On This Site

What's New?

Deal 3.1.5 point release: Deal 3.1.5 has added some minimal Unicode support, improvements to the -trick option to dds, and slightly better documentation.
Deal Release Blog: A simple blog to use to announce new releases of Deal. Subscribe to the feed to learn about the latest point release.
Deal 3.1.2 point release: Deal 3.1.2 has some bug fixes, slightly better use of Bo Haglund's double-dummy solver, universal binaries for Mac OS X, and a smattering of new features.
New deals added to Bad Fit Deals and Doubly Asymmetric Deals.: Found using Deal 3.1 using the new double-dummy solver.
Deal 3.1 Released!: Includes a built-in double dummy solver, DDS, written by Bo Haglund.
High Card Points Versus Binky Points: Comparing values between Binky Points and High Card Points, added to the Hand Evaluation Research page.
Deal gets mentioned in The New York Times.: In a column about research on bidding notrump games opposite balanced hands even with major suit fits...
A New Address: bridge.thomasoandrews.com: I've finally gotten a vanity domain address. The various old addresses should redirect you to this address.
An Ajax implementation of The Impossible Bridge Book.: Ajax stands for "Asynchronous Javascript and XML" and it's a powerful way to write Web-based applications.

Interesting Bridge Hands [Non-Framed]: A large collection (50+) of bridge hands, with my own, occasionally flawed, analyses. I am partial to squeeze plays.
Everybody Makes [PDF]: A single remarkable deal where 3 NT can be made by any declarer against best defense.
Par Zero Deals [Non-Framed]: A collection of double-dummy oddities where no contract makes.
Bad Fit Deals [Non-Framed]: A set of double-dummy oddities; a collection of deals which play best in six-card fits.
Doubly Asymmetric Deals [Non-Framed]: A set of double-dummy oddities; not for the casual reader. In these hands, north/south make contract A only declared by south, and contract B only declared by north.

XML Test Documents [Non-Framed]: All of the articles above (in Bridge Stories and Deals) are generated from XML via XSL and CSS. These test documents are my method of making sure I haven't broken anything. The test documents include sample input and output.
XML and Bridge Publishing: More examples of bridge with XML/XSL. This page discusses the advantages of XML and gives some examples which can be formatted by Internet Explorer or Mozilla, the only browsers with good XSL support.

Deal 3.1: The latest version of my Tcl-based dealer which allows programmatic analysis of bridge hands. The GIB web site says that Deal is "the most powerful dealing program we've seen."
The Impossible Bridge Book: I have a book with every possible bridge deal in it. Just give me the page numbers, and I will give you the deals. Says someone in Germany, ...irgendwo zwischen Genie und Blödsinn... which translates as, somewhere between genius and rubbish.

Hand Evaluation Research: Several articles on hand evaluation methods based on double-dummy trick data. Also, try out an online version of the evaluators.
A Surprise in the Law: This is an article detailing a statistical oddity in the Law of Total Tricks.
Taking the "Suck" out of Suction: An article briefly noting the problems with the "Suction" convention, and a suggested solution, introducing two systems, "Psycho Suction" and "Inverted Psycho Suction."

George Coffin's Great 88: A classic set of 88 five-card endings that are dazzling and disorienting.
Hugh Darwen's Double Dummy: A large collection of fascinating double dummy problems.
Richard Pavlicek's Site: Includes many interesting articles, including stuff related to this site. Particularly, his deal encoding algorithm, which I've implemented in the Impossible Bridge Book, and his Bridge Writing Style Guide, which I used as a guide in my Bridge/XML work. In addition, he has a great double-dummy hand, Mind Bogglers III: Optimum Contract, where both sides have three spades as their best making contracts.
Mike Lawrence Articles: A good set of articles by Mike Lawrence, including an interesting framed presentation.

In Shuffling Cards, 7 is Winning Number: A New York Times article about the seven-shuffle result. Essentially,this result says that seven shuffles yield good randomness, while fewer shuffles do not, and more shuffles do not significantly increase randomness. If you have some mathematical knowledge, you can read a proof of the result.
ACBL Article on Computer Deals: An ACBL response to frequent fears that computer deals are not 'true' or are somehow rigged, it gives a reasonable layman's description of why the perception is there, and why that perception is inaccurate.
Disorder in the Deck: Another article on computer dealt hands, from Science News.
Deja Vu at the 1995 CNTC Final: Fred Gitelman reports a case where computer dealing clearly was flawed. [This page doesn't look good with Mozilla.]
Bridge software development mailing list: A mailing list for bridge software development issues. Check out the archive.

: The oldest and best online bridge service. My id is thomaso.
GIB: The best-playing computer bridge program. It uses a variation on my evaluation techniques during bidding, and its double-dummy solver is callable from my dealing software, Deal 3.1.

The American Contract Bridge League: It ain't perfect, but it's the main option for American tournament play.
The World Bridge Federation: International body.
MIT Draper Labs Bridge Club: Where I started playing.
The Bridge World: The most venerable bridge magazine.
Great Bridge Links: Probably the best organized collections of bridge links.