GameKnot: GameKnot related, Max time allocated to tactic = 4:15?

GameKnot related: Max time allocated to tactic = 4:15?

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levellerlevvie
09-Sep-10, 08:33

Max time allocated to tactic = 4:15?

I think someone has mentioned it before here in the forums but when I sort on Time then I see that I have 8 tactics with 4 minutes and 15 seconds.
Now that would be a huge coincidence and I know I had a few where I thought up to 10 minutes because it didn't see the solution (That explains the 7 out of 8 failures ) You can check it out at the bottom of this post

Is this a bug or a feature?

When My Rating Time ↑ Status Rating Beauty % Solved Avg Time
08-Sep-10 1334 04:15 Failed 1112 75% 00:47
08-Sep-10 1351 04:15 Failed 1223 72% 01:10
07-Sep-10 1350 04:15 Solved 1274 52% 01:14
07-Sep-10 1327 04:15 Failed 1144 69% 01:01
26-Aug-10 1300 04:15 Failed 1058 69% 01:16
26-Aug-10 1298 04:15 Failed 1214 67% 00:15
24-Aug-10 1330 04:15 Failed 1539 30% 01:51
24-Aug-10 1315 04:15 Failed 1469 35% 01:32

kingdawar
09-Sep-10, 09:22

255 seconds... go figure 11111111

Gameknot.com
09-Sep-10, 10:13

Yes, that is correct -- we are limiting the max elapsed time to 255 seconds (or 4:15). The logic there is that the longer elapsed time will likely not be someone actually sitting there and thinking/analyzing the position all that time (although it does happen of course), but more likely it'll be someone stepping away from their computer, or switching to their e-mail program to answer an e-mail or two, or even closing the tactics window and coming back later. Which would make the longer times simply meaningless (at least statistically).

baronderkilt
09-Sep-10, 12:59

Ahhh ...

It's Binary Time, yes !?!! Think of the bandwidth saved over 257 seconds
* * *
}8-)

levellerlevvie
09-Sep-10, 15:29

I understand the limitation ...

... but 255 seconds is not very much if you ask me .... Even I sometimes think longer about a problem and I only solve the easy ones so far... Imagine the amount of time needed to solve hard problems.

I'm pretty sure that guys like heinzkat think at least 255 seconds about every problem so the time-stat will be totally out of balance for them.

Wouldn't it make more sense to increase the max-time together with the difficulty of the tactic. For eg a exponential/logarithmic increase would fit better then a linear increase.

0800 - 060 sec
0900 - 090 sec -> 60*(3/2)
1000 - 135 sec -> 90*(3/2) or 60*(3/2)²
1100 - 202 sec -> 135*(3/2) or 60*(3/2)³
1200 - 304 sec -> ...

2000 would give you 7784 sec or 2h 9min 44 sec.

-> Now I can see that this last max time would be a bit much but I'm sure gameknot can find a more balanced formula. Probably by increasing the starting time from 60 to 120 and decreasing the multiplier from 1.5 to say 1.3. This would give for rating 2000 a max time of 2795 seconds which is like 46min or so.

Anyway ... the current solution is somewhat incomplete if you ask me ... a little math should solve it quickly though!

kingdawar
09-Sep-10, 16:39

The total time statistic is "out of balance" anyway with certain exercises being deleted and its used time still added to the total. I would prefer to see an average per exercise, or considering the time is irrelevant anyway, to show no time at all? But all this is secondary. There are still some "fundamental" issues like the rashed Queen giveaways that need some review in the generator code, but enabling the "win only" function does make things surprisingly much better and enjoyable.

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