I haven't had the time to properly check out Nove yet, but as the landing page was mentioned, I pretty much agree with hyperpape. In fact, I postponed checking Nova out a couple of times a while back when I first heard of it because the landing page didn't seem to make any sense to me at first glance. But it's good to hear you've got ideas for improvement.

To give some quick input on the matter, I like the simplicity of KGS a lot - it's very easy to see what's going on. WBaduk style is also similar and works for me (although the overall design just looks too old). Kaya.gs was mostly fine, but what annoyed me a lot was that you couldn't see the active games straight away (only open challenges) and the chat took almost half a page, which is a bit too much. --> So as a summary, make it so that you see everything important at a quick glance, without too many bells and whistles jumping at your face

and... patch!

• Per-group ladders! Now you can compete in private or semi-private ladders in any groups you are a member of. Site wide ladders will be enabled probably the next major patch.
• Review / analysis hot keys have been added. If you're familiar with the cgoban hot keys, they will feel pretty much identical.
• Added the ability to follow / star games to easily keep track of any matches you are interested in
• Tournament winners are now awarded trophies
• 80 some odd patches of small tweaks and interface improvements

And we also updated our landing page.. for better or worse

Definitely for better. Nova has transcended all other servers and keeps getting better.

What are the chances of getting Chinese, Japanese and Korean interfaces available? This seems like it would be one of the best ways to increase users and make this a go to server for live games.

Thanks to macelee, we already have a Chinese interface For Japanese and Korean, we just need someone willing to volunteer their time at http://translate.nova.gs/ to do those translations.

Oh that sounds exciting! Let me check it out again.

"Hello?" <hello, hello, hello, hello>

Nobody there. Still. I don't mean no open games, I mean no active live games at all. So not only can't I play, I can't even kibitz.

Perhaps this server will have transcended all other servers when it gets users, but until then, nope.

Good luck NOVA, I'm still rooting for you, and I'll gladly try again in a few months.

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- Brady
Want to see videos of low-dan mistakes and what to learn from them? Brady's Blunders

well, i had two live game there, so that's still a little better than kaya, but agreed, we're not quite there right now.

Features! Well ok only one major feature and some minor enhancements

• Voice chat is now available for both games and reviews

You can now chat via voice on games, demo boards, and reviews if you are using an up to date version of Firefox or Chrome.

How about IE?

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- Bantari
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WARNING: This post might contain Opinions!!

We're using WebRTC, so no not yet. It's a fairly bleeding edge W3C standard, so IE will probably get around to it eventually, but it'll be awhile I'm sure. Although if you install chrome frame it'll probably work in "ie" then

Edit:
Actually, this may work too: https://code.google.com/p/webrtc4all/

I checked this out a while back when it wasn't very feature rich, and I have to say, it's improved leaps and bounds - color me impressed! You guys have done really, really well here and I much prefer this to KGS, Tygem and IGS in terms of usability, interface and features.

In particular, I was impressed that I could log on with my 7" android tablet and play comfortably through the browser - there's a nice responsive design in parts where it's needed.

Of course the main challenge as we all know is building a player base. All I can offer is to spend more time on the server playing games and helping newcomers, in the hope that over the coming years your reputation will build. Very best of luck!

Oh, and regarding the landing page after logging in - I too am not really interested in board displays of my recently played games, I'd would *much* rather see a list of all the open challenges, then followed by games in progress.

The important question is, however - WHY is nobody playing real-time games on Nova?

Even on Kaya there were RT games minutes within its opening, and all the way until it closed. On KGS when it was created there were RT games going on immediately after it got announced, from what I remember. Same with NNGS, and other servers I am aware of, always. Even if it took a long time to build a solid user base, there were always SOME RT games going.

I have not seen a single RT game on Nova yet. Which does not mean there are none, but they are visibly less than on any other server. I am logging it about every other day or so.

Anyhow - once you answer this question - fix it and Nova might soar.

PS>
My personal hypothesis: You made the server really convenient for NRT games, which are going on all the time. When I log in, I see them. Maybe people are put off, they think: "oh, another NRT server, sweet, I go back to KGS." This is how I feel, very strongly, even thought I know better. And often I log out even without bothering to check the chat and see who is there.

So, if the above is part of the problem, my advice is as follows:

On the landing page, do not display the games in progress so prominently (it will not be practical anyway once you have hundreds of games going) - and certainly don't show the positions and the timing. I know its a cool feature, but still... I think this might do more harm than good. Instead, maybe do some tabs or something, like 'Challenges', 'Your Games', 'RT Games', 'NRT Games' - with the 'Challenges' being the default active tab. You can do the Challenges graphically (as they are now, very nice) and also as a list like other servers - people like to see familiar stuff.

Another issue is finding people. The 'Chat' link you have is not very prominent, nor intuitive to use. A newcomer, when logging in to Nova, gets the impression it is deserted, nobody there, only a few NRT games going. Bring the people and the chat to the forefront, maybe as the fifth tab on the landing page, and make it a default tab? Or just make the chat and channels to be the default landing panel.

Overall, I think one of the problems Nova has is the interface. It works well, but the design is austere and functionality is unusual. If nothing else, make the important parts of the interface more prominent.

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- Bantari
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There are many real time games going on nova on a daily basis. Especially during the evening in the US/night in Europe, when most people seem to be online at the same time.
Right now there are 2 real time challenges open (one 5k and one 5d) and they were opened in the last minute. Of course, given the player base, you can't expect to open a challenge and find a player in 30 seconds. Create your game, join the chat, announce your game if necessary and wait 15 minutes. I will be VERY surprised if you don't find anyone willing to play.

(There are 82 users online right now, and the number has been steadily growing for the past months)

Great news. No need to change anything then. Rock on.

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- Bantari
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WARNING: This post might contain Opinions!!

I agree with Bantari that the interface tends to be the weak point. The reason why many servers work is that is what people want, one screen with some chat, open challenges, and current real time games in one place. As it is, it always currently looks a bit odd to me.

Also, I suggest getting bots online to aid in getting real time games going quicker. Kaya had many real time games that were against bots. It's not a replacement for people vs people games, but it lets people try things out quicker.

Well, I should probably add that I agree with some of your suggestions. I think Oren's idea would be a great improvement as well.

That's some great feedback. We've been talking a lot about changing the main page pretty much for all the reasons you've brought up, and I think you're spot on about bringing the seek graph/challenge interface to the foreground instead of active games. We certainly do need to find a better solution for making the chat more prominent, we may very well make an option to stick that on the landing page too, we'll see.. we've got some ideas floating around to attempt to appeal to both the crowd that really wants that, and the crowd that really doesn't.

Yep, bots are certainly still on the list, we'll get them in

Oh, please not simply “instead”. Running RT games should immediately be visible.



Ideally, I’d think, there would be three things on the landing page:

- main chat
- challenges
- running RT games w/ specs

with the option to turn any of these off.


Greetings, Tom

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Just throwing something out here: How about a non-web client?

When it comes to go I have yet to find a web interface I'd prefer over a separate client. I know at least the vocal majority says that a successful modern go server must be web based, but I probably wouldn't even use KGS if not for the standalone client. There was a thread somewhere (months ago) where this topic was touched and, surprisingly, quite a few people said they don't like to play go via a browser...

(Let's not go into the extra time needed to develop such a client for now )