eBay Auction Sniper

JoyBidder Pro Edition comes with 14 days free trial. The registration fee is US $11.95. Once registered, you can use the software for one year with free upgrades and email support. After that, you will pay the US $9.95 renewal fee each year in order to continue using the software and getting upgrades and email support.

If you don't want to use the software, we'll refund your money within 30 days of purchase.

Yes, 100% FREE.

If you don't use Firefox browser, then install the desktop application. If you are a Firefox user, the extension provides better browser integration and runs on Windows, Mac and Linux.

JoyBidder supports 22 eBay sites, including eBay Motor.

Firefox Extension is developed and tested on Windows, Linux and Mac OSX, it should run on any operating systems that have Firefox3.5 or above. The desktop application only runs on Windows currenlty. Mac OSX application is planned.

When you download JoyBidder from download sites, for example, download.com, softpedia.com, you get a .xpi file. This is the Firefox addon installation file. To install it, you just simply drag and drop the file to Firefox window, (don't drop it on the address bar)

If you are using Firefox 3.5.1 and trying to download the latest version of JoyBidder from Mozilla web site. The download link on the Addon detail page won't work. This is a known issue with Mozilla web site, until it is fixed, you can download either from the Search Result page or from this link.

If you are not using Firefox 3.5.1 or trying to dowloading older verisons of JoyBidder. Please see this Firefox Support Knowledge Base article for solution.
Here is a screen capture to how to Enable 3rd Party Cookies.

Pro Edition:
In the item list, right click the item(s) that you have problem with. This will bring up the popup menu. Select the Report Bug menu item. This will copy the item information which you can paste into the email sent to joybidder.support@gmail.com.
Free Edition:
Click the Help menu toolbar button, (the last button in the toolbar) and select Report Bug menu item.
View YouTube Video Tutorial

Occasionally, you are asked by JoyBidder Support to provide a debug log.

1. Open Setting dialog
2. Select Others tab
3. Select the Enable Debug Log checkbox

Once enabled, JoyBidder will write debug log to a file. The file name is shown besides the checkbox. You should click the Clear Log button to clear the existing logs before you start re-produce the bug, so that only information relevant to the current issue is logged. You can then send the log file to joybidder.support@gmail.com.

Disable the log if you are not asked for it. However, there is no performance impact on enabling the log, other then the size of the log file will grow by time. If you want to keep debug log enabled, you should clear the log every week or month, depending on how often you use JoyBidder.

If you are currenlty using JoyBidder Free edition for Firefox, and you would like to upgrade to JoyBidder Pro. You need to first uninstall the Free edition.

1. Click Tools menu in Firefox
2. Click Addons menu item
3. Click Extensions tab
4. Locate JoyBidder Free Edition in the Extensions list
5. Click Remove button
6. Restart Firefox

When you launch JoyBidder for the first time, you will be asked to add an eBay User ID. You can also add more eBay User ID. Here is how:

1. Open User Manager dialog
2. Select -Add User- in the list
3. Enter eBay ID and Password
4. Click Save button

If your eBay password is changed, or you want to change your shipping country or zip code. Here is how:

1. Open User Manager dialog
2. Select the eBay User ID in the list
3. Update the information you want to change
4. Click Save button

Please always make sure you have the correct password and shipping information.

1. Open User Manager dialog
2. Select the eBay User ID in the list
3. Click the Delete button

[note] You cannot delete eBay User ID which has open auction items.

• 3rd party cookies are not enabled. When JoyBidder login to eBay, eBay will sent a cookie to your browser, since the login request is issued from JoyBidder, Firefox considered this cookie as a 3rd party cookie, (vs the same cookie you get when login from eBay's own login page). If the 3rd party cookie is disabled, then JoyBidder cannot login in. Please enable 3rd party cookies. If you don't want to enable 3rd party cookies, you can add ebay.com (or other ebay international sites) to the exception list.
  Enable 3rd Party Cookies Add ebay sites to exception list
• eBay require a numeric security code to be entered on the eBay sign in page before you can be signed in with this eBay user. Please use your web browser sign in and out several times until eBay stop requiring the security numbers

• Click the Purchase tab, select "Product registration with one year license" option, and click Purchase button. This will take you to PayPal to complete the transaction.
• Within one day after payment is recevied, your should receive the product registration information in your PayPal email or email address you enterred during the purchase.
• Open JoyBidder and open License dialog. Click to see screen capture
• Copy the production registration code, paste it into the field, click register button.Click to see screen capture

JoyBidder connects our license server to validate your license, however, due your network connection and our service traffic status, sometimes, it cannot connect the server proplery, thus cannot validate your license. This is a temporary issue. Try to restart JoyBidder and Firefox, it usually should fix the problem. If you are using multiple instances of JoyBidder on your computer, for example, running JoyBidder Firefox extension on multiple Firefox profiles or have both JoyBidder extension and desktop application, you are more likely has this problem.

• Click the Purchase tab, select "One year license renewal" option, enter the registration code, and click Purchase button. This will take you to PayPal to complete the transaction.
• Within one day after payment is recevied, your should receive the product renew confirmation in your PayPal email or email address you enterred during the purchase.
• Restart JoyBidder and Firefox if it is a Firefox Extension version

Before you submit a bug report, you might want to

• Go to user manager and update your eBay user information
• Remove all the open items and add them back

New version of JoyBidder might need some additional information that are not tracked in the earlier version. By doing the above, you can make sure JoyBidder has all the information it needs. If it still doesn't work, please submit a bug report.

The "maximum bid" works in the same how eBay bidding works.
See eBay instruction here: http://pages.ebay.com/help/buy/automatic-bidding.html

If you have a high speed connection and fast computer, you can have a smaller lead time. It is recommended to place an instant bid early in the bidding process. so that you can find out:

• If the bid is successful or not. (Some times, eBay places restriction on bidding on certain items).
• How much time it takes eBay to process the bid.

Sometime, when you schdule group bid, you will get an error message, like the one here

When end time of auctions in the group are close to each other, close to or even smaller than the lead time, JoyBidder displays this alert to warn and prevent user of accidently mis-use group bidding and win more auctions than they want.

For example, there are two items in a bid group. item1 ends on Sep 21, 2010 16:58:03 PDT, item2 ends on Sep 21, 2010 16:58:13 PDT, they are 10 seconds apart. If your lead time is set to 15 seconds, then JoyBidder will place the bid for item1 on Sep 21, 2010 16:57:48 PDT, since we won't know if we have won item 1 until after item 1 ends, which is Sep 21, 2010 16:58:03, JoyBidder cannot cancel the group bidding and continue to place the subsequent bid on item2 on Sep 21, 2010 16:57:58 PDT. If you are are the highest bidder on both item 1 and item 2 when the auctions ends, you win both items.

Solutions

• Don't add item or items that ends very close to each to a bid group
• Reduce the lead time, in the above example, if the lead time of item 2 is 5 seconds, then JoyBidder has enough time to determin the outcome of bidding of item 1 and cancel the bid group if won. JoyBidder add 5 seconds extra as safety pre-caution, so you need to extra 5 seconds when calculating the lead time. Again, there is only so much you can reduce the lead time, depending on your computer and network speed and how much auctions you are bidding. I never recommend any thing below 5 seconds.

Your user information is only saved to your own computer and only used by JoyBidder to login to eBay to track and place bids on your behalf.
User password is now encrypted since 1.3.5.

Yes. You computer has to be on and JoyBidder should be running in order for the scheduled bid to work. You can have JoyBidder minimized. You can close Firefox browser.

JoyBidder can send you SMS or Email via Twitter when your sniper bid is lower than the minimum bid, so that you might have a chance to adjust your sniper bid. It is easy to set up, here is how

1. Sign up a Twitter ID if you don't have one
2. Have you Twitter ID follow joybidder
3. Enter your Twitter ID in the JoyBidder Settings dialog
4. Click the "Send a test message" button to send youself a test message
5. You should receive the test message in your cell phone or email, depending on your Twitter setting
6. That's it.

Yes, you can click the "Put your computer to standby mode" button on the toolbar. Your computer will be in standby mode and wake up to place the snipe or check the item status.
You can change the wake up time settings under Standby tab in the Setting dialog. You should test if your computer supports this feature before you put it into real use. Here is how.

1. Make sure you have at least 1 open item in JoyBidder
2. Open Setting dialog
3. Click the Standby tab
4. Change the first dropdown to 3 minutes
5. Save the setting
6. Click the Standby button in the toolbar
7. Your computer will go to standby and wake up in 3 minutes

Don't forget to change your setting back. You don't want to wake up your computer every 3 minutes in real use. Note: This feature is only available for Windows users since 1.3.5

Yes, but it not enabled by default. Here is how to enable/disable it

1. Open Setting dialog
2. Click the Desktop tab
3. Check (or uncheck if you want to disable) the Minimize to Tray checkbox
4. Save the setting

Once it is enabled, minimize the JoyBidder window will put it into System Tray, and click JoyBidder icon in the System Tray to restore it. Note: This feature is only available for Windows users since 1.3.5

Yes, Here is how to create a desktop short-cut for JoyBidder

1. Open Setting dialog
2. Click the Desktop tab
3. Click the JoyBidder icon button on the right side of the Minimize to Tray checkbox

Note: This feature is only available for Windows users since 1.3.5

Bid group allows you to buy specified number of auctions from a list of auctions, For example, there are a lot of auctions for iPhone, but you only want to get one. Here is how to do it in JoyBidder:

1. create a "iPhone" bid group in Group Manager, specify number of iPhones you want to buy
2. search eBay and add all the iPhone auctions that you want to buy to "iPhone" bid group
3. schedule a snipe for each of the items in the group
   [tip]Scheduling snipe one item at a time is error prone and tedious, you can use Batch Snipe to schedule snipe on a large number of auctions in one shot

JoyBidder will bid on the item that ends first. If it wins the specified number of auctions, it will cancel all the rest scheduled snipes in the group. But if it doesn't win, it will bid on the next item in the group.

Batch Snipe allows you to schedule snipe on multiple auctions in one shot so that you don't need to do it one by one. Here is how:

1. Select the auction items in the Grid
2. Click the Place Bid toolbar button
3. Enter the max bid price
4. Click Bid button

You should, in most cases, have Include Shipping checkbox selected so that JoyBidder can adjust the bid price based on the shipping cost of each auction. For example, you have Batch Snipe two auctions, item A is free shipping and item B is $4.00. If you enter $50 in the Batch Snipe dialog and have Include Shipping checkbox selected, JoyBidder will set $50 as max bid price for item A and $46.00 ($50-$4.00) for item B.

1. navigate to eBay View Item or Search Results page
2. right click the browser window or the item link
3. select Add to JoyBidder menu item
4. select eBay User ID, if you have more than one
5. optionally select Group
6. click OK button

1. click Add By Item Number(s) toolbar button
2. type or paste the eBay item number(s) to Item #(s) field
   [tip] multiple item numbers are deliminated by space, comma or line break
3. select your eBay User ID, if you have more than one
4. optionally select Group
5. click OK button

1. click Import Auctions from My eBay toolbar button
2. select your eBay User ID, if you have more than one
3. select which items you want to import (watching, active or selling)
4. optionally select Group
5. click OK button

You can add BuyItNow items. It is not enabled by default. Here is how to enabled it.

1. click the Help, About and Web Site toolbar button (the last toolbar button with question mark icon)
2. select the Setting... menu item
3. click the Other tab
4. check Enable tracking Fix Price list type checkbox
5. click the Save button

You can customize the Items Grid by adding or removing columns. You can also change the order and width of the columns by simply drag and drop. View demo.

First, you need to enable this function on JoyBidder running on both computers.You only need to this once.

1. click Help button (the last button on the toolar)
2. select Setting... menu item
3. click Server tab
4. check Allow transfer items among multiple JoyBidder instances checkbox
5. click the Save button

Next, from the JoyBidder you want to transfer items from, click the Upload toolbar button. Then from the JoyBidder you want to receive the items, click the download toolbar button and select the One-time only option.

Enable Transfer Items List From Multiple Computers

First, you need to enable Transfer items among multiple JoyBidder instances feature on both computers at home and work.

Then at your home computer:

1. Click Download Item LIst button from JoyBidder toolbar
2. Select how often JoyBidder will sync your items from other computersAutomatically Sync Item List From Other Computers
3. Click Okay button.

Now, you will notice that JoyBidder at your home computer runs on Server mode. It sync item list from JoyBidder running at your office and snipes. JoyBidder in Server mode

Note: While running in Server mode, JoyBidder will remove any existing open items, before downloading items list from other computers.

At your office computer, you use JoyBidder as usual, adding items and setting up snipes, but you will click the Upload button to tell JoyBidder that changes of your items list need to be synced. Upload Items List

Click Ctrl+F or Command+F on Mac OS to open the Item Finder Toolbar

You can search item title, item ID, price, feedback score and many other options.

JoyBidder automatically checks new version everyday, and will alert you when there is a version is available. You can also manually check for new version:

JoyBidder Desktop Application (Window and Mac)

1. Click the "Help" toolbar button (the right-most button on the toolbar with a big question mark)
2. Click the "Check for Updates" menu command

Update JoyBidder Desktop Appliction

JoyBidder Firefox Extension (Window, Mac and Linux)

1. Click the "Tools" menu in Firefox browser
2. Click the "Add-ons" menu command
3. Click the "Extensions" tab
4. Click the "Find Updates" button on the bottom-right corner

Update JoyBidder Firefox Addon (Step 1) Update JoyBidder Firefox Addon (Step 2)

JoyBidder Free Edition Firefox Extension

Note: if you are using the Free version for Firefox, due to the Mozilla's rigid review process, the new version will be reviewed by AMO reviewers before it can be made public. (it could take 3 to 5 days).