About bjstrat
bjstrat.net was established in late 2005 as a hobby website. At the time I was working on the initial version of my program cdca, which computes exact (composition dependent) expected values for common rules variations in the game of blackjack for 1 to 41,297,762 decks. I wanted to see if I could create an interactive page where a user could enter options and/or information regarding blackjack, click a button, and then view output that was specific to the input. The first version of the program was very crude and only output the best composition dependent strategy for an input player hand versus an input dealer up card and applied only to a full shoe. The next version could somewhat mimic my desktop version and actually display computed expected values. Like the desktop version it did so for all up cards. It could compute overall expected values and expected values for a partial player hand. Like the desktop version, it also allowed for computing for a depleted shoe as input by the user. The latest version is the same as the previous one except that the GUI is nicer, in my opinion.
At the same time I was working on the website I developed several semi-finished and unfinished blackjack related software and information pages, some of which at one time or another were listed on or downloadable from bjstrat.net. The most notable among these was tdca (Total Dependent Combinatorial Analyzer.) Whereas cdca was capable of displaying theoretical expected values, tdca displayed more practical (overall) expected values for a player that simply plays according to correct total dependent basic strategy. In my opinion a very valuable feature of tdca was the built in practice game. It was different from other practice games because it actually displayed computed total dependent expected values as each card was played while simultaneously displaying up to 2 counting systems and also the exact composition of what remains to be dealt in the shoe. A user could see how well his counting system was evaluating expected values (relative to basic strategy) in real time as cards are dealt. It would be nice to have an online version of this but I wouldn't know where to start in order for it to be fast enough and user friendly enough to be usable online.
At the present time (March 2012) I am working full time and don't have a lot of time to devote to the website. I will add content as time permits.
I have spent time playing blackjack both in a casino and in practice. I have experienced both good and bad results in each. The main problem I saw was there could be prolonged periods where, although I felt I was doing as much right as possible that nevertheless negative results persisted. Rather than actually playing I began to look for ways to confirm that how I was playing was the best I could do. Gradually I got into computer programming. The first program I wrote was on a primitive computer and was stored on a cassette tape. It could not vary the probability of drawing any given rank. In other words the probability of drawing any given rank was fixed. This is known as an infinite shoe composition (where the drawing of a single card has no effect on the next draw.) For a full shoe this probability is 1/13 for any non-ten rank and 4/13 for a ten value card. I was able to confirm that the basic probabilities and strategies I had seen were likely right but I still lacked the ability to look at finite variations in shoe composition.
I spent several years just working without much thought of blackjack. Then all of a sudden I found myself out of work with seemingly few alternatives. I went through all of my savings. I took some programming courses at a community college and got an occupational certificate in computer programming. Eventually I decided to try to apply what I had learned to writing a blackjack program for finite shoe compositions.
The goal of the website is to present content with a basic underlying simplicity.
I can be contacted at this email address: kc@bjstrat.net