DEFINITIONS

***** DEFINITIONS *****

Registered / Guest
- Registered members have an ICC username (also called a handle), ratings 
  and other data (collectively called an account), and log in with a
  password.  Unregistered players can usually log in as "guest" and are
  given temporary names like guest737, but are very restricted in what
  they can do.  See "help register".

Administrators
- These are ICC staff and volunteers who can help configure your account,
  e.g. to set your email address.  An admin often has a (*) next to his
  name, indicate that he's on-duty (but may be busy).  See "help admins".

Helpers
- These are volunteers, often youths, who field questions in channel 1. 
  In that channel they appear with an (H) next to their name.  "help helper".

Wild
- Variants on normal chess.  See "help wild" for more info.

Bullet / blitz / standard / 1-minute / 5-minute / 15-minute / wild / 
  bughouse / crazyhouse / correspondence: 
- The ICC maintains a number of ratings for each registered player.  Which 
  rating is affected by a game depends on the time control and other match
  parameters.  See "help clocks" and "help ratings".

Provisional / established ratings:
- Each rating is either provisional or established.  The rating is
  provisional if it is based on fewer than 20 games, and is established
  otherwise.  See "help provisional" and "help ratings".

Active / inactive ratings:
- Each rating is either active or inactive.  A player's blitz rating is
  active if that player has played 8 rated blitz games in the last 31 days.
  The requirement is also 8 games for bullet ratings to be active.
  For standard and wild games, the requirement is 6 games per month.
  For 5-minute and 1-minute, it's 8 games in one week.  For 15-minute it's 
  4 games in one week. For correspondence, 2 games in one year.
  The [need] number of a players finger tells how many games a player
  needs to become active in each rating.  Games in which you do not
  gain any points with a win do not count towards being active.
  People who are not active are not listed on the "best" list or counted
  in the "stat" command.  They also won't appear in "rank".

GM, IM etc.
- These are titles awarded by FIDE, the international chess federation.
  See "help titles".  

Interface or Client
- This is the program each player runs on his PC, displaying the chess board
  and so forth, and connecting to our central server.  See "help interfaces"

See also:  register, clocks, ratings, provisional, wild, titles, admins,
           helper, interfaces