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Chess.com site annoyances

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CeSinge

For all the efforts that the devs do to improve this site and offer more, it's odd that their are still a number of oddities that don't seem to get fixed - ever. 

In a vain - I'm afraid - hope that this once gets improved, here are a few:

- When someone played a move, a white on red number shows right to Play in the left main menu. Oddly, I have to click Home not Play to see an overview of my games. Under play, I can see the single game, but not the the overview of my games to be played. Very weird.

- It took years to have the captured pieces on the correct side (White's captured pieces on black's side). That has been set right on the (Windows) site. Even more confusing now is that in the Android app, the captured pieces are still on the wrong side!

- Another annoyance is the apparent inability to see the tournaments one is participating in. The obvious Play / Tournaments does not show the tournaments I'm participating in at all. One long-winded approach is Home / the > on Current games / select a game in a tournament / open that game / click the tournament name at the top left there...

- A more minor thing is that the Game Archive is also hidden behind Home / Stats and more drill down. This Past Games should be neatly be under Play, together with Current Games and Tournaments.

All trivial to fix. Let's live on hope that maybe one day...

notmtwain

Can you try that first one again? I have read it several times and I can't follow you. Does the number show the number of games where you have a move to play?  

 

CeSinge

When games are to be played, a white on red number appears next to the Play menu, like so:

That's nice, and makes one believe that by clicking on Play, one can access the list of games being played. Not so! This can be reached by clicking Home instead. The only thing you get is, at the bottom a limited list of the individual games, not the Current Games. 

I've now taken the habit to click on Home whenever I want to play...

And so I think it would be normal to see Current, Past and Tournament games in the Play menu, not scattered around.

jdcannon

Thanks for the feedback! I'll dig in and see what we can do. 

CeSinge

Another user pointed to me in a direct message - not sure why - that the play menu has indeed an option to see ones own tournaments, the game archive, and the current games. He's just right, and I should learn to scroll down, or look better or both... at least I learned something here!

Maybe clicking on the Play menu should open the current games, rather the new ones, but anyway.

As for the inconsistency of the side of the captured pieces, let's hope that it s in the pipeline for the Android app, then. 

daddypupalots
I haven't read forums here before. But I can't stand this biggest annoyance in the site ever. When I play someone and I'm waiting for my opponent to move, his clock seems to be ticking. But when he actually moves, all of a sudden I've lost 10-15 seconds instantly. This has always been happening and I've tried not to play here because of that. But I love the game and this site aside from that big technical glitch. Because I constantly lose on time my rating is down and I'm forced to play super long games with long time so I don't get cheated by my opponent on time. Please fix this. If it's my signal don't show that the opponent's time is ticking in reality it's me who's losing time.
jdcannon

 

You can see what tournaments you are playing from here: https://www.chess.com/tournaments as shown in the screenshot above. 

notmtwain
caloyski31 wrote:
I haven't read forums here before. But I can't stand this biggest annoyance in the site ever. When I play someone and I'm waiting for my opponent to move, his clock seems to be ticking. But when he actually moves, all of a sudden I've lost 10-15 seconds instantly. This has always been happening and I've tried not to play here because of that. But I love the game and this site aside from that big technical glitch. Because I constantly lose on time my rating is down and I'm forced to play super long games with long time so I don't get cheated by my opponent on time. Please fix this. If it's my signal don't show that the opponent's time is ticking in reality it's me who's losing time.

It sounds like you are experiencing lag adjustments.  https://support.chess.com/customer/portal/articles/1444849

Why did the clock times suddenly change? The clocks seem broken!

  

Don't worry - the clocks are not broken. This jumping is caused either by Internet lag, or because of bonus time. Here is how lag works on chess.com:
 

You make a move, the move gets sent to our server, & then your opponent's computer. We adjust the clocks dynamically so that neither player is "charged" for communication time - but rather, only for the time actually spent thinking.
 

A very extreme example
 

Imagine it takes 5 seconds for the move to hit our server, then another 5 seconds for the move to hit your opponent's computer from there. Your opponent will not see this move until 10 seconds after you make it, but your opponents clock will usually start counting down on your screen when the move hits our server. Then, let's say your opponent thinks for a total of 10 seconds. After this, it takes another 5 seconds for the move to be transmitted to our servers, and another 5 seconds for the move to now go to your computer.
 

So, you have been waiting for this move for roughly 30 seconds (10 seconds total travel time, 10 seconds thinking time, and another 10 seconds total travel time), and your opponents clock has been counting down for roughly 25 seconds. But since your opponent only spent 10 seconds thinking, that's all the time they get charged for. So, when their move finally hits your computer, their clock display re adjusts for the 15 extra seconds that your opponent wasn't actually thinking. Meanwhile, your clock display on your end will only count down while you are thinking. There is no need for correction on your end (and remember, your clock is adjusting similarly on your opponent's screen).
 

Fortunately, in reality, travel times are usually less than what is described above.  (In fact, we only allow members to play if their detected lag is two seconds or less.) However, the travel times are not consistent, so adjustments must be made dynamically. There is no way around it: all real-time chess servers have to deal with lag, though other sites are a bit less transparent about it.

CeSinge

So here another annoyance, and because the taken pieces were on the wrong side, another confusing thing were often really have to compare and deduce who plays black or white.

Take this game/page: https://www.chess.com/daily/game/229676900.

Seeing the black '3 days' label at the bottom, next to HarunAwie, and a similar white rectangle next to the opponent, swmike, it seems obvious that HarunAwie is indeed the black player...

Not so! HarunAwie wins as white, and the black taken pieces are now correctly on his side. 

But then why on earth are these 3 days'' labels of the wrong color, except to confuse everyone?

I don't know what these colors are supposed to mean, then.

incorrectname

The white box is displayed on the side that's required to move. 

CeSinge

This is not correct, because then the colors of these labels should change with each turn, and that is not the case. There is already a little clock within these labels to indicate that...

So that's not the explanation.

incorrectname

Have you ever seen the clock on a black box?

CeSinge

Yes, just do Previous Move in the game for which I provided a link above.

In the above, HarunAwie plays white and it's his/her turn to play. So the clock correctly indicates for whom the clock is ticking, hence, whose turn it is to play. But I really do not understand the meaning of the color of the boxes the clocks are on. The white and black boxes never change sides, also. 

Let alone it's confusing, it's even a mystery to understand what is meant, here!

 

navergonnagiveyouup

I use the iOS version of the chess.com app, and I really want to do the drills, but for whatever reason when I play a move it just says loading and won’t make a move. I have tried just limiting the engine max time and letting it evaluate, but it never moves. Does anybody else have the same problem or know why this is happining?

navergonnagiveyouup

I actually fixed the problem with the app so never mind, but I discovered an issue with the online tournaments. I am rather underrated so a lot of times in one of my regular tournaments I wind up beating 700-800s+ very badly, but sometimes they just wait until the end of the tournament so the game will abort. I like Lichess tournaments because you can still finish a game, but you just don't get any points for it. I would not call this cheating, but it is unfair when you are about to beat a 1500 that the game just aborts and they have a way out.