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Date: 19 Nov 2008 23:54:55
From: Dave
Subject: A proposed solution to the 'disconnectors' on ICC
If you play on ICC, you have almost certainly come across those that
disconnect from the server in a poor or lost position. I am not the only
one to find this annoying, but I believe I have a solution which is
better than any current ICC solution. If you think so, please tell ICC.
If not, tell me why!


If you used the command 'stored'

% stored <SomeICCmember >

then the stored games will be shown. Any games where the player himself
disconnected (rather than their opponent) will have an exclamation mark
beside them, in Blitzin, (I expect Dasher too). You can also see the
same on the console, as below.

Taking as an arbitrary example, 'chess-spy'

******************************
aics% stored chess-spy
chess-spy has adjourned games with the following opponents:
chemin(!) furaxdog(!) kookoo Paulkov(!) Toalla
Chipshot(+!) JackKetch(!) manta2(!) postalite(!)
Dimos(!) JmmKing markkutikka(!) rhoward(!)
DutchKnight(!) jonkpoet(!) nilsotto(+!) Sirgeorge(!)
fibre(!) Just-Jim(!) oopsbot(!) Tarakanovich(!)
(+) indicates the player is present.
(!) indicates the game was adjourned when chess-spy disconnected.
******************************

There we can see chess-spy has 21 stored games, 18 of which is where
he/she disconnected and three (Toalla, JmmKing and kookoo) where
chess-spy's opponent disconnected.

ICC have two 'solutions' to the problem of disconnectors, neither of
which I feel are very good.

1) If BOTH players agree to use the 'noescape' setting, then if a player
disconnects and does not return within two minutes, they loose the game.

This penalises accidental disconnections, which can always happen,
especially on long games.

2) If someone is really, really bad, they get put onto a 'disconnectors
list'. Then, any time they disconnect, they automatically lose.

The problem with the 'disconnectors list' is that someone has to be
really really bad for this to happen. We can see above chess-spy has
disconnected 19 times, and he/she is by no means an extream example. I
once see someone with over 30 disconnections.


MY SOLUTION


My proposed solution is to have ICC add one extra server variable for
each player called 'disconnections'. The variable will be set to the
number of stored games the player has, where he disconnected. So in the
above case, chess-spy's 'disconnections' variable would be set to 18,
not 21.

Once this is done, we could use that variable in a formula, like we
would any other variable such as rating, So my formula might be

(rating > myrating -50) & (disconnections < 3)


Then if someone has one or two disconnections, they can answer my seeks,
but if they have 3 or more, the server will respond to them them my
formula requires disconnections < 3.


This would

1) Never result in a game being loss due to an accidental disconnection
with 'noescape'

2) Cut down on the time ICC adjudicators have to spend adjudicating games.

3) Result in a better experience on ICC.

Anyone else feel this would be useful? Can you improve on it? I do not
believe this would be hard for ICC to implement. There are currently
numerous variables we can use in our formula - I doubt adding one more
would be a lot of work.




 
Date: 10 Dec 2008 14:18:21
From: David Richerby
Subject: Re: A proposed solution to the 'disconnectors' on ICC
[ Cross-post trimmed. ]

Dave <[email protected] > wrote:
> My proposed solution is to have ICC add one extra server variable
> for each player called 'disconnections'. The variable will be set to
> the number of stored games the player has, where he disconnected.
> [...]
>
> Once this is done, we could use that variable in a formula, like we
> would any other variable such as rating, So my formula might be
>
> (rating > myrating -50) & (disconnections < 3)

Well, nobody else has responded but I have to say that sounds like a
pretty good idea to me. Have you tried suggesting it to ICC?


Dave.

--
David Richerby Unholy Laser (TM): it's like an
www.chiark.greenend.org.uk/~davidr/ intense beam of light but it's also
a crime against nature!


  
Date: 19 Jan 2009 09:54:26
From: AtomicDog
Subject: Re: A proposed solution to the 'disconnectors' on ICC
On 10 Dec 2008, 09:18, David Richerby <[email protected] >
wrote:
> [ Cross-post trimmed. ]
>
> Dave <[email protected]> wrote:
> > My proposed solution is to haveICCadd one extra server variable
> > for each player called 'disconnections'. The variable will be set to
> > the number of stored games the player has, where he disconnected.
> > [...]
>
> > Once this is done, we could use that variable in a formula, like we
> > would any other variable such as rating, =A0So my formula might be
>
> > (rating > myrating -50) & (disconnections< 3)
>
> Well, nobody else has responded but I have to say that sounds like a
> pretty good idea to me. =A0Have you tried suggesting it toICC?
>
> Dave.
>
> --
> David Richerby =A0 =A0 =A0 =A0 =A0 =A0 =A0 =A0 =A0 =A0 =A0 =A0 =A0 =A0 Un=
holy Laser (TM): it's like anwww.chiark.greenend.org.uk/~davidr/=A0 =A0 =A0=
=A0intense beam of light but it's also
> =A0 =A0 =A0 =A0 =A0 =A0 =A0 =A0 =A0 =A0 =A0 =A0 =A0 =A0 =A0 =A0 =A0 =A0 =
=A0 =A0 =A0 =A0a crime against nature!