Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Chess/Archive 13

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This is an archive of past discussions on Wikipedia:WikiProject Chess. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.

Archive 10

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On the Topic of Uploading Biographical Images

Hello Wiki chess members!

User Voorlandt has raised a very important question on a topic that I know next to nothing about: image licensing. Recently, I have uploaded a number of biographical images for chess players that I have found on various websites. Being ignorant, I just released them under "GNU Free Documentation License", and didn't give it another thought. However, as Voorladt pointed out, an admin reserves the right to delete these pictures on command, because they do NOT fall under the GNU Free Documentation License category. Seeing as myself and Voorlandt, are not experts "on what is best to do with pictures found on random websites", I have brought this to the attention of the WikiProject chess smarter-people. Please check out any of these articles: Andrei Kharlov, Igor Khenkin, Gilberto Milos, Friso Nijboer, Angus Dunnington, and Ricardo Calvo; as all of them have an image I have uploaded 'illegally'. What should be done about these pictures? - should they be deleted, or is there a license that includes "pictures for random websites"? Additionally, in the future, what steps should be taken to properly upload an image from somewhere else, and under what license? Thanks for your taking time to adress this concern, regards, αЯβιτЯαЯιŁΨθ ^(talk) 22:19, 1 September 2008 (UTC)

Sadly, this is one of the most frustrating things about Wikipedia. Other websites borrow biographical images without a thought, on the premise that they will remove them if a copyright holder appears and objects. Wikipedia on the other hand, for legal reasons, takes a very hard line on images, so if there is no waiving of copyright expressly granted at the site in question, then the picture cannot normally be used. This is only a very rough guide ( - it would take too long to cover all the tangents), but there are 2 main exceptions to this rule;

Very old images (life of the author plus 70 years) are copyright expired. See Joseph Henry Blackburne for examples. Image one gives the lifetime plus 70 yrs license, whereas image two uses a 100 yrs license, which I think is more widely accepted under copyright expiry law in a range of countries.

Fair use images (normally images of deceased persons). Provided there are no freely available (copyright free) images already in circulation (you should conduct a reasonable search yourself), then the use of copyrighted images that portray just that deceased person, may be permissible. There are some other criteria too, but they don't usually represent an obstacle. Click on the photo of Erwin Voellmy to see an image I uploaded with it's necessary 'fair use rationale' and (non-) license acknowledgement. You will see that the full list of criteria covered in this rationale forms a good checklist. You can take a copy of this template and adjust it in your sandbox to fit a specific deceased subject, but be sure you satisfy the main points. Also, don't overdo it. For all but world champions, a couple of images should be enough.

Other than this, for more contemporary subjects, we mostly rely on heroes like User:Stefan64 to post images in Wiki Commons, or to be proactive, you could travel to some tournaments and take your own - I recommend the Dresden Olympiad later this year, where just about everyone in attendance can be regarded as a photo opportunity! Regarding the images that you have already posted, you can just leave them and sooner or later, an admin or bot will ask you to justify them prior to deletion within a few days. Regards, Brittle heaven (talk) 23:10, 1 September 2008 (UTC)

Wow thanks, that helps a lot. However, what about images for living people? Take Andrei Kharlov for example. Unfortunately for Wikipedia, he's still perfectly alive. The picture for his article here does not qualify as "very old" nor for "fair use". How then can images like these be used on Wikipedia (can they?}. Voorlandt mentioned contacting the photographer for use of their image. What are Wikipedia's policies on that? Thanks again, regards, αЯβιτЯαЯιŁΨθ ^(talk) 01:02, 2 September 2008 (UTC)

Broadly speaking - no, they can't be used. For living people, the range of options are principally, 1) wait for Wiki Commons to get the image you need 2) take the picture yourself 3) write articles about people who already have images available in Wiki Commons 4) search the website Flickr for an image of your chosen subject and hope that the Creative Commons license is the correct sub-type for share-alike use (incidentally there are procedures and tools to help you do this - see under "Greetings" on Voorlandt's Talk Page for an explanation) or 5) obtain permission from the author of the image. I can't give you many details of 4 & 5, because I havn't tried them myself - it's best to stick to 1 - 3, or it all gets very confusing; for instance, with Flickr, as well as checking the license is okay, you have to wait for an admin to check that the license applied when you say it applied. In other words, there needs to be a 'permission audit trail'. I imagine the same would apply to individual permission from a photographer, but if it's in an email, how would you post that for checking? It's all a bit of a minefield, but if you have the time, there's lots of info out there e.g. WP:FU and WP:Copyrights. There's even a helpdesk - WP:Media copyright questions where you can ask questions of the experts. Brittle heaven (talk) 02:30, 2 September 2008 (UTC)

I wrote the article on Napoleon Marache, a mid-19th-century American player (died 1875). I would like to add the picture of him that is here. I don't know who did the picture, or when, but it's been 133 years since he died so I think it's a reasonable assumption that it's in the public domain by now. (I haven't written to chessgames about it, but based on my experience with them I would not hold my breath about getting a response if one did so. A number of months ago, I did e-mail another site that had the same picture, asking for permission to use it, and never got a response.) I'm pretty technically challenged, so is someone willing to upload the picture and do whatever else one has to do to use it in the article? Thanks! Krakatoa (talk) 07:23, 2 September 2008 (UTC)

Done. I have a long list of 'fair-use' images awaiting some upload action, but those 'public domain' ones are relatively quick and easy. Brittle heaven (talk) 09:20, 2 September 2008 (UTC)

Incidentally, someone has flipped his death date (11/5 <---> 5/11) - i.e. Bidmonfa/Chessgames give May 11, whereas you (Gaige?) say November 5. I've personally got no idea who is correct. Brittle heaven (talk) 11:21, 2 September 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for taking care of that. On the birthdate, whoever flipped it is right. Gaige gives "11-05-1875". Since Gaige is an American, I had assumed that meant November 5. But reading the introduction, I find, surprisingly, that he expresses dates the non-U.S./logical way: "day-month-year". I suppose that other dates in the book like "31-05-1841" should've tipped me off sooner . . . . Krakatoa (talk) 16:08, 2 September 2008 (UTC)

should this article be deleted?

Should Jamie Olsen-Mills be deleted? Not that notable, in my opinion. A little gushing. And much of the editing has been done by one anon user that edits only this article. Bubba73 (talk), 02:47, 2 September 2008 (UTC)

I agree, not notable except in the sense of 'potential', which is not enough, frankly. We've always stated that outstanding junior achievement makes up for the absence of a title, but this is not that outstanding.

Agreed. Strong Delete. I've opined in the past that benchmark normally should be GM, WGM or national senior mens or womens champion. Olsen-Mills - #81 girl in the US at age 17 - doesn't come close. Also I note that the page creator only has two edits to his/her name,[1] and their other edit - Janice Chen - should probably be deleted too. At least the chess content. The magazine editor might be a different person. Peter Ballard (talk) 04:15, 2 September 2008 (UTC)

Another one that troubled me recently was Marius Ceteras ... what do we make of this one? FIDE master, some problem with his 3rd IM norm, a chess writer but mainly for 'Correspondence News', a coach, but no famous clients or big reputation ... again, does it merit being kept? Brittle heaven (talk) 03:26, 2 September 2008 (UTC)

This one has more merit. Though he's not a GM I'd be inclined to give the benefit of the doubt, EXCEPT... the page editor only has one edit to their name,[2] and I strongly suspect WP:Autobiography. Peter Ballard (talk) 04:15, 2 September 2008 (UTC)

I put Jamie Olsen-Mills on AfD. Janice Chen should be there too, but it is after my bedtime. Bubba73 (talk), 04:44, 2 September 2008 (UTC)

Janice Chen emphatically should be deleted, for essentially the same reasons as Jamie Olsen-Mills. Marius Ceteras is certainly closer to notability than either of them, but I don't think a 35-year-old FIDE Master is notable. I would put him in the same category as Charles Weldon and the young guy (the name escapes me) with a high correspondence chess rating who had a couple of his correspondence games listed among Chess Informant's best games, both of whom we deleted with little or no dissent. And yes, it looks very much like WP:Autobiography. Krakatoa (talk) 07:00, 2 September 2008 (UTC)

Janice Chen is not a simple delete, because the article was originally created about a magazine editor called Janice Chen, and then another editor deleted that and put in information about an entirely different person, Janice Chen the chess player. (What I call Stealing the namespace). So I've reverted back to Janice Chen the magazine editor. Peter Ballard (talk) 07:36, 2 September 2008 (UTC)

I have PRODed Marius Ceteras. Yes I like being bold, and yes I am a deletionist Feel free to remove the PROD if you wish to do so, and then we get to the AfD. SyG (talk) 19:41, 2 September 2008 (UTC)

Removed, as I feel it's borderline and an AFD discussion would be more appropriate. --Pawnkingthree (talk) 22:30, 3 September 2008 (UTC)

All right, I have launched the AfD. SyG (talk) 07:28, 6 September 2008 (UTC)

Napoleon Marache

Anyone want to take a look at re-rating Napoleon Marache? I've added a lead and tidied up a few things. Thanks to Brittle heaven, it has an image now, too. I think it may merit B-class now. Krakatoa (talk) 17:37, 2 September 2008 (UTC)

Mmm there may be a misunderstanding, I had a "bullet look" at the article and there is not really a Lead as all the text is in one single section (probably you mean the first paragraph ?). In my opinion that would fails criterium 3 for B-class: "the article has a defined structure". No big dead to add a few titles here and there, though. SyG (talk) 19:47, 2 September 2008 (UTC)

Pick, pick, pick! :-) OK, I added a few titles. If you want, I can split "Early years; writing" in two, but then the "Early years" part would just be one very short paragraph. Anyway, see how it looks now. Thanks. Krakatoa (talk) 20:52, 2 September 2008 (UTC)

I had a closer look now (a "blitz look") and I raised it to B-class. I left my review on the Talk page. Well done once again! SyG (talk) 19:13, 3 September 2008 (UTC)

Thanks! Glad you liked it. Krakatoa (talk) 21:15, 3 September 2008 (UTC)

four knights can checkmate

Checkmate says that four knights can checkmate without help from their king. It has been in there a long time. I'm sure it is true, but I can't find a reference. (I got a reference for K+3N vs. K, but I couldn't find one for 4N vs. K.)

Does anyone know of a reference? Otherwise, I'm considering taking the statement out. Bubba73 (talk), 01:11, 4 September 2008 (UTC)

It is true, I have read it somewhere, and I once personally demonstrated it in a tournament game (with six knights, actually, in a game that my opponent refused to resign). But so far I can't find where I read this. I thought it was BCE, but that seems to talk only about K+3N v. K. It's very frustrating trying to find this. The point has absolutely no practical significance (it's highly doubtful that K+3N has any practical significance, and this is even further out there), so almost no one talks about this. Krakatoa (talk) 06:49, 4 September 2008 (UTC)

K+3N has occurred in a few games, IIRC. There is also a particular stalemate position that is used in compositions (Ke3/Nf2/Nf3/Nf4 v Kg3). Interestingly, K+4N wins against K+Q. Guido den Broeder (talk, visit) 07:56, 4 September 2008 (UTC)

I know it is true about four knights, but there isn't a reference and secondly I'm not sure how important it is, since you always have a king too. I found a reference for K+3N vs. K in the old edition of BCE (but it isn't in the new one). Bubba73 (talk), 17:19, 4 September 2008 (UTC)

Ah, yes, Guido den Broeder, I have seen that. Black plays Kg3 attacking all three knights, and the only way to save them all is Ke3 stalemate. You're right, Bubba73. As I say, I doubt that K+3N v. K has any practical significance, and I can't imagine how K+4N possibly could. It's just a curiosity. So I don't care one way or the other whether the remark about K+4N v. K stays in or goes. Krakatoa (talk) 20:34, 4 September 2008 (UTC)

K+3N vs. K may come up but the part I'm concerned with is "4 knights can checkmate without the help of the king". I know that must be true, it doesn't seem to be really relevant since you do have a king. Of course, you could do it without using the king, I suppose. It seems to me a bit of an interesting fact that is stuck in there that isn't very important. Bubba73 (talk), 20:44, 4 September 2008 (UTC)

Yes. Note that we don't address whether three bishops can checkmate by themselves, or whether four are required. Krakatoa (talk) 20:56, 4 September 2008 (UTC)

On the other hand, checkmate does discuss checkmate with two major pieces without the king. But I think that is important. Bubba73 (talk), 03:51, 5 September 2008 (UTC)

There is only one of each of these in the Chessbase 9 database. One was a blitz game where one player promoted 4 pawns to knights and won. The other one is strange, one side promoted to one or two knights, then the defender promoted to a knight, when a queen would have been better. It went on until K+3N vs. K, with a 2000 player with the knights. But he stalemated the other player. Bubba73 (talk), 05:11, 5 September 2008 (UTC)

(Unindent) That's pathetic. I remember that the time I had the six knights I had to be very careful about not stalemating. By the way, thinking about it without a board, I think four bishops are actually required, by themselves, in order to mate a lone king. Surprising. (No, I don't think this belongs in the article.) And yes, the ability of two major pieces to mate by themselves is worth noting. Oftentimes in games between weak players one sees the two rooks mate. Krakatoa (talk) 09:02, 5 September 2008 (UTC)

With two bishops on each color, right? Four bishops on the same color can't checkmate, even with the king. I'd expect 3 and 1 to not be able to do it by themselves. Bubba73 (talk), 15:42, 5 September 2008 (UTC)

Right, I was assuming 2 and 2. I don't think even 32 and 1 can do it without their king. (E.g. white bishops on all white squares, black king on g7. White needs to cut off access to f8, f6 and h6, so he can meet the forced 1...Kh8 with mate on the a1-h8 diagonal. It takes two dark-squared bishops to cut off those three squares.) Krakatoa (talk) 17:52, 5 September 2008 (UTC)

Out of sheer curiosity, and since I couldn't quickly find the answer at Krabbé's site, are there any known games where one player had three light-squared (or three dark-squared) bishops simultaneously? -- Jao (talk) 19:19, 5 September 2008 (UTC)

The Chessbase 9 data base only shows one such game, between a 1250 player and a 796 player. The 1250 player eventually has six bishops, four on white, two on black, and is able to checkmate. (One may wonder why such games are in the database.) Bubba73 (talk), 20:17, 5 September 2008 (UTC)

Diagrams are not working again

Resolved

	a	b	c	d	e	f	g	h
8									8
7									7
6									6
5									5
4									4
3									3
2									2
1									1
	a	b	c	d	e	f	g	h

This shows the name of a file rather than rank numbers

Diagrams are not working correctly again, at least to me. I don't know how to fix it. Bubba73 (talk), 05:56, 5 September 2008 (UTC)

File reloaded, working!? --AndrejJ (talk) 10:55, 5 September 2008 (UTC)

Yes. Bubba73 (talk), 15:40, 5 September 2008 (UTC)

Chess Portal

The Chess Portal contains one C-class article, Budapest Gambit. The rules for the portal indicate that it is supposed to contain only B-class and above articles. I suggest that Budapest Gambit be replaced by Stalemate, which is a B-class article. It is an excellent article that Bubba73 and I have done a lot of work on lately. It is definitely in the upper echelon of B-class articles, and in my opinion deserves a higher designation than that. (I would try to do the replacement myself, but the process looks fairly involved, and it's almost 4 a.m. here . . . .) Krakatoa (talk) 08:52, 5 September 2008 (UTC)

I think the Budapest Gambit article is better than C class. It is a very good article about an opening, the drawback is that it is not a common opening. Bubba73 (talk), 15:45, 5 September 2008 (UTC)

As I happen to be both the most active editor on Budapest Gambit and the only maintainer of the Chess Portal, I have huge conflicts of interests on this subject so I will have to keep quiet for once :-) So just tell me the result of your discussion and I will be glad to realise the change on the Portal, the process being cumbersome indeed. SyG (talk) 16:02, 5 September 2008 (UTC)

I certainly wasn't maligning the Budapest article, which I agree is a very good article about a somewhat offbeat opening. Under current article-rating standards, it probably does merit C-Class, IMO, if only because it doesn't have a proper lead. The lead does not properly summarize the article - for instance, it says nothing about the history of the gambit, the strategic themes for both sides, etc. Until such time as the article is rated B-Class or better, it shouldn't be in the Portal.

Even if the article were rated B-Class, IMO it wouldn't be the best occupant of the Portal's limited space. There is only one opening article in the portal (Sicilian Defense). If we're to occupy the space with a second opening article, in principle I would be inclined to go with a more important opening like the Ruy Lopez, Nimzo-Indian Defense, Slav Defense, etc. Unfortunately, looking at all of those I see that they're rated C-Class or lower, and the Budapest article is considerably better than any of them, IMO. I think another consideration should be how important the subject is to the game of chess. You can't get much more fundamental than Stalemate; it's a lot more important to chess than Budapest Gambit.

To sum up, at present Budapest Gambit is rated C-Class and is ineligible for the Portal. I recommend Stalemate, which is rated B-Class and is surely toward the high end of B. If the Budapest article were rated B-Class, it would be a tougher call. In that event, my personal inclination would still be Stalemate, since as I say that's a pre tty fundamental subject for chess - but Budapest Gambit certainly would not be a bad choice. I should say that I, like SyG, am not a disinterested observer, since I've done a lot of work on Stalemate (235 edits), and a fair amount on Budapest Gambit for that matter. Krakatoa (talk) 17:44, 5 September 2008 (UTC)

Thinking about this further - Budapest Gambit is a fine article, definitely one of the best two opening articles, maybe even better than the B-rated Sicilian Defense, the only other opening article that is in the Portal. It would be a shame to cut it - although it's really supposed to be B-class to be in the Portal. Really what we should do is leave Budapest Gambit alone and give one of The Turk's weeks to Stalemate. Do we really need to read about The Turk, which is a fine article but has nothing to do with chess as such, eight weeks a year? I would advocate cutting back all of the Featured Articles (yes, including even the beloved First-move advantage in chess) to six weeks a year each. As it is, the three Featured Articles eat almost half the year (24 weeks), leaving precious little space for other meritorious articles. As fond as I am of First-move advantage in chess, I don't think it's eight times as worthy as the B-class articles, or the one C-class article, on the Portal. Krakatoa (talk) 15:59, 6 September 2008 (UTC)

That sounds a reasonable proposal, so if noone opposes here in the few coming days I will reduce the frequency for FA-class to 6 weeks a year, and add Stalemate to the list of selected articles. SyG (talk) 09:12, 7 September 2008 (UTC)

If the proposal is implemented, here are a few articles that I think are interesting and should be considered for the newly-opened-up slots in the Portal: Zwischenzug, List of world records in chess, Chess handicap, and Zugzwang. I've done a lot of work on all of these, so I don't claim objectivity. Krakatoa (talk) 00:19, 8 September 2008 (UTC)

I have added Stalemate, Chess handicap and Zugzwang to the Portal (Zwischenzug already was in the list). SyG (talk) 16:11, 13 September 2008 (UTC)

png to svg?

Do the diagrams and the table of pieces use png or svg images? This Image:Chess bll44.png says that the png should be replaced with svg whenever possible. I have noticed that the diagrams usually load very slowly as of late. Bubba73 (talk), 17:37, 5 September 2008 (UTC)

See Image:Chess bdl44.png and :

--AndrejJ (talk) 11:32, 9 September 2008 (UTC)

Some of the png files are now missing. I changed the png files I used in articles to svg. Bubba73 (talk), 16:48, 9 September 2008 (UTC)

Update on quality: September 2008

Now the silly season is over and your holidays as well (sorry), here is a brief update about what happened in August and the current focus for quality:

Howard Staunton has reached the GA-class! Congratulations to Philcha, Bubba73, Brittle heaven, Eubulides and Krakatoa for their efforts. Unfortunately there are still doubts on the neutrality of the article that could harden its journey to the higher classes (A-class or FA-class).

Rules of chess has been nominated for review. It is a very important article as it is seen about 15000 times every month. So please help and and give your advice on the article at Wikipedia:WikiProject Chess/Review/Rules of chess.

Adolf Anderssen is still nominated for review, but unfortunately has not garnered a lot of attention for the moment, the main reason being most usual reviewers were busy working on the reviews of Howard Staunton and First-move advantage in chess. So if you would like to help this article to reach the recognition it deserves, please voice in at Wikipedia:WikiProject Chess/Review/Adolf Anderssen.

SyG (talk) 09:04, 7 September 2008 (UTC)

Game notation with figurine

Game notation with figurine:

21. e6 a3 22. xa6 b4

Or Unicode: 21. ♕e6 ♝a3 22. ♕xa6 ♝b4

See test immortal Game.

Opinions?--AndrejJ (talk) 11:49, 9 September 2008 (UTC)

Looks nice. There's a Wikipedia:Accessibility issue though: users of software that can't display images (such as screen readers) are out of luck for understanding the notation. I do think that this would be solved by simply specifying an alt parameter (like so:

), but I'm no expert in the accessibility field. -- Jao (talk) 12:25, 9 September 2008 (UTC)

At one time I couldn't display such characters on my system. That system is used a lot in literature, but since this is the English Wikipedia I think it is OK to use the letters for the pieces. Also, it isn't as easy to get those into the text. And another thing is that the user can change the size of the text, but not those images. Bubba73 (talk), 15:42, 9 September 2008 (UTC)

Good point. It all scales nicely in Opera and Firefox, but I opened up IE7 and zooming severely messes up inline images. Don't know why, but probably it means we should avoid them. -- Jao (talk) 15:51, 9 September 2008 (UTC)

On my computer the figurines are a bit low vertically, not correctly aligned with letters.

Also, if we want to use this system in Wikipedia, the easiest would be to include all signs in the list box under the edit screen where there already is the cyrillic stuff (the one where you have "Insert", "Wiki markup", "Symbols", etc). SyG (talk) 18:05, 9 September 2008 (UTC)

The thing looks renders well enough on my screen, but I think we should avoid figurine algebraic. Although several books use figurines because it makes the variation analysis understandable to an international audience, I think we can assume that the English Wikipedia's audience understands English. One problem with using the *.svg images is that it puts a huge strain on the computer to have to upload hundreds of images for one page. The unicode figures avoid that problem, but they don't look pretty at all to me, they seem rather thin, small and anemic, and I'm having trouble seeing the king and queen apart. Moreover, people who want to edit pages with figurines are going to have a huge amount of trouble doing so, I can easily type a "B" for bishop, but there is no "♝" key on my keyboard. (I'm sure there is a way of getting it, but editors should not need a course in unicode to contribute to Wikipedia articles.) Sjakkalle (Check!) 06:30, 10 September 2008 (UTC)

Is that why diagrams load so slowly now, the svg files? The text of the file for the png files said to use svg instead. Bubba73 (talk), 15:47, 10 September 2008 (UTC)

Bugs in Chess Titans

Concerning Chess Titans (Windows Vista game) I would like to know why the "Game Bugs" entries are routinely deleted by the staff here at wikipedia. The last set of bugs I reported personally, providing youtube, screen shot, and microsoft.com forum discussions as references. The information was and remains 100% accurate and none of it violated copyright laws. Has anyone else had major difficulty in posting the bugs on this game? —Preceding unsigned comment added by KevinConnerJp (talk • contribs) 14:30, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

I don't specifically know, but the "Game bugs" section sounds really weird. It talks about a "non-ckeck mated win", this kind of thing is meaningless as mate always occur with check, so "non-check" and "mated" are oxymora.

The sources provided are also weak; Youtube and fora are generally not considered as reliable sources.

I will keep a look on the article, though, in case Bill Gates wants to edit it uncorrectly.

SyG (talk) 20:41, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

Searching Google, the only evidence of the castling and double-move bugs I have seen is that Youtube video, and quite frankly we have no way of telling whether it's real. Maybe there's an "enforce legal moves" option that you can just turn off or something? Susan Polgar seems to buy it, but that's hardly enough to make it a reliable source. If this were a real bug, wouldn't a lot of people have confirmed it online? As for the forum thread cited, almost everything there is people not understanding the en passant, stalemate and threefold repetition rules; someone who does seem to have a grasp of the rules still thinks the game calls illegal draws, but hasn't been able to provide an example game where this occurs. And yes, if the section is kept it must certainly be clarified (such as, what on Earth does it mean to "force one's opponent into a non-check mated win"?). -- Jao (talk) 13:49, 13 September 2008 (UTC)

I also provided a couple of screen shots, but if you don't believe me, feel free to replicate the bugs. The castling video on YouTube seems to have caused a patch update at one point, because it relies entirely on the computer opening up with the queen's pawn, and so far CT won't do that anymore. However, here's an example of a non-mated win: http://members.aol.com/dalbozofgurth/chess_cheats.jpg

Now I don't know what you call that where you come from, and I know I'm not big on chess lingo. But I was taught this is called one of three things, "non-checked win", "non-mated win" or a "Forced Resignation".

I've replicated this bug on a number of occasions and it ticks me off every time I do because it screws my stats. As you can clearly see in this particular screen shot, the white king (computer) is clearly not placed in check. However, White is incapable of making a move. Even IF White were somehow able to move, I would get check mate in the turn directly following.

The computer refuses to accept this as a loss.

I have another screen shot I took but I haven't placed it on the web just yet. However, I replicated the same bug with 1 knight, 1 queen (still have another knight on the board - and a king, obviously), against opponent's black king. Knight and Queen made it impossible for the Black King to make a move, but instead of resigning, the computer says: "Oh it's a draw." I'm like "WTH I have two knights a queen and a king, your guy can't make a move, and it's a draw!?"

Like I said, these are very easy bugs to replicate, you can do it on any setting, from 1 to 10. I've also had the computer outright declare a draw after over 10 consecutive checks without mates.71.218.220.229 (talk) 03:31, 16 September 2008 (UTC)

All right, the person who told you about this "non-mated win" thing was either talking about another game, or just disinformed. There's no such thing. The correct word for the situation in that image, when a player has no legal moves, is stalemate, and it's a draw by the official rules of chess, and has been so at least since 1820. This is not a bug. It is your responsibility to avoid letting your opponent run out of moves before he is checkmated.

And as for the 10 consecutive checks, is it possible that the exact same position arose three times? In that case, the computer may claim a draw – again, by the rules of chess, not by cheating. -- Jao (talk) 10:05, 16 September 2008 (UTC)

I'm sorry but you're entirely misinformed. A stalemate occurs only when both players are incapable of making a legal check. A forced resignation occurs when no matter what when one player is inherently doomed. Or are there regional rules to chess? Because my chess book says the exact opposite of what yours says. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.218.220.229 (talk) 16:55, 16 September 2008 (UTC)

I don't know about regional rules, but please tell us the name of that book, and we might be able to figure it out. At least in the official international rules though, a stalemate is when the player who is to move cannot make a legal move. If you don't believe me (and also don't believe our stalemate article), check the actual rules at the World Chess Federation's website. It's in article 5.2 b. Under the official rules, there is no such thing as a "forced resignation". If the player who is to move is in check and cannot move, the game is over (checkmate); if he is not but cannot move, the game is over (stalemate); and if he can move, then he is free to do so. Nobody can be forced to resign. -- Jao (talk) 17:13, 16 September 2008 (UTC)

No, stalemate is when the side to move has no legal move and is not in check. Please read the stalemate article - it is very good. And there is no such thing as a forced resignation - it is the option of the player. Also read rules of chess. What book are you reading? Bubba73 (talk), 17:09, 16 September 2008 (UTC)

Proposed archive for cited web pages

We've previously discussed the risk of cited web pages going offline or being taken over by advertisers / domain resellers. Several chess articles would be at risk - the worst case might be Winter's Chess notes pages' becoming unavailable. The risk has been raised at Wikipedia:Village_pump_(proposals)#Wiki_cache_for_references and I've already responded. I suggest WikiProject Chess should pitch in, and also post on the Talk pages of any other Wikiprojects that would be seriously hurt by the disappearance of important pages / sites. I'll post a similar notice at WikiProject Video Games. -- Philcha (talk) 09:59, 13 September 2008 (UTC)

Emanuel Lasker

I think Emanuel Lasker is not far from GA, but I don't think it's ready for formal review as there are still some loose ends:

a few unreferenced statements;
the whole thing looks rather bitty, because Lasker was active in so many fields. -- Philcha (talk) 09:52, 14 September 2008 (UTC)

"...because Lasker was active in so many fields" mmm, it reminds me something... ;-) SyG (talk) 09:55, 14 September 2008 (UTC)

How many fields are you accusing whom of ploughing? -- Philcha (talk) 12:44, 14 September 2008 (UTC)

I was just thinking, if he was active in so many field we are allowed to write a Lead with 15,312 characters in 976 paragraphs, instead of the usual 3 paragraphs. WP:IAR!! :-) SyG (talk) 19:50, 14 September 2008 (UTC)

WP:IARrrrgh when a GA reviewer sees it!

BTW, and almost on topic for once, check out Wikipedia_talk:Lead_section#Lead_length_for_big.2C_complex_article -- Philcha (talk) 21:36, 14 September 2008 (UTC)

Rules of chess - Philcha's comments

I've added comments to Wikipedia:WikiProject Chess/Review/Rules of chess. I apologise for my belated participation, I've been busy with paleonotology articles. IMO at present the article needs some work to pass GA. I'll watch the review and contribute where possible. -- Philcha (talk) 12:42, 14 September 2008 (UTC)

No need to apologise, all participation is welcome! SyG (talk) 18:51, 16 September 2008 (UTC)

I think everything has been addressed or commented on. The vast majority of things have been changed as the reviewers suggested. A few things I didn't really see the need to change, and I commented on those. Bubba73 (talk), 18:58, 16 September 2008 (UTC)

Wikipedia 0.7 articles have been selected for Chess

A collection of Wikipedia articles is being collected together as Wikipedia 0.7. This collection will be released on DVD later this year, and will be available for free download. The Wikipedia:Version 1.0 Editorial Team has made an automated selection of articles for Version 0.7.

We would like to ask you to review the articles selected from this project. These were chosen from the articles with this project's talk page tag, based on the rated importance and quality. If there are any specific articles that should be removed, please let us know at Wikipedia talk:Version 0.7. You can also nominate additional articles for release, following the procedure at Wikipedia:Release Version Nominations.

A list of selected articles with cleanup tags, sorted by project, is available. The list is automatically updated each hour when it is loaded. Please try to fix any urgent problems in the selected articles; a team of copyeditors has agreed to help improve the writing upon request.

We would also appreciate your help in identifying the version of each article that you think we should use, to help avoid vandalism or POV issues. These versions can be recorded at this project's subpage of User:SelectionBot/0.7. We are planning to release the selection for the holiday season, so we ask you to select the revisions before October 20. At that time, we will use an automatic process to identify which version of each article to release, if no version has been manually selected. Thanks! For the Wikipedia 1.0 Editorial Team, SelectionBot 20:30, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

I've done a partial scan through selected articles by score as I suspect a lot of articles are getting through the net. After getting about 40% of the way through this huge list, I'm staggered by the number of sub-B-class articles on the list. User_talk:Philcha#v_0.7_hitlist lists those in the first 40% for which I think I have sufficient prior knowledge to knock out adequate content for a B-class article, so I'd only have to look up a few refs and then dash off a lead - and I assume some are virtually B-class, but have just not been reviewed.

To my surprise, there are a few chess articles in my (incomplete) hit-list. I suggest the offer of free copyediting above is worth taking up if we target the weakest articles in the Chess list first. -- Philcha (talk) 19:45, 21 September 2008 (UTC)

Chessmetrics article under threat

A couple of people are insisting that Chessmetrics should be deleted - see Talk:Chessmetrics. You may find this diff interesting. -- Philcha (talk) 01:38, 16 September 2008 (UTC)

I believe your insinuation is poorer than the incivility you alleged from the other page. I only came to him because he is 100% neutral. He and I have only interacted one time in our life, and we were on opposite sides, and I accused him of wikilawyering and he accused me of practicing medicine. I wanted the opinion of a "tell it like it is" person, who has numerous reminders about not being so blunt. Look at his talk page and archives filled with "please tone it down" reminders. He is straightup, tell-it-like-it-is, and his brute honesty comes accross as possibly offensive. I knew no one better to ask. I have never done him any favors, nor him for me. I just knew Philca's tactic would be to question, doubt, and over analyze every one of my 500 strong edit history. Luckily, you'll find I have zero experience with kainaw except for a tooth-question on the reference desk, and we disagreed constantly. Plus he has zero interest in chess I believe, so that's an added layer of neutrality. I never would try to underhandedly influence any discussions which I'm a part of. I am a logician, and a good listener, who could ask for more from someone on the opposite side of a discussion. Plus I'm a Capa fan. Sentriclecub (talk) 05:04, 16 September 2008 (UTC)

I have made no insinuations. I admit to making your statement of objectives public. I don't mind if other people quote me, so long as they do so accurately and in context. -- Philcha (talk) 22:03, 16 September 2008 (UTC)

I'd like to request some assistance at chessmetrics talk page

chessmetrics I want to invite everyone who is interested, to take part in a discussion, involving the scaling back of how many pages (chess articles) have needless chessmetrics information. I wish for it to only exist on pages that benefit article, and not benefit chessmetrics. I also would like the article to read like a research paper, not read like a hypothesis. (for the same and complex reasons as the archives of petrodollar warfare). Thanks, and I hope those participating will be patient with me. Its my first article I tagged for proposed deletion, and may make some beginner mistakes, for which I ask forgiveness in advance. Sentriclecub (talk) 04:45, 16 September 2008 (UTC)

Hi Sentriclecub, and thanks for the interest you put in chess-related articles! I have a bit of difficulty to narrow what's going on here, so could you please choose in the following list the sentence that describes best what your concern is:

You want to delete the article chessmetrics because you believe it is non-notable.
You want to delete the article chessmetrics because you believe Jeff Sonas' theories are wrong.
You want to delete references to the article chessmetrics in chess-related articles because you believe chessmetrics is non-notable.
You want to delete references to the article chessmetrics in chess-related articles because you believe Jeff Sonas' theories are wrong.
You want to change the content of the article chessmetrics to make it describe a research paper instead of a rating-method.
You want something completely different.

Make a pick! SyG (talk) 21:14, 16 September 2008 (UTC)

I just wanted to invite discussion. The discussion page went from 1 sentence, to a novella, and both sides have agreed. (thanks to the editors who came in and addressed my strong concerns). All I wanted was lots of productive discussion. I wanted the content of the article to not be about the hypothesis, but about the research. However, the article now is very fair and balanced, so its no longer necessary. Petrodollar warfare is a much sharper, controversial article. Thankfully, there are several editors who also wish to see less chessmetrics on other articles (especially where it doesn't really add anything). So I'd say mission accomplished, and thanks to those who came over and dropped a productive message. Sentriclecub (talk) 23:46, 17 September 2008 (UTC)

Origins of Chess

You may have noticed at Talk:Chess that users Jao, HermanHiddema and myself are having a running battle with user ARYAN818, over the prominence of the statement that 'chess originated in India' within the Chess article. We have now reverted him twice and other user views would of course be welcome, as he seems to think that we have biased or prejudicial opinions. I note also, that he has altered the Origins of Chess article to suit his agenda, perhaps to the detriment of the flow of that article. As I am not an expert on the Origins of Chess, does someone else want to have a look and see whether his opening statement is the most appropriate/grammatically correct way to start the article? Brittle heaven (talk) 09:49, 28 September 2008 (UTC)

All right, I will have a look. SyG (talk) 16:02, 28 September 2008 (UTC)

Rating of Chess tournament

Is there anyone who wants to re-rate chess tournament? I added some information and I think it might meet the criteria of at least C-class. Thanks, αЯβιτЯαЯιŁΨθ ^(talk) 20:06, 28 September 2008 (UTC)

Well, I had a quick look and I have to admit I am a bit sceptical about what this article tries to achieve. That being said, I do not know what C-class precisely is, so no problem for me if someone else wants to re-rate to C-class. SyG (talk) 21:15, 28 September 2008 (UTC)

Okay, I read over the criteria for C-class and it seems to me like the article meets them. αЯβιτЯαЯιŁΨθ ^(talk) 11:39, 29 September 2008 (UTC)

I don't know. At first glance, the article seems to contain quite a few errors. Guido den Broeder (talk, visit) 22:49, 2 October 2008 (UTC)

Collaboration of the week

Does WikiProject chess have any "collaboration of the week" type thing? I was looking for one and I couldn't find it. Thanks, αЯβιτЯαЯιŁΨθ ^(talk) 01:12, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

No, there is none. Attemps were launched to have some, but it did not fully work. SyG (talk) 06:44, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

Agreed—there is nothing as formal as that, although collaborations do take place frequently, such as with article reviews, or editor requests for help in this column. Generally, there's quite a lot of guidance on things that need creating/improving on the project page and these can be freely added to. Ultimately, editors have the freedom to pick and choose which articles they work on, but if you have something specific in mind and it strikes a chord with some willing collaborators, then it's certainly worth mentioning. Brittle heaven (talk) 06:57, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

I've seen "collaboration of the week / month" processes on other Wikiprojects, and IMO they don't work. The main constraint is WP:RS, so articles get improved as people find good sources. OTOH Wikiproject does have a "to do" list at Wikipedia:WikiProject_Chess#Articles. If someone has a few good sources for one of these, he / she should just WP:BOLD do it. -- Philcha (talk) 08:44, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

This is an archive of past discussions on Wikipedia:WikiProject Chess. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.

→

Catherine Lip

Interestingly, Chessgames.com's Game of the Day is a game that Catherine Lip won at the 2001 Women's Zonal. As you'll recall, we deleted the article about her for lack of notability. Decent game - Black goes awry at some point and Lip crushes her (it looks like 15...Qf6, instead of 15...Qxc5?, would have been OK for Black). The game is here. Krakatoa (talk) 07:58, 18 September 2008 (UTC)

Sorry I just saw that. Seems to me like Chessgames.com just put it in as a lame attempt to get in a Sarah Palin joke, and many of the chessgames kibitzers agree. It's just a nice game between a couple of 2000 rated players. It's only in the chessgames database because it was at a zonal, but these Oceania zonals are run as (close to) open swisses so relatively weak players can play. I still think we were correct to delete the Catherine Lip article. Peter Ballard (talk) 03:58, 30 September 2008 (UTC)

I have no knowledge about the Oceania zonals, but other than that I agree with everything you wrote. Krakatoa (talk) 08:56, 30 September 2008 (UTC)

I stand by my previous assessement that it's appropriate to have an article on her. She has various secondary source information about her, and so fulfils the Wiki notability criteria. The fact she is a relatively poor player is not a notability criteria that matters to whether a wiki page should exist or not. SunCreator (talk) 22:37, 2 October 2008 (UTC)

Deleting FIDE World Chess Championships 1998-2004

The article FIDE World Chess Championships 1998-2004 is pretty well redundant now and I've nominated it for deletion. If you wish to contest (or support) the delete, see Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/FIDE World Chess Championships 1998-2004. Peter Ballard (talk) 05:54, 6 October 2008 (UTC)

p.s. I saved its contents at User:Peter Ballard/Sandbox, where it will probably stay for several months because I hardly ever use my sandbox. Peter Ballard (talk) 06:00, 6 October 2008 (UTC)

articles with diagrams won't load

Today I've been having a problem loading pages with more than a few diagrams, for instance checkmate. They won't load for me. Articles with just a few diagrams will load. Loading diagrams has been very slow for me for weeks or months. Is anyone else having this problem? Bubba73 (talk), 20:33, 6 October 2008 (UTC)

See the discussion at Wikipedia:Village pump (technical). Bubba73 (talk), 22:25, 6 October 2008 (UTC)

Sounds odd. Checkmate and Chess opening both load quite rapidly for me (2 or 3 secs). Checkmate looks a complete mess though, with diagrams four abreast shooting off the RHS of the page, so it may be a good idea to trim the number down a bit ... or at least spread them out some more. Brittle heaven (talk) 22:53, 6 October 2008 (UTC)

Look at the discussion at Wikipedia:Village pump (technical). Someone measured it, and chess opening took 54 seconds to load and checkmate would not load and returned an error. Maybe there is a problem with servers. This page takes more than 30 seconds to load and more than 30 seconds to save an edit for me. Bubba73 (talk), 02:13, 7 October 2008 (UTC)

I think that discussion is mistaken about the number of images involved -- only 26 distinct images are used for each board size. My guess is that this is just slow wikimedia servers because chess opening loads for me in about 3 seconds right now. Checkmate loads a bit slower but faster than 6 seconds. (P.S. The diagrams in checkmate are a bit ugly. They should be changed to use a more uniform size rather than the haphazard mix of Template:chess diagram and Template:chess diagram small.) 165.189.91.148 (talk) 15:08, 7 October 2008 (UTC)

Checkmate loads in less than 10 seconds for me today. As far as the number of images, it seems to load each square individually rather than saving it. That is, it seems to reload square images even if they are the same as one already loaded. I can see the squares filling in one-by-one. Bubba73 (talk), 15:46, 7 October 2008 (UTC)

Improving an article

What improvements can I make to this article to bring it towards reaching B-class? Thanks, αЯβιτЯαЯιŁΨθ ^(talk) 02:26, 7 October 2008 (UTC)

I'm afraid the improvements need to be done whole-scale on the article to bring it to B-level, the main issue being comprehensiveness. The article has many sections with only a sentence or two of content, which makes the structure look somewhat choppy. In this case, I think the sections are short because they are underdeveloped, and lacking in comprehensiveness. For example, we have one section saying that player need to keep score of the game. (This is true of chess with long time controls, in rapid chess, this is not the case, the point could be elaborated on.)

There are some other things which I think are factually inaccurate, e.g. "A player must recognize that their opponent has run out of time for the game to be ended in favor of the player." I see no such rule in the Laws of Chess, and in the tournaments I have played, the arbiter has often ended the game himself with a player oversteps.

Another example is "If the game needs to be interrupted, the arbiter shall stop the clock", but if a game is interrupted because a player wishes to claim a draw by repetition, it is usually the claiming player who stops the clock. (I see this point is made in another section.)

I don't think the USCF usually categorizes tournaments; they categorize players. Tournaments are usually "open", letting anyone play. The closest you get to categorization are rating sections, and these can be placed however the organizer wants, regardless of the USCF's categorization system with 200-point intervals.

Talking about categorization, I think part of the historical reason for FIDE's categorization scheme was to have a system for generating IM- and GM norms for players aspiring for one of those titles.

Some items need sourcing, e.g. "The most common form of round robin tournaments are quads, where four different players compete." I'm not sure if these four-player tournaments are all that common outside the United States. International round-robins are often quite a bit larger than four players. On the topic of Round Robin, I think some mention ought to be made to the Berger tables used to set them up.

Also, talking about tournaments, single elimination tournaments are very rare. In the "Tournament Life" section of Chess Life, I have never seen a single elimination tournament advertised. Certain World Championship tournaments are single elimination, but that is about it. It seems a bit strange that this is the longest of the three sections on tournament systems.

Perhaps a mention of the Scheveningen system ought to be added; this is a well-known way of handling team chess over multiple rounds.

I suggest taking a look at the B-class criteria, I think it is point 2 where there is most to improve here. Regarding inline citations (point 1), I'm not sure how much is needed, but there probably should be more of it than there is in the present version. There is a lot of prose which needs to be written if you want to bring it up to B-level, but if you want to give it a shot, I think there is a potential for a pretty good article here.

In case my reply here comes across as very harsh, then you have actually done a very good job with it. The vast majority of articles less than two months old are far less developed than this one. Thanks for the article, and for your efforts in creating it! Sjakkalle (Check!) 11:18, 7 October 2008 (UTC)

Wow, thanks a lot. Great review! Now I have an idea how to improve this article. I'll start working on it soon. Thanks, αЯβιτЯαЯιŁΨθ ^(talk) 11:41, 7 October 2008 (UTC)

Sjakkalle is right - the USCF does not usually categorize tournaments. Often there are sections for under 1800, under 1400, etc. Sometimes there are class tournaments, where all of the players in a section will be in the same class rating. But otherwise the USCF doesn't use categories for tournaments the was FIDE does. Bubba73 (talk), 20:35, 7 October 2008 (UTC)

Very minor chess openings: merge proposal

OK, the AFD for Pickering Defense has been closed as a "no consensus", which means that deletion is off the table. The closer did note that there were several proposals as to what to do with it, and only one person called for outright keep. I think the consensus is strong enough that this opening does not justify a standalone article.

Here is the way I view the notability of the 20 possible replies to the King's Pawn Game, and I'll mark those which I think should be merged with King's Pawn Game:

1...a6 Probably notable, certainly gained attention in 1980 because of Mile's win over Karpov. Has two columns in MCO. Ambivalent
1...a5 No analysis found, MCO refuses to cover it. Merge
1...b6 Uncommon, but notable. Appears to be detailed coverage in the book Play 1...b6' by Christian Bauer. Should keep Owen Defense as a standalone.
1...b5. Just drops a pawn, no analysis found. Has no article. No article should be created.
1...c5, 1...c6, 1...d6, 1...d5, 1...e6, 1...e5, 1...g6, 1...Nf6 are all easily notable, main line defenses with a wealth of coverage. All deserve separate articles as is now, without question.
1...f6. Only tidbit worthy of note here is the Barnes somehow defeated Morphy with it. MCO doesn't cover it. Merge
1...f5. Another dubious sacrifice, lacking coverage in chess literature. Merge.
1...g5. Has two columns in MCO, and played seriously by Michael Basman. Ambivalent.
1...h6. Lacks analysis. Merge
1...h5. (This is the one which was AFD'ed), reasons given to delete can also be used to argue for merge.
1...Na6. Only time I've seen this mentioned is an old Back to Basics article in Chess Life where this had been recommended against (old) computers since they would play the bad reply 2.Bxa6. Otherwise, lacks analysis in chess literature. Merge, may mention the computer recommendation.
1...Nc6. Separate chapter in MCO, though not in ECO. Considerable non-trivial coverage, should keep a separate article.
1...Nh6. Lacks analysis. Merge.

Any comments on this? Sjakkalle (Check!) 10:17, 9 October 2008 (UTC)

My first comment is that it is outrageous that the closer thought that there was no consensus. Only one person said Keep, and that was a Weak Keep, and his reason (an example of a bad opening) was shown to be wrong. Bubba73 (talk), 13:14, 9 October 2008 (UTC)

Well, I'd assume the closer is not a chess player who is familiar with the subject matter, and when that is the case it is tough to sort out a consensus from the mass of "move", "redirect", "delete", and "merge" comments. As an admin who has closed a few AFDs myself, I won't blame Stifle too hard for determining "no consensus to delete" when there were many who wanted this opening mentioned somewhere. Consensus was very clear that a standalone article was not justified, so I think it's best to move along from there. Sjakkalle (Check!) 13:56, 9 October 2008 (UTC)

Normally I dislike deletionism (grin, who'd have noticed?), but bad chess moves are an exception - exterminate! Seriously, if we give these space, we open the door to a whole range of bad 2nd moves, etc. We should keep only those that are mentioned in MCO or equivalent, or have been played in IM-level or better competition. -- Philcha (talk) 14:08, 9 October 2008 (UTC)

When you say merge, you mean discuss it in King's Pawn Game, right? Let's do that and then try to get Pickering deleted. I think the Pickering article was probably started as a joke. I checked several references and none of them give that name. I think all of the chess project people that voted, voted to delete. And I haven't found any analysis after 1. e4 h5. Bubba73 (talk), 14:15, 9 October 2008 (UTC)

OK, formal merge proposal underway at Talk:King's Pawn Game. Sjakkalle (Check!) 15:13, 9 October 2008 (UTC)

Anand–Kramnik match at Portal:Current events/Sports

This is kind of a minor issue, but anyway. I wasn't sure chess would be welcome at Portal:Current events/Sports, so I asked at its talk page and it seems to be no problem, which is good as this is a major event. However, Nitsansh wants input on what the best format for game reports would be, and I'm not sure about that myself, considering that it will target an audience of people not used to seeing chess scores. If you have thoughts on this, please visit Portal talk:Current events/Sports#Chess. -- Jao (talk) 17:07, 11 October 2008 (UTC)

I will have a look. Also, I have scheduled the article World Chess Championship to be the "Selected article of the week" at Portal:Chess next week, for obvious reasons... Unfortunately nor Vladimir Kramnik neither Viswanathan Anand are of B-class quality. Another aspect: maybe we should wikiwatch these two articles in the coming weeks, as I expect a higher level of vandalism and good-faith-but-wrong edits on them. SyG (talk) 14:44, 12 October 2008 (UTC)

Fractions

There is a suggestion (or something of the sort) at Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style (dates and numbers)#Fractions to explicitly deprecate Unicode fractions such as ½. As ½–½ is common in chess scores, I thought some of you might be interested. -- Jao (talk) 17:29, 15 October 2008 (UTC)

Really? That surprises me because I thought the trend was to Unicode. Anyhow there are ASCII codes for ½, ¼, and ¾, do Unicode doesn't enter into it for those fractions. Bubba73 (talk), 14:18, 19 October 2008 (UTC)

My 60 Memorable Games

My 60 Memorable Games and the Fischer article have recently been changed to say that the book was reprinted this year. I can't find anything about it on Amazon, Barnes & Noble, or the publisher website. Does anyone know if this is true? Bubba73 (talk), 02:24, 26 October 2008 (UTC)

In one of Winter's note it is written:

In September 2008, eight months after Fischer’s death, Batsford announced the imminent publication of a new algebraic edition of My 60 Memorable Games, ...

Maybe it is not published yet, but will be in 2009. In all cases, I find the section "Availability" redundant with the section "Editions". Why not merging them ? SyG (talk) 07:48, 26 October 2008 (UTC)

It's available for preorder on the New In Chess website here. They say "Expected end of October" so it doesn't appear to be out quite yet. By the way I have no objection to merging the two sections suggested by SyG. --Pawnkingthree (talk) 21:22, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

ChessWorldChampions Template

I've long been frustrated by the fact that Template:ChessWorldChampions template has much less information packed into it than Template:World Chess Championships. So I decided to "be bold" and replace it in all the World Chess Champions' articles. I envisiage deleting this template - it is pretty well superceded by Template:World Chess Championships. I didn't seek discussion, on the basis that there was no discussion when this template was added either :) Anyway, if you have problems with what I've done, discuss either here or at Template talk:ChessWorldChampions. I'm happy to revert back if that's the way the consensus goes. Peter Ballard (talk) 03:04, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

American Chess Congress

I posted the below a while ago, and since then have found a new possible source, hope somebody can help this time around! The article American Chess Congress has complete crosstables for all nine editions except the 1921 eighth American Chess Congress in Atlantic City. I added a few results from what I could find online, but it would be nice if we could complete it. It is probably covered in either of:

Gaige, Jeremy (1974), Chess Tournament Crosstables: Vol IV: 1921-1930, Philadelphia
Di Felice, Gino (2006), Chess Results, 1921-1930: A Comprehensive Record with 940 Tournament Crosstables and 210 Match Scores, McFarland, ISBN 978-0786426423
Essays in American Chess History John Hilbert. 359pp. Hardcover (Caissa Editions 2002) [3]

Does anyone own one of these books? Voorlandt (talk) 22:16, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

FIDE Ratings

I've noticed that many chess players' articles list their FIDE ratings but most are very outdated. I've updated a few but it seems like this should be done systematically after each ratings update... —Preceding unsigned comment added by Geordie derraugh (talk • contribs) 08:49, 7 November 2008 (UTC)

Yes, something we have already talked before. The information cannot be maintained appropriately so it should not be in Wikipedia. I say, we could keep only the peak rating. SyG (talk) 18:48, 7 November 2008 (UTC)

I am also in favor of keeping only the peak rating. Bubba73 (talk), 19:40, 7 November 2008 (UTC)

Coverage of the World Championship on Wikipedia

Now the World Championship is over, maybe it is interesting to do a quick debriefing. All statistics from stats.grok.se.

Chess was viewed about 140.000 times, against 120k-130k in a normal month. So a surprinsingly low increase.
Rules of chess was viewed about 20k times, against 15k in a normal month. So greetings to Bubba73 who had the wiseness to get the article to GA-class just before the championship.
World Chess Championship was viewed about 43k times, against 10k normally.
World Chess Championship 2008 was viewed about 80k times.
Vladimir Kramnik was viewed about 33k times, against 7k normally, an enormous increase. There was an astounding peak on 30th-31th October, with respectively 11k and 7k each day.
Viswanathan Anand was viewed about 85k times, against 17k in a normal month. Here also there were peaks on 29th-30th-31th October.
The result was mentioned on the Main Page of Wikipedia, in the section "In the news", from 29th October to 5th November.
The result of each game was updates on Portal:Current events/Sports thanks to User:Jao.

Thanks to all for your efforts on this great event ! SyG (talk) 20:24, 8 November 2008 (UTC)

Update on quality - November 2008

Here is a brief update of what has recently happened on quality articles (i.e. GA-class and higher):

Rules of chess was nominated for review by Bubba73 on 28th August, and was then reviewed by Sjakkalle, Philcha and myself until 30th September. All reviewers agreed the article was of GA-level. You can find the review at Wikipedia:WikiProject Chess/Review/Rules of chess.
Besides the review within the WikiProject Chess, Rules of chess was nominated formally for GA-class at WP:GAC on 13th September and reviewed by GaryColemanFan until 20th October, when it finally passed to the GA-level. Greetings to Bubba73 for this success and his tremendous involvement in the article, and thanks to all the reviewers !
Adolf Anderssen is nominated for A-class review. Please participate at Wikipedia:WikiProject Chess/Review/Adolf Anderssen
Wilhelm Steinitz is nominated for A-class review. Please participate at Wikipedia:WikiProject Chess/Review/Wilhelm Steinitz
George H.D. Gossip is nominated for A-class review. Please participate at Wikipedia:WikiProject_Chess/Review/George_H.D._Gossip

Also, please do not ~~shy away~~ be too modest by thinking you are not strong/wise/knowledgeable enough to perform a review. All comments are welcome ! SyG (talk) 15:10, 9 November 2008 (UTC)

Chess tournament

Hi WikiProject chess!
Would someone mind reviewing the chess tournament article for B-class? I would like to make some improvements but I'm not sure where to begin. Thanks, αЯβιτЯαЯιŁΨθ ^(talk) 03:14, 9 November 2008 (UTC)

Hello Arbitrarily0, I have quickly reviewed the article and left my comments on the Talk:Chess tournament page. SyG (talk) 14:27, 9 November 2008 (UTC)

Thanks a lot, SyG! αЯβιτЯαЯιŁΨθ ^(talk) 16:12, 9 November 2008 (UTC)

I have raised the article to B-class. SyG (talk) 22:04, 19 November 2008 (UTC)

George H.D. Gossip

Anyone want to take a look at George H.D. Gossip and see whether it merits B-class now? I've spent a lot of work on it, including buying the bound volume of the 1969 British Chess Magazine so I could get my hands on G.H. Diggle's article on Gossip. Thanks. Krakatoa (talk) 10:10, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

Hi Krakatoa, I had a brief review of the article, and I raised it to B-class. See my comments on the Talk page. Well done ! SyG (talk) 14:53, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

That is well above a typical B-class article (OK, I know we chess enthusiasts have higher standards). The only significant gaps I can see are:

Personal life.
Why he was unpopular, with a couple of examples.
A bit more about his playing record and strength. It may be useful that Chessmetrics: G H Gossip says his best performance was 39% in a 2590-rated tournament in New York, 1889.

Given that Gossip was not one of the giants and therefore the range of WP:RS about him is probably limited, I think the article is quite close to GA. Nice job, Krakatoa! --Philcha (talk) 15:42, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

Thanks, SyG and Philcha! I have started writing a section on "Reputation" and will certainly check out your Chessmetrics suggestion, which sounds like it's well worth adding. Krakatoa (talk) 17:44, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

I have spent considerably more time on the article, and think it's very good now. I hope you agree. I am nominating it for A-class (typically done before nominating for GA, even though A is higher). Krakatoa (talk) 21:18, 12 November 2008 (UTC)

Alvah Mayo

I need some help from the chess community on article Westville,_Nova_Scotia#Notable_residents. I have expressed my concerns on the talk page. I am hoping that someone here will have access to better references, or be able to advise on the notability issue that I raise. Thanks Derek Andrews (talk) 11:59, 19 November 2008 (UTC)

The notability issue that you raise seems to have merit to me. I had never heard of Alvah Mayo, and there is no Wikipedia article on that person. Listing Westville, Nova Scotia's notable residents and saying, by way of explaining why Alvah Mayo is one of them, "It is the home town to Alvah Mayo (two time Nova Scotia Chess Champion)" seems a weird form of bootstrapping to me. Some city or town in Novia Scotia may well be home to the Nova Scotia checkers champion, tiddlywinks champion, go champion, etc., but I question whether that in itself makes all of those persons (even if "two-time" or more champions) notable.

Is Alvah Mayo notable as a chess player? Doubtful - ChessGames.com does list 16 games by him. However, the same site indicates that his peak FIDE rating is 2103, and his current rating is 2067. There is no indication that he has ever held any FIDE title - see Grandmaster (chess), International Master, FIDE Master - and a rating of 2103 would be too low to get any of those titles (I think 2300 is the lower bound for attaining a FIDE Master title, the lowest of those; the strongest players in the world have ratings near 2800). Were someone to write a Wikipedia article about Mayo, there is a high probability that it would be deleted on the ground of non-notability. I think the consensus among the members of WikiProject Chess is that holders of the grandmaster title are notable; International Masters may be (particularly if they have done something else significant, like writing well-received chess books); junior players who have achieved extraordinary results for their age may be; and women who are among the highest-rated women players may be. A FIDE Master would generally be deemed non-notable (for example, we deleted on grounds of non-notability an article on Charles Weldon, a FIDE Master with a 2300+ rating who as I recall was a several-time state champion (Wisconsin?)). Mayo's rating indicates that he is not even close to obtaining a FIDE Master title, so he appears to be significantly less notable than someone like Weldon.

Perhaps even more relevantly, a few months ago we deleted on grounds of non-notability an article on Catherine Lip. Ms. Lip is a young Australian woman with a rating of 2052 (very similar to Mayo's current 2067); she was also young (19 or 20, IIRC) and female, two considerations that would make us more likely to find notability despite a not-very-high rating. As far as I know, Mayo is neither female nor as young as Lip. I hope that helps. Krakatoa (talk) 14:53, 19 November 2008 (UTC)

Réti Opening/KIA

Réti Opening says that it is also known as the King's Indian Attack. The Reti can lead to the KIA, but they are not the same, are they? Bubba73 (talk), 04:31, 7 October 2008 (UTC)

I think it should be removed as well. The KIA involves a setup with d3, g3 and Bg2 in addition to Nf3. I am even slightly unsure as to whether 1.Nf3 is enough to qualify something as "Reti", my impression has always been that it is 1.Nf3 d5 2.c4 which is the Reti. White's challenge of the Black d-pawn with c4 is key to that system. But I also see that chessgames.com cheerfully calls anything with 1.Nf3 "Reti" (e.g. [4]), so I may have to concede that point. Sjakkalle (Check!) 10:38, 7 October 2008 (UTC)

I've just looked at my ancient "Ideas Behind the Chess Openings" (R. Fine; publisher Bell, 1964), and Fine says "After 1. .Nf3 there is only one important independent reply, 1. ... d5." I guess Fine added all the qualifications because 1. Nf3 can transpose into almost anything, even after 1. ... d5; 2. c4. The move sequence is not diagnostic. I think you have to look at both side's P formations after 5 or 6 moves. The White set-up Sjakkalle described ("d3, g3 and Bg2 in addition to Nf3") could be Reti or KIA, partly depending on Black's response. If White plays early e4, it's KIA. But a set-up with White Ps on g3, d3, and c4 and Black Ps on d4 and c5 could be Reti or KI (Yugoslav) reversed - it might depend as much on whether White plays for a Q-side attack (Yugoslav reversed) or to undermine Black's centre (Reti ?).

Better ask Krakatoa! -- Philcha (talk) 11:10, 7 October 2008 (UTC)

You can't call a Reti a King's Indian as they are different. Whether it's okay to call 1. Nf3 the Reti is quite unclear also. I think most chess books are ambigious on the subject implying that it's a Reti yet saying it's not until further moves have been played. Kinda odd and I guess wiki can be just as ambigious. SunCreator (talk) 19:46, 7 October 2008 (UTC)

I agree with SunCreator, a Reti and a KIA are two completely different things. Of course a Reti can lead to a KIA, like a Budapest Gambit can lead to a French defense, so really nothing in common. And about what a Reti is, my source says 1.Nf3 constitutes the Reti, even if it is very likely to transpose into something else. SyG (talk) 21:39, 7 October 2008 (UTC)

SyG can you be specific with what your sources are that constitutes 1.Nf3 being a Reti. SunCreator (talk) 20:28, 20 October 2008 (UTC)

With great pleasure: Giffard, Nicolas (1993). Le Guide des Echecs (in French). Éditions Robert Laffont.

This is the most comprehensive book on chess in the French language, written by a former French national champion. The Réti is presented and discussed at page 323. An example is given about a Réti NOT transposing into something else: 1.Nf3 Nf6 2.d3 g6 3.g3 Bg7 4.Bg2 O-O 5.O-O c5 6.Nbd2 (Plaskett - Short, Great-Britain championship, 1993). SyG (talk) 19:38, 21 October 2008 (UTC)

(unindent) I was surprised to find that the books are quite inconsistent as to what constitutes a Réti Opening; The Oxford Companion to Chess (2d ed. 1992), generally considered the most authoritative source, calls 1.Nf3 the Zukertort Opening (p. 479 n. 1283), reserving "Réti Opening" for 1.Nf3 d5 2.c4 (id. n. 1286). Modern Chess Openings, 15th edition, p. 716, says, "Nowadays, the Reti Opening refers only to those variations in which Black plays d5; White plays c4 (after Nf3), fianchettoes at least one bishop, and does not play an early d4, transposing to the Catalan or Neo-Grünfeld." But other sources call simply 1.Nf3 the Réti Opening: Raymond Keene in Golombek's Encyclopedia of Chess, p. 274; Anne Sunnucks, The Encyclopaedia of Chess, p. 339; Nathan Divinsky, The Batsford Chess Encyclopedia, p. 175; Edward R. Brace, An Illustrated Dictionary of Chess, p. 238; John Nunn et al., Nunn's Chess Openings, p. 12; Garry Kasparov and Raymond Keene, Batsford Chess Openings 2, pp. 8, 413. Incidentally, if "Réti Opening" means only 1.Nf3 d5 2.c4, then that means, contrary to common understanding, that Réti did not beat Capablanca with the "Réti Opening" at New York 1924, and that Alexander Alekhine is wrong in claiming in the tournament book that he did. The game began 1.Nf3 Nf6 2.c4 g6 3.b4 Bg7 4.Bb2 0-0 5.g3 b6 6.Bg2 Bb7 7.0-0 d6, which the tournament book (p. 55) calls "Réti's Opening". Krakatoa (talk) 09:24, 24 November 2008 (UTC)

I agree with Sjakkalle and SunCreator that the books are unclear as to whether 1.Nf3 is a Réti Opening, or something further is required. If someone asks, "What do you call 1.Nf3?", the answer is "the Réti Opening", but there's a high likelihood that it will transpose into something else. It will really only stay a Réti Opening if the things described by MCO-15 happen. Probably it would be better to call 1.Nf3 the "Zukertort Opening" and avoid the ambiguity, as The Oxford Companion to Chess does - but no one else seems to do that. Krakatoa (talk) 09:47, 24 November 2008 (UTC)

Hmm, that kind of seems to be the same situation as we have with the English Opening. Sure, it's defined by 1.c4, but if the game continues e.g. 1...Nf6 2.Nc3 e6 3.d4 Bb4, it's no longer an English. (I read somewhere that about half of all 1.c4 games transpose out of the standalone English.) Sjakkalle (Check!) 10:04, 24 November 2008 (UTC)

I'm not at all surprised Krakatoa found that "the books are quite inconsistent as to what constitutes a Réti Opening". See Transposition (chess) and its comments (with citation) about how players play "transposition stud poker" - is there a WP:RS that uses any similar phrase? If so, we should quote it, especially if we can get a comparison with High-low split. Sjakkalle is right about the English Opening being another transpositional poker game, and AFAIK the Catalan opening is yet another.

I agree with Krakatoa's diagnosis that Réti did not beat Capablanca with the "Réti Opening" at New York 1924, since IMO ... d5; c4 ... is a necessary but not sufficient feature to make the game a "Réti Opening". I suggest we decide whether we classify such openings by simple initial sequences or by player's strategic objectives as revealed in later stages of the opening play. Either way we have to point out the tranposition possibilities and the variation in published classifications.

Do we have any WP:RS for a pattern in how Zukertort proceeded after 1.Nf3...? If so, that might make the "Zukertort opening" distinct from the Réti - well, as distinct as one can expect under the circumstances. --Philcha (talk) 12:17, 24 November 2008 (UTC)

Well the Colle-Zukertort System is d4, Nf3, e3, b3, Bb2, Nbd2 against practically any black moves. A neat system for those who don't want to learn any theory. But I'm not sure he played it all the time - The Oxford Companion just says he followed up 1.Nf3 with d4, which of course can lead to most QP games. The point is, it's not the first move that defines the opening, so why are we trying to call 1.Nf3 something - it's just a move ... we don't try to call 1.e4 anything in particular, so why would 1.Nf3 be any different? Most commonly, I would imagine it leads to the Queen's Gambit/Slav/Semi Slav complexes (Chessbase would confirm this), but it might just as easily lead to a Catalan, Reti, Benoni, Nimzo, QI, KI etc. - in fact anything where white doesn't play an early f4. Brittle heaven (talk) 18:15, 24 November 2008 (UTC)

Just a bit of devil's advocate:

"it's not the first move that defines the opening" so 1.b3 is not the Larsen opening anymore, is it ?
"we don't try to call 1.e4 anything in particular" it is the king's pawn opening.

;-) SyG (talk) 19:22, 24 November 2008 (UTC)

Aah, but I knew someone would fall for that trap! 1.b3 could transpose into the Colle-Zukertort, some lines of Bird's Opening, a Queen's Indian Reversed or an offbeat Anti-Sicilian line, among others. It is only Larsen's Opening if it follows the established theory of Larsen's Opening - my point exactly! Now the Sokolsky may have been a different story, but you chose the wrong one!! ;-) As for the King's Pawn Opening ... well then I think we can call 1. Nf3 the King's Knight Opening. It will be written so somewhere - of that I have no doubt!!! Brittle heaven (talk) 22:26, 24 November 2008 (UTC)

ROFL! Thanks, Brittle heaven and SyG. --Philcha (talk) 22:51, 24 November 2008 (UTC)

Fair enough Brittle heaven, I get your point. Now does that mean the name of the opening is only defined once it cannot transpose into another one ? (WARNING: there is a big logical trap in my question) SyG (talk) 19:09, 25 November 2008 (UTC)

Help! I'm trying hard not to get too bogged down with semantics here ... but, heeding your warning, I think I'm saying when it does not transpose into another opening, rather than when it cannot. Brittle heaven (talk) 00:00, 26 November 2008 (UTC)

I see. Sill playing the devil's advocate, it seems to follow that the name of the opening is never known until the game finishes, because as long as the game continues you are not sure it will not transpose later into another opening. :-) SyG (talk) 21:52, 26 November 2008 (UTC)

You are full of devilment!! Maybe we're exaggerating the frequency with which transposition occurs. Mostly, it's between different lines of the same opening, and once you get a few moves down the line, the chances of transposition are really very slim. Some masters seek it out and use it as a tool to trick opponents, but we mere mortals are mostly not so knowledgeable or sophisticated. I often play the Dutch and Modern Benoni as Black and transposition has occurred very rarely; perhaps when my Dutch has crossed over with some (quite favourable) lines of the Nimzo-Indian, or when White has decided to pawn-storm my Benoni and we've drifted into a King's Indian Four Pawns Attack. Of course, the precise classification is not always totally clear and I have even seen expert annotators get it wrong. Writing something like NCO must be a total minefield!—although I recall one occasion when Speelman solved a highly complex 'mate in six' in two minutes, only to be told that Nunn had done it in twenty seconds. His reply was "Ah yes, but that guy has a brain" Brittle heaven (talk) 01:24, 27 November 2008 (UTC)

James Hanham

Anyone want to take another look at James Hanham? It's been rated as Start-Class, but I've done some more work on it. I think it might be B-Class now. Krakatoa (talk) 22:03, 19 November 2008 (UTC)

I have shortly reviewed the article, and raised it to B-class indeed. Good job Krakatoa ! SyG (talk) 13:52, 23 November 2008 (UTC)

Thanks! btw, whatever happened to A-class review? None of the A-class-nominated articles ever seem to get reviewed by anyone. Krakatoa (talk) 08:38, 24 November 2008 (UTC)

Yes, unfortunately it is difficult to find reviewers within the WikiProject Chess. I have started to review Gossip but I am still a long way from the end. SyG (talk) 19:24, 24 November 2008 (UTC)

Chess (the article)

I noticed some comments by a non-involved editor at Talk:Chess. While looking through the article I concluded it would not now pass a GA review, mainly because of referencing issues. I don't know whether WP:FAR allows instant de-listing as WP:GAR apparently does. I've done an "informal review" at Talk:Chess. It might be easier to improve the article now rather than to take it through a full series of reviews later if it gets de-listed. --Philcha (talk) 21:17, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

Some of the things he talks about seem to be needed to make the article more understandable to a new reader. Bubba73 (talk), 22:29, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

The article underwent a FAR in January this year and was kept; can it really have deteriorated so much in that time? Are you seriously suggesting it's not even of GA standard?--Pawnkingthree (talk) 23:13, 30 November 2008 (UTC)

Several sections of Chess lack refs for significant parts of their content. That would be enough to fail a GA review at present. --Philcha (talk) 18:02, 2 December 2008 (UTC)

FYI: New articles

A bot has been set up, which looks through the new Wikipedia articles and picks up those that are likely related to chess. The search results are available at User:AlexNewArtBot/ChessSearchResult and are normally updated on a daily basis. Colchicum (talk) 01:27, 29 November 2008 (UTC)

That is just great, thanks for this bot ! SyG (talk) 08:50, 29 November 2008 (UTC)

Village pump discussion about infoboxes

Wikipedia:Village_pump_(policy)#A_discussion_on_the_use.2Fnecessity_.28.3F.29_of_biographical_infoboxes is about the use of infoboxes, especially in biographies, and who should say whether specific articles should have infoboxes. While looking around for examples in earlier stages of the discussion, I noticed that WP:Chess makes very sensible use of infoboxes where appropriate, and uses other means, e.g. diagrams, in other articles. Just to give you an idea of what a bad infobox looks like, see Strom Thurmond. This is not an attempt to drum up support for any particular view, but a hope that you guys can contribute some badly-needed common sense to the discussion at Wikipedia:Village_pump_(policy)#A_discussion_on_the_use.2Fnecessity_.28.3F.29_of_biographical_infoboxes. --Philcha (talk) 09:38, 2 December 2008 (UTC)

American Chess Congress - big problem!

There is a big problem with the American Chess Congress article. The article is about a series of tournaments that are important to American chess history, starting with the First Congress, in 1857. That one was won by some guy named Paul Morphy, who was later driven insane by some English $%*#$@. :-) Apart from the First ACC, which is well documented, the principal factual source for the later tournaments has been a series of articles (I believe) by Graeme Cree on an AOL Hometown site. One example of these is, or rather was, here. AOL Hometown was apparently bulldozed on October 31, 2008, and all of its contents evidently no longer exist. That means there is very little factual support left for most of the American Chess Congress article. I have deleted all of the dead links to Cree's stuff in the article. Can anyone find that material cached someplace? Did Cree move it someplace? Any other bright ideas? Krakatoa (talk) 06:43, 6 December 2008 (UTC)

About your first issue on the English you-know-who, I think it would be normal retaliation to downgrade his article from its current GA-class, just to show you cannot mock an American champion like that. Another possibility, a bit less extreme, would be for the USA to invade England (after all, they have oil), as a perfectly legitimate preemptive action in case another English ever dares to avoid a match with a US champion.

About your second issue, I am afraid most of the articles under AOL are gone forever :-( Here are a few pages you can find back on Cree's stuff, but it does not include the 1857 championship: Cree's articles on US championships.

SyG (talk) 09:23, 6 December 2008 (UTC)

GWB will be going home, none too soon (he should really be going to prison instead), so I'm happy to say that we probably won't be invading any other countries in the near future. And the Bush doctrine of preemptive action (a/k/a aggressive war) will be leaving with him. Krakatoa (talk) 09:39, 6 December 2008 (UTC)

For the time being (if you quickly want to verify something), there is still google's cache for most pages, eg [5] Voorlandt (talk) 09:43, 6 December 2008 (UTC)

Most UK sources give Staunton as the winner in 1857 :) The same sources give Ossama as GWB's replacement, although this is probably still less scary than having Palin in charge of foreign policy! Brittle heaven (talk) 10:18, 6 December 2008 (UTC)

Yeah, Palin almost makes Dubya look like an intellectual. :P Krakatoa (talk) 10:55, 6 December 2008 (UTC)

Chess photo's

Life magazine has recently put around 10,000,000 photo's on the web [6]. Some of them are old enough to be in the public domain, others not. Naturally, quite a few chess photo's. [7]. Well worth a view! Voorlandt (talk) 13:35, 6 December 2008 (UTC)

Terrific photos, particularly those of Fischer, Ray Charles, Reuben Fine, Lord Dunsany, Lisa Lane, Marcel Duchamp—Brittle heaven (talk) 17:08, 6 December 2008 (UTC)

We especially need a free one of Fischer, since we can't claim "fair use" on a non-free one since there is a free one available (in his article now), even though it is a very bad representation. Bubba73 (talk), 22:26, 6 December 2008 (UTC)

Unfortunately they are probably all copyrighted. Bubba73 (talk), 01:40, 7 December 2008 (UTC)

File and Rank, redirects or articles?

The redirects Rank (chess) and File (chess) have recently been made into regular articles. Should this be reverted? Voorlandt (talk) 22:40, 22 November 2008 (UTC)

I think they should be redirects. Wikipedia is not a dictionary (WP:NOT) and I don't see that there is much that can be said about these other than the definition. The redirects linked to glossary of chess, and I think that is best. Bubba73 (talk), 23:20, 22 November 2008 (UTC)

If they are changed back to redirects, save the diagrams to use in glossary of chess. Bubba73 (talk), 01:28, 23 November 2008 (UTC)

If the diagrams are to be used, I really think the colours have to be changed. Even after reading the caption, I wondered why the rank was not somehow marked up in the image, until I finally spotted the green. (This might be due to my colour vision deficiency, I don't know.) -- Jao (talk) 16:42, 24 November 2008 (UTC)

Chessboard is another possible redirect target since that also contains the definition of file and rank. (This might be needed if the glossary is ever moved over to Wiktionary.) Sjakkalle (Check!) 11:50, 23 November 2008 (UTC)

Sorely missing is the article Diagonal (chess). :-)

Redirecting to Chessboard seems fine to me. The article could be expanded with a section on geometry. Guido den Broeder (talk, visit) 13:23, 24 November 2008 (UTC)

Yes, redirecting to Chessboard seems like a good idea to me, too. We could even fold in my article White and Black in chess, which I think has some value but (as others have suggested) may not warrant its own article. Krakatoa (talk) 17:49, 2 December 2008 (UTC)

I expressed some doubt that White and Black in chess needs to be a separate article, but I don't think it belongs with chessboard, since it deals with pieces and not the board. It is probably a good idea to move Rank and File to Chessboard. They directly relate to chessboard and they are too small to stand on their own as much more than a definition. Bubba73 (talk), 18:28, 2 December 2008 (UTC)

(Sigh) I just can't make you happy, try as I might. :-) Krakatoa (talk) 00:47, 3 December 2008 (UTC)

Well, I prefer White and Black to be its own article rather than be merged into Chessboard. Bubba73 (talk), 01:40, 3 December 2008 (UTC)

No problem. I see your point; indeed, on reflection I am inclined to agree. I was just teasing you. Krakatoa (talk) 02:42, 3 December 2008 (UTC)

Yea, I know. I thought that chess piece would be better for White and Black than Chessboard, but that is not a good place for it either. Bubba73 (talk), 03:02, 3 December 2008 (UTC)

(unindent) If rank and file are put into chessboard (which I think is a good idea), then I think it would be good to mention kingside (chess) and queenside (chess) there too. Bubba73 (talk), 23:36, 7 December 2008 (UTC)