Comments/Ratings for a Single Item

The Diagram does not support rules like "you can only do this once (or N times) per game" or "only after so many moves". Sometimes you can reformulate such rules as something a piece can do only once (if there only is a single piece of that type), and this can be achieved by having the piece type that can do it promote to one that cannot when 'it' is done.

I'm considering adding a rule that any Pawn or Scorpion may make a move and then immediately "promote" to a Pyramid (cannot move, cannot be moved, cannot be captured). This would only be allowed once per game for each player, presumably to block a sliding capture where otherwise the opponent would respond by capturing the Pawn (or Scorpion), leaving the player in the same pickle but minus the captured piece, or to create a handy near-edge environment for cornering a lone King, though there could be other reasons as well.

The main problem with it is that I'm not sure I could code this in the Interactive Diagram.

I did find the "source" button, that Jean-Louis recommended, so I think I'll be going that route, at least for this variant. It seems much simpler.

Thanks for the help, though, to you (H.G.) as well as Jean-Louis (and Bn Em as well).

Plus, with my vision, finding some of those typos are a pain in HTML mode.

You can search for the text you want to replace by typing Ctrl-F while the cursor is in the box that you want to edit. I admit it is a bit strange there is no button for that in the editor's tool bar.

WHen you edit your page, you have a toggle box with "Source" for every section. If you play with it for the sections where the ID is not, then nothing occur to the section where the ID is. Well, this is my own experience.

Otherwise, to prevent accident, I make a copy of the ID code in a txt file in order to use it back if necessary in case of corruption.

The next time I go to edit one of these (which I may soon do with Dealer's Chess), I'll look for that again. I tried to find tha sort of thing once before, to no avail.

But that copy of the ID code is similar to what I already do: copy and paste into an open WordPerfect document, then cut-and-paste back. It's also a tad easier to edit the ID that way (not much, but still easier).

Besides, switching to WYSIWYG for fixing simple typo's seems unnecessary. These can be fixed just as easily in the HTML source.

That's how I was able to fix the other typos and stuff. The "Shiek" typo I caught after my previous edit, and decided to wait until fixing the Satrap/Ayatollah thing, since that was a little more involved; opening the file to fix one typo didn't seem worth the trouble when I knew I'd be going in soon anyway for something bigger. That's not even considering Jean-Louis's very fine notes.

Plus, with my vision, finding some of those typos are a pain in HTML mode.

You can avoid that by making the Interactive Diagram the only thing in the setup section. Then there is never any need to switch that section to WYSIWYG.

Besides, switching to WYSIWYG for fixing simple typo's seems unnecessary. These can be fixed just as easily in the HTML source.

WHen you edit your page, you have a toggle box with "Source" for every section. If you play with it for the sections where the ID is not, then nothing occur to the section where the ID is. Well, this is my own experience.

Otherwise, to prevent accident, I make a copy of the ID code in a txt file in order to use it back if necessary in case of corruption.

Once an Interactive Diagram is posted, it's incredibly complicated to fix anything else. I got most of BnEm's notes done, but the Malik and Pawn things, along with the Satrap/Ayatollah mixup, are things that require preserving and removing the ID before switching the editor to WYSIWYG, then going back to HTML and pasting back in (with any edits to the ID done separately before resturning).

That's what had to wait until I had a bit more time, today.

Oh, and I had noticed the "Shiek" typo. I'll have to hunt down the other one.

• There are some dislexic errors: it should be Sheherazade and not Sheherezade; Sheik not Shiek.

• BnEm is right. King in Arabic is pronounced Malik. Less frequently, I had also seen Malek. Never Melek. However it is true that for semitic languages (such as Arabic, Hebrew,...) what is important are the consonants. They make the root MLK. The vowels are even not noted in current Arabic writing. But if you have no strong argument, I would write Malik.

• Yes, I had shortened Snaketongue to Snake for my Fantastic XIII game. I am the only guilty, Eric had kept the long form. The original name refers to the move pattern, but I prefered to use an animal's name instead of an organ.

• BnEm is right again. The word Pawn, Pion in French, derives from Latin Pedes. Sanskrit has not transmitted any word for the chess nomenclature of the pieces. Most of the nomenclature derives from Middle Persian, then Arabic. Piyada was the word in Middle Persian, also designating a foot soldier. The root is Indoeuropean as HG said. Latin, Persian (and Sanskrit) belong to that language tree. The Latin word does not derive from the Persian one because what has been transmitted to Christians was the Arabic word (Baidaq). Europeans named that piece a foot soldier by understanding what it was in the army (as they did for the King). It was natural to see a foot soldier in the front line of the chess army, whatever the language.

Re: Melek - That's the translation I was given.

Re: Emir, et al - Well, Scheherazade was where I borrowed those pieces from.

Re: Snake - Thanks for the info. I'll update that.

Re: Satrap - You're partially right; it's not an oversight, but a matter of confusion. As you say, it's next to nothing to switch their names.

Re: Spear - I need to update the move in this case. I meant it to be the "Pawnrider" you describe. I don't know why I did it the way it now appears. (Brain glitch, no doubt.)

Re: The word pawn - I'll also update that sentence to "its (eventual) origin."

Again, thanks for all the great notes!

fBfR occurs as Free Iron (the promoted form of the Iron General) in Maka Dai Dai Shogi.

Sanskrit also is an Indo-European language, so the word can probably be traced back to an even earlier common ancestor.

Just got a chance to read through this; some things I noticed:

Melek is Arabic for "king,"

Which dialect is that? I can only find مَلِك (malik) — or, perhaps closer, Hebrew מֶלֶךְ (melech)

[The Emir] is borrowed from Robert Shimmin's game Scheherezade

Afaict it looks like this piece, as well as most of the other Scheherazade [sic] ‘Queens’, was not actually named by Shimmin; H.G. needed names for the ID. Not really sure how best to cite such a thing though

I'm actually not sure where the Snake originated

Betza's Bent Riders article. The shortening to ‘Snake’ is due either to Jean‐Louis or to Eric Silverman, first attested on these pages here

The Satrap moves [as mFmAcWcD]

I assume it's an oversight that you've switched the capturing and non‐capturing moves — Gilman's Satrap operates in pawn/steward directions. Not a big deal ofc; you can trivially swap the Satrap's and Ayatollah's names

the earliest place where I can find [the Arabic/Arabian Spear] is in Hans Bodlander's game Pick-the-Team Chess

Note that in that game, the Arabic Spear is divergent in pawn directions (i.e. it's a mfRcfB or ‘Pawnrider’). The nondivergent piece you describe I remember only as the Princess of several Gilman games, but I'd be surprised if a piece w/ that move wasn't in the larger Shōgis too

As noted in the Piececlopedia, the word "pawn" has its origin in the Sanskrit word "padati"

Pedantically speaking, the word itself only goes back as far as Late Latin pedōnem (pedestrian or footsoldier), albeit as an indirect calque (in French) going back to the Sanskrit term

The emphasis on Camel leaps is certainly striking!

And with the Interactive Diagram posted on the page, I think this is ready for approval.

Cool! (Although that might not be the proper term for a desert. ;) ) I imagine a desert to be a little more yellowish, though. (But Desert Pub Chess probably overdoes that.)

Updated Interactive Diagram (now in desert colors!):

You don't have to test this with the AI switched on. You can just move a Pawn (or other promoting piece) to the promotion rank, to see what choice you get offered. You don't even have to use legal moves, or move the opponent.

Thanks for the tip! I tried this, and apparently got the coding right.

Note you can tweek the square colors of the ID for an aestethically pleasing main diagram through parameters like light/darkShade, firstRank, rimColor, coordColor, useMarkers=1, etc.

I know. That's next. :)

I'm not sure I got the promotions right, but I'm not good enough to play the game and get a Scorpion or Spear through to the back.

You don't have to test this with the AI switched on. You can just move a Pawn (or other promoting piece) to the promotion rank, to see what choice you get offered. You don't even have to use legal moves, or move the opponent. (But it is not possible to enter illegal captures, so the Pawn will have to eat its way through the enemy camp.)

Note you can tweek the square colors of the ID for an aestethically pleasing main diagram through parameters like light/darkShade, firstRank, rimColor, coordColor, useMarkers=1, etc.

I've adjusted the ID to allow promotions on the Scorpion and Spear, set the allowed promotions, replaced the Ostrich with the Mamluk, and made a few other changes.

I'm not sure I got the promotions right, but I'm not good enough to play the game and get a Scorpion or Spear through to the back. If someone could take care of that for me (either by playing it through or looking at the code and using one's own familiarity), I'd greatly appreciate it.

I plan to use this in lieu of static setup and move diagrams, so I'll copy it into the main article (and link the piece graphics) once I'm confident that that's the last thing to do.

Because of the camel moves this game makes me remember cavalier chess!

About that ID: I still need to add Scorpions to promotions, and figure out what the Spears can do upon reaching the far side.

Here (tentatively) is the Interactive Diagram for this variant, as it currently exists: