Import & Sync: getting your hands in

Choosing each room's folder, importing your history, following the import live, understanding the queue and sorting out hands that do not go through.

Everything that brings your hands into GrindLab is set in one place: Settings › Import & Sync, the first section of the Tracker's settings. The sync line, at the bottom of the menu, also takes you there in one click.

Adding a room

The Tracker does not guess where your hands are: you show it the folder once, and it follows it on its own from then on.

1. Click “Add a Screen Name” (or, on first launch, the “Import Your Hands” block on the dashboard). The question is: “Which room do you play on?”
2. Pick your room: Winamax, PokerStars, Unibet, Betclic, PMU, GG Poker, or “Other folder” for another room.
3. Select the folder where the room saves your hand histories. The Tracker shows “Reading the folder…”.
4. It recognizes your screen names in the hands. If it finds only one, it adds it. If it finds several, it asks you: “Untick the ones that aren’t yours”, then “Start the Import”.

A message confirms: “Folder chosen: its new hands will arrive on their own.” On the Free plan, the import takes your hands starting with the most recent ones, up to 10,000.

The room is read from the content of the hands, not from the folder's name: if you keep your histories somewhere other than the default folder, just pick that folder.

Where to find the folder

Each room's client shows, in its settings, where it writes your histories (look for “hand history” or “historique des mains”). The most common locations:

Depending on your PokerStars client, the folder may also be called PokerStars or PokerStars.EU. On Windows, AppData is a hidden folder inside your user folder: type %APPDATA% or %LOCALAPPDATA% in the File Explorer address bar to go straight there.

Betclic and GGPoker

These two rooms do not keep your hands on your computer. You have to export them first:

• Betclic: use the export in the Betclic Poker software, then “Choose the Exported Files”.
• GGPoker: download your history from PokerCraft, then “Choose the Downloaded Files”.

These imports are not followed continuously: export again from time to time.

Supported rooms

The Tracker reads hands from Winamax, PokerStars (Zoom included), Unibet, PMU, Betclic, GGPoker, iPoker (in XML format) and CoinPoker, as well as Poker Bankroll Tracker exports. 888poker, partypoker and WPT Global are not read yet.

Importing files by hand

“Import Files”, at the top of the section, imports individual files: .txt, .log, or a .zip archive (250 MB at most once unzipped). It is useful for an old history, an export, or hands from another computer. Hands already imported are never sent twice.

Following the import

During an import, the “Importing” block gives the estimated time left, with a “Pause” / “Resume” button. If the connection drops, it shows “Connection lost” and retries on its own.

Pending imports form a queue. It is processed in this order:

1. the table you are playing right now
2. the imports you started yourself
3. catching up on followed folders

Within each import, the most recent hands go first. You can remove an item from the queue, with a few seconds to “Undo”.

At launch, the Tracker catches up on the hands played while it was closed (“Followed folders · Catching up”). After that, it watches your folders continuously and sends new hands about every 30 seconds.

Right after a big import, your hands are there, but the Statistics and Players pages fill up within a few minutes: “Your stats are on their way…”, with the progress of the analysis.

The sync line

At the bottom of the menu, on every page, a line sums up the state of the import:

• Up to date, with the time of the last hand
• Importing or Import paused
• Connection lost
• Action required: something is waiting for you in Import & Sync
• To check: some hands could not be imported

Your rooms and screen names

The “Your rooms” list shows each screen name with its room and its folder. A row's “···” menu offers:

• “Find the Folder”, if the room moved it
• “Change Folder” or “Disconnect the Folder”: the hands already imported stay
• “Import Files” for this screen name
• “Delete the Screen Name”: its hands stay in GrindLab, unless you also tick their deletion from the cloud, which is irreversible

Followed folders belong to each computer: on a second computer, you have to choose them again.

When something is stuck

Messages at the top of the section tell you what to do, each with its button:

• “Sign in again to send your hands”: your session has expired, “Sign In”
• “Folder not found”: the folder was moved or renamed, “Find It”
• “10,000-hand limit reached”: the Free plan is full, “Go Grinder”
• “… hands not imported”: opens the import details

The “Import Details” button (the clock) lists the imports of the last 7 days and, under “To check”, the hands or files that could not be imported, with the reason: a format the Tracker cannot read yet, a damaged or oversized archive, an unreadable folder.

“Report to the Team” sends us the failed hands, the import log of the last 7 days, your Tracker version and your system, with an optional comment. Nothing else: not your other hands, not your results. Once the format is fixed, the hands go through. “Ignore” removes the alert.

What goes to the web, what stays on your computer

Your hands are read on your computer, then sent to your account: that is what makes them available in the browser, in the Lab and on another computer. Every Tracker page reads this data online.

What stays on your computer: the list of followed folders, the queue, your display preferences and your rakeback rate.

On the Free plan, beyond 10,000 hands, new hands are no longer collected.