement but first impressions are that I can see all my friends from the Acol Club (casual area) and the competitive area. I also expect team invitations to work wherever the invitee is located.

I expect BBO will make a big announcement when they are happy that it is stable. It is really, really good news but hopefully people will not notice which is why the announcement can be delayed.

I will have to retire some of my videos

[pescetom]

Does this mean that BBO reverts to the previous maximum limit of online users ?
Not currently a problem, things are a lot quieter than a year ago.

[hrothgar]

I suspect that it means that they fixed the file descriptor limit

[paulg]

I doubt that they reverted to the previous code (if that was even possible) as it would be setting them up to fail in the future if the popularity of BBO exploded. We saw in March 2019 that you may only get two weeks notice ... assuming you recognise the notice.

hrothgar, on 2021-August-24, 11:42, said:

I suspect that it means that they fixed the file descriptor limit

I agree that the code was probably full of 16-bit values (where the maximum would be 65,535) and it needed to be upgraded. In my distant past I used to port code between platforms and such a task would be a nightmare, in terms of the rigour needed to catch all the explicit and implicit dependencies, which is probably why it took so long. If only you could say, "change all 16-bit integers to 32-bit integers" and it worked

[pilowsky]

The most valuable consequence of the fall of the BBO wall is that you can sign up for a tournament and then go and play on a casual table safe in the knowledge that you will be sucked into the tournament when the time comes and not left in the ether.
I recall when I started playing - in the casual area - wondering what happened to all those people that just disappeared with "CausticSoda has left the table to join a tournament" lingering in their wake.
I'm assured that this is the case; I hope it's true.

[scarletv]

Good improvement