HM2 is a big step backwards in terms of usability

[croekk]

After goofing around with HM2 for the best part of this morning I can't quite get my head around what the designers must have been thinking. I was hoping for a slimmer, faster version of the old Hold'em Manager. Instead I have to deal with an interface that is totally cluttered and overloaded with useless buttons, apps, ribbons and what not. The color scheme is horrible as well. Why does everything have to be so shiny and colourful? The old HM1 grey was perfect in my opinion. Usability (which is the most important thing for any software) has taken a massive hit.

Who wants a programme that looks like MySpace and slows your whole system down? I'll definitely stick to HM1.

[pczxmg]

I tend to disagree with this comment. As all new tools I thinkg you need to be patient and leave yourself time to learn and get used to it.
I also think that you cannot judge a beta version in terms of functionalities and potentials. I think HM2 has a lot of potentials. It could improve in things that are currently not working (e.g. ntoecaddy popus) and maybe introduce some very important stats concerning shoves and AI calls.

[morny]

Hi,

If you can give us specific's of exactly what your looking for we'll certainly look at it and see if we can improve it. I know one common thing people have when moving to a new version of software be it Facebook, Skype, Photoshop or even games when people go from something there familiar with to a brand new layout the initial impression is its confusing, where do i even start and this is to be expected. That said if we left it the same we wouldn't really be improving it so we feel the new layout makes it more intuitive where you expect to find settings.

Here's 2 FAQs that give you a crash course in where you can find the new options.
New Settings - http://hm2faq.holdemmanager.com/questions/1601/Transitioning+from+HM1+to+HM2
Hud Options - http://hm2faq.holdemmanager.com/questions/1611/Live+HUD+Options+and+Features

You refer to over-cluttered, with the interface we try to give you 1 click access to the most used features in that TAB, we certainly value your feedback if you have suggestions on how we can improve it, is there a particular ribbon or button or app that gets in your way or you think should be removed?

[Not Excessive]

I know one common thing people have when moving to a new version of software ... initial impression is its confusing, where do i even start and this is to be expected. That said if we left it the same we wouldn't really be improving it so we feel the new layout makes it more intuitive where you expect to find settings.

In some regards I agree with OP. I'm trying to get a feel for what the developers are trying to achieve, but at the moment I just don't get it and that's making adoption of HM2 difficult for me. I'm looking for functionality that should be 'here', not because that's the way it was in HM1, but because it makes sense to put 'it' 'here'. Unfortunately, when I go looking for something it's not where I expect it. Worst still is finding things where I don't expect them.

For instance, the replayer window. It seems to be on every page. I would rather have a simple button that launched the replayer thus freeing up valuable real estate on the HM2 pages.

[morny]

Hi, for the replayer were going to have an option to collapse that window so you can collapse/hide it as needed, its quite useful to have that panel for hand review or replaying, not everyone has the screen real estate to make this useful so i thinking hiding it should benefit both.

If you want to go into more detail on where you couldnt find things you expected to find or where you found things you didnt expect well take a look at that and see if we can improve it

[Not Excessive]

Don't get me wrong, I think once I get used to HM2 I'll better appreciate its potential. Anyway, you asked, so here goes.

This is the opening screen shot in HM2.

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Like most Windows users I'm used to icons/options not being clickable if they're greyed, and clickable if they are full intensity. So I'm confused by the 'Start HUD' and 'Stop HUD' buttons. They can't be both operational at the same time, can they? Similary, the 'Hand Importing' text/icon indicates to me that hands are currently being imported, even when they are not. Besides, this option takes you to some configuration settings for hand importing which, imo, would be better placed under the 'Settings' icon. Settings are settings, no?

I'm all for simplicity and clarity, so having the 'Holdem Manager News' panel, and two instances of 'Add another widget to your dashboard' on the home tab and no ability to remove them makes me frown every time I open HM2.

Morny, there is no one thing about HM2 that irks me, it just seems like there are a bunch of niggling things that are, for lack of a better word, messy. Perhaps I'm being too picky this early in the development process.

[morny]

Hi, good point on the start/stop hud, im sure we can get that fixed.

Hand importing is different, this icon doesnt represent if its importing or not, we show the import progress in the bottom status bar and if we greyed it out when we were importing then people would think its not active, since it is active and it brings you to the import settings window we always want it to appear active.

I guess it could go under settings but what we tried to do with the ribbon was give users quick access to settings people use regularly, hud options, importing, database, settings and aliases were the most used options so we thought it was better to have importing available as its own icon rather than burying it in settings and its more of a tool than a setting. Import had its own section in HM1 too. That said i would be interested to hear other peoples feedback on this too.

Ill also ask about the ability to remove the news widget, it also might be worth looking at a more compact way to add the widgets rather than the current section which as you point out does take up a bit of space.

No i don't think your being picky, some valid points there and i hope more people give this kind of feedback to help improve the product, ill forward all your suggestions and feel free to suggest more

[SuperSized]

The color scheme is horrible as well. Why does everything have to be so shiny and colourful?

Try the dark theme. I think it's much better looking.

I tend to agree about the interface being clunky. It's slow and annoying in certain situations. I do think that overall the product is a step forward, I just think certain things are a step backwards. For example, in HM1 I could easily see my STT tourney graph, filter it properly, see an ITM bar graph distribution all on one page. Please don't separate this into multiple tabs now.

[udbrky]

What about a graph that looks sort of like this - split in 3 w/ winnings, ROI and finish bar graph

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[gibbo]

Yer i love it froze my computer 4 times todays 1 time in hand i lost a $180 i know why it free

[ccps25i]

Hi, for the replayer were going to have an option to collapse that window so you can collapse/hide it as needed, its quite useful to have that panel for hand review or replaying, not everyone has the screen real estate to make this useful so i thinking hiding it should benefit both.

If you want to go into more detail on where you couldnt find things you expected to find or where you found things you didnt expect well take a look at that and see if we can improve it

I have to agree with this. When I want to view a hand I usually double click it and view it in the separate replayer window.

Having the replayer as a panel slows down the loading of the Reports/Sessions/Opponents tab. Hopefully this is just a beta issue and will be resolved in the future.

Perhaps an option to remove the replayer panel for those of us who don't want it or have lag issues.

[russb]

After exploring the software for about half of today I'm coming to the same conclusion as OP here. The redundancy in features between tabs is actually making it difficult to figure out how to do basic things unique to a certain tab. For instance, I think the sessions tab is a great example. In HM1 it unsurprisingly listed your sessions in a simple and intuitive fashion. Now it has 4 subwindows and is where table scanner and table manager have been placed as well as graphing, a hands list and the internal hand replayer that is everywhere. In spite of all of that, I can't figure out how to do something super basic like see a list of my recent sessions with some associated data, such as results, if I want to, for instance, find a recent big losing session from a couple of weeks ago and go over my play.

I'm sure there's a simple way to do that but the point is that it is not intuitive at all. In HM1 you'd have to be simply incompetent to not be able to figure out how to do that, but that's not the case for HM2. And I'm a software developer as well as a pro poker player. I can't even imagine the troubles less technical users will have.

That said there's some interesting new functionality here, but it could really be presented much more nicely in my opinion. As a suggestion why not lay out the entire interface in xml? Players could create their own HM2 mods, get rid of widgets they don't like and even create entirely new tabs. For instance I would could create a new tab called LivePlay. In it I could take take table scanner, table manager from the sessions tab, hud options out of every tab and dump them all into the LivePlay tab. That seems like it would have some amazing potential. Instead of complaining on a forum about the interface I could simply create and share my own. If you want to get really fancy you could even add skinning options.

[thegrief]

I think a lot of the new functionality is great as some of the apps. The UI is a little confusing at time but this is just a learning curve and can also be improved upon during the Beta testing. I am finding performance issues with sync, loading all hands on startup, and hangs/freezes debilitating though. I don't think I could use it in a work situation until these are addressed.

[johncc]

I have been trialing since the alpha version, i have added lots of bug issues etc to this forum

I must say its so complicated to find almost anything and i have been using it 6 months (everyday and i know HM1 & probably HM2 better than most)

I must say i can't see when i would ever use a widget and in 6 months never have and never will (i just pick what i want out of favourites)

If you think its tricky wait till you try filters. HM1 it was so simple

I must say though as this is the beta most things that have been asked for are slowly arriving.

I also use it full time with a few problems, saying that i also know most work rounds which most ppl might not know as yet

[Kniffer]

After exploring the software for about half of today I'm coming to the same conclusion as OP here. The redundancy in features between tabs is actually making it difficult to figure out how to do basic things unique to a certain tab. For instance, I think the sessions tab is a great example. In HM1 it unsurprisingly listed your sessions in a simple and intuitive fashion. Now it has 4 subwindows and is where table scanner and table manager have been placed as well as graphing, a hands list and the internal hand replayer that is everywhere. In spite of all of that, I can't figure out how to do something super basic like see a list of my recent sessions with some associated data, such as results, if I want to, for instance, find a recent big losing session from a couple of weeks ago and go over my play.

I'm sure there's a simple way to do that but the point is that it is not intuitive at all.[...]

There actually is, yes ;) I found that very irritating at first as well, if you keep looking around you can find it pretty easily although I agree with you that it isn't very intuitive. But on the other hand, that is just because we are all used to how it workes in HM1.

Looking at your sessions and such is now in the "Reports" tab. Under the menu at the top, you have some tabs (By Stakes, Overall and such), where you can easily filter which reports you want to be shown. If a "Sessions" filter isn't there, you have to click on the button "More Reports" above in the menu and you get a nice drop down list with a lot of various report filters.

In my opinion, as I said, if you don't think about how it worked in HM1 it is logical to put all those things together in the reports tab. But as it is, the Sessions window is a bit mislabeled because it is pretty counter intuitive. You are looking for your session results and obviusly you go looking under sessions at first ;)

I like the idea of a customizable "Live Play" window though. Although it actually is nearly the same as the Sessions window right now^^ It just isn't customizable, but you have pretty much everything you mentioned in that window already ;)
But you should at least be able to minimize the individual parts of it, because many people don't want to see there winnings/losses or the graph while still playing. So a really customizable option as you mentioned it would definitely be nice. Personally I would be content with things being minimizable. It needs a auto refresh function as well, since it doesn't refresh your Session summary until you change the tab and change it back, which is pretty annoying with the performance issues right now.

Have to say I like the new HM. Sure, it isn't perfect but it is still a beta and a lot of things are being worked on. I am confident that it will be a nice step up from HM1 once it will be officially released. And even after that they will keep working on it.

But as I mainly wanted to tell you where you can find the session review, or better said report, I will leave it at that. Enjoy your chance to play with HM2 guys and have a nice sunday.

[udbrky]

Yer i love it froze my computer 4 times todays 1 time in hand i lost a $180 i know why it free

If you provide logs we can probably figure out why, but without them, we can't. Please keep in mind that this is pre-release, there will be issues. Also, how big is your DB, what is your computer's ram and CPU? What is the ram and cpu usage in task manager when you're not playing, what is it when you are playing? Is note caddy running?

Where is my log file?
7: C:\Users\{username}\AppData\Roaming\HoldemManager\

Showing hidden files: How to show hidden files in Windows 7 (http://www.bleepingcomputer.com/tutorials/tutorial151.html)

XP: c:\documents and settings\{username}\appdata\HoldemManager

Showing hidden files: Microsoft Corporation (http://www.microsoft.com/resources/documentation/windows/xp/all/proddocs/en-us/win_fcab_show_file_extensions.mspx?mfr=true)

[udbrky]

I have to agree with this. When I want to view a hand I usually double click it and view it in the separate replayer window.

Having the replayer as a panel slows down the loading of the Reports/Sessions/Opponents tab. Hopefully this is just a beta issue and will be resolved in the future.

Perhaps an option to remove the replayer panel for those of us who don't want it or have lag issues.

This is being investigated

[udbrky]

I think a lot of the new functionality is great as some of the apps. The UI is a little confusing at time but this is just a learning curve and can also be improved upon during the Beta testing. I am finding performance issues with sync, loading all hands on startup, and hangs/freezes debilitating though. I don't think I could use it in a work situation until these are addressed.

Please provide log files and details about what you're doing so we can find out why and fix these issues. Please remember this is still pre-release.

[udbrky]

I did put in a request to look at the possibility of making a customizable live play tab. I know some people use different tools while playing.

I encourage you to look at the videos on the home page in the HM2 TV widget. Brent has made a lot of videos showing new features and introducing a lot of aspects of HM2. We also have interactive FAQs available in the help section. If you want more info on some parts, let us know what, so we can make informative videos and/or articles to introduce and help transition.

Yes, HM2 is completely different from HM1. HM/PT3 were way different from PT2. Office 2010 was a big change from previous Office versions. When Firefox came out with the tabbed browsers, it was a big change from the way internet browsers looked. Programs evolve over time. We strive to bring as much information and tools to you as we can and help you become a better player.

There will be a learning curve. There is with a lot of software ground to cover. I feel like I still learn something new every day that I didn't know existed, and I've been using it for about 8 months now. We do strive to help with the learning curve as much as possible. Feel free to contact me for anything you want more help in picking up.

[russb]

I did put in a request to look at the possibility of making a customizable live play tab. I know some people use different tools while playing.

I encourage you to look at the videos on the home page in the HM2 TV widget. Brent has made a lot of videos showing new features and introducing a lot of aspects of HM2. We also have interactive FAQs available in the help section. If you want more info on some parts, let us know what, so we can make informative videos and/or articles to introduce and help transition.

I wasn't suggesting a LivePlay tab. That was just an example of something an end users could implement if they so desired under my original suggestion; that suggestion being to place the interface into a standardized XML format as opposed to hard coding it. This would allow end users, like me, to tweak the interface to fit their own personal tastes. These tweaks, or mods, could then be easily shared just like a custom stat.

My issue the new interface is that even simple tasks are not intuitive at all. I never watched a single video for HM1 yet I was able to migrate over from PT2 without a single issue. And from there I had a solid foundation to learn the more advanced features of HM1. All I want from HM2 is the same thing; to be able to naturally and intuitively perform the same tasks as I did in HM1. From there, I don't mind watching videos to learn how to utilize the new more intricate and complex features, but having to watch videos to learn how to utilize basic functionality that I was already able to do intuitively and effortlessly in HM1 just feels like a big step backwards in user interface design.

[udbrky]

It would be easier to make things easy to find if people were more specific about what they can't find?

Like:

"It took me 2 days to figure out how to ____________"
"I spent a whole afternoon trying to do ___________"

[Not Excessive]

It would be easier to make things easy to find if people were more specific about what they can't find?

Like:

"It took me 2 days to figure out how to ____________"
"I spent a whole afternoon trying to do ___________"

I tried, here:


re: Tourney listed as Euro. HH and TS sent to HM2 support. This needs to be looked at from a 'Report' perspective as well. ie, how do I find the HH/TS for the required tourney when the tourney number is not listed? There is no apparent place in this report where the tourney number located, excedpt in the ubiquitous replayer. Is a long winded way of doing things as tourney number has to be one the keys that links all tourney data, no?
One report shows an error, but that's not the report where you can make changes and there's no link in the report where you can make changes back to the error. The current structure of tourney reports is not intuitive, imo.

[udbrky]

Thank you, I have made notes to bring this up in our meeting tomorrow.

[russb]

It took me half a day and I still couldn't figure out how to do half the things I can do easily in HM1.

I know some people have stated the interface grows on you but for now the primary selling point of HM2 for me is simply versus hero stats. That's not enough for me to give up an interface I'm entirely comfortable with for one whose use I'm finding non intuitive. If you want a specific example, I already listed one: list and sort sessions by an associated criteria such as results, VPIP, etc.

I really do hope you'll stop ignoring my suggestion of laying out the interface in XML, as opposed to hard coding, to allow end users to tweak it. Do you understand the suggestion? No offense intended with that comment, I'm not sure if you're a dev or just a community management person. Its not a big deal at all and this is the sort of project that just screams out for it. Isolate all the interface data, serialize it out, wham bam thank ya ma'am.

[udbrky]

The development team is currently working on getting HM2 to Gold status. Your suggestion has been passed along, and might happen down the road but I can confirm all efforts are aimed at this goal.