In a recent posting I used the phrase "client side time". Someone has
asked me what I meant. As well as answering him, I am posting my answer
here, for three reasons: (1) to inform those who do not know, (2) to
invite correction from those who know better than me, (3) as a gentle
nag to any Go server programmers who be read this.
"Client side time" means that the clients, rather than the server,
measure the time used by the players. This means that only the time
which the player has available for thinking is counted against him. So
the way a good chess server works is:
The server sends my opponent's move to my client.
My client starts my clock and displays my opponent's move.
I think, my clock ticks.
I input my move to my client, my clock stops ticking.
My client sends my move to the server.
This differs from the way Go servers work (or at least, all Go servers
that I know about). With Go servers, time for both players is measured
by the server. This has the disadvantage that communication time is
counted against the player, increasing both the time used (which does
not matter much) and its variance from random netlag (which matters a
lot).
Providers of Go servers claim that it would be pointless to try to
implement client-side time, as players would be able to cheat by hacking
their clients and fiddling with the clock. I don't doubt that they
would try to cheat, indeed I know that they would; but providers of
chess servers have been able to prevent cheating. As I understand it,
their clients perform CRC checks on themselves to ensure that they have
not been hacked, and the packets they send are CRC-checked by the server
to ensure that the packets have not been hacked.
Nick
--
Nick Wedd n...@maproom.co.uk
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