Talk:Oyster card/Archive 1

message: According to Transport for London, you are not obliged to provide your real identity when applying for an Oyster Card, however the station officers are not obliged to accept an application that is blatently bogus. If you apply for a card with a false name and address, you are unlikely to be able to recover your funds or season ticket in the event that it is stolen. --Salimfadhley 23:29, 19 Sep 2004 (UTC)
thread_title: Registration

message: I don't understand the statement Pre Pay is not planned to be launched on the rest of London's Rail network, mainly because of the difference in pricing structure between train operators. If that is the reason, it is a real criticism of the Oyster technology; after all the similar Octopus Card in Hong Kong has been around for a lot longer and supports all sorts of different pricing structures by different operators, ranging from buses to soft drink vending machines. --  User:chris_j_wood 15:56, 14 Dec 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: I doubt it has anything to do with the technology whatsoever. More likely cost and corporate politics. I mean, the article presents a card which is pretty sophisticated. --kingboyk 13:36, 25 January 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: National Rail

message: I don't think it says anywhere in the article where the name comes from. Does it have anything to do with an oyster? <KF> 20:19, Feb 16, 2005 (UTC)
:I have been led to believe it comes from the phrase "The world is your oyster" KrisW6 04:22, 1 August 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Perhaps also a sideways acknowledgement of the earlier Octopus card in Hong Kong, which was the first really successful city-wide smart card ticketing system. -- Chris j wood 12:21, 28 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I was sure it had to do that the Oyster card itself is a "container" for tickets - since it can hold both pre-pay money and a travelcard at the same time. --PkerUNO 02:38, 7 June 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Why "[[Oyster]]"? 

message: I've reverted the description as it was slightly misleading. The system is set up so for example if you made one short tube journey and then got the bus for the rest of the day, capping would convert to a bus pass and charge for the single journey instead of a travelcard. If you use the tube once before 9:30 (i.e in the peak) and several times after 9:30 (off-peak) the capping might be to a single journey + off peak travelcard instead of a peak travelcard (as it works out cheaper). In effect you pay for the cheapest combination of tickets. This complexity is deliberately hidden in publicity to make the system easier to understand by users MRSC 10:14, 10 Jun 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: That's fair enough. The problem I have with the current wording is that on the Oyster statement and the readout on the barriers, the conversion doesn't exist. Instead, journeys suddenly cost £0.00. The article should mention this. --Dtcdthingy 10:40, 10 Jun 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: Capping

message: Well you deleted the 'relay exploit' section which I think was relevant. Anyway Oyster is a "Proximity card" not a "contactless smartcard." The range is also not 10cm - the range is determined by the power of the reader (ticket gate or pay station) which as you read in the link has been tested to 50m with the standard phillips kit.
: There certainly needs a section on either privacy (other than that specific to tfl), fraud (stealing from someone else's card), or plain hacking (turning your own card into someone else's - adding prepay).
:also some discussion about the Jan 2006 fare structures. As a zone 1 resident & commuter it's cheaper for me to use prepay than the zone 1-2 monthly (no zone 1 monthly is available now). The paper (3UKP) vs oyster (1.5GBP) is a good point & I have also been stung by this one (paystation out of order).
:The 'negative balance' issue - I have had a zone 1 monthly blocked by a 40p debit (Not £1). My belief is that negative balances of any values are disallowed. Which is different to the Hong Kong MTR as you know.
Incidentally, where did the figure of 10cm range arise from? Any reader that I've experienced is much less sensitive than that. I tried my home one at Beckton Park this morning by gradually bringing the flat card nearer, and I reckon it tripped at about 15mm. The ones at the end of the journey are even less sensitive at Old Street - requiring not just a tap, but momentarily holding the card flat against the pad. I note that many people don't get this, and frantically rub the card against it, which probably confuses it further. Ian Tindale 16:55, 1 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Technical details 

message: I can't help but feel that one of the external links (http://www.softwarereality.com/design/OysterGotcha.jsp) is not neutral.
It criticises pretty much everything, starting with the name and compares eating oysters to "licking snot off a tortoise shell" which I can't help but think has nothing whatsoever to do with the subject, and is in pretty poor taste. The first blog the site links to (http://www.electricdeath.com/blog/786) continues this in an even worse manner.
"The Oyster Gotcha" and the blogs it quotes do raise some valid and perhaps valuable criticisms on both the system and the service provided, but unfortunately the style borders on, and sometimes crosses into, verbal abuse.
Seeing as most of the good points raised on those sites have already been covered in the wikipedia article, I feel that the link is superfluous anyway, and recommend its removal.
:I can't help but agree - the points put forward are based on little factual information and for an article that calls itself an analysis, calling the Oyster readers "magnetic detector things" is inexcusable. There are good pages on the shortcomings of the Oyster system, but this isn't one of them. --PkerUNO 03:32, 7 June 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Agreed. Ray 20:04, 7 June 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  External Links 

message: States that you have to incur a minimum debt of £1.00 for travelcard to be invalidated; not true. £0.50pence was enough to prevent me from exiting barriers with a £30 travelcard stored on the card, all because of fault through LU. Don't know how much dedt you can incur, but I know they go potty over £0.50, and literally 'steal' your invested money in the system to use on TfL network, especially when its them who don't have a sufficient refund policy system. Complexity on this system is a joke and will continue to be so until compatibility issues with London network carriers devise a compromise. Sun 14 January 2007; 22:00hrs (GMT) - User: anonymous —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 85.210.15.35 (talk) 21:58, 14 January 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Design

message: It's not made clear either here or on the article MIFARE exactly which type of MIFARE card is used in Oyster; Standard, T=CL or DESFire. (MIFARE seems to imply DESFire but it's worded oddly so I'm not sure.) Anyone know?
:The dates also suggest this (2002 - DESFire > 2003 - Oyster). --anskas 17:59, 19 July 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: On the other hand, this site claims that oyster uses MIFARE standard chips. --anskas 22:32, 19 July 2006 (UTC)

text: This site confirms this.  I will edit the page accordingly. --anskas 22:34, 19 July 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Type of Mifare card?

message: Mifare classis has been hacked and it is possible to exploit the system.. not easy but we will get there
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MIFARE   
However back office check can still be performed...  
can be bothered to update the page so somebody else do it  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.15.17.223 (talk) 23:37, 27 January 2008 (UTC)
thread_title: Securiy Issues

message: Any chance of a pic of the Oyster reader and perhaps an Oyster card actually being used on a reader? Ian Tindale 14:27, 29 November 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Photos and pics

message: The article says that the user gets charged a £4 or £5 fare if they forget to swipe out. It also says that the maximum charge for a day is calculated so as not to exceed the price of a Travelcard. What I'm wondering, and the article should make clear, is if the second point applies when the user forgets to swipe out? Let's say they do that twice in a day, the penalty fare *2 is likely to be more than the price of a Travelcard. How much do they pay? --kingboyk 13:47, 25 January 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: As far as I understand it, the penalty fare applies to each "unresolved journey" but there may be a cap on that. It's independent of the calculation for travelcards, which is based only on "legitimate" fares. I'm not going to change the article though, because I'd like to see the info referenced from the official terms & conditions, which I don't have to hand. – Kieran T (talk) 18:19, 25 January 2007 (UTC)

text: On the 27th December 2007 my wife managed to get through a barrier without the card registering properly.  The ticket office said that "unresolved journey" fares (then £4) are not included in the cap.  They refunded £2.50 but that still leaves my wife £1.50 out of pocket if she hits the cap that day.  Since the word of one man in a ticket office is hardly official policy I'm not going to change the article either. 22:21 24 January 2008 (UTC)
I got a "seek asistance message" when I checked in and an assistant opened the gate for me. When I arrived at the destinantion and checked out, I got charged £4. When I noticed this, nobody was willing to help. Oyster is fraud to the customer! There must be thousands of people every day who make the same experience.  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 81.158.55.18 (talk) 23:13, 9 February 2008 (UTC)
thread_title: Charges when user forgets to swipe out

message: Would it be possible for anyone who knows about the subject to write about the technical architecture?  
To write about the technical architecture openly would potentially open the system up to fraud or hacking.  It is safe to say that the technical architecture is fully documented in painstaking detail and designed to be extremely resilient and robust.  Techniques such as Finite State Machine were used during design to ensure safety and reliability and no loss or corruption of data.  As noted in the failures section,  the only failues that have occurred have resulted from incorrect configuration data.
What intelligence is there in a station gate line?  
The gate line is frequently updated with information about Oystercards than need to be disabled for what ever reason.
What further machinery acts as a comms concentrator in a station?  
There is a station computer.
What communications network is used?  
The network is IP based.
Where is the central database?  
On a large mainframe.
What software is it made out of?  
Various programming languages were used.  Within the closed system there are over 30 different systems of varying ages and technologies.
Who built it?  
CUBIC, Fujitsu Retail (although completed by CUBIC) Fujitsu Enterprise Systems (although completed by CUBIC), 
How long did it take?  
Started 17 August 1998, planned to finish on the milestone date called NSLD "New Service Live Date" 4 years later.  There were multiple milestones in the programme plan.  Delays by LT caused delays in the go live date.
How do non-networked validators, eg on buses, work?  
The same way as networked validators.  They have the same electronics and sofware, just the downstream/upstream data occurs only when the device is docked.
The article as it stands describes the user experience well, but is very thin on the guts of this system.  In my opinion it's very reliable and I'd be interested to learn how that was achieved.  David Colver 20:29, 2 February 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Architecture

message: Regarding maximum cash fares, they still apply even if you have reached the daily price cap. You must still touch in and out at Oyster readers. I have edited the article to reflect this - SteveMcSherry 22:58, 6 May 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Maximum Cash Fares

message: —Preceding unsigned comment added by 82.45.191.224 (talk) 16:59, 12 July 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: If you find a reliable source detailing this, feel free to add it to the article. It should be easy - I remember reading about that bug myself. :) DanielC/T+ 10:50, 13 May 2007 (UTC)

text: This page describes a related bug, namely that Oyster allows a maximum time of two hours between touch-in and touch-out, even though there are valid journeys within the system which take longer than this (Upminster to Heathrow was the example given). An attempt to touch-out after two hours will be counted as a new touch-in, incurring two maximum fares (one for each touch-in). 217.155.20.163 17:22, 27 May 2007 (UTC)

text: This is not a bug but part of system design. Oyster journeys are required to be completed within two hours of start; otherwise they count as two separate journeys. There are no journeys on the system that should routinely take more than two hours although there are some possibilities for exceeding this time when there are train delays or disruptions. The system charges the minimum fare from the station for entering and exiting from the same station within a 30 minute period. After that it is counted as two incomplete journeys and two max fares apply. All of this is done to prevent opportunities for fraud.  —Preceding unsigned comment added by Shashi verma (talk • contribs) 09:46, 1 February 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Hmm... I put Uxbridge to Heathrow Airport Central into the TFL journey planner, and the time is 1h58 (I had to disable travel by rail, since I didn't want to pay for the Heathrow Express).  With luggage that could easily take an additional two minutes.  I've been charged for entering and leaving a station (after the last train had departed).  ƕ (talk) 19:23, 19 February 2008 (UTC)

text: Your experiences are original research, and therefore cannot be used. Find an authorative source that states that the situation you experiences is a) possible, and/or b) common. Nick Cooper (talk) 13:02, 20 April 2017 (UTC)
thread_title: A Bug in the System?

message: I've done some general cleaning up and have changed the positioning of the photos so they are all together. SteveMcSherry 23:06, 6 May 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  More tweaks... 

message: In the article it says "When using the DLR at Bank using PAYG you must touch the reader by the DLR platform even if you are changing to/from the London Underground."
However the following suggests that this is not correct:
http://groups.google.co.uk/group/uk.transport.london/tree/browse_frm/thread/976d45b2501da5f5/9eee351c6433c4e8?hl=en&rnum=11&q=touch+oyster+bank+underground&_done=%2Fgroup%2Fuk.transport.london%2Fbrowse_frm%2Fthread%2F976d45b2501da5f5%2Fbfeb7392e051d332%3Fhl%3Den%26lnk%3Dst%26q%3Dtouch%2Boyster%2Bbank%2Bunderground%26#doc_cbaa5400aea958f6
However this is contradicted by a letter in last night's
thelondonpaper:
http://www.thelondonpaper.com/cs/Satellite/london/talk?packedargs=cat...
"No need to touch out twice with Oyster
"In response to Melvyn Windebank's letter (24 November), the new
rules for Oyster cards have been implemented to benefit honest
passengers and cut down on fraud. There is no need for a passenger to
touch in and out when transferring from DLR to Tube at Bank station.
"The Oyster card can calculate the correct fare when you touch out with
the card after completing your Tube journey. The only circumstance
where a customer needs to touch in at the validators at Bank when
transferring from the Tube to DLR is when the customer has a Zone 1-2
travelcard but intends to terminate his journey outside Zone 2.
"Shashi Verma,
Transport for london" 
(The link in the usenet posting doesn't give this letter any more - I guess the letter must have been 1st Dec 2006 but I don't know how/whether this can be accessed via www.thelondonpaper.com)
199.172.169.32 16:19, 5 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: The official TfL site says: "If you are joining DLR at Bank and are planning to use pay as you go to travel outside of your Travelcard zones, you must touch your Oyster card on the reader on the DLR concourse to ensure you have a valid ticket to travel on DLR." Geoking66talk 08:24, 28 December 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Touching at Bank during interchange

message: According to the article, a person travelling from Cambridge Heath to Liverpool Street using a zone 2-3 travelcard and Oyster PAYG would be charged a penalty fare, even though Oyster PAYG was technically valid.  This, I believe, is incorrect.  This route is currently not available on Oyster PAYG- a person could only use an Oyster card on this route if they held a travelcard covering zones 1 and 2.  The travelcard must cover the entire journey. Jenks1987 (talk) 00:48, 16 January 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: I've changed the example to Forest Gate. Stratford to Liverpool Street on "one" is covered by PAYG so it's a legitimate extension. (I did consider the larger Ilford but there are readers there, albeit only for checking travelcard validity, and I think the example would get over complicated.) Timrollpickering (talk) 01:01, 16 January 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: I agree that the new example is a legitimate use of Oyster PAYG.  For a user to be charged the correct fare, they would have to get off at Stratford, touch in with their Oyster card and then continue their journey to Liverpool.  I have edited the article to reflect this. Jenks1987 (talk) 11:19, 16 January 2008 (UTC)
thread_title: Example journey from Cambridge Heath to Liverpool Street

message: Is it worth mentioning under the techie bit that Oyster is based on JavaCard and Java technologies throughout?? James Gosling from Sun just mentioned it in a keynote at the Mobile and Embedded Developer Days Conference... I certainly didn't know it before, so if anyone knows of any references to this, that would be interesting to throw in perhaps. 17:13, 23 January 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Oyster is based on Java technology 

message: How revelant is this, given that it explicityly states that the sytsem technology mentioned is not used in Oyster? Nick Cooper (talk) 12:44, 24 January 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  "Attacked other systems" section 

message: If anyone can figure out a better way of revealing the chip and the aerial, please message me... Spent ages chiselling away at the thing!  Maybe sticking it the oven at a low heat?!  --Tomhannen (talk) 23:41, 28 January 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Added photo showing the chip inside the card 

message: There are two pictures of underground trains, both with a caption explaining that Oyster is valid on all underground trains. There also seems to be a whole column of pictures of trains, buses, etc, with each caption explaining that the Oyster is valid on them. This is obviously decoration rather than illustration - a picture of a bendy bus from the outside does not illustrate the fact that there are Oyster readers inside. What's more, we have a picture of the three types of Oyster card, and then a separate picture which again includes each type of card, but also the respective holders for each one. The latter would be sufficient. --194.203.201.92 (talk) 11:51, 29 January 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: A good point, whoever you are, 194.203.201.92. Images are supposed to support the content of an article and not just decorate it. I've made some effort at re-arranging images into more relevant places which should help. The article could benefit from more photos specific to the subject matter, rather than just GVs of a random bus or whatever. Contributors might also consider using the gallery function rather than littering the article with images. Cnbrb (talk) 17:29, 10 August 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Far too many photos 

message: The article mentions that there is essentially no difference between a paper travelcard and of one loaded onto an oyster. Aren't day travelcards cheaper with an oyster?  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.142.245.224 (talk) 03:24, 30 March 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Day travelcards aren't available on Oyster; however, the daily price capping scheme ensures that Oyster PAYG users pay no more than 50p less than the equivalent day travelcard they would require to cover all the journeys they make in one day. Jenks1987 (talk) 08:52, 5 May 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Paper Travelcard costs more than Oyster Travelcard?