Main
Date: 16 Aug 2005 11:47:47
From: Will Kemp
Subject: Does Online Openings Classifier Database Exist?
Does anyone know of an online openings classifcation program? I'm not a web
programmer, but it seems like this is a project someone would have tried
before.

Fritz is terrible at classifying openings, usually giving some vague
classification such as "King's Pawn Opening, 2.Nf3 and various."

I have MCO and BCO, but neither of those are very helpful when it comes to
looking up transpositions.

Chesslab doesn't cut it.

So far the best I have found is Bookup's ECOMaster file; however, even it is
not quite as comprehensive as I would like.

Ideally, a web-interface program would allow the user to enter moves, and
would show the most common names of the opening in, oh, let's say English.
It would also give you ECO and NIC codes, and perhaps even show the common
transpositional paths.

What prompts this question is the following opening from Capablanca -
Alekhine WCh 1927 (3):

1. d4 Nf6 2. Nf3 b6 3. g3 Bb7 4. Bg2 c5

Bookup calls this a Queen's Indian: ienbad System.

Fritz6 calls it: A47: 1.d4 Nf6 2.Nf3 b6: Torre, London, and Colle Systems.

Bookup gives 5.c4 as the only main line continuation.

Fritz gives 5.0-0, 5.c4, and 5.dxc5, but attaches no names to any of these
variations.

Chessbase's Online Database found 248 games with 5.0-0 with participants
such as Tarrasch, Colle, Vid, Richter, Steiner, Denker, and of course
Capablanca, so it can hardly be called obscure. Yet it appears to have no
name.







 
Date: 19 Aug 2005 23:46:11
From: SchemingMind
Subject: Re: Does Online Openings Classifier Database Exist?
> Does anyone know of an online openings classifcation program? I'm not a
> web programmer, but it seems like this is a project someone would have
> tried before.

Hi Will

I wrote a page for browsing through the online correspondence games that
have been played on SchemingMind.com - it's pretty basic at present, but it
does classify openings (based on position, not move sequence, so it should
handle transpositions) - is this the kind of thing you were asking about?

http://www.schemingmind.com/gameexplorer.aspx

I also had the idea of adding a database of 'expert games' to try and make
it more useful as a research tool (there is no quality control for the
SchemingMind games), but I haven't managed to get very far with that yet!

Hope that helps,

Cheers
Austin Lockwood
Webmaster, SchemingMind.com




 
Date: 18 Aug 2005 13:38:19
From: Will Kemp
Subject: Re: Does Online Openings Classifier Database Exist?
Thanks for all the leads. I'll see if any work for me.




 
Date: 18 Aug 2005 12:34:17
From: Mike Leahy
Subject: Re: Does Online Openings Classifier Database Exist?

"Will Kemp" <[email protected] > wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
> Does anyone know of an online openings classifcation program? I'm not a
web
> programmer, but it seems like this is a project someone would have tried
> before.
>
> Fritz is terrible at classifying openings, usually giving some vague
> classification such as "King's Pawn Opening, 2.Nf3 and various."
>
> I have MCO and BCO, but neither of those are very helpful when it comes to
> looking up transpositions.
>
> Chesslab doesn't cut it.
>
> So far the best I have found is Bookup's ECOMaster file; however, even it
is
> not quite as comprehensive as I would like.

Bookup's ECOMaster file is quite small. You might look at the "Opening
Guide" ebook or expand your favorite.

I wrote a game classifier that used a Bookup ebook to tag PGN games with ECO
codes. If I recall, it will go at least 32 ply deep, in hopes of finding a
transposition to a "better" ECO code no matter how convoluted the opening
moves. It would take something to make it a web program though.

Mike Leahy
"The Database Man!"
www.bookup.com




 
Date: 16 Aug 2005 18:22:27
From: Ari Makela
Subject: Re: Does Online Openings Classifier Database Exist?
["Followup-To:" header set to rec.games.chess.computer.]
On 2005-08-16, Will Kemp <[email protected] > wrote:
> Does anyone know of an online openings classifcation program? I'm not a web
> programmer, but it seems like this is a project someone would have tried
> before.

Try David J. Barnes excellent pgn-extract. Google will find it for you.

Slightly off-topic, but I've got Python and Java libraries for that.
The java library can be found at

<URL:
http://sourceforge.net/project/showfiles.php?group_id=79128&package_id=86766
>

If someone's interested in the Python library please post to the rgcc
and I will put it on the net. Both libraries are GPL-licensed because
the data comes from the GPL licensed Lasker chess server.

--
Ari Makela no escaping it -
[email protected] I must step on fallen leaves
http://arska.org/hauva/ to take this path (Suzuki Majoko)



 
Date: 16 Aug 2005 14:05:05
From: Chris F.A. Johnson
Subject: Re: Does Online Openings Classifier Database Exist?
On 2005-08-16, Will Kemp wrote:
> Does anyone know of an online openings classifcation program? I'm not a web
> programmer, but it seems like this is a project someone would have tried
> before.

Have you tried pgn-extract?

<http://www.cs.kent.ac.uk/people/staff/djb/pgn-extract/ >

If you want it on-line, a CGI script would be quite easy to write
as a front end.

--
Chris F.A. Johnson <http://cfaj.freeshell.org >
==================================================================
Shell Scripting Recipes: A Problem-Solution Approach, 2005, Apress
<http://www.torfree.net/~chris/books/cfaj/ssr.html >