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Channel Number Channel Size Channel Security Card Sharing and Team Poker

Connect

Pressing this button will cause WH to attempt to connect to the central server at winholdem.net. If your connection is granted several things will happen. The server will attempt to authenticate your WH client using a private player product key. And the server will attempt to place your connection in the Channel Number you have selected. If your selected Channel Number is not currently in use then the winholdem.net server will open that channel for you and make you the owner. If your selected Channel Number is currently in use by another group of WH users then the winholdem.net server will attempt to join you to the channel. You will be joined to an existing channel if the Channel Size is large enough to accommodate your connection. If the channel is full you will be denied entry and placed in the NULL channel. If you are denied entry and you were attempting to create a channel then just select another Channel Number and try again. If you are denied entry and you were attempting to join a channel created by a friend then the channel is probably full and you will need to get your friend to increase the Channel Size to allow you to join. Once you create or join a channel you will be able to card share with other WH users in that same channel.

Channel Number


In the WH window title bar you will see the word "channel" followed by a number in parenthesis ( ). This number is your currently selected Channel Number. The winholdem.net server supports over 4 billion channel numbers. The channels are for your personal private use as a WH user to allow you to easily card share with your friends. When you launch the WH client your initial Channel Number is randomized for your convenience. However, you can easily select your desired channel from the File menu at anytime either by directly typing it or randomizing it with a button press. Directly selecting your Channel Number is something you will obviously need to do if you are joining an existing channel. With over 4 billion channels numbers to choose from it is very rare occurrence to randomly select the exact same channel as another group of WH users but it is still possible and for that reason each winholdem.net channel has a channel size.

Channel Size


You will also see two additional numbers on the WH window title bar indicated in parenthesis after the Channel Number as (n/m). The first number is the number of other WH users in your channel. The second number is the maximum number of WH users allowed in the channel including you. If you are the first to open a channel then you are automatically the channel owner and you have the power to control the maximum number of WH users in your channel. You can select this Channel Size from the File menu at anytime. Note that a Channel Size of zero '0' means that there is no restriction on the number of WH users in your channel. Any number greater than zero restricts the maximum number of WH users in your channel to that size. Note that if you set the Channel Size to 1, then you and you alone are allowed in the channel. The winholdem.net server will close any channel with less than 2 members after a minimum period of inactivity. Also, if the channel owner leaves the channel then the next channel member, that joined after the initial owner, will become the new owner. Any channel is immediately closed if there are zero members in the channel.

Channel Security

Your privacy as an online poker player is a very high priority. As such we at winholdem.net have taken measures to guarantee your poker playing privacy. We also use WH on a daily basis to play for real money and it goes without saying that we care about security. The WH client/server uses blowfish encryption with a fairly large key size (undisclosed). Each byte in every WH message is first initialized with random noise from your PC and then the message information is added and then it is encrypted. These extra noisy bytes help increase the entropy of the encrypted message. No two WH messages ever look the same even if the information in the message is identical. You can be sure that any and all information transmitted to the winholdem.net server is safe and secure. Furthermore, nothing other than your private product key (required) and your email address (optional), is stored in the server database. If you are card sharing, your cards are not stored on the server in any form other than the temporary storage in RAM necessary to forward your info to the players in your channel. The poker casino where you are playing is never transmitted to the server. The table where you are playing is never transmitted to the server.

In order for a cheater to gain an advantage over you in poker a poker game, they must know what your cards are. Furthermore, in an online environment, they would need to know the online poker casino where you are playing, the table where you are playing, the chair where you are playing and finally they would need to know your cards. They would also have to be able to sit down and play against you at that exact table and they would need to wait until they got a better hand than anyone at the table including you and they would need you to be betting on your hand in order to steal your money.

Prerequisites for cheating an online poker player:
1. cheater must know you are online playing poker.              (must be non-tournament table so cheater can sit and play against you)
2. cheater must know your online poker casino.                   (never transmitted by WH)
3. cheater must know your online poker casino table.           (never transmitted by WH)
4. cheater must know your online poker casino table-chair.   (transmitted by WH once per hand when connected and sharing)
5. cheater must know your cards.                                       (transmitted by WH once per hand when connected and sharing)
6. cheater must be seated and playing at your table.
7. cheater must be dealt the best hand.
8. you must be dealt a good hand that you will bet on.
9. conditions 7 & 8 must continue to occur.

If a hacker ever managed to compromise the winholdem.net channel security, they would not gain much. Once per Hold'Em hand they would see a single packet from each WH user, travel to the server with a chair number and card info. Ok, fine, they still lack items 2 & 3 above thus rendering your chair/card info absolutely worthless.

Card Sharing and Team Poker

One of the most exciting WH features is the ability to easily and conveniently share your cards with a fellow friend playing Hold'Em at the same online poker casino table. If you play Texas Hold'Em online you can be sure that other players are using various means to share their cards with one another to try and gain an advantage over you. In an online internet environment it is impossible to prevent players from card sharing. The online poker casinos would like to be able to prevent card sharing but they are powerless to stop it and they know it. Because of this simple fact of life, we at winholdem.net take the policy position of "if-you-can't-beat'em-join'em." And as such, we have done everything possible to make it simple, easy, convenient, private and safe for you to play team poker with whomever you choose from the privacy of your home. As far as we know we are the first to offer this service to online Hold'Em players.

Guidelines for card sharing:
1. Do not card share if you are playing alone.
....There is simply no reason to publish your cards to a winholdem.net channel regardless of how secure it is.
2. Always set the Channel Size to the exact number of friends you are playing with.
....There is simply no reason to use a Channel Size of 10 when it is just you and one other friend. Set the size to 2.
3. Do not use ridiculously low channel numbers like 1 or 2.
4. Use a random Channel Number  whenever possible.
5. Do not use channel numbers that are easily guessed by enemies that know you (like birthdates, phone numbers, ssn's).
6. Always verify that everyone in your channel is who you expect them to be.
....You can use your normal chat mechanism AIM, MSN, ICQ ... etc. to ask them to publish two specific cards to a specific chair.
....They can use manual mode to easily do that.
....If you see those cards appear in that chair then that's a real good sign they are who they say they are.
7. Never card share with others you do not know or trust.
....They could be sharing your info with everyone else at the table.
8. Card sharing on a tournament table is, in theory, 100% safe, since there is no way for a cheater to join a tournament table.
9. Card sharing is not collusion.
....Collusion occurs when your knowledge of another players cards redirects your otherwise normal course of play.
....If you have a terrible hand but you jack the pot for your friend with AA then you have engaged in collusion.
....Be warned that if you do this, the online poker casinos can detect it and your account could be cancelled

Observer

Pressing this button will activate Observer Mode.

Resend

Pressing this button will clear the internal card sharing state and cause your cards to be retransmitted to your channel if you are currently connected and sharing. This is useful if a friend joins your channel late in the hand after your cards have been transmitted to the channel.
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