Concepts

Listings

A listing is an item on the shelf. It is one of two kinds:

Every listing stands for a time: house.listing.default-duration (2d) unless the seller names one, at most maximum-duration (7d). Its category is decided once, when it is written.

Orders

A buy order is the other side: a player names an item, an amount and a price, and the house holds their money until a listing fills it. A new listing at or below an order's price sells into the best paying order at once.

Watches

A watch is a player waiting for an item. When it is listed, the watchers are told.

The mailbox

Everything the house owes a player waits in their mailbox until they take it: an unsold item, an outbid refund, the money of a sale that could not be paid straight, an item bought while away. Nothing is ever put into hands that are not there.

Ids

Listings, orders, mailbox rows and log lines each have an id. The windows write them into the commands they run, so a player rarely types one; an operator reads them in /uxmauction lookup and the log.

Money is never converted

Every price, bid, fee and refund of a listing stays in the currency it was listed in. The house has no exchange rate and never invents one. A shown price is rounded up, never down.

A closed house

/uxmauction lock closes the house on every server: every window still opens and nothing moves. No listing is created, bought, cancelled or expired while it is closed.

flowchart LR
  S[Seller lists] --> L[Listing on the shelf]
  L -->|buyer pays| B[Buyer gets the item]
  L -->|order matches| O[Order filled]
  L -->|time runs out| M[Item to the seller's mailbox]
  B --> P[Seller paid, or money to the mailbox]
  O --> P

Related: Your first sale, Selling