Timer problem, could have won

https://www.chess.com/livechess/game?id=1553842442

 

This Game.  I clearly had 1.2 seconds left on my timer and my flag fell without even giving me the opportunity to move.

Yeah we get that a lot around here.  Probably this:

https://support.chess.com/customer/en/portal/articles/1444849-why-did-the-clock-times-suddenly-change-the-clocks-seem-broken-

or maybe:

https://support.chess.com/customer/en/portal/articles/1444918-my-internet-connection-is-fine---why-am-i-getting-disconnects-

The game log shows you had 1.7 seconds left after white's last move. What likely happened is that you had a brief disconnect and the server may not have received your move. 

 

The server is the keeper of the accurate time. With the lag compensation algorithms the times on the clients may not be accurate. That is why you may occasionally see clocks adjusted in games, even without increments. 

Try spending less time on opening

This timer problem is a big issue with spotty connections.  People should not be penalized for having a slow connection.

I played another game while on break at the gym and their wifi is not that great.  I played a 3 minute game and took all of 30 seconds to make all of my moves.  I lost on time... what gives?

So, here's the problem.  The server starts your clock the moment the opponent makes a move, and the time that it takes for the update to make it from the server to your chess device is subtracted from your total move time.  This is not how any of the other chess services work. I played on ICS and FICS for years with an app called timeseal.  This app works in conjunction with the server-side to ensure that your clock is updated to reflect only the time it took you to think about your move and to make it (not the time you spent waiting for the server to send you the move).

!! Chess.com really needs to address this !!

 

I wind up matched up against many people not in my home country and I do feel bad when I win on time due to a spotty connection on the far end.  And this is painfuly obvious when it happens during play.  You make your first one or two opening moves, and 30 seconds go by off your opponents clock and he makes his third move.  By the time the clock runs down to 30 seconds remaining, which should leave enough time for at least 10-15 moves from a seasoned speed player, actually leaves this poor person with time for maybe one move since he's penalized for having a slow connection.

Why are you playing 5 min games if you know you have a slow connection?

Why not?  Why Can't I?  Why should people on slow connections be penalized at all?

 

I can play a 1 minute game on FICS with a slow connection and be just fine.  My clock seconds are reduced by the about of time that was used to see the move, and make the move (not the time it took for the internet to do its thing, this is an important distinction.

 

And as related to "Move on dude.".  I'm not hung up on this particular game that I lost, or this other particular game I won.  I'm hung up on the timer issue that affects us all.  People lose precious seconds in speed games that is entirely avoidable by some programming adjustments.  As a software developer myself, and understanding the mechanics involved in making this happen, it's not hard.  It's a matter of getting the community support to encourage the devs to make this change.

It's not the devs that have to decide to make any change but erik and his management team.

 

The site already attempts to take into account time spent on the move and doesn't count transit time against the player, at least in general. There is a balance in how to handle the situation otherwise you can end up with bullet games that can take 3 or 4 minutes intead of 2 with similar issues in blitz.

 

This explains how they handle lag and thinking time.

 

https://support.chess.com/customer/en/portal/articles/1444849-why-did-the-clock-times-suddenly-change-the-clocks-seem-broken-

Oh, I see baddogno already provided that article in the second post. 

That's interesting they apparently do claim to support adjustments for lag, but I have some obvious examples of it not working.

 

I can post a video next time.

Don't get me wrong,  it is possible the app may not be working correctly or the same as the website. Though they really should work the same since the back-end server should be making the adjustments.

or maybe you should play a bit more faster,dont moan because you have no more time deal with it and move on .LOSERS

See, it's comments like this that make online fourms look sophmoric and crufty.  You're missing the point.  You can *try* to move as fast as you want but if the app wont let you in laggy network conditions, you're basically set up to lose no matter what.

 

Whoops, I forgot you're not supposed to feed the trolls!

Sorry, im new to chess.com. Is there a way to choose to be black on live chess ? or does the game automatically put you on random color. The thing is, I only like playing on the black side. I cant find out how on preferences or anything.... Someone please help.. Once again, sorry im off topic

or is there a way to host a game with a color of my choosing? if so how?

 

If you always want to play black you have to play unrated. Unrated will allow you to chose your color.

Timer problem is not only an issue of servers. I have 3 different network connections, different providers, and it DOES NOT explain the problem, since when I play 7 games in a row with an extra time for the opponent of 5 to 30 sec (yes, believe me seen opponent timer going for 0 to 6 sec 4 times in same game, plus seconds that are 3 sec long...) I change network and DOES NOT solve the lag. I am quite sure that this is AS WELL dependent on the connection to chess.com servers. Obviously I SEE AS WELL when the opponent has lag, but I cannot report other's "experiences". I started today on bullet on the 1100s and finished on the 1300s. Why? Today I had good connection. PS: I do not stop playing even if I have terrible lag, therefore I range from 1000s to 1300s in max. 1 month. Sometimes it seems that somebody at chess.com is really fooling my timer on purpose 😂

 

I confidently will guess that all of your connections travel through much of the same infrastructure to get to the site's servers. Any one of those hops can introduce lag.

 

The site can only control their servers, their local connectivity, the client code and potentially some connectivity/peering in major markets. They can not control what happens on every hop of the connection between clients and the server. 

(In theory, and in an ideal world) Yes, and no.

(In practice, completely correct, the time is pure fiction).

 

Yes, the official time is on the server.  And even though the support article on timers says it updates it to reflect lag, either there is a major bug in the handling of this, or they have an incorrect implementation of this.

 

The official time must be updated to reflect move time elapsed since seeing the move and making the move, and nothing else.  There needs to be no 'lag adjustment algorithm' or any nonsense like that.  It's client-side timing pure and simple (more easily secured with the closed-source app (which I prefer to play on) versus the javascript based web portal, but still possible to relatively secure with minified js and other techniques.

 

And I completely agree with HKPP. If I'm on a good network connection and have a low latency to the chess.com servers, I'll win on time on just about every game.  If I'm on some crappy starbucks wifi, I'll consistently lose on time (because the *real* time taken is about 60 seconds during a 3 minute game, but the clock runs out due to lag.)  I don't have this issue on other servers like chess.net, or fics, or any ics server.

 

But I do like the chess.com interface and the high availability of lower-rated blitz games (along with all the trainings and things of that nature, so that's why I would prefer to stick around.

 uglyhairdo,  You dont play bullet 1 min... So you cannot or does not want to understand...

Actually timing problems are only relevant in bullet, and more especially in 1 min. Even with chess.com server´s delay, other games are ok. For a 3min game, it becomes irrelevant (unless is the OWN internet connection).