Czuch: I faced this problem too. It just getting corrupted during the download since the connection speed is not good i guess for some reason.
My son solved my problems when he told me to use a download manager to download the file. He installed on my computer the program flashget and if you try to download with it then you will have your file with no problem.

Then you need winzip or winrar to extract the games of the file into PGN format.
Unfortunately for example for Loop Chess the games are 20000 so when you extract them in a folder Windows are very slow to handle and anyway it's just too tough to do anything with them having to open each one separately each time.

So my son saved me again by showing me a way to join all these PGNs with single games, into one big PGN with all the games.
Just create a BAT file and write:
for %%f IN (*.PGN) DO type %%f>>collect.out
ren collect.out FINAL.pgn

Don't ask me what are all these, i don't know. But it does the work.
Then inside the folder with all the games run the bat file and at the end you will have a PGN named final.pgn with all the games. Now you can delete of course all the 20000 single PGNs.

And then you can handle this PGN with ease.

rabbitoid:Your lack of precision is not logical ;-)

Czuch: First you may try to download the file again. Please compare the file sizes, the one which is shown during the download, and the one of the file on your computer after the download has finished. If the size of the downloaded file is less than the predicted size, then the file wasn't downloaded completely and thus can't be opened. If this happens more than once you may try to create the zip file again. If this doesn't help as well then I don't know either... Probably Fencer could check whether the zip file on the server is OK?

kleineme: I did now download winrar, and now I get an error message that the file is either unknown or damaged?

kleineme: Right, but I assumed that Czuch had wanted to download the files in order to replay the game in some pgn viewer. My bad, I shouldn't have assumed anything. :)

Pedro Martínez: Well, not really :) PGN files are just plain text files and can be opened with any text editor, like Notepad on Windows.

Czuch: You have to have a program which is able to open zip files, like Winrar for Windows.

Even if you already have a zip program on your computer, there may be a problem with the download. From time to time I'm not able to download the zip files completely, which also produces an error message that the file can't be opened. You may try to create the zip file again or you may ask Fencer...

Pedro Martínez: er.... okay....

Pedro Martínez: Thanks! I guess my lack of correct punctuation didnt confuse you or my question....

Czuch: You have to have a program allowing you to open pgn files.

Czuch: Yes and yes. :)

(17. May 2009, 12:57:57 is the last term before timeout for this move)


To clarify.... This will include any weekend days and set vacation days? Then the only way this will change is if auto vacation day is used or if after this is posted a vacation day is set?

Can this also change if after it is posted weekend days are changed?

I am trying to use the feature to down load a zip file from a players games of dice chess.... but my windows says it doesnt recognize it and cannot open it?

Anyone know what I am talking about?

Whatever

rabbitoid:That would be red matter :-)

Dark Prince: Actually, you learn all about the red bullet in the new Star Trek movie :)

Pedro Martínez:
Thanks Pedro
Jared

pedestrian: And while we're at it: the system permits to delete without BKR penalty until move 4. With obvious consequences.

pauloaguia: Yes, I thought about that after I posted. Actually you could post several games and delete them until you get one you like, or you could spend the waiting time analyzing the position in depth.

I guess my main point is that it's not equal conditions for the players, and I suppose it wouldn't be that difficult to repair?

pedestrian: The player that started the game can also check the board and withdraw the invitation... it's not such a big advantage for the other player...

I'm probably not the first to notice this, but when you put a game on the waiting list with random start position (such as Fischer Random Chess or Knight Fight) the position is shown in the waiting game. Isn't this a clear advantage for the player who takes the challenge? Shouldn't the position be randomized after the challenge has been taken?

Dark Prince: http://brainking.com/en/OldFAQ?ht=24

In the waiting room, there is a red bullet between the color and time in some games but not others. What does the red bullet indicate?
Jared

Fencer: no its fine i just said i had never seen it do that before so wasnt sure what was going on

Fencer: Some achievement ideas
have 1000, 5000, etc started games and ALL in state of "Opponent's turn"
have 1000 etc games, all in state of "your move", under 1 day timeout, and less than 24 hours later move in all.

TheCrazyPuppy: The purpose of the system is to avoid cheating with vacation days, not to make absolutely correct calculations in all cases, especially when someone starts more than 3000 games, so it would be too CPU-consuming to recalculate time left values for all such games. Anyway, if you have a vacation day today, the timeout checker will detect it and add 24 hours to all affected games.

Pedro Martínez: there isnt really a problem
just never seen it happen before
plus today and tomorrow im using vacation days so its puzzling to say the least

TheCrazyPuppy: And what's the problem with that?

i just changed my weekend days to Mon Tues
and all of a sudden about 50 of my games are at - 1 day 23 hrs

i should add that isnt really a problem has i can easy move on them
im just wondering why it happened

Fencer:  Awesome!  It works now!

It's a shame people have to use a program to win a game

Fencer: Yes fixed now,thank you.

Carl: And now?

Fencer: I lost mine for a while also.
But then I remembered where I put it, so all is good.

Fencer: My notepad has disappeared too.

rednaz23: Try it now.

rednaz23: No problem with mine either. I'd say open a Bug Report.

rednaz23: sorry...mine is working just fine as well...

rednaz23: No problems with my notepad

rednaz23: I haven't used mine since 2007 but it is all there......no probs

Has anyone else had trouble with their notepad?  For some reason when I click on the notepad link it brings me to a completely white page.  This only happens on the notepad page and it has been like that for a couple of months...  any thoughts?

Thanks,

Phil (rednaz23)

Fencer:

Fencer: Well done! Thank you! Thank you!

Fencer: Well, at least until the next smart invention...
I'll watch my turtle. Thanks!

The vacation system has been fixed.
Or at least I hope so. Since the time left recalculations are queued in a separate thread (in order not to overload the server in case of too many changes of vacation days at once), there might be a short delay (a couple of seconds) before the game data reflect the change.

Anyway, it should not be possible to cheat with vacation days anymore.

rabbitoid: I never suggested it should be fixed in a hurry. I'm a programmer myself and know all about "simple things having big impacts" That's one of the reasons why I'm stressing the fact that this doesn't change much over the current implementation - less changes means less things that could go wrong.

Anyway, I was just replying to the thread that came up about people abusing the current system. I've suggested this approach a few times in the past and nothing has been done yet. But I'm patient, I can wait even more days, months or years
Personally I don't care much about people abusing the vacation system against me - I already have a few opponents that drag their games (and come to think of it, I'm dragging some of my own lately).

One thing I would not like Fencer to do is fix something in a hurry. No offence, Paulo, but I know from my programming experience that "simple" solutions tend to hide side effects which often prove worse than the thing they try to fix. Especially with delicate algorithms such as timeout calculation which are bound to have an effect on a large amount of the software.

This problem has been with us for a while and a couple of days or months, whatever it takes, won't make a difference.

AbigailII: Fischer clock settings means no vacation days on this site. So I'll assume it's not a Fischer clock game
The fact that you already spend your vacation day is not a problem - it's set on your account as a vacation day. Any other game that would otherwise timeout during that day will also get extended time when the moment arrives without wasting another vacation day, this is already how it works today.

nodnarbo: After a site's downtime no time checking functions are running on the site, if I understand correctly. That's why games go into negative time - there's no function running that will make them timeout in the background. However, if you allow games to go into negative times in normal conditions (while all these processes are executing) changes could indeed be profound.


Again, my main point was that NO CHANGES in the timeout or vacation days mechanisms need to be done. The only change would be the calculation of the deadline for timeout. Everything else would continue to work as currently. But, of course, only Fencer can say for sure if my reasoning is correct or not - he's the master of all time around here

pauloaguia: What if, instead of adding time to games the games just continue into negative time, but they aren't checked for time out if a vacation day is activated. This is also already implemented on the site with the case of site downtime, and wouldn't think it would take a huge coding change.

pauloaguia: Also, if it's not the player's turn, the time settings shouldn't be changed

Of course they should! Suppose you have 2 games running. In one it's my move, and you have 5 hours left (assume Fisher clock). The other times out at noon. Now, you want 24 hours on both your clocks, otherwise, I make a move at 1 PM, and you'll time out at 6 PM. Since you've already spend your vacation day this day, you would lose the game. That's why all clocks should get 24 hours in my scheme, not just the ones where it's your move.

AbigailII: I was just commenting on current site's implementation (as I think it is. I'm not really sure, for all I know it can be as you described already). I aggree that setting it for all the games is probably more efficient, my focus was on not having to implement anything different (but, like I said, for all I know it can already work as you described)

Why subtract 1 vacation day? I suppose you're thinking about autovacation, but pawns have no such feature, they need to set their vacation days manually (and so can paying members). I can't see why a vacation day should be subtracted if one is already set. Activating autovac and actually using vacation days are two different features right now (and will probably remain so)

EDIT: On second though, I don't aggree. The site should only add 24 hours to the games that would expire on the same day, not to all games. Otherwise, we'll get back to the same problem (a 30 days per move game has no need to geting extra 24 hours daily from almost 1 month in advance). Also, if it's not the player's turn, the time settings shouldn't be changed - otherwise I could have extra time added to my games because my opponent was on vacation, even if I'm out of vacation days already).