Programmers, help fight the UIGEA from the bottom up.

[jukofyork]

[ QUOTE ]
If the players were technically knowledgeable and sufficiently motivated it might be feasible.

The main problem is obviously guaranteeing that a non-hacked version of the software is running on the server. This means each client would need some secure way of validating the internals of the software it's connecting to.

You're a much smarter guy than me so maybe you have some ideas. I can't think of any way to query a system to guarantee the integrity of its parts, when the server owner has complete control over it and access to the source code.

I can't think of any existing code that does this. There's a validation protocol in a p2p app that I'm not allowed to mention, that's required for it to connect to a certain third party network, but it's hackable.

[/ QUOTE ]
Ignoring all the extra complexities of poker then a much simpler question would be:

Q) Is it possible to play an "uncheatable" game of Roshambo (rock, paper, scissors) using a P2P topology (ie: no central server)?

Perhaps this can be accomplished using some kind of public key encryption system, but I'm not 100% sure and haven't thought about it carefully yet. If it is possible then the next question is:

Q) Is it possible to play an "uncheatable" game of Roshambo using a P2P topology where each player's choices are randomly selected and either the randomness is checked/enforced somehow or it is impossible for one player to positively effect the outcome by choosing their number(s) manually.

Even if if (1) is possible, then I wonder if (2) will just end up being some kind of "Byzantines General Problem" and end up intractable... If P2P Roshambo is impossible to secure then so will P2P poker.

Juk [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

[Triggerle]

This should be 1 table only!

[Nortonesque]

I have a vague recollection of someone mentioning a verifiable card deal, where all the players get a "piece" of the random number, and afterwards the legitimacy can be verified using everyone's pieces. IIRC its weakness was if someone dropped out, no one else could verify.

One interesting model for an online poker system might be to separate the poker playing from the payment system. I.E. anyone can start a table and invite specific players, and access the chip counts. There would be nothing stopping a 3rd party from using the system to provide real money games, be it an overseas payment processor or a group of friends playing a home game.

[mappedout]

I have some technical background... let me give this a whirl here...

Well as for the P2P system were there would be no "central server" i am not sure how that could work, and if it did i would think it would require all players at a particular table to have a connection to all the other players individual data so that the table could operate on all PCs without there being a central server and then transmitting the incremental changes as they occured to all PCs... this would be really rediculous even if it were possible and would lead to serious security issues for players as all players hole cards would be encrypted somewhere on each players machine...

As for the system of hosting your own small poker site from your connection i see many problems.
First of all even to host 3 or 4 tables of players all playing at once would not be possible on most PPLs PCs today, you would need something much more robust to handle all the connections and each individual game in a timely manner.
Second we are forgetting our coveted random number generators that our expensive sites have spent oodles of money perfecting, i believe Stars uses a hardware based mechanism that takes random polling of environmental readings in the immediate room surrounding the servers to "seed" its complex RNG... this just wouldn't be possible for each individual hoster therefore leading to a compromised game or atleast not as random as other online solutions. This would be much like the video games you can play on the PC now like the WSOP game, which is internet multiplayer enabled.
Third your internet connection just wont handle more than about 1 table worth of players connected to you at once, if that. The poker sites we all play on spend THOUSANDS of dollars per month to pipe in huge amounts of bandwidth to handle players.

This is a good fight and i commend you for taking it up, however this just wont be possible while maintaining the same amount of game integrity we gain from sites like Stars and FTP IMHO.

[Grasshopp3r]

How do the gaming companies operate over the internet? This is far less time sensitive or robust than Half Life or Quake.

[Nortonesque]

How about this: cards can come (encrypted and digitally signed) from a third party.

So the system could be configurable to use:
A) Someone in the game
B) Some random person from the P2P network
C) One or more trusted 3rd parties (I can see a business built solely around providing a stream of random cards)

So in a game with lots of trust among players you use A, in a game with no trust you could use C, and if you're somewhere in between you might use B. Obviously when you sit at the table you have to agree to the provider.

[Tuff_Fish]

One point, only one PC has to handle anything more robust that the clients we already download from the sites.

The random number generator is a function of how well you guys write the server program.

Internet connections can apparently handle a couple of dozen games at once if I am to believe the multitablers around here.

Again, this whole thing is supposed to be a small network of a dozen or so players up to maybe half a dozen tables.

I see my coworkers all playing Halo against each other at the same time on plain vanila PC's. That has to be a whole bunch more computer intensive.

You guys write good solid poker software, I don't think there are to many more issues. My wife will be the banker. She is honest to a fault.

Tuff

[_dave_]

Tuff,

did you read my proposed system n IG forum?

Are you familiar with the scale of current CounterStrike etc. game servers out there?

dave.

[Tuff_Fish]

Yes, I read it.

I didn't understand most of it. I am not a gamer nor much of a computer geek.

But if there is a workable model, that suits me fine. Just make it work.

Tuff

[Toasta]

.. when its open source, there will be hacks.
.. when its not open source, who knows there will be no superuser or keylogers trojas or whatever.

-> as soon as money comes into play p2p, mesh/private networks wont work.


edit : my biggest probs : software rngs are exploitable, encryption is not guaranted.