Multiple Decks no longer can be "Spread"

[Greg the Yeti]

Hi,
lots of goodies in the new version 10, however here the second fault I've found.

Yes you can still OPEN Multiple Decks faultlessly, using the shift click method within the Deck Listing. however you can now ONLY use these additional deck for drawing a single card or for displaying them using "Free Selection".

GONE is any possibility of using them with any of the spreads!

Now this may not matter in many cases, however I tested it against the Motherpeace Tarot. On the Deck share is a set of three decks to allow full use of the Motherpeace Deck and it's "Reversed" and "Left" and "Right" readings plus the various 12 Astrological readings for the Wheel of Fortune card.

These three decks rely on the Multiple Deck feature but also rely on being able to "Spread" the "Moon Phase Deck", using the same spread as for the Main Motherpeace Deck. Then the Main Motherpeace Cards are "Spread" directly on top of those. (Full instructions come with the Decks - and it's fairly intuitive to do..)

(For the "Wheel of Fortune Deck" it is not a problem, since only one card is required, so can be drawn manually.)

As far as I'm aware this is the ONLY way of using the Motherpeace Tarot fully according to the Guidebook version. It is a very great shame that this can now no longer be done!!

I really hope that you will restore full use of "Spreads" for any of the Multiple Decks!
Without this it almost seems that you've turned "Multiple Decks" into just an amusement or a different way of doing Deck Comparison?? Taking away their "Soul"?

Regards Greg

[WebWeaver]

Can you give a step by step of what you are trying to do? I think you may have encountered a bug in the program, and want to verify what it happening versus what should be happening.

Also make sure you are using the latest version, I was able to create a spread and deal an additional deck manually on to it.

Thanks!

[Programmer]

Hi Greg, It sounds like you want to access the spread menu from a secondary deck. At the moment you can't do that. I am sure I will add that at some point, but for the time being there were so many new features going into the program that it was too confusing for me to work out all the possible code paths and I made it so you can only launch a spread from the principal deck. The other aspect of this is that when you design a spread the first deck can use the current deck or a named deck, but not a subset. But a spread can contain secondary decks or subsets, and I think that is what you are are looking for. So you design a spread that uses:

1) The current deck
2) A subset of the Mother Peace deck.

Thinking about it, maybe I could change it so that a secondary deck does have the spreads menu, but a subset doesn't. Actually that might be the way to go as obviously from what you are saying in the previous version of the program a secondary deck had the spreads menu (I have been working on version 10.0 for about three months now so I had forgotten that). So you still won't be able to launch a spread from a subset but maybe it is too strict to say that if it is a deck it has to be the primary deck.

[Greg the Yeti]

Hi Richard,
thanks for getting back so fast!

I will experiment with what you've said. If this new way of working does the business, then fine. I'll let you know.
- -
Hi Shari,
with the Motherpeace Trio of Decks on the Deck Share, to use the full interpretations of the "Guidebook" version, you need to

1) First shuffle and Spread the "Moon Phase Deck" using the main "Motherpeace Spread", which is also shared. This gives you which of the four interpretations you will use for each of the cards in the spread.

2) Then LEAVING THE Moon Phase Deck's Spread THERE, shuffle and Spread the main "Motherpeace (Guidebook Notes)" Deck DIRECTLY ON TOP.

To get your reading for each card you need to shift the main card just enough to see the general direction of the Moon Phase Card below. This gives you whether to read the "Upright" "Reversed" "Right" or "Left" reading. It takes only a second and is fairly intuitive.

If you want a record for personal use or to give another person "Their Reading", then you will simply need to cut out the three parts of the reading which are not relevant. (and totally ignore the Moon Phase Deck's entries, which have no notes anyway...

3) If you got the "Wheel of Fortune" Card, then in the "Guidebook Notes" version it comes with twelve "Astrological Readings". I suppose you could always read the sign of the person for who the reading is being done. But perhaps that isn't relevant - we're not always in our "Home Sign". So there is a separate Motherpeace "Wheel of Fortune" Deck, which you draw only when you get the "Wheel of Fortune" in the Main Spread. This needs shuffling and drawing the top card, which indicates by the position of the Sun in the "Ascendant" which of the 12 reading to use.

As far as I'm aware, this is currently the ONLY way to do the full "Guidebook" version of Motherpeace and was rather nice... (thanks MysticEast!)

So you will always need to have two decks open at the same time and both of those need to be spread with the same spread, directly on top of each other. The third Deck is only opened as and when necessary, and only requires a manual selection of one card.

I hope this explains what is supposed to be going on. Currently with the new version of Orphalese it isn't working as before. Richard has indicated above that there may be a new way of doing it...
I've got to experiment and see if it "Does the Business"!

Regards Greg

[Greg the Yeti]

Hi Richard,
I've rushed doing that trial of your suggestion above so that I can get the result to you - hoping you might be able to implement your other possible suggestion that you mentioned.

Yes basically it looks as if it ought to work, but NO, it doesn't.

To test it out I created a copy of the orginal spread, but went in and changed it so that it is deck specific to the Motherpeace Moon Phase Deck. That whatever deck appears open, the spread will change that and deal the Moon Phase cards. (I also edited the original to be specific to the Main "Motherpeace (Guidebook Notes)" Deck.

(Now I've got two decks open when I do that spread. The Main Motherpeace Deck as the First Deck and the Moon Phase deck as the secondary)

Fine. So I do that edited Spread and now I've got the Spread of Moon Phase cards, but they CAME FROM the FIRST Deck, not the one that was already open as the Moon Phase Deck.

Now go to try to shuffle and spread the main Motherpeace Deck on top.

When I spread them with the re-edited spread specific to the Main "Motherpeace (Guidebook Notes)" Deck I get a notification "Do I want to collect the visible cards first. Selecting "no" it does the spread and inbetween getting sizes wrong in the meantime. These were eventually sorted and the two sets of Spreads were now one on top of the other (as they should be).

HOWEVER 1:- The second Spread of cards were also dealt from the First Deck, not the secondary deck. Both Spreads came from the First Deck. No cards were spread from the secondary Deck.

HOWEVER 2:- as I suspected from the prompt "Do you want to collect the visible cards" I guessed that ALL those cards are now from the Main Motherpeace Deck and the ones from the Moon Phase Deck have been CHANGED to the Main Motherpeace Deck. I check them and it is so!

The two spreads also seem to exclude the "Card Positions" of the first from the second spread. So if the first Spread laid out card "00", that could NEVER be spread by the second spread, because that card position has already been allocated and has not been gathered or collected in. I think that's so?

So in short this doesn't "Do the Business". It only gives two spreads from the same one Deck, with the second spread limited to the cards not already drawn by the first spread.

So please, as a matter of urgency, can you re-enable being able to access the Spread part of the menu from the secondary Decks. Please, Please, Pretty Please with 15,000,000 cherries on top, Please!

Regards Greg

[Programmer]

Well I can see it is easier to have them. The reason the options weren't there on the secondary deck wasn't because it is not possible to launch spreads or other subsets or whatever from those menus, but because I wasn't really confident that I had covered all the possible errors that could come along by having them there. Anyway, I have gone over it several times today after adding them back and it all seems to be OK (yes, I know I have said that before) so there it is and you can test it in version 10.0.2 as of now.

Quick link for those who already have version 10.0: http://www.orphalese.net/downloads/clic ... pgrade.exe

[Greg the Yeti]

Hi and Thanks,
I'll check that out forthwith and immediately and get back to you!

Thanks VERY VERY muchly!

Regards Greg

[Greg the Yeti]

Hi Richard,
I've duly tested that (once) and it seems to work and that lovely feeling of being able to use Motherpeace with the Full Readings is returning!

However I did note the following which concerned me:-

1) First Spread of the Moon Phase Deck (the secondary deck - because I want the readings for the Main Deck to take precedence in the Save Readings Dialogue) went to plan. No Probs.

2) On Spreading the Main Motherpeace Deck (primary deck - see note above) I got a worrying dialogue "Did I want to gather in the cards that were already Spread" No - NO NO NO!
After selecting No to that, the spread seems to have worked fine...

What I'm worried about is that the Dialogue "Do you want to Gather the cards already Spread", makes me think that possibly the second spread will ignore the "card positions" taken up by the cards in the first spread??? So that if in the First Deck and Spread "Orphalese Card Positions" "00", "12", "23", "47" for example were drawn, that in the Second Deck and Spread, those card positions from that Deck Could not occur?...

If that were so then certain cards would be excluded by the first spread from being in the shuffle and spread of the second deck?? If that is so then this is still not working!...

In my way of thinking, since the two spreads are from different decks that warning dialogue is not only not necessary, but really should not happen!

I'm trying to think of a way to test that out and work out for certain what going on.
I think I might try to use the same Two Deck - Two Spread idea but with two of the Lottery Decks (because they only have numbers so it would be easier to see). I will probably need to duplicate the Deck (with a slightly different name) just to be sure what's going on. I'll try that and report back.

Regards Greg

Before I do that - I did also notice that when gathering the cards, the gather command first gathered only the cards on top and then when I selected the other pack,the command this time, gathered those.
That's probably correct and is a change from the last version of the program where (as well as the other errors) the gather command gathered EVERYTHING from both decks simultaneously!

I would say - "Don't Change this". If the Gather Command does gather the cards from two decks simultaneously, it makes me worry that there is an unwanted interaction going on between the decks. I'd prefer to have to do the two gathers, for the re-assurance of Zero Interaction!
- - -
I note that there are now three options for "Gather".
I could have used "Gather and close all decks" - Doh!... But that may not be what I want if I want to do a second reading...
Possibly in the future you might consider adding a "Gather cards from all Multiple Decks - without closing them" as a possibility?
But I suggest leaving that at least until we've got the basic functionality back and tested and guaranteed to be working correctly... if at all?

[Programmer]

Hi Greg, you can rest assured there is no relation between the two decks so you can quite easily have the "same" card from each deck in the spread at once.

The gather command (or ctrl+G) just gathers the current deck, the gather all command (ctrl+shift+G) is new and gathers and closes all decks accept the principal one.

I think the warning is fine as most people probably will want to gather cards before dealing a spread. If it got really annoying I could maybe add an option to never prompt.

[Greg the Yeti]

Hi again Richard,
Done and Dusted!

I chose the EuroMillions Stars Chiller Parchment Edition as the Guinea pig. Duplicated and changed the card back to the alternate graphic so I could tell which was which.

Selected "Always Shuffle before dealing a Spread", which isn't my norm, but helped to guarantee accurate results for this test.

Repeated the test quite a number of times and got instances of the same card occuring in both draws often enough to set my mind at rest.

Fine and well done and thankyou for getting that right first time!

- - -

I ALSO NOTICED:-

1) Having to do extra mouse clicks each time a shuffle is done. This one I'm blaming Microsoft for, for the way it's driving all software to do things the "Tablet Way" (when the PC way was always better...)
I hate having to do extra clicks that don't seem to be really necessary. Especially as I have a case of RSI already!!! I don't know if you can do anything about this? I just draw it to your attention...

2) I note the new behaviour of "Parking Decks" immediately after a Spread.
It is a very useful behaviour!
I note that you allow the parking of the extra decks too, and that you have implemented it more or less exactly as muggins suggested last year. Nice!
I note that the Options Dialogue allows you to customize the way this works. Very Nice! Not everybody wants the same!
HOWEVER:-
I note that the options for the "Used Deck", I think this means the Deck that is being Dealt, are Park or Leave. That seems correct.
But I notice that the options for the "Spare Deck" are only "Park" or "Close".
This is NOT NICE!
That extra deck, is not a "Spare Deck" -I'm using it, even if I'm leaving it till after spreading this one to spread that one too. So I DON'T want either to Park or to Close that extra Deck. I want to "LEAVE" it.

To be honest I can't think of a reason why somebody would have an extra deck open and be spreading another, unless it were just a deck that was "Spare" and you'd simply FORGOTTEN to close it.

But that's not what Multiple Decks really SHINE in. They beg to be USED, not just to be SPARE!

Please give the second (or third...) extra decks the option to be "Left", when the other deck is being spread. Otherwise for those people actually USING Multiple decks you get the annoying situation that if you don't want the extra deck peremptorilly closed on you yu have to see it go into the Park, only to have to unpark it to use it. More and more clicks....
People who've just been forgetful are getting all the convenience and people actually using the function getting all the inconvenience - it just ain't right!...

I SUGGEST:-
Changing the designation of both to
a) The "Deck being Spread"
b) All "Other Decks"

Giving both designations the same options.
i) "Park"
ii) "Leave"

as to the third Option "Close" - like I said I can't think of a real use for this for anybody actually USING Multiple Decks.
It's only really handy for someone who is only "playing around" with Multiple Decks. NOT really using it for anything other than amusement or to compare decks. A feature that is perhaps better done by the copare tool. I'd suggest deleting the option to be honest. It may be handy for someone who is just careless but it is a NASTY option for anybody else.

regards Greg