Ratings & Comments

The starting squares of the Scout and Cleric are not Brouhaha squares in the interactive diagram you included. They are not defined as holes, and consequently, when the piece leaves them, they become empty squares, which can be entered again.

Also, is it really the intention that the initial moves of Scout and Cleric can also capture?

There is a linefeed missing between King and Rook in the diagram definition.

To the editors. Now this article is ready for review.

To the editors. Now this article is ready for review.

To the editors. Now this article is ready for review.

The AI responds with knight to c6, ignoring the check.

OK, fixed. Thanks for spotting this. The problem was in the j prefix for indicating ski-slides. (The alternative definition gyafW did work without problems.) The Betza parser splits such a move into 2 legs, one to jump over the adjacent square, and a remaining normal slide. But it adapts the range of that slide by subtracting 1 (so that jR4 moves 2, 3 or 4 steps.) Infinite range is indicated by 0, however, and this was adapted to -1. Now the move generator of the AI (in contrast to that of the UI) did not interpret the -1 as an infinite slide, but as a slide up to half the board. I now changed the Betza parser such that it refrains from decrementing a range of 0.

Hello Greg, Any hope for the latest ChessV version this weekend? I hope to share it with my friends.

View. I just set white to orc, move black king to e6 and move wywern to h3 (as a setup), click play and move wywern to e3 to give check. The AI responds with knight to c6, ignoring the check.

1. Ke6 Yh3 2. Ye3 N'c6

I would like to request that the presets default2 and promotest for Suzumu Shogi be deleted, as they are excess presets and no known games for Suzumu Shogi have been found. (promotest was made to try and work around an internal bug in Game Courier, and default2 was made when I thought I would need to update the default preset for the game, only to find that it was safe to change the original).

Are you using the aliases as the piece IDs instead of the original piece IDs specified by the set file being used? If so, that will not work. You need to use the piece IDs originally specified by the set file, as the alias command only makes a visual change to the piece ID (it does not change the internal ID used in the code).

The Game-Code generator is not alias-aware. It just uses the piece IDs you specify in the diagram as piece labels. If you want to use aliases, it is up to you to edit the generated Game Code for adding the alias commands, and to decide whether you want to use the aliases or piece labels as piece ID in the Diagram.

I implemented some new parameters with the diagram for controlling its appearence:

• borders=0 can be used to suppress the black lines that separate the board squares. (Not recommended on uncheckered boards!)
• rimColor=#FFFFF can be used to specify a color for the rim around the board that holds the coordinates, where #FFFFFF (= white) is the default, but can be replaced by any valid HTML color spec.
• coordColor=#000000 can be used to specify the text color for the printed board coordinates, where #000000 (= black) is the default, but can be replaced by any valid HTML color spec.

I don't typically make it the primary diagram because different pages have different presentation styles (colors, etc) and I don't want them to all look the same.

I fully agree that the pages should keep their current character. But in many cases it should be possible to make an Interactive Diagram that looks exactly the same as the static diagrams they have now. These are often also based on piece themes like Alfaerie, Utrecht, etc. These can be used in the diagram too, and the square shades can be arbitrarily configured. This is what I usually do when I post diagrams in the comments. E.g. the three diagrams I posted below for Courier, Shatranj, and Makruk all use Utrecht, and the same piece representations as the original images in those articles, (even though I consider the use of a Queen symbol for the General in Courier rather dubious), and the latter two use an uncheckered, white board, while Courier uses the 'CVP orange' for the dark squares.

Of course in cases where the original setup 'image' consists of ascii art, it becomes a bit questionable whether it deserves to be preserved.

A more important concern is that we want the pages to be presentable (even if not fully functional) for people that have switched JavaScript off. To achieve that for my own articles (e.g. the recently submited Pink Chess), I use the following method: After I created the Interactive Diagram, I take screenshot of it, and upload that as 'membergraphics' for the article. I then include that image in the article within <noscript> tags, so that it would only be shown when JavaScript is off. To prevent the user gets to see the unprocessed definition of the Interactive Diagram, I give the <div> tag that contains this definition a style="display:none". The Diagram script will change this style so the section gets visible for each definition it processes.

Are you using the aliases as the piece IDs instead of the original piece IDs specified by the set file being used? If so, that will not work. You need to use the piece IDs originally specified by the set file, as the alias command only makes a visual change to the piece ID (it does not change the internal ID used in the code).

I still hope we can implement a solution that allows members to do this without any editorial help. It shouldn't be that difficult to have a 'custom' option in the piece-set selector of Game Courier, and a text entry where the user can specify the directory where he uploaded the images.

Fergus did add the ability to customize the graphics used, described here.  It's a little complicated, but I used it when making the preset for Royal Court rather than making a new piece set.

... I think the site would also benefit from a more organized presentation of the available piece sets.

This is definitely needed.  I have a spreadsheet I made to help me track some of some of the set groups.  You can download it here.  But something more comprehensive is in order.

Also, I would like to know how to group sets together...

Each piece set is defined in a php file.  The format of that file is described here.  The file /play/pbm/sets.php contains the list of all piece sets, and to which group they belong (if any, otherwise defaults to "unique").  The ability to put multiple piece sets into a group is an important feature, allowing each player to choose which set to use.  (e.g., I can use abstract style pieces even if my opponent wants more standard-looking pieces.)

First, I generally think that these interactive diagrams should be promoted from comments into the articles themselves, unless they are somewhat experimental and would require frequent editing by someone other than the author or an editor.

Well, I only have access to articles I authored, and there the diagrams are indeed in the articles, as the main diagram for showing the setup. Some other members have included diagrams in their own articles, usually as a secondary diagram. Greg has used his power as an editor to add diagrams to some of the 'founding articles'.

Since I have no access to other people's articles, I always posted diagrams in the comments section for variants that I thought deserved one. I usually tried to stick to the 'theme' of the main diagram in those articles (coloring of the board, piece images). Any editor can copy the diagrams to the main article, as far as I am concerned. (In some cases I accompanied the diagram in the comment with an explanation on the features of the diagram script that I had to add to make it possible to do that variant; I would appreciate it if these comments could stay, or perhaps be moved to the comments on the Interactive diagram itself.)

Having the diagram in a comment does have an upside, though: when accessed from the index page I made, I always linked to the page you get when using the 'View' link to view the comment in isolation. Which means they immediately get the diagram in view. A link to the main article might have the diagram hidden somewhere at the bottom, after many other diagrams for showing setup and piece moves.

I don't think any of the diagrams needs any maintenance. They all link to the same JavaScript file, and most maintenance is done there.

Even if it would be a special index page, someone would have to maintain it, I suppose. I don't see how this could be automated. Any author could at any time decide to add a diagram to an article of his, and how would we know? If the index page formally is an article of mine, at least I can update it myself for diagrams I create. Editors can update it anyway.

BTW, I did some more thinking on the 'computer resources'  section of the home pages. Wouldn't it be better to split the graphics stuff from that, to put it in a separate section?

It's great to see some of these old resources preserved! Great work on tracking it down and digitizing it, and thanks to Joseph for providing the text!

But, are we allowed to post this here? Do we have the appropriate permissions?

Thanks for all this!

First, I generally think that these interactive diagrams should be promoted from comments into the articles themselves, unless they are somewhat experimental and would require frequent editing by someone other than the author or an editor.

The list of these can still exist and linked to as "play"ables. But it may work to turn it into an index, rather than you maintaining it. That may work out best with some other structural change though (adding a field to the member submissions e.g.), so I won't push for this in the very near-term.

I'll try to add links to the other resources in appropriate places; thanks for all the thought about where they best fit.

H. G. Muller wrote on 2021-05-02 UTC
I still hope we can implement a solution that allows members to do this without any editorial help. It shouldn't be that difficult to have a 'custom' option in the piece-set selector of Game Courier, and a text entry where the user can specify the directory where he uploaded the images.

I'm not an expert on Game Courier, but I want to make sure this doesn't get lost in the comments. I agree this would be nice. I can have a look into it if Fergus or Greg don't have time in the near future.

... I think the site would also benefit from a more organized presentation of the available piece sets. There are may sets now that are hidden in membergraphics directories, which people who could benefit from them would never find.

I agree. I do think that some editorial review should happen though. Perhaps a new page type should be added, the graphics home extended to query those page types, and Courier set to look for either the traditional folder or membergraphics folders attached to pages of that type.

Adam DeWitt wrote on 2021-05-02 UTC
I am inclined to agree. Also, I would like to know how to group sets together...

I don't know anything about this right now, but wanted to quote it so that it's on the top of my (our) mind(s) as we work this out.

Oops, I wrote the Q in the move field, instead of the id field, where I had intended it. Thanks for spotting this!

you cannot chase away werewolf with weaker piece, opponent can just defend and keep the werewolf

Well, if you chase it away with a Pawn, the opponent would lose the piece he defends with for a Pawn, even though he keeps his Werewolf. So it is not that easy. But it indeed upsets the usual assumptions on tactics; there is no penalty on using the most valuable piece first.