The mechanics of a poker game were defined over a century ago. In our home game the same mentality prevails. We manually shuffle and deal the cards. Then, hopefully, we know when to hold ‘em and know when to fold ‘em. In the Absolute Poker situation, we also need to know when to walk away and when to run.
In home games, disputes can be sticky situations because there is little or no security. In the casino, there is a far more structured and secure situation with the ‘eye in the sky’ and poker room management oversight. Online rooms can and must go far beyond casino security because of the electronic media. Not only is this a requirement but it is relatively easy to make happen. Computers are very smart and very dumb. It is the responsibility of the program developers to include this security in a way that is flexible and complete. The problem is computers do rote jobs very well while humans are flexible in their thinking and can overcome the rote aspect.
As players, we tend to think about poker without the extraneous security. Our ideal is a fair shuffle and display of the cards. Most of the time we can and do ignore the nitty-gritty unless it beats us over the head.
Security is paramount here. And more work goes into the security aspect than in the game itself. I could write a poker program to display random hands in an hour or two. In a similar time I could write a program that establishes a rules based system to determine a winner. There has even been a release of an actual, workable, online poker program that does all this to the public domain. This was done by ‘Dutch’ Boyd and friends.
When you start handling money, it can get involved. You expect your bank to maintain your deposits in a prudent manner. You would be more than disturbed if a fire at their site eliminated all your funds. So banks and others with a fiduciary responsibility must go beyond our home game mentality that is our default way of thinking. It is only at times like the Absolute fiasco that we are faced with the reality of what can happen that we have ignored because we have no control of it and only have to think about it when it intrudes into our lives.
Programming and programmers try to conform to a set of guidelines called