"GUEST" high scores

[TDog]

Originally Posted by Claireanne

I dont see how. You cant copy a puzzle because I am certain admin has set up codes to prevent that, and copying would be the only way to cheat... copy and paste to a solver of some sort? There is no way I can see how that could happen.

Greetings,

Forgive me for intervening, but I recently wrote a cryptogram solving program for a client. I also wrote a temporary module (FOR TESTING ONLY) that 'scraped' the cryptogram displayed here, and sent that to my program, which then sent back the results and 'typed' them back into the form. My program is currently only 39% accurate, but is very fast (1-2 seconds when solved) (add 5+ seconds for lag & to type back the results).

NOW, as I said in my greeting message...
I only used this site for testing purposes of my program, and I asked the admin to delete ALL results from my account from the database. I hope that it will be easy for him/her to do this. Once again, my apologies to all those that are offended by my actions. I registered before testing so that my results could be easily removed (hopefully!). The cryptogram.org testing module will be removed before handing the program to my client, so that it can't be used here again!!!!

My sincere apologies,
-TDog

[claireann]

Plan on removing it soon? Whether its a "Test" module or not, you are affecting peoples scores, and this mod you have must be hitting the server fairly hard, causing slow downs on the site.

And ask first. Would have been the politest way to do things, taking into consideration what you are doing is dicey at best.

If your bot is scraping the database, you are affecting the players currently on line. Alot of us could not play due to delay and lag time.

I am not administration, but if I were them, I would locate your addy, and block you. And I doubt admin will be able to remove your scores.

So, as nice as you appear to be, you really did a number on players competing. And couching it under the guise of do it and then ask for forgiveness is the immature way to deal with it.

Excuse me I am angry.

[TDog]

The module was removed yesterday, and CAN NOT/WILL NOT be used here again.

Regarding lag, my tool was not responsible. I tested my program for a few hours 2-3 days ago. It was manually clicked each time it solved a puzzle, with at least 30 seconds in between puzzles. Typically about 3-5 minutes while I analyzed the results.

I understand your anger, and once again, apologize to all of you for testing this tool here. If the admin knows anything about databases, my results can easily be removed. I registered and 'played' while logged in to make it easier to identify my results vs. having to filter out random guest results.

Yes, I realize I should have asked first, but I was under time constraints to finish this project. This is not an excuse, just the facts of my situation. Not that I will ever do this again here, but in the future, I will obtain permission prior to 'testing' any forthcoming program I may build.

-TDog

[opallady]

I have been setting records with embarassingly long solve times for several days now. In each case the previous record holder is "Guest" with a solve time of 120 seconds, and the cryptograms have been ones I've solved before. Have any other cryptedians or cryptediennes experienced this?

[admin]

The "120 second guest" records is not a bug - they are games which held inappropriate record times, by players who were not playing within the rules. I was unable to determine the previous record holder for these quotes, so I arbitrarily set them to large record times which I knew would quickly be broken by registered users. In fact, most of them already have - there were about 750 in total.

So not a bug, and nothing to worry about - just enjoy the easy record-breaking while it lasts, before bansai et. al. get around to solving them again at 10 seconds or faster. :-)

[opallady]

Thank you for clearing that up, admin.