Poker Sharpener

A software combo plate that features a calculator and self-analysis program.

As online poker players get more and more exposure to self analysis software that offers potentially game changing information to those willing to actually look at themselves and their mistakes, along comes (albeit quietly) Poker Sharpener. This self analysis program also combines a decent odds calculator for online game play as well several other built-in hand history features that a discerning player may really appreciate.

By combining these two major functions into one solitary program, Poker Sharpener has defined a niche in the market which may trend that way now for others to follow or possibly, perish for lack of value. Now you might think that tackling such a major programming challenge would end up corrupt with programming errors, but let me tell you now that during some hard testing, Poker Sharpener runs as smooth as Béarnaise Sauce on a New York steak.

Think of Poker Sharpener as two programs. One of them, you can use during play on multiple tables and even multiple sites as a stand-alone poker odds calculator with some added features including table hand history action, a slew of opponent statistics for last 30 hands, and even a review of how your opponents came into a pot, from where and what they were holding. These windows of information can be called up in separate modules that are clearly displayed and nicely designed.

I find way too often that designers do not have taken the extra care to use an easy to read dark font with white background and appropriate sized print. Now Poker Sharpener did take proper measures to make sure the information is legible, but as a result created a somewhat complex array of open and close modules that takes some getting used to.
Poker Sharpener can also be classified as an empirical poker calculator because it does profile your opponents while you are playing with them. This may have been the original intent of the programmers as an end product because it is that competitive. The calculator itself is accurate and efficient but could use some user friendliness in terms of having to search too hard for commonly used indicators. For example, the spreadsheet display for opponent stats should have an alternate colored background.

Poker Sharpener has also created a unique color-coded bar system that overlays your opponents seat position and empirical poker calculators combined with an array of critical indicators can show at what grid style your opponent has been classified. The color bars are creative, but they will take some study. If you are of the Schoonmaker philosophy and know the tight-loose, passive-aggressive grid as your natural guide, then this color system will work fine for you. Ideally, you should just be looking at the color bars to identify your opponent’s style of play, rather than searching through digits. I can’t really say it’s better than competitive programs that use avatars or icons to identify an opponent, but it is clever.

Ideally, you should just be looking at the color bars to identify your opponent’s style of play, rather than searching through digits. I can’t really say it’s better than competitive programs that use avatars or icons to identify an opponent, but it is clever.

Oh yeah. The dreaded overlay feature making havoc of your poker table and limiting the flexibility of resizing and multi-tabling. As far as overlay programming is concerned – I hate it. There always seems to be challenges when resizing and multi-tabling, however Poker Sharpener seems to have a solid handle on this type of programming whereby it has added resizing, and on and off options. If overlay or even screen scraping programming has any long term future with other poker software, then Poker Sharpener programmers will definitely have an advantage, because they have apparently figured something out that the designers at Poker Edge and Calculatem Pro have not.

The other half of Poker Sharpener is a self analysis program. Not quite the in-depth prowess of Poker Office, but for most players it performs just fine for analyzing and exploiting some weak points in your game. When you first go to import hand history into Poker Sharpener, just go to lunch, I mean it. It may take several hours to convert your hand histories to .bak files for analysis. It’s time well spent though as Poker Sharpener quickly goes to work with hand history analysis that offers up a selection of data and graphs regarding your overall financial performance, review of you and your opponent’s play into categories like position, grid style, blind play, choice of hand, aggression and many more.

It also displays your overall financial performance, tournament performance and allows you to tweak your game recommendations for position and aggression and starting hand decisions. By the way, once you do the original file conversion of your hand histories, Poker Sharpener will add any new files created automatically, as long as you have it running while playing.

Poker Sharpener also allows for self analysis from multiple poker sites and multiple player IDs. Now neither major function of Poker Sharpener is the best of its class so to speak, but to have both of the calculator and analysis features rolled into should interest a good number of online players and I think Poker Sharpener did a fine job of it, given the enormous planning and programming coordination involved.