Comments/Ratings for a Single Item
H. G. Muller wrote on Wed, Feb 14 06:51 AM UTC in reply to Jean-Louis Cazaux from 06:17 AM:I think the dotted circle is a new feature of CG, for highlighting locust captures. The question is why there was a locust capture.
Do you have a link to the preset? Never mind, I figured out how to use the log id.
@Fergus: Is there a way to see the result of print and printr statements in the GAME code when the move gets accepted? I only get to see those automatically when it executes die, which I can often trigger myself by playing an illegal move. But in this case I really want to know what happens on a specific move, and without any output from the prgarm debugging is hard.
Thank you Fergus. I thought that the apparition of a dotted circle instead of piece could not be in relation of the use of HG's PTA.
@HG: could you please have a look?
I can't see what is the problem. Is that with my coding of the GC?
Since you used H. G. Muller's PTA to make this preset, you will have to ask him.
@Fergus: In this log
timurthelenk-fhou-2024-41-899
If I play (with Blacks) any move with a non-pawn piece, for ex; sh d11-e8, the white pawn in f6 disapears, replaced by a dotted circle (?) and it results that white King is in check which should not happen.
I can't see what is the problem. Is that with my coding of the GC?
Thanks
There are a couple of other way(s) to go about it, too, that I forgot to mention. Once, an opponent's last comment in a game vs. me was that I was too strong for him, so henceforth I have not accepted any of his open invites (though he could pick up any of mine later if he wished).
On another occasion an opponent just wrote that he needed a break from our matches, before resigning a game - again I have not accepted any of his open invites, though he may choose to accept one or more of mine later.
Yet another way that might be effective is to end a game by commenting something like 'let's not play again until [e.g. March, of 2024] at least, I need a break from our matches'.
If all else fails, you might issue only (or some) Personal Invitations, at least for a while. Some can be played privately, I understand, if you don't wish to give any hint of an impression that you might be avoiding certain player(s).
I will finish the game I have with him and then I will keep silent, no open invitation anymore.
When you make an invitation, you can enter a message for anyone thinking of accepting. So you could use this to say that you would like to play against someone you're not already playing this same game with or whatever stipulation you want to provide.
Thanks Kevin. There is no quarrel in my case. I'm glad to play with Richard, actually I have my best stats with him. But he took the last 5 or 6 open invitations I have made in a row, so it is a bit frustrating, I say to myself, let's open a new one to play someone else, and immediatly, it's him again.
I will finish the game I have with him and then I will keep silent, no open invitation anymore.
I once commented to Greg and he agreed that maybe a filtering-out option on open invitations could be a good idea - at the time there was one player who would take back moves if he blundered, such as in games of mine with him. CVP staff seldom seem to get involved in any of the few GC quarrels we have.
There are two other choices: if a person you don't wish to play lives in another time zone far away, and you know that, you could issue an open invitation(s) when you think that person may be asleep.
Alternatively, if the person you don't wish to play accepts an open invitation, you could just delete that game log, and repeat the process as often as needed. He may complain though, but you could argue your case at that point, too - perhaps by email with CVP staff, if you wish to keep things low-key.
@Fergus: is it possible to make an open invitation, open to everyone but 1 person?
I'm almost joking but on the other hand, launching an open invitation is identical to play always with our friend Richard which is always the most rapid to accept. It is virtually impossible to play agains someone else by open invitation.
@Richard: you are playing more than 1/2 of the total list of logs here, so please let the others play a little bit. Thanks.
Some diagrams for certain Game logs of mine, even long after I made a move, are showing funny patterns, like circular lines on the board's squares - for example:
That's now corrected. I had forgotten to correct how the upsidedown position for square table boards checks whether anything is different from the previous position. It now checks the $prevpos variable instead of $posdata[$movenum - 1]["space"]. By checking the wrong variable, it calculated that everything was different and highlighted every space.
Also for me
@ Fergus:
Some diagrams for certain Game logs of mine, even long after I made a move, are showing funny patterns, like circular lines on the board's squares - for example:
Ok, I viewed those logs in question, and, from my perspective at least, they now show correct result on the Finished Games Page that's linked to from the What's New Page.
If you view these logs, they should self-correct.
Thanks Fergus, although it appears some other entries near the top of the Finished games page (games I didn't play in myself, I think) have wrong results, still.
In one new line, I had tested for empty($log) when $log wasn't a global variable. So I changed it to empty($GLOBALS["log"]), and that fixed both of the games you mentioned.
@ Fergus
For some reason the Finished Game Courier logs page is showing wrong results of late today. For example, a game of Pocket Shogi Copper I won vs. wdtr2 in 2023 is showing up as 'Juan Juan has won' in the result shown for it, in the Finished Games page linked from the What's New page(!):
Also from 2023, a game of Pocket Copper Shogi I won vs. Richard Milner is showing up as 'White has won'(!), which is better, at least:
When I try to open it for accepting (or not), I get this error message: Your userid is timurthelenk. This log is private. It may be viewed only by the players. If you are one of the players, please sign in first. You may use the menu for this.
I fixed that problem, but when I clicked on the link, it automatically accepted the invitation for me without giving me the option.
@Fergus:
Paul Rapoport (Numerist) has launched an invitation to play Pemba:
numerist-cvgameroom-2024-8-677
When I try to open it for accepting (or not), I get this error message: Your userid is timurthelenk. This log is private. It may be viewed only by the players. If you are one of the players, please sign in first. You may use the menu for this.
In my experience, this has only happened to me in the past with Paul's invitations. As far as I know, he never got an invitation accepted and he finished by cancel them. Sad. But maybe, there is something wrong that he or we have not understood. If his invitation is open to anybody, how come I am refused to open it?
Could you please have a look to this particular log. Maybe you will see what is not done properly or if there is a bug.
Many thanks
Thank you for this explanation. I didn't know it was incremented that way. Thanks
What you're calling a reference number is just the date and time in the format date("Y-z-B"). They are the same, because the invitations were issued close enough together in time. So, it's no surprise that in each case, the same person issued the two invitations with the same date and time.
@Fergus: thank you, it looks much better.
Oh, it is not a major issue but if that interests you, I see a remaining anomaly: there are 2 couples of games which have the same reference number although being related to different games.
As far as I'm concerned, I don't ask for a correction. I just show this in case it indicates something important for the website.
Thanks again
One is to clean the database.
I cleaned the FinishedGames and GameLogs tables, and I dropped the OngoingGames table.
The other is to figure out what caused this and stop it.
I identified code where the plus sign got added back in and added a line calling urldecode on $game. So, when you click on a log for a game with a plus sign in it, the game's name should now show up without any plus signs. This has the unfortunate side effect that games cannot have plus signs in their names. Fortunately, it doesn't affect many games, because there are few games of that sort.
Comment #31244 indicates that I created FinishedGames in April, 2015, and Comment #34645 indicates that I created GameLogs in July, 2017. No comments prior to today mention OngoingGames.
It appears that OngoingGames is not being used anymore. I used grep to search for .php files with OngoingGames in them, and none turned up. Searches of OngoingGames for Log names matching %2016% through %2023% turned up nothing. So, I probably stopped using it in 2015, the same year I took over running the site. Around that time, I modified the Logs page to use the Database instead of reading every log in the file system, because reading all the logs was using too many resources. It seems that at that time I discontinued OngoingGames in favor of GameLogs, which contained a record of every log in a single table that could be searched with an SQL query from this page.
This is a huge problem that is even affecting my own games from 2004. Database searches indicate that it affects FinishedGames and GameLogs, but it doesn't affect GameSettings or OngoingGames. Since it didn't affect OngoingGames, it flew under the radar for people who didn't look back at past games. The solution has two parts. One is to clean the database. I will probably have to use a script, since a mass delete might get some rows that shouldn't be deleted. The other is to figure out what caused this and stop it. In urlencoded URLs, the + sign is sometimes used to represent the space. So, it looks like it has been saving urlencoded game names into the database. Since I know which tables in the database have been affected, I know to look at the scripts that write to those tables and to compare them to those that write to the unaffected tables.
@Fergus:
I don't understand your answer. You ask URLs. Those below are not enough? Or I don't understand what you don't understand. It seems that there is a problem with the way the recorded games are labelled.
I re-post the list below, they have all the same problem.
timurthelenk-numerist-2023-327-894
playtester-cvgameroom-2023-303-807
timurthelenk-cvgameroom-2023-259-648
makov333-cvgameroom-2022-244-501
cssdixieland-timurthelenk-2022-235-134
panther-cvgameroom-2021-304-254
catugo-cvgameroom-2021-289-757
The duplication seems to come because of the game title which is given as "A B" and "A+B": ex: Chinese Chess and Chinese+Chess.
Finally I also see this mistake where a same number is attached to 2 different games: timurthelenk-cvgameroom-2022-73-858 is once attached to Metamachy and once to Maasai Chess.
Please provide full URLs to the duplicated logs and their duplicates and others you find problematic.
Thx for answer)
Temporary bug while updating some code. Technically, the pieces had a height and width of zero, but this should be fixed now.
{BUG} Hey why I move in first game I should move in and in other my games all pieces are trasparent???
Dear Fergus. There are several bugs in this page:
It is rather simple. All games dated with 2022 or 2021 or even 2020 have not been played in these last days of 2023. I am quite sure of that. Here the bug seems just they have been moved in time. Strange.
There are also games which are duplicated. Like:
timurthelenk-numerist-2023-327-894
playtester-cvgameroom-2023-303-807
timurthelenk-cvgameroom-2023-259-648
makov333-cvgameroom-2022-244-501
cssdixieland-timurthelenk-2022-235-134
panther-cvgameroom-2021-304-254
catugo-cvgameroom-2021-289-757
The duplication seems to come because of the game title which is given as "A B" and "A+B": ex: Chinese Chess and Chinese+Chess.
Finally I also see this mistake where a same number is attached to 2 different games: timurthelenk-cvgameroom-2022-73-858 is once attached to Metamachy and once to Maasai Chess.
Fergus:
Please take a look at this link.
All problematic logs are distinguished by having the + sign inserted in the game name, for example, Kamikaze+Mortal+Shogi instead of the correct Kamikaze Mortal Shogi.
When trying to view those games or print the list of plays, the software warns that the logfile is missing, or something is misspelled.
Apart from what the records say, I wouldn’t know which games you have or haven’t played. I see no such problem with my account, and no one else has reported this. So, if you want me to look into this, I will need exact details.
@Fergus
I report another bug: in the table of the GC games I'm supposed to have played: https://www.chessvariants.com/play/pbm/logs.php?userid=timurthelenk&age=0&sort=age&stat=actfin
There are many that I have not played, at least not these recent dates (for example, I don't remember having played at Mosaic Chess), many games which are duplicated, etc.
So, the table is wrong. Maybe I'm not the only one. This may affect other statistic pages that are computed on this site.
The first one is now corrected. The second should be
A. M. DeWitt wrote on Mon, Dec 18, 2023 06:58 PM UTC in reply to Fergus Duniho from Fri Dec 15 10:53 PM:There are still a couple of logs that are experiencing this bug:
Fergus, this is impossible. Who deleted them?
It turns out no one deleted them. The problem was that they were written to the wrong directory. The $gameid variable had been set to an empty value in the header, as I was now using $gameid in the header to help find pages for playing games, and I was getting the value from the database. But Game Courier already used this variable without getting it from the database. After changing the header to not set $gameid if it's already set, I located the logs and moved them to the correct directories.
The problem happens not only with Open Invitations but also with Personal Invitations, such as those recently launched by Tim O'Lena:
Error: The logfile at ../pbmlogs/bear_chess/tim_olena-playtester-2023-343-632.php is missing, or something is misspelled
Error: The logfile at ../pbmlogs/bear_chess/tim_olena-alienum-2023-343-635.php is missing, or something is misspelled.
Error: The logfile at ../pbmlogs/mccooeys_hexagonal_chess/tim_olena-bosa60-2023-343-637.php is missing, or something is misspelled.
Error: The logfile at ../pbmlogs/mccooeys_hexagonal_chess/tim_olena-sissa-2023-343-641.php is missing, or something is misspelled.
With so many cases, it is evident that there is some bug in the Game Courier software. And it is probably related to the fact that since several days ago the logs of finished games have been duplicated, and when trying to review or print them, the software warns of the same type of error: "the logfile is missing, or something is misspelled". See, for example, this: https://www.chessvariants.com/play/pbm/play.php?game=Pocket%2BMutation%2BChess&log=olbog-gwduke-2006-234-653
Fergus, this is impossible. Who deleted them? They are too many and all consecutive for the last 7 days. Moreover 3 were created by me, I don't understand how I would do something different than usual. Something has been done.
Error: The logfile at ../pbmlogs/conquer_ii/degenschess66-cvgameroom-2023-342-344.php is missing, or something is misspelled.
Error: The logfile at ../pbmlogs/pattern_chess/degenschess66-cvgameroom-2023-342-576.php is missing, or something is misspell
Error: The logfile at ../pbmlogs/dai_seireigi/sesquipedalian-cvgameroom-2023-342-707.php is missing, or something is misspelled.
Error: The logfile at ../pbmlogs/zwangkrieg/sesquipedalian-cvgameroom-2023-342-707.php is missing, or something is misspelled.
Error: The logfile at ../pbmlogs/mccooeys_hexagonal_chess/tim_olena-cvgameroom-2023-342-959.php is missing, or something is misspelled.
Error: The logfile at ../pbmlogs/sac_chess/tim_olena-cvgameroom-2023-342-960.php is missing, or something is misspelled.
Error: The logfile at ../pbmlogs/bear_chess/tim_olena-cvgameroom-2023-343-627.php is missing, or something is misspelled.
Error: The logfile at ../pbmlogs/camel_decimal_chess/timurthelenk-nanil618-2023-346-522.php is missing, or something is misspelled.
Error: The logfile at ../pbmlogs/fantastic_xiii/timurthelenk-cvgameroom-2023-346-524.php is missing, or something is misspelled.
Error: The logfile at ../pbmlogs/maasai_chess/timurthelenk-cvgameroom-2023-346-525.php is missing, or something is misspelled.
Error: The logfile at ../pbmlogs/modern_makruk/makov333-cvgameroom-2023-346-569.php is missing, or something is misspelled.
Error: The logfile at ../pbmlogs/dai_seireigi/bahram-cvgameroom-2023-347-388.php is missing, or something is misspelled.
Error: The logfile at ../pbmlogs/devingt_chess/nanil618-cvgameroom-2023-347-676.php is missing, or something is misspelled.
Error: The logfile at ../pbmlogs/chess/cspk-thoner-2023-347-774.php is missing, or something is misspelled.
Error: The logfile at ../pbmlogs/different_pawns_random_chess/makov333-cvgameroom-2023-347-993.php is missing, or something is misspelled.
Error: The logfile at ../pbmlogs/cool_camels_vs_fabulous_fides/makov333-cvgameroom-2023-347-027.php is missing, or something is misspelled.
Anyone else can say if he/she sees the same thing than me?
None of those logs exist, and there are no backups for them. They were probably deleted.
I raise again this issue. The games under invitation cannot be played. The error message is the following (example):
Error: The logfile at ../pbmlogs/camel_decimal_chess/timurthelenk-nanil618-2023-346-522.php is missing, or something is misspelled.
Error: The logfile at ../pbmlogs/modern_makruk/makov333-cvgameroom-2023-346-569.php is missing, or something is misspelled.
Error: The logfile at ../pbmlogs/chess/cspk-thoner-2023-347-774.php is missing, or something is misspelled.
My correspondant has the same issue, so I'm not the only one.
Please help!
@Fergus: it seems that there is a bug. It is impossible to access to any game with an open invitation. By clicking on the game, one gets an error message. Could please you have a look and fix it? Thx
Is it only visible by opponent at this moment?
Things are not as simple as they used to be. The Logs page used to go through all the actual logs in the file system, but that was a huge drain on resources. So I rewrote it to use the database. When the log was deleted, it was also deleted from the database, and I have no backup for that. Since it's not in the database, it's not on the Logs page. But you can go directly to your game, and once you move, it should probably create a new database entry for it.
Is it only visible by opponent at this moment?
@Fergus: thanks but where is it? I don't see it.
Okay, I have restored the backup.
Yes please, my opponent said he wanted to resign and, due to a language confusion, he pressed delete instead. I would appreciate you rename the backup so we can end up this game in a regular manner. Thank you Fergus.
Your opponent might have deleted the log. If he didn't and wishes to continue, I will rename the backup.
I was playing that game on GC when suddendly I got this message and now I don't find the game nor the log anymore. Very frustrating:
Error: The logfile at ../pbmlogs/devingt_chess/nanil618-timurthelenk-2023-314-626.php is missing, or something is misspelled.
@Fergus: any idea of what has happened?
Time for me to fix that ID on the game, too, I think.
H. G. Muller wrote on Sun, Oct 29, 2023 01:49 PM UTC in reply to Bob Greenwade from Fri Oct 27 03:25 PM:@H.G.: There seems to be something wrong with my Vanguard game. I'm not sure whether it's my coding or yours, but I'm getting the list of legal moves, and the rifle capture I'm trying to do isn't among them; it's not letting me do my move.
The move was amongst them, but screwed up as h12-#to; @-i10. This problem was caused by the fact that the second leg of the rifle capture was marked as an 'iso' leg; apparently the ID you produced the code from had defined this move as caibN instead of the correct cabN. Since i in a continuation leg means 'as many leaps as the preceding rider leg, and N is not a rider atom, this produced an undefined value for the destination square. The ID is apparently able to handle that, but the GAME code wasn't. I made it resistant to this error by defaulting the number of leaps in the latest rider leg to 1.
Unfortunately this uncovered another problem, in the JavaScript for move entry. The move now shows up in the 'legalList' as h12-h12; @-i10. That is correct, but the script expects the second click to go on the destination, but cannot handle the case where the destination is equal to the origin. (This collides with the normal function of a second click on the selected piece, to deselect it.) The desired clicking sequence here would be h12, i10.
So I will have to redesign the move-entry script to handle these kind of moves. In the mean time you should be able to continue the game by typing the move, I expect.
H. G. Muller wrote on Fri, Oct 27, 2023 07:51 PM UTC in reply to Bob Greenwade from 06:07 PM:I will debug this tomorrow, when I have enough time to be sure I can finish it. The symptoms are similar to what happened once before: the variable 'to' (the destination square) gets assigned a non-existent value (likely a non-existing array element), and in GAME code this can lead to the name of the variable (#to) being assigned to the variable, and later bemistaken for the destination of a move.
Yeah, that's why I initially addressed the question to him. :)
At the top, it has this error message:
a h12-#to; @-i10, which is listed as a legal move, is not a well-formed move.
This seems to be the move you say is missing. The problem is that it includes a variable name instead of the value of that variable. Since your code is automatically generated instead of hand-written, H. G. Muller is in a better position to further help you with this than I am.
My Archer at h12 should be able to shoot the Sergeant at i10.
(I did previously use my Bowman currently at m9 to capture a Pawn at n7, so at least that part works.)
I'm not sure whether it's my coding or yours, but I'm getting the list of legal moves, and the rifle capture I'm trying to do isn't among them; it's not letting me do my move.
Tell me more about what you're doing and the move that should be legal but isn't showing up among the legal moves. Since I have not written any code to specifically accommodate rifle moves, you will have to make sure your code handles them properly.
@H.G.: There seems to be something wrong with my Vanguard game. I'm not sure whether it's my coding or yours, but I'm getting the list of legal moves, and the rifle capture I'm trying to do isn't among them; it's not letting me do my move.
There are invitations for the variants Queens, Queens II and Queenmania. I would be happy if anyone is interested.
I tried looking at the finished logs for Duke of Rutland's Chess and most of them give an error like this
Error: The logfile at ../pbmlogs/duke_of_rutlands_chess/cavalier-cvgameroom-2006-127-561.php is missing, or something is misspelled.
The logs and settings files were each in two different directories. The older directory had an apostrophe in it. So I moved the files from the directories with apostrophes to those without apostrophes, and I removed the old directories. The standard behavior now is to generate directory names without apostrophes.
I tried looking at the finished logs for Duke of Rutland's Chess and most of them give an error like this
Error: The logfile at ../pbmlogs/duke_of_rutlands_chess/cavalier-cvgameroom-2006-127-561.php is missing, or something is misspelled.
It was using the wrong case for the promotion. It will now enter that move as N 7g-5j; +N-dest and work correctly.
after move N 7g-5j; +n-dest this preset doesnt work https://www.chessvariants.com/play/pbm/play.php?game=Hex+Shogi+91&log=makov333-cvgameroom-2023-19-928
Every single finished shogi log is saying a move is illegal for some reason.
From the looks of it, a good amount of logs are going haywire; at some point some specific move is regarded as broken and so it can't display the log on the interface itself
Paul had deleted his invitation in between. Strange, it was an open invitation to anyone and I was getting this message as if the invitation was private. We will see if this occurs again in future. Thanks.
I don't see the invitations you're speaking of. So, I can't look into it. The message you're reporting should be displayed when someone tries to accept a private invitation meant for someone else.
Help is needed. I'm trying to accept Numerist's invitation at Pemba. When I click on "Anyone" I get this message:
Your userid is timurthelenk. This log is private. It may be viewed only by the players. If you are one of the players, please sign in first. You may use the menu for this.
I remember that it was also the case few days ago, also with an invitation from Numerist, and Aurelian had also the same problem, getting a similar message.
Maybe Fergus may have a look. Is Numerist doing something wrong when inviting? Or something else?
Thank you
This one gives a white page too:
makov333-cvgameroom-2022-272-899
I see your logs at least have the error message you described, unlike mine vs. Chistine.
@Kevin: I also see a blank page on your log. What do you see on my logs?
I have a similar problem with log linked below (except I only see blank page):
Also on this one:
arx-timurthelenk-2022-283-047
Please help!
I have 2 games running on GC that I can't access anymore. I get the following message: "Please report any bugs or errors to Fergus Duniho"
There are
timurthelenk-numerist-2022-294-596
timurthelenk-cvgameroom-2022-288-470
I don't understand what's going on.
Thanks for your help
Mon Admirable Monsieur Jean-Louis Cazaux,
Je parle assez couramment la belle langue de Racine, même que je ne l’aie pas parlée depuis des années, mais veuillez me permettre d’offrir les informations suivantes dans la langue de Shakespeare, comme une aide pour ceux qui peuvent avoir des difficultés à lire Votre langue.
Le sujet est déjà suffisamment complexe en l’état tel qu'il est.
The player whom You refer has nothing less than 43 games hanging in Game Courier. The oldest is hanging since 29th June 2021 (a frightening 421 days as of 24th August 2022), the newest since 15th August 2022.
Of those 43 games, 7 games are waiting for his move and 36 are waiting for the move of his opponent. All sorts of Chess varieties are represented, out of the thousands of varieties that exist here in Game Courier. Even the most exotic and flamboyant varieties, are represented amongst his 43 games. Very few appear more than once, the vast majority appear only once. The pattern here is clear: a player who experiments with every variety that has existed, exists, and will exist, in the whole History of Chess. But also a player who does not care much about the results of his games, nor about a minimum respect for his opponents.
And of those 43 games, only 3 are timed (one with Ye, the other two with Mister Daniel Zacharias), while the other 40 games are untimed. The game that he is 'playing' with Ye was posted to the public room for any player to accept, but here it is not a question of who sent the invitation and who received or accepted the invitation. It is rather a question of DISRESPECT for the opponents, and to some extent also of abusing the resources offered by Game Courier. About technical resources the problem is trivial, because the data base of Game Courier can handle many more games than it handles now, but about the lack of respect for opponents, the problem becomes much more serious. You already know, Sir, my recommended solution.
Then, let me please proceed to explain how You can apply the solution, hopefully catering to Your personal preferences or needs. I hope to avoid too many technicalities, but pray forgive me if I dive deep into waters technical, and You find it difficult to bear with me. I am at Your disposal for answering relevant questions.
Sophisticated time controls were incorporated to Game Courier over eighteen years ago, in February 2004.
The idea was to make the Play By Mail system capable of handling games in a single session, also known as 'one sitting', or 'real time', or 'face to face', or by other names, and in several or many sessions for the same match, likewise called 'extended period', or 'delayed time', or 'correspondence', or by other epithets.
It was for that reason that complex time controls were introduced. Complete, exhaustive, flexible, with rich possibilities for any situation that could possibly be imagined. Then a manual was written and made public detailing how Game Courier can be correctly operated. GAME Code is full-fledged programming language, full of resources for implementing almost any board game in existence, short of boards of infinite extension or hyper boards of N dimensions. Naturally, the time control system had to accompany that sophistication.
It was hoped that the manual could answer almost any doubt. And in fact IT CAN answer almost any doubt, but it is easy for programmers to say that. The uninitiated may find certain explanations somewhat cryptic.
The manual assumes a certain level of Computing literacy, but any technical system offered to the public is a trade-off between technical sophistication, and usability. The most perfect computer in the World, but with the technical manual, every instruction, and all characters on screen written in Sumerian, would be useful only to those who can read Sumerian. And to a team of top-level specialists in several disciplines who would need years for deciphering the text or for discovering how the computer works by very careful process of trial and error. And even so, there is a high chance that not every feature would be discovered.
In Your specific case, which may also be the case of a number of our Esteemed Members, it seems to me that the best approach at the moment is to solve Your immediate problem, instead of delving into a rich plethora of concepts and definitions, but let me briefly inform that there is not a single method for timing competitions of Chess, or of other games, sports, or contests. Be it championship, tournament, single match, or some combination of them, various timing methods have been devised throughout History.
The first truly international Chess Tournament, organised by Mister Howard Staunton and other prominent British players, played in London in the year 1851, and won by Herr Adolf Anderssen, had no time controls whatsoever. As a consequence, some players took an exceedingly long time for their games. Twenty hours for only one game, or even two hours for one single move, were recorded for the amazement of posterity.
You will understand that under such conditions, more than a mental sport, Chess becomes a sport of pure physical resistance. The most suffered and ascetic hermit wins the game. After that horrifying experience, time controls by need had to be introduced in Chess competition. First the clepsydra (also called sand glass or hour glass), later the analogue mechanical clock, then the double clock originally invented specifically for Chess (later applied also to other competitive activities), and in the XX century the digital double clock.
Besides physical devices, diverse methods of timing or winning have also been experimented with variable success. There is the fixed maximum time per turn, fixed maximum time per game, increment or delay by Fischer or Bronstein Method, the Sudden Death, the tie break by points or by Armageddon, and others.
It would be my pleasure to go on describing how Chess and its ancillary equipment evolved in the course of years and of centuries, but if I continue, then this short introduction will become a book. Thus, without any further immersion into the History of Chess that I love, I am going to offer presently a concrete instruction that, as it is my hope, will be understood and put in effect without need of previous technical knowledge:
Go to a working preset that You would like to play, against a specific player or offered in the Public Room.
Activate the link that reads 'Invite'. In another page You will see "Invite Someone to Play (Name of Preset)"
Fill the relevant fields and leave the others as they are. You have already done it, so You know what I mean.
I strongly recommend that You activate the two check boxes labelled 'Rated Game ?' and 'Timed Game ?'
Once in the time controls, You set the third of seven boxes (upper right box) called 'Min Time' to 40 days.
I repeat, because this is the most important detail of the whole operation: SET MIN TIME TO FORTY DAYS.
Be careful for not setting it to 40 weeks, 40 hours, 40 minutes, nor 40 seconds. It must be for FORTY DAYS.
You leave all the other time control fields as they are: ZERO. Then You activate the link marked as 'Invite'.
I sincerely hope that the unavoidable technical complexity of the lines above have not been too confusing.
As example, You have received an invitation from me for playing Maidens Chess, a Chess variety of my own invention. The set is identical to Standard European Chess as per FIDE rules, therefore if You prefer we can play normal Chess instead of Maidens Chess. My preset does not enforce rules, neither shows legal moves.
I request the Honour of playing this game with Your person, Monsieur. Accompanying my invitation to play, You have also received from me a formal request that I include in the following lines. Good luck, Monsieur.
Mon Respecté Monsieur Jean-Louis Cazaux,
Je demande l’honneur de jouer à ce jeu avec Votre personne. Nous pouvons le jouer comme des échecs européens normales, en suivant les règles de la Fédération internationale des échecs, ou nous pouvons le jouer comme des échecs de jeune fille (Maidens Chess), une variété d’échecs de mon invention.
Le préréglage n’applique pas les règles. Le délai est exactement de 40 jours PAR COUP (entre un mois et deux mois, comme Vous l’avez demandé). Bonne chance, Monsieur.
Dixieland for ever ! P. A. Stonemann, CSS Dixieland
Dear Sir, thank you very much for your detailed comment and recommendations. I agree with what you say, it is common sense.
I had a problem with another unfinished game, but in this case I knew the player: he lost his terminal at one moment, and then when he got a new one, he explained to me that he could not play again because he was asking to accept cookies when connecting to CVP, and for some reasons I can't understand, he was very (very very) afraid to accept cookies. Seeing no issue and after waiting about 3 months, I have decided to delete this game that was in its end with a desperate position for him. (In fact I had already accepted not to play a checkmating move on one mistake from him few moves before).
The Fantastic XIII game which is unfinished is a pity. My opponent, RM, had made the invitation, not me. This person has played a lot of games recently on CVP, many with me, with no problem. I hope he has no serious issue and that he will come back playing one day. Indeed, I will delete this game one day if he does not show up after a while, let say in 2 or 3 months from now.
I agree that it is better to invite with timed games. The problem I see is that is very complex. The system in GC is certainly very elaborated, able to do many things for many different situations, but it is not user-friendly for common users like me, in my opinion. I would just need a mode which is ending after 1 or 2 months of non-activity of one side, a mode that can be selected by ticking just one box, not entering several parameters with subtile names. See www.chessvariants.com/play/pbm/userguide.html#timecontrols. Or maybe a set of Spare T, Grace T, Min T could be recommended in the invitation form for something simple. Of course, if I'm the only one in difficulty with that, never mind. Thank to all for your answers, I have appreciated that exchange of points of view.
Distinguished Monsieur Cazaux:
At the end of the rules for my preset of Constructing Chess You can see my brief instructions for erasing an untimed game, and my warning for not proposing or accepting untimed games to or from unknown players:
"Either of the two players can erase the game from the data base of Game Courier at any stage during current play, or can erase a finished game. The operations of drawing or of erasing a game should be done only by AGREEMENT between the two players, or in case of one player having disappeared for a long time in a game without time limit".
"Players should not propose or accept games without time limit, except to or from players whom they know very well".
I only play untimed games with players with whom I have already played many times, players with whom there has been satisfactory conversation via Game Courier or other manners of contact, and players of whom so far I have no justified reason for doubting of their gentlemanship, honesty, and sportive spirit.
Otherwise there is risk of meeting some stupid who may keep an unfinished game hanging, because he is losing, and in his small mind he is not man enough for accepting his defeat. Even with perfectly trustable players, I prefer to avoid untimed games unless there be justified reason. Unreliable Internet, for example.
A game may hang for a month or more due to cause of force majeure. The other player may be suffering some tragic, unforeseen, or overpowering circumstance. He may have had a serious accident and be in hospital. Or in prison. Or in cemetery. Or fighting the War for the Glorious Cause of Independent Ukraine.
Such events happen. In the first case he may be absent for months. In the second for years. In the third, for ever. And in the fourth, I patiently wait for the return of the Hero, if I do not join the Heroic Struggle myself.
For preventing a long waiting time, players are advised not to play untimed games with unknown people.
There is no need of modification to the algorithm of Game Courier. The solution is as simple as avoiding untimed games, except in cases where the other player is fully trustable, or if there be a justified reason.
Or else, erasing a hanging game. But for this, players should make a reasonable effort to ascertain that a long time has passed without reply from the other player, whose whereabouts are completely unknown.
Such cases are rare with me, but they occasionally happen. Fortunately they have not happened to me in Game Courier so far, but they have happened for untimed games in other servers. I follow the policy of waiting for a maximum of about twenty days. Then I try to make contact with my opponent, if possible.
If I have no way to contact him, or if after a few more days I do not receive any reply from him, then I take the game out of my list of current games, if possible I erase the game from the server (in Game Courier it can be done by either of the two players), and I include the name of the missing player in my black list.
If I receive a reply, then my decision will of course depend on the content and trustability of that reply.
After all those important considerations, Monsieur Cazaux, if You honestly believe that a game has been hanging for too long without conclusion, and You have no way to contact Your opponent, or no reply from him, or the reply have not been satisfactory, then You are undoubtedly entitled to follow this procedure:
List all games played in Game Courier by Monsieur Jean-Louis Cazaux (nom de guerre 'timurthelenk'): https://www.chessvariants.com/play/pbm/logs.php?userid=timurthelenk&age=0&sort=age&stat=actfin
You will see that most games are finished from 28th April 2020 to the end of 3rd August 2022 (server time) but there is an untimed game of Fantastic XIII that has been hanging since 31st July 2022. Make a serious effort to contact the opponent and tell him that You are still waiting for his move. If You have reply, then use Your best judgement as to Your correct action. But considering that twenty-four days have already passed, if You have no reply in a few more days (or if You have no contact with him at all, in this case without need of further waiting), then continue to the sad but necessary method for solving these fastidious situations.
Activate the hyper link at the right side that reads 'Delete'. You will see a warning for not deleting a game in progress without a justified reason. If You honestly believe that You have justified reason (and I personally believe that You have), then proceed to delete the game from the data base. For that You will need to enter Your identity or be logged-in, and Your password. Then You will have made a favour to Game Courier. Then You should include the offender in Your black list. Then You should NEVER play an untimed game without a very powerful reason to do so. Finally, You should continue honouring Game Courier with Your presence.
Dixieland for ever ! P. A. Stonemann, CSS Dixieland
Thanks
I think that playing at least once in 2 months in a game that will require 80 or 100 moves is a fair minimum. Otherwise better resigning and not play at all. I don t catch the interest for someone to play one move every 2 months. It is unpolite and not respecting the opponent.
The way I see it is I know starting an untimed game creates a risk that it will go unfinished. That's why I don't make untimed games with someone I trust to keep playing. If for some reason the other person stops moving for long enough, there's always the option of deleting the log.
@ J-L C: If I recall right, one way is that there is a 'Delete' link you can click on that's beside any given game log (to its right) on your personal list of your game logs (accessible by first mousing your name if that appears on the menu at the top of your screen after you login to CVP). You can then find 'Delete log' (or something to that effect) somewhere on the page that pops up. After clicking on that you can go back to your personal list of logs to verify that it's not on your personal list of logs anymore.
KP
@Kevin: how do you delete hanging untimed games?
@Daniel : sure timed games work. This system seems very complete but it is far much complex for me. I have read the explanations maybe 30 times and at the end I don t understand the numerous parameters. But this is not the issue here
I think that playing at least once in 2 months in a game that will require 80 or 100 moves is a fair minimum. Otherwise better resigning and not play at all. I don t catch the interest for someone to play one move every 2 months. It is unpolite and not respecting the opponent.
Sometimes it seems like 'Gentleman's Rules' are used on Game Courier, as I haven't noticed many cases where CVP staff intervene to resolve a complaint about a given game. In the past on occasion people used to take back a whole series of moves sometimes without asking, and I think since then automation was introduced so that an opponents' move could not be taken back by a player, to solve that.
It happened to me a few times before that change that a player took back my moves without asking, and I eventually just deleted all my games against that player, and tried to never play him again (with the IDs he used at the time, at least). Deleting games is something people do without asking their opponent sometimes, deliberately in an unsportsmanlike fashion (when losing or even confused about a CVs rules), too. I don't know how you'd prove it, though (I don't remember a case where a player typed in 'drawn' or 'won' without opponent agreeing, but I suppose that's possible too - CVP staff might intervene then upon complaint, if clear-cut case where the other side is winning).
I now normally delete hanging untimed games with players who stop playing, say after 60 days or more without their moving (unless I know them personally, and ideally they have told me they're taking a break), though often it seems they have decided never to return to CVP after losing many games badly. Otherwise I don't like looking at all the unfinished games either (there are many people here don't seem to mind them, though). I now don't mind too much the idea of not gaining a few Game Courier rating points, as I think something like a FIDE rating system should be used instead anyway.
I forget whether I ever asked long ago, but I think a time forfeit of untimed games after a very long period (say one year, not as little as 60 days) would work in cases where an opponent has suddenly stopped visiting CVP site since. If a player shows up only every 2 months to make a move, I don't know what you can do other than complain to him or CVP staff (besides just deleting the game and any others with same opponent). Like I alluded to, sometimes it's hard to avoid the 'Gentleman's Rules' concept.
Is it timed games not ending properly? I like that it's possible to start games without any time limits.
When I look at my page of "Your Games on Game Courier" I see several lines which correspond to games that are not finished because my opponent stopped to play. I don't know what was the reason my opponent stopped to play, but it was in most of the cases for games on which my position was quite stronger than his. I don't like to see games unfinished like this, and I think it is unfair. Would it be possible for the editors to fix a hard limit, say 30 days or 60 days, after which a game not played will be automatically considered lost for the player who had to play? And won for the other player, the last to have played.
This would clean the tables which have many unfinished games.
Do other users of CVP agree with me?
Chess Variants World Wide Web server availability report. By P. A. Stonemann, CSS Dixieland
About 15 hours Universal Time Coordinated on Sunday 10th July 2022 the Uniform Resource Locator: https://www.chessvariants.com/
...has been checked for availability. The initial page of that Web document has been loaded from various world-wide locations, according to details given below in this report. A short introduction is given first:
For measuring up-time several checks would be necessary along a defined period of time. Such measuring has not been executed, as it is at the moment deemed more important to check geographic availability, than chronographic availability. Many causes may intervene in the availability of a server to one or several locations, or to all of them. A typical cause is maintenance: the Web Master, or also the hosting provider, need some time for performing tasks of technical nature. During that time the document or service may be redirected to another server, or may show a page informing the visitor that there is a temporary down time for attending maintenance work, or may simply be unresponsive and result in a message of error after the time limit set for the query. The server may not be down completely, but may be slow in responding. A more detailed explanation of possible causes is beyond the scope of this report, but the Distinguished Players of Game Courier, if interested, will find general information in Internet. They may also write to the author of this report for more specific guidance to technical documents on the subject, which will be instructive.
The hosting provider for the Web document is Cloud Flare. The availability checking service is Uptimia: https://www.uptimia.com/website-availability-test/4d3ed533
As it can be seen in the report hyper linked above, the complete initial page of Chess Variants has been loaded from forty-three locations world-wide with and average time of 12600 milliseconds, but of course with ample variance of loading time from one location to another. Exact loading times by location, domain, content type, and other parameters, can be studied in the data referenced above. They appear normal.
Here is a list of Web availability checking services with complementary characteristics, for the interested: https://geekflare.com/monitor-website-uptime/
A second check has been performed using the services kindly offered by Regery, with the following results: https://regery.com/en/tools/site-availability-check/https/chessvariants.com
As it can be observed, the Transfer Control Protocol/Internet Protocol numbers are 172.67.171.41 from some locations and 104.21.39.179 from other locations. The hosting server is located in Toronto. There has been no problem for loading the complete initial page of Chess Variants from: Ashburn, Bombay, Dublin, London, Frankfurt am Main, Paris, Portland, São Paulo, San Jose, Seoul, Singapore, Sydney, Tokyo, and Toronto.
The ticket for both services, Uptimia and Regery, may probably have expired by the time when this report is read. In such a case, the Illustrious Readers of Game Courier are invited to repeat the check themselves. This Web availability checking service, Regery, is heroically working from Ukraine, under appalling conditions, and requests international support for the Noble Cause of Sovereignty, Independence and Freedom of the Ukrainian Nation: https://regery.com/en/survive-in-ukraine
Conclusion: it is the assessment of the author of this report that the difficulties recently experienced by the Honourable Members of Game Courier can be explained by a probable need of maintenance work that the Web Master Mister Fergus Duniho, or another authorised person or persons, had to execute. The reason has not been disclosed by the Web Master, but it can be seen as normal in a Web document of this size.
Dixieland for ever ! Slava Ukrainie ! P. A. Stonemann, CSS Dixieland
I'm experiencing similar issues!
It was back to normal around noon, European time, but now (6:30 PM, Paris time) is awful again, sloooooooooow, impossible to play or read a page. Am I the only one with that problem? Is there anything changed I have to care of?
For me the CVP is really really slow. It's really a pain. What's going on?
For me, too!
@ Fergus:
This CVP site has been painfully slow (for me anyway) for at least a couple of weeks, especially when trying to move on GC. Any idea what's happening?
That's now fixed. The function for the Waffle, which moves as a Wazir or an Alfil, was using the W function, which is for the Woody Rook, instead of the WZ function, which is for the Wazir. Since the Woody Rook moves as a Wazir or a Dabbabah, it took a situation like this for the bug to be noticed.
I'd like to report a bug in a Game Courier Preset for Chess With Different Armies:
In this game between Aurelian and me (lunaris-cvgameroom-2021-48-645) on my turn 17, the preset concluded on check, even though it wasn't the case. It didn't impact the game, since my opponent took my piece anyway, but it could have, preventing him from doing another move. I read that the preset was created by Fergus, so maybe you find some time to look into that.
Thank you, Armin
Okay, I turned on the group write bit for all log and log backup files, and I modified Game Courier to also turn it on. That should fix the problem.
In this private log my opponent tried to move but got an error saying the log backup failed https://www.chessvariants.com/play/pbm/play.php?game=Tiger+Chess&log=arx-agroden-2021-51-783
The database seems to be working now. I have adjusted the time controls for games to give ten extra days to make up for the downtime.
I got the invitation you sent in my email, but not the one I sent. Both are showing up on the group page, though.
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Something very fishy is going on. I discovered that what GAME code prints is hidden in the header of the preset page, so I could see it by looking at the Page Source. (A bit inconvenient, as it is buried in an insane number of empty <P> tags, but I managed.)
I experimented a bit in Play mode, and the fastest way to reproduce the disappearence was 1. j3-j5 i10-i8 2. j5-j6 i18-i7 3. Nk2-j4 and i7 would disappear. In particular, the problem occurred when a Pawn was moved a single step to attack another Pawn; that Pawn would then disappear.
So I put statements in the GAME code to see what move was offered to GC for playing. This was simply "N k2-j4", no instructions to remove anything else. So I printed the board just before that move would be executed. The Pawn was already gone. So I tried printing the board earlier in the process of verifying the legality of the move, to see at which point the Pawn would disappear. But after that the Pawn on i7 did not disappear anymore!
That was weird. Printing something should not alter what the code does to the board. I commented out that extra printr statement, and later removed it alltogether, to go back to the situation where I last saw the problem, only printing the board just before the move was made. The Pawn did not disappear anymore. So I removed all print statements I had added for debugging: the Pawn stays. I played to the game position: also there no Pawns disappear.
So it seems the problem has cured itself, without making any changes to the preset. Please try again to make a move in the game, to see if you have the same experience.