reputation improvement

[socksey]

We do!     It's called "gag".     Even the bad eggs add color to Fibs.  I wouldn't want to eliminate them.  I might like to put them all in a cage and throw tomatoes at them.  LOL  Just kidding!  At the very least, they keep us alert when things get dull.    

socksey



"The two most abundant things in the universe are Hydrogen and stupidity." - Harlan Ellison

[gammboy]

I started to put together a program a couple of months ago that I was going to call "statbot" that collects all the data that scrolls by on fibs and allows you to ask it questions.    Its written in PHP against a mysql backend.  All it does right now is log in and echo raw data to the screen.

It has some interesting applications, for instance I would think it could make some pretty good predictions about who is a dropper based on their activity on fibs.  For instance, a person who repeatedly leaves matches when losing, but never when winning is most likely a dropper.  

Just off the top of my head, I envision the output for the basic query "ask username" might be something like this:

"tell statbot ask dropper"

Stats for dropper:
---------------------------------------
Member since:  1-01-01
Rating:             1650.68
Experience:      1000

30 day Rating change :  +150.68

Matches played: 25
Wins: 10
Losses: 0
Drops while winning:  0
Drops while losing:  15
1pt match drops: 0
Saved games:  15

Opponent's comments  12% positive, 88% negative

Most recent completed game against: NIHolympic
Most recent dropped game against: bonehead

Previous opponents logged in right now: gammboy, burper, NIHolympic, Honeygirl
------------------------------------------------------

I think a repbot-like component could be added to collect opponent comments.  It would allow a single comment from each player for each match played.  The comment can either be positive or negative, a neutral comment is recorded if the opponent opts not to leave a comment.  Statbot could be set to automatically use "tell" to prompt the players to enter comments upon the completion of each match.  Output might be like so:

"tell statbot ask dropper comments"

Comments for dropper
------------------------------------
25 comments on file, 0% positive, 60% negative, 40% neutral

(+)(W) gammboy:  "He played a good match, I lost (fibs dice suck)"
(-)(D) burper: "I was about to backgammon him for the match and he dropped"
etc
etc
etc
--------------------------------------

Since this is all against a mysql database, it would be trivial to set up a php web page to display stats, graphs, etc.  

I haven't done any analysis on storage requirements, query speed or anything.  This would collect a respectable amount of data, and after a while would have to be pruned.  

Anyway, just brainstorming.  Comments welcome, flames > /dev/null

GB

"Experience is what you get when you didn't get what you expected." - unknown

[Chris]

Matches played: 25
Wins: 10
Losses: 0
Drops while winning:  0
Drops while losing:  15
1pt match drops: 0
Saved games:  15

I like statistics. And I really like statistics arising automatically.
But how do you detect "drops while losing"? If you have a board state it's quite easy with gnubg - but how do you get the board?

Regards, Chris

[gammboy]

But how do you detect "drops while losing"?

Just thinking about it,  we can really only do that for match play, and by games won/lost.  For instance, we know when a 5 game match is started, and when each game  is completed.  So if a player that is down 3/1 drops he gets a "dropped while losing".  If he later resumes, it would be updated.  Now that player could well hold the 16 cube and be about to backgammon his opponent when he drops, and so he would actually be winning and still get a dropped while losing point.  I would think that would be the exception rather than the rule, and a resumed/completed match would update the stats anyway.

One thing that is crystal clear is that no modifications to the fibs server code will ever happen.  So, we have to accept the compromises that come with that and work within the framework that is in place today.  This was the best way I could think of to give some data for detecting droppers.  Perfect? No.  But probably more reliable, and definately less of a pain than repbot.

If I could change the fibs code, I would make a change that would deal permanently with the dropper situation:  If you have a saved game that YOU dropped with someone that is currently online, you cannot start a new game with someone else until you resume or the dropped opponent refuses your invite.

GB

"There's no place like /home"

[Chris]

For instance, we know when a 5 game match is started, and when each game  is completed.

Hm, perhaps I'm missing something, but as far as I know fibs only tells you about starting and ending matches, not about starting and ending games ... How would you get this information?

[gammboy]

Yup, you're right.  Fibs only tells us about match status.  Rats.  Oh well, theres one idea shot down.  I obviously need to spend more time studying the CLIPs reference.  

GB

[jonesyjt]

Keep thinking though, Gammboy.  Brainstorming is always useful.

jonesyjt

[zorie]

We do!     It's called "gag".     Even the bad eggs add color to Fibs.  I wouldn't want to eliminate them.  I might like to put them all in a cage and throw tomatoes at them.  LOL  Just kidding!  At the very least, they keep us alert when things get dull.    

socksey



"The two most abundant things in the universe are Hydrogen and stupidity." - Harlan Ellison

 lol

[socksey]

Great to put these ideas forth before implementing.  Many ideas from many are almost always superior to ideas from only one.    Just don't ever send your ideas to a committee!    

socksey



"Life may have no meaning. Or even worse, it may have a meaning of which I disapprove." - Ashleigh Brilliant

[gammboy]

Many ideas from many are almost always superior to ideas from only one.

Well said.  My loose idea here is to collect every bit of data FIBS will cough up, and provide a query engine for people (and other programs) to do their own research.  

Right now, the working model is two bots, watchdog and statbot.  watchdog just watches and parses the incoming data into database tables.  Statbot will be the interactive component that will query the database for information and present it to the user.

Statbot would have built in queries like "ask username" and such to display most common stats for the user, but I'm thinking about allowing the user to enter complex queries using SQL.

So, if you ever wondered:

...how many IPs has resh_lakish logged in from?
...how many users have logged in from 123.123.123.123?
...who were those users and what date/time did they log in?
...how many times had donzaemon used the "N" word in shouts?
...who has played and won against fungie?
...has zyxtcba ever said anything to calm the situation?
...who has gammboy won against this year (2 hits found)

The list is almost endless.....

Based on my estimates last night, I collect less than 150,000 bytes of data per hour, which equates to about 1.3G of data per year.  So a 40G drive would hold in excess of 30 years of history.  

Any thoughts or comments welcome, flames > /dev/null

GB

[tansley]

Socksey @ Feb 18 2005, 01:22 PM

Just don't ever send your ideas to a committee!

Committees...

They keep minutes, but loose hours.

[webrunner]

Very cool idea Gammboy, but won't that scare users away?
Kinda like "big brother is watching you?"

[Shades]

Very cool idea Gammboy, but won't that scare users away?
Kinda like "big brother is watching you?"

enough decent people are scared away by the bullies as it is now....  

[socksey]

Kinda like "big brother is watching you?"

That was my first thought, although, I really did enjoy being able to retrieve shouts by date and time when that option was available.

socksey



"Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere." - Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.
 

[gammboy]

Very cool idea Gammboy, but won't that scare users away?
Kinda like "big brother is watching you?"

Interesting question.  Maybe it would.  The last thing I would want to do is discourage membership and participation in Fibs.  On the other hand, which users would care if "Big Brother" were watching their Fibs activities?  Probably only those who were up to something, or had something to hide.

But if the consensus is "bad idea", especially if Patti were to weigh in, that would  be the end of it.   I would have thought this would be an enhancement, though.

GB