ICC Help: timestamp

We have developed a system that eliminates the effects that lag has on your clock in ICC games. A "timestamp" program measures the amount of time you spend thinking about each move. The ICC server uses this information to update the clocks.

The Flexible Lag Compensation system determines how much lag time you will be compensated for during games. In pool and tournament games on ICC, you will be compensated for up to one second (1000 milliseconds) of lag per move. If your lag is less than one second, as it is for 98% or 99% of players, none of the lag will be charged to your clock. If it exceeds one second during any move, your first second of lag time is "free" and any additional lag time will be charged to your clock. help LagCompensation

Timestamp is built into the interfaces Dasher, Blitzin, Fixation, Jin, etc. And it will run automatically with WinBoard and some other interfaces. So normally, you don't need to do anything special to use timestamp.

For some other interfaces, you run timestamp in addition to your usual ICC interface program. It has been tested with xboard, xics, ziics, and giics, slics, MacICS, and other interfaces. There are two main versions of timestamp: Unix timestamp and MS Windows timestamp.

Unix timestamp works with any client if you connect to ICC through a Unix machine. Of course it works if your own machine runs Unix. It also works if your own machine does not run Unix, but you connect to ICC through a shell account on a Unix machine. In the latter case, though, timestamp cannot compensate for any lag that might exist between your own machine and the Unix machine where you run timestamp. Such lag can occur (for example) if the Unix machine is heavily loaded, so that you are not getting enough CPU time, or if you are calling over a noisy phone line with an error-correcting modem.

You can use MS Windows timestamp if you have a PC running Microsoft Windows that is on the Internet, and your Internet software package supports the 32-bit Winsock API (which it should). Only very old Windows 3.1 machines or versions of AOL from about 1995 are likely to have a problem.

All data sent in both directions between the timestamp program and the ICC server is encrypted.

To find out how to get and use timestamp, type help unix-timestamp if you need the Unix version, or type help win-timestamp if you need the MS Windows version.

See also: LagCompensation, unix-timestamp, win-timestamp, clocks