Wandering Timestamps

[Maginot]

So why did last week's rankings reset half an hour early?

No notification or explanation to players? Before or after? Why not?

[Maginot]

And why no Sillysoft game servers tonight even though dustin logged into the forums?

[Maginot]

Hello? Mods? dustin? Anyone?

[GFips]

I am sorry, I have no information myself and I think the other mods also do not have more infos.
Obviously there seem to be some technical issues on sillysoft side.

Dustin was around in STMs host yesterday and was logged in the forums. So lets see what he will say and lets hope that things will be fixed soon.

Thanks to STM and -MikeyG- for hosting in the meantime!
Sorry for the inconvenience from my side (although out of control of mods)

[SecondTermMistake]

When dustin dropped in yesterday he said he needed to take the servers down to do some maintenance of sorts.

Hopefully they come back? Otherwise I'll make more STM hosts

[Red Beard]

Lol, yeah. Who knows. It's funny, but when he was in the room I told him that it seemed the rooms were freezing less often the last two weeks. And literally since the servers went down it seems like it's been freezing constantly again lol.

[Red Beard]

When dustin dropped in yesterday he said he needed to take the servers down to do some maintenance of sorts.

Hopefully they come back? Otherwise I'll make more STM hosts

I for one welcome our new STM overlords.

[dustin]

Nothing changed about the reset time.

I am doing some server maintenance and changes this week. It looks like there are a few different community hosts running, so I'm letting them have a chance to shine before resuming sillysoft rooms...

[SecondTermMistake]

STM hosts are the best hosts.

[Maginot]

Nothing changed about the reset time.

If nothing changed about the reset time, then there's something wrong with your database clock sync settings.

Last week :: #2152882 @ 17:30 EST // Reset // #2152883 @ 17:49 EST

This week :: #2153382 @ 17:59 EST (!) // Reset // #2153383 @ 18:14 EST

(Weekly rankings are snapshot'd at 18:00:00 EST; seedings calc takes a few seconds; then current leaderboard is cleared.)

No big deal, it's just five or ten minutes on average, but the problem goes back as far as last summer, perhaps longer.

[Maginot]

Quick random sampling:

2021 Jan 24 :: #2150190 @ 17:47 EST // Reset // #2150191 @ 17:54 EST

2020 Dec 20 :: #2147007 @ 17:50 EST // Reset // #2147008 @ 17:53 EST

2020 Nov 08 :: #2142781 @ 17:59 EST // Reset // #2142782 @ 18:09 EST

2020 Oct 04 :: #2139348 @ 17:38 EST // Reset // #2139349 @ 17:53 EST

2020 Jul 12 :: #2132570 @ 17:51 EST // Reset // #2132571 @ 17:58 EST

2020 May 24 :: #2128828 @ 17:53 EST // Reset // #2128829 @ 17:56 EST

2020 Apr 19 :: #2124915 @ 17:48 EST // Reset // #2124916 @ 17:57 EST

(It's all over the place; usually between zero and ten minutes early, but never late, and sometimes ten to fifteen minutes early.)

[Maginot]

Anyway, for example, if someone wanted to do a "Greatest Last Minute and Last Second Chase Wins" retrospective, then it's borderline impossible with game results like this, wherein database timestamps have shifted away from real time because of bad server clock syncs. I know that Sillysoft, in the past, has collected host side timestamps in the "extrainfo" text string sent to the mothership, so maybe there's a way to use those crumbs to refocus things more precisely, but obviously, that's way above my head.

:nonexistentshrugsmiley:

[Maginot]

George874: is para here
George874: i was watching the reset the week i won
killercatfish: good thing he's not here
Maginot: was it on time?
George874: it did NOT reset until after 6 pm
George874: yes
George874: i was watching because i was the leader
George874: it was 30 seconds after 6 pm

(Soooo, in other words, game #2152883 on February 28th 2021 at 17:49 EST has been verified as actually happening after 18:00.)

[Maginot]

Some mod should rename this thread, yes, in all caps: "SILLYSOFT GAME TIMESTAMPS ARE WRONG!"

[Maginot]

Never mind! I did!

[Maginot]

Basic stuff like game timestamps shouldn't be wrong.

(Mods? Love you, but I kinda think you guys should be demanding answers, clear explanations, and fixes, here.)

[Maginot]

Okay, okay; thread title changed to something less provocative.

[GFips]

LOL Maginot. You made Dustin such crazy that he obviously eliminated all clocks ... (no reset at all till now)

@Dustin: can you check please!

George874 won the week. He will get the winning award! Congrats!

[Maginot]

I don't remember exactly or precisely, but more or less, for the entirety of Lux's history, the game timestamps were almost always based on eastern US (NYC) clocks. I remember there were a few hiccups with daylight savings time changes in the early days, but nothing too major. I'd ask why dustin has suddenly shifted to UTC (Greenwich) timestamps, post-recent-server-migration, but I assume the answer is a lack of care or interest; default settings, forgot to set the server timezone, so fuck off anyone who asks. Again, in the present (now) of Lux, and how rankings do (or do not) work, it's barely important; but, in the grander scheme of Lux, meaning the fifteen or soon to be twenty year history of things, suddenly shifting the baseline timezone of game results without discussion or warning kinda does matter, if only as a footnote for serious historians.

(But, honestly, who cares about timezone questions, when we still can't get simple answers about inaccurate clock syncs.)

[dustin]

New server is back onto Eastern time now.

[Maginot]

I know that Sillysoft, in the past, has collected host side timestamps in the "extrainfo" text string sent to the mothership, so maybe there's a way to use those crumbs to refocus things more precisely, but obviously, that's way above my head.

Any plans to fix the bad unsync'd timestamps over the last year or two? Again, in the game scheme of things, a few minutes here or there, in old data, I guess, well, it doesn't really matter to most people, but it'd be great to recalibrate those timestamps, if only for fun Lux history trivia stuff.

(And, I assume, games played in the last few days are still recorded on UTC time; no fix yet?)

[dustin]

Getting correct game timestamps is desired yes. It seems like they may be coming in as UTC times now still

[Maginot]

Not good!