An opponent just told me s/he can see my hidden notes.
Is it a known bug?
The game is here: fmansa vs. maxiimou
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They can see them if they’re logged out of their account (or logged in to another account), as the M Log is visible for everyone else but the opponent.
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Yeah, I know that, that’s what I told them in the chat, waiting to see if I get more info… but since It’s so rarely used I wonder if there’s a known bug.
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More a design problem as a bug.
To have really private notes on OGS you can
1 use add note option (by player)
2 send a message to yourself in the forum message system.
If you want to avoid to see the notes ingame from your opponent it’s simple: don’t logout of OGS (you can stay logged in forever, even after closing reopening your browser). Be still careful when cleaning cookies/cache.
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Ok… it looks like it’s a “feature” that’s implemented by the front end not the backend… so it needs to be reimplemented again and again on all 3rd party apps 
…
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It’s funny that there is still no private notes feature, as I imagine it has far greater demand than malkovich log.
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hypothesis
1 few players logout (usually by accident)
2 when cleaning from time to time your browser you have to login again (remember above)
3 not so a surprise, you forgot your password
4 So you lost your private notes
5 luckily you find again your password somewhere in your Malkovich
5 bis or find it in your opponent Malkovich who friendly kept it for you
6 conclusion Malkovich took priority on private notes
7 Malkovich users are correspondance gentlemen users whatever.
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TO RESTATE (because this keeps coming up): THIS IS A FEATURE NOT A BUG
Malkovitch is NOT a private notes system.
It is a feature to make games more entertaining for spectators.
I think the expectation is this would only happen in a “trusted and fun” environment.
It is “used mistakenly” by players who discover it accidentally and think “oh cool, private notes”
That being said - I think “Private Game Notes” are a feature that people would use and value far more than Malkovitch Chat.
Now that we have “per account key-data-store” available in the back end, any person/app could implement “Private Game Notes” if they wanted…
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Maybe rename “Malkovich log” to something like “public notes” or “spectator notes,”?
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Seems like a good idea to me
That’s what Malkovich already means
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Yeah but how many people know that?
I think the evidence tells us: not enough.
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You could say the same thing about Rengo, yet we choose to keep that name. I think the same (good) reasoning that applied to Rengo applies here. It already has a name, one can look it up or ask someone on the server and then one knows 
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What does it change?
What we have now is not spectator notes as they are as public as chat messages on clients that do not implement them correctly.
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I don’t think it’s really the same at all. Rengo is a traditional name for a particular variant of Go, whereas the Malkovich log is a thing that applies to any game of Go. The fact that there is a page about it on Sensei’s and a lot of confusion on Reddit and ogs forums I don’t think points to it being a “standard” term like rengo.
Actually looking at the Sensei’s article it makes it seem like a forum game relying on good faith by the opponent not to read the comments. Plus a reference to a 21 year old niche (limited release) film is very “insider” I think, especially for the younger generation. I’ve even seen the film but still can’t really work out why that name is used for a chat line that is hidden from one person only.
Anyway, a long way of saying that a better name would be better. Maybe “kibitz chat” would be clearer while retaining the jargon element…
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The difference is that Rengo doesn’t look deceptively like something else that “obviously should be a feature, implemented in exactly this way”
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I don’t think so. If you ask a pro what is rengo then i expect a 95% good answer. I won’t expect the same for malkovitch. At least i never heard/read one of them.
Malkovich is not a popular name, only used by a limited part of the go player (Maybe it’s a word coming from the chess world i dunno?).
It’s in sensei but without being linked to it, few chance to find it.
Myself first time i discovered this name, it was because of exploring the L19 forum. I guess the name is known now in the same way or because OGS use it too. Or some chess players?
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Kibbitz chat is bit too restrictive as it has the idea to hide to the opponent firstly
Now if we introduce private notes, it could make more sense.
Installing private notes, like a third option to select like we have two now, shouldn’t be that difficult. The way it enforce that only the owner can read them will offer a greater security. With keeping the Kibbitz chat, one can still have the pleasure to share his ideas.
It’s not a kibitz chat though, since you’re not actively talking to anyone as the player recording. You don’t even know if anyone is reading it until after the game and maybe they’ve commented.
I think these are just very subtle differences, and we’re still inventing a new name for a term that has been used for years. It’s pretty obvious that Rengo is not the same as a Malkovich chat log, I don’t think we need to explain that they are different.
And once again, if anyone has issues with a Sensei’s page they could change it, or better yet just point people to the OGS Documentation instead
If you click on the Chat button it will change color to green and read Malkovich . While in malkovich mode, your messages will be hidden from your opponent until the game ends. After the game ends you can read all malkovich messages your opponent has written and your opponent can read yours. Spectators can see your malkovich messages even in an ongoing game. This includes any logged out person visiting the site, and includes your opponent if they choose to log out and look at your game. This feature is intended for entertainment of spectators, not for really private notes.
I don’t even know why we have documentation if no-one seems to think that explaining the website in a spot where there’s space for it, makes sense.
I don’t think it’s relevant what a pro does or doesn’t know.
My experience is, I played on OGS, I clicked a bunch of buttons, I see Malkovich chat and I look it up (or possibly have someone explain it me)*, and then I know exactly what it is. I can’t see that being a big issue really.
The greatest security is just not to write anything you don’t want others to read
*I think the actual timeline was I had already tried it, probably looking up how it worked. Someone else I recall telling me about it then mentioned it afterward, maybe in some more detail.
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I just think that if you can implement something in such a way that it doesn’t need further investigation to understand it then just do that. Surely not always possible but where it is possible then it’s daft to implement it in an unintuitive way and then expect people to look it up.
Maybe it’s not possible to implement Malkovich in a self explanatory way but at the moment it’s implemented in a way that actively prevents understanding.
If I tap chat and turn it into Malkovich I get an “explanation” in the chat box that says “visible after the game” which is a falsehood. Anything I type there is visible from the moment I send it, just not to my logged in opponent…
Sure I could look up what Malkovich means but since there is some info about it given right there, why would I?
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