Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Chess/FAQ/Format

=Diagrams=

Chess position pictures
Now that Template:Chess position works well and is already widely used, should all old chess position images be replaced by it? --ZeroOne 15:31, 25 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I vote yes. Other things to consider:
 * Consistent appearance is a plus.
 * Improvements to the template improve all diagrams automatically.
 * It makes it possible to find every article that includes a chess diagram by using "What links here" on Template:Chess position.
 * On the negative side, right now we can't mark individual squares or put arrows on the boards.
 * How large do we want the diagrams to be? Following the lead established by others I have been using size 30 for the main diagram and 25 for smaller diagrams.  Bishop's Opening is an example.  It may be that there are better sizes to use.
 * Should the chess boards have a border around them? Currently they don't, but all printed chess books I've seen do have a thin solid border around the board diagrams.  I put something on Template talk:Chess position asking for opinions on this. Quale 06:11, 30 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Agreed with Quale, I have replaced a few of the diagrams with the standard template and I use it for all new articles containing diagrams. Still, it is not a top priority to eliminate the old ChessBase diagrams. The matter became a lot less urgent after the individual openings were split off from the chess opening article. Sjakkalle 08:17, 30 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I think the size of chess diagrams should be at least 30 and probably at least 32. The reason is that if you have larger than normal text selected in the browser (IE and Firefox on my computer at least), it puts white space between the ranks, unless the size is 32. At 30, there is only a small amount of white space between the ranks, but at 25 it is pretty bad. Bubba73 03:53, 24 May 2005 (UTC)

My guess is that this shows up because the text for the a-h, 1-8, grid coordinates uses the default font size and thus is scaled, but the board squares are not. If you use a large font size the grid coords will be larger than the normal table cell size and there are gaps. I think another way to fix this would be to explicitly set the size of the font for the coordinates to 10 or 12 points. The font family is already set to monospace so all that should be required is to set the font size. I'm not actually sure that the diagrams look better with the coordinates in monospace. Maybe the font family should be left to the default, but I haven't tested this to see how it would look. Quale 04:36, 24 May 2005 (UTC)

Is this all OBE now that "Chess diagram" is here? The corresponding article talks about LaTex, but I don't see the need; the template seems to work well enough. See Standard chess diagram for more information. Dwheeler 16:59, August 31, 2005 (UTC)

How-to for the chess position template
I've written a sort of how-to at template talk:chess position. Hopefully this covers the basics. What do others think? Also, I've been trying to figure out how to make chess diagrams with captions look similar to image thumbnails with captions. You can see my attempt at The Game of the Century. I think this looks better than the captions at Kasparov versus The World (not to pick on whoever made those). If someone could help figure this out I think it would be useful. jacobolus (t) 02:17, 21 May 2005 (UTC)

Thanks Jacobolus for your work. I must admit that I'm not very good at using the chess position template, usually I just copy and paste a template from another article and then move the pieces around to get the diagram I want. Your how-to is very helpful. Sjakkalle 07:36, 21 May 2005 (UTC)

I just found out about it, so I haven't had time to read it yet. However, I need this information very much. I couldn't find any documentation on the template, so I just copied, pasted, and altered from other diagrams. Bubba73 05:14, 25 May 2005 (UTC)

Jacobolus, I just want to also thank you for the clear, easy to understand explanation. I will start using your suggestions for handling the floats. Your captions at The Game of the Century look very nice. Quale 16:27, 25 May 2005 (UTC)

There was a big effort to unify the different language's templates; they took the English "chess position" template, made various improvements, and created "chess diagram". I think it's really good, so I used in a few cases, and noted it in the WikiProject Chess page as what appears to be the new standard. Have I gone off my rocker?!? Please correct if what's stated on the WikiProject Chess page is inaccurate. On the other hand, if LaTex isn't going to be used (it produces uglier black and white images, and requires code changes), then maybe that should get dropped entirely. Dwheeler 18:53, August 31, 2005 (UTC)

New SVG format
I posted an RFC at meta:Talk:WikiProject Chess. Please feel free to comment. Cburnett 23:52, 27 December 2006 (UTC)

It would be nice to have a new template, which uses your SVGs instead of PNG. For example, "Chess diagram experimental". Then we can add two diagrams here side by the side to make it easier to compare. Also it would be nice if your images and board colors would resemble the current one as much as possible. I think the current images are very nice and there are many screenshots already which use them, see e.g. Hexagonal chess. Andreas Kaufmann 10:30, 29 December 2006 (UTC)

Here you go: Two issues I see: Otherwise they are pretty similar. The SVGs, not to my surprise, look sharper.
 * the colors don't match but that's a trivial thing to change
 * the border on the light pieces could be bigger on the SVGs to match the PNGs.

I will go ahead and start changing the background colors to match so depending on when you read this some of the images might not match. Cburnett 00:55, 30 December 2006 (UTC)

The SVGs look ugly! I don't like them. Sibahi

Do you have anything constructive to say, or just here to complain? What makes them ugly because I have to put my nose to the screen and squint to tell the difference. Cburnett 13:50, 2 January 2007 (UTC)

Although I would not call them "ugly", I agree with Sibahi that the pieces, especially the Black ones, are better readable in PNG: look e.g. at the white borders on black Knights there; also the shapes of the pieces are better in PNG (SVG Pawns are too massive while the Bishops too small). Greetings, Ioannes Pragensis 14:19, 2 January 2007 (UTC)

Comments I can work with, thank you. Keep listing more without getting too pedantic. Cburnett 14:56, 2 January 2007 (UTC)

Generally I think the shape of the pieces is better in the diagram on the left, expecially the pawns and knights. Also, the black knight (on the left) has a bit of white outlining which helps. The other black pieces have a bit more white (at least on my screen) that helps them to look better. The prongs on the queen's crown look too crowded on the right. Bubba73 (talk), 18:31, 2 January 2007 (UTC)

Well, what Bubba73 said. The pieces shapes in the left diagram are better looking. There is more colour balance, that is to say: while the PNGs' borders are quite nice, the SVGs' borders are way too thin. Other than borders, the knight looks very.. er.. stiff. Almost all pieces lack balance between the upper part and the lower part, especially the king. His head is very big but his base is very small. I would draw the SVGs exactly like the PGNs, probably by importing the images to Adobe Illustrator or the program you use and draw over the lines. (The SVGs do look nice in the larger scale, but there is absolutely no need to show them in 90px!!) I don't know if the pieces look differently in other people's screens, the way it looks in my screen is in image:chessyyy.gif. -Sibahitalk 23:54, 2 January 2007 (UTC)

So far I have fixed pawns, rooks, bishops, and kings. Comments on those? Cburnett 02:23, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

I think that is a vast improvement! One thing, I liked the shape of the old SVG rook a little better, but that is not a big deal. Bubba73 (talk), 02:30, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

The old version is still on the commons. This is why I'd like to see these chess pieces changed to SVG. :) Basically, the old SVG was narrower and slightly taller. Cburnett 02:41, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

New queens and knights are uploaded. That should be all of them. Now which of all the above comments still stand? I know there are still subtle differences (in particular the "spine" of the knights") but at what point is it "good enough and tweakable to our heart's content in the future"? IMHO, they are good enough and anyone willing to spend hours perfecting the pieces is what wikipedia is all about. Cburnett 03:00, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

Good job, now there is very little difference. You are right about the spine of the knight - the white area on the black one helps define it a little better. And the shape of the old knight and old bishop are a little more what is usually printed in the literature. But I think that the differences are so small that the new ones are quite acceptable. About the only way they look inferior is a direct side by side comparison. In my opinion, these are good enough. Bubba73 (talk), 03:25, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

Question: in the old ones, besides putting an "X" (which you showed), you could also put a dot on a square as well as digits 1 through 9. These are needed - are they in the SVG version? Bubba73 (talk), 03:28, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

The best what I could find for the dot are: and Those would be nigh trivial to make if that's what you're referring to. As for digits 1 through 9, any particular size? The height of a chess piece or the size of the dot shwon above or somewhere inbetween? Cburnett 03:50, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

Those dots look fine. As far as the digits, probably about half the height of the squares, centered. See Corresponding squares. Also see King and pawn versus king for uses of dots and Xs. The SVG takes a lot longer to load. Bubba73 (talk), 04:09, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

Those above were the original PNGs, here's the SVGs: Here is #1 in SVG: The SVGs shouldn't take any longer after the first time media wiki converts the SVG to PNGs to actual viewing. I added numbers 1-9, dots, and X's to the diagram for comparison. Cburnett 06:19, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

Those look fine to me! Bubba73 (talk), 06:27, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

Thank you for all your feedback! If anyone else would like to chime in, that'd be great. Cburnett 06:31, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

The new pictures look much better, I still prefer the PGNs though (the SVGs are a little sharp.) I have to say I don't see the need to change to the SVGs. But since you're working on them any way, you might to try it for the vriants. -Sibahitalk 13:06, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

Have a read: commons:Commons:Transition to SVG. I don't think I really need to make my own case, do I? Cburnett 14:06, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

There is nothing at that page. Bubba73 (talk), 15:06, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

Fixed, needed another "commons:" in the link. Cburnett 15:13, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

Well, according to this link you posted: "SVG images use more server resources to generate than a normal image view." This is in no way practical for the Chess project, especially that many articles have an awful lot of diagrams. Besides, this article only mentions flags and the sort, and probably mathematical diagrams. I don't see how SVGs can be useful to the Chess project in particular. So, I guess you need to make your own case. -Sibahitalk 20:26, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

Server load is only when the file is rendered the first time. If the file doesn't change then the rendered version is cached and it's no faster than PNG (it is, in fact, converted to PNG). So the load issue is a moot issue since 26px is how their rendered everywhere in chess diagrams. Since that seems to be your only complaint, then I ask you want about SVGs don't fit the chess project? The last two disadvantages don't apply unless you can list technical deficiencies of my SVG images. So that leaves only positive reasons which are iterated in the link and, IMHO, self-evident to anyone who understands vector graphics (and this is not the place to argue the merits of vector graphics). So, really, what is your problem with SVGs? How pedantic and tedious do you want to get with comparisons? The SVGs are satisfactory to both Bubba73 and I. And, here's the best part, since they're SVG you have a lossless source that you can use to tweak and play with to get the pieces as perfect as you can possibly make them. Cburnett 22:03, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

In fact, the SVGs are re-downloading every single time I open the page. The only advantage for SVG over the current PGN is that you can get it larger. This a completely useless feature for the chess project, as you correctly pointed out "26px is how they're rendered everywhere in chess diagrams." The problem I have with the SVGs (and you're obviously taking this personally,) is that the PGNs are not arousing any problems, they're working perfectly well and adaptable to any other addition to the current set. And, as Andreas Kaufmann pointed out, they've already been used in non-template diagrams. My argument, simply put, "If it ain't broke, don't fix it." The PGNs are satisfactory to almost every member in Wikipedia. And none of these changes will be executed unless the people at MetaWiki go for their favour, so they can be applied to all Wikipedia projects. -Sibahitalk 12:38, 4 January 2007 (UTC)

First, it's PNG not PGN; if you're going to argue in favor of it at least be able to spell it right... Second, my only "taking it personally" is that basically all you've done here is complain. Calling my work "ugly" is a very poor way to start a conversation nor does do anything to your favor and saying that only creates animosity. So if you're complaining about me taking it personally then maybe you should be a tad more courteous (have I insulted you or your work?) and more tactful in what you say (see bubba73's and Ioannes Pragensis' response for tips). I can take criticism just fine but "ugly" is not helpful by any means and is an insult instead of constructive criticism. Don't complain when you started it. That said. The problem with PNGs is that they are raster-based images. I want to see a reference that vast majority of wikipedians not only are fine with PNGs but have an aversion for SVGs (two completely separate questions and I'm assuming a very vocal minor such as yourself). I'm fine with PNGs but, all things being equal, I'll gladly accept SVGs in their place. Category:Images which should be in SVG format is not empty. Neither is commons:Category:Images that should use vector graphics. Clearly there are many people who are in favor of a technological improvement despite PNGs not arousing problems. The move toward SVGs is not spearheaded by myself, which is pretty much your implication when you place the vast majority of wikipedians on "your side". IMHO, sticking with the "satisfactory" status quo simply for its sake is not a very good reason especially when your real complaint is aesthetics or, more specifically, "ugly[ness]". On a side tangent, if the SVGs are redownloading ever time then that's the fault of your browser since I just confirmed via the HTTP response headers that the rendered PNG is being cached by the squid servers meaning they are not being reconverted. In other words, your "problem/experience" is not due to the fact that it's a PNG-rendered SVG. Cburnett 21:00, 4 January 2007 (UTC)

First of all, I apologize for misspelling PNGs, if this offends you in any way! As for your work being 'ugly', I responded to what you said in your very first sentence "feel free to comment." 'Ugly' was the first comment that popped to my head, and I wasn't trying to start a conversation. I merely critisized your work. If there's any problem it's that you didn't accept my criticism. You simply remarked that it wasn't "constructive". (By the way, it is spelled "ugliness", and I am not even a native English speaker!) Second of all, there isn't a single comment here, except yours, suggesting the the SVGs are better than the PNGs. I am only talking about the Chess project, non-chess-diagram pictures cannot be included as examples. I still don't see why the change from PNG to SVG only in the chess project is needed, or how it will change any thing. Third of all, I am glad you said the problem is in my browser, because I use IE7. I can safely presume it is one of the most widely used browsers on the planet, can't I? The fact that they're being cached by the squid server (whatever this means) doesn't change anything about how my browser handles the images. However, in order to stop the "battle", this is my final comment; you will not hear from me - in this page, at least - again. -Sibahitalk 00:16, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

You need to read WP:CIVIL: "Treat your fellow editor as a respected and admired colleague, who is working in collaboration with you on an important project." Saying "The SVGs look ugly!" speaks neither out of respect nor like a colleague and you're willingness to drop an insult without caring how it will be interpreted and having zero interest in explaining yourself speaks volumes about you. You seem to have zero care nor give any recognition that I'm trying to improve wikipedia in the ways that I can. If you don't like my work, FINE! But if you can't convey that civily and without insults then you best keep your thoughts to yourself because as WP:CIVIL says: "...we have every right to demand civility." Asking anyone to "feel free to comment" doesn't mean insults are fair game. Cburnett 01:46, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Since Sibahi is withdrawing, then I'll wait for anyone else to chime in. I'm a nice guy and I won't bite your head off for chiming in or not liking my work. I welcome suggestions and input on how to improve my images. (I appreciate Bubba73's input immensly!) Just be civil about it... Cburnett 01:46, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Great job! However, I'm not really happy with the black knight. The spine almost grows out of its back. Can you move its top-part a little inwards, like in the png-version? And the black knight on white background has a completely different spine, it should be changed to match the rest. About USCF-style pieces. The current form of the chess template is already the second one. There was a long debate and a vote of the looks of it. Certainly you are free to create those new images but let's not replace the ones used in the template with them. Neither should we create a new, different-looking template nor add a parameter to the current template, as concistency between the diagrams in different pages is very important. ZeroOne ( talk | @ ) 23:14, 12 January 2007 (UTC)

I guess let me ask (in parallel, comments definitely still welcome) if there's anyone opposed to or supporting of switching from PNGs to SVGs? Cburnett 21:20, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

I think in general it would be nice to switch to SVG. It will be much easier to create fairy chess pieces from existing vector graphics pieces then from bitmap ones. However, I think the current SVG images still need some work: Besides this we also need compare PNG vs. SVG for Chess diagram small template, which also used in many chess article. Andreas Kaufmann 22:26, 5 January 2007 (UTC)
 * "X" is too large, it should be of the same size as in PNG (since it is usually used to show where the piece can move)
 * Black king has a strange white dot in the middle (not present in a larger image version - SVG rendering bug?)
 * White shadow on black knights could be wider (just as on PNG equivalent)
 * Black queen bottom part looks somewhat blurred.
 * SVG images for 6 fairy pieces are needed (see list in Template talk:Chess diagram), but this certainly could be done after images for standard pieces are settled.

Response: I will make a copy of Chess diagram small in a moment and place it above with the others. Cburnett 01:16, 6 January 2007 (UTC)
 * "X" is reduced.
 * The white dot has to do with the line being drawn. I can spend time trying to figure it out if it's that big of a deal
 * Increased shadow on black knights
 * PNG doesn't have a third line at the bottom so removing it made it look less cluttered
 * Since several fairy pieces depend on the regular ones then I'll wait until they are settled to make the fairy ones

White dot on black king is quite distracting, it would be nice to fix it. I think you need to separate two white arcs with a vertical black line in the middle. This is how it is done in PNG version. Andreas Kaufmann 17:13, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

Chess diagram using FEN
So i created a new template, Chess diagram-fen, which is pretty similar in capabilities to Chess diagram, except that you feed it the FEN string to draw the board. so instead of

you write

i will be happy to hear what you guys think. also, let me know if there's any missing feature, or if you have problems seeing the template with any specific browser, esp. older version of IE, and any mobile browser.

currently, the Chess diagram-fen template only deals with 8x8 boards, and does not support any of the "special" features, such as drawing X's and O's, digits, or fairy pieces. it *does* have one feature the regular template doesn't — it can display the board from the black's point of view, i.e. with h8 at the lower left corner.

the main thing, in my mind, is switching from the tedious and non-standard format of Template:Chess diagram to a standard and ubiquitous FEN notation. however, there is one additional advantage: wikipedia saves it more than twice as fast as it saves the existing template: e.g., User:קיפודנחש/sandbox contains 36 instances of Template:Chess diagram, and takes about 45 seconds to save, and in contrast User:קיפודנחש/sandbox2 contains 80 instances of Template:Chess diagram-fen, and takes less than 40 seconds to save. i do not believe it's even possible to have 80 instances of Template:Chess diagram on one page on enwiki — it would blow up with error/timeout when you try to save it.

peace - קיפודנחש (aka kipod) (talk) 07:49, 24 February 2013 (UTC)
 * It's very nice! Congratulations!OTAVIO1981 (talk) 14:21, 26 February 2013 (UTC)
 * Like again fascinating, Rosenkohl (talk) 14:59, 26 February 2013 (UTC)
 * I'm impressed, I think this could be a good replacement for the current chess diagram template for most uses. Quale (talk) 05:41, 27 February 2013 (UTC)


 * Wow, that took a lot of work! I see that Template:Chess diagram transcludes each row, which in turn transcludes each square, which takes a lot of processing power and generates a huge amount of HTML.  A different board game (Arimaa) has a template that is MUCH simpler.  Could it be adapted into an efficient chess template?
 * Template: Template:Arimaa_diagram
 * One page that uses it: Arimaa Mattj2 (talk) 05:33, 29 March 2013 (UTC)

There is more discussion of it here and here. Bubba73 You talkin' to me? 05:48, 27 February 2013 (UTC)

I'm working on a program to convert the diagrams in an article from the old format to the FEN format. I just did it to Rook and pawn versus rook endgame. My informal tests show the FEN version to be quite a bit faster when bringing up an article with a large number of diagrams to edit and to save it. This article has nearly 50 diagrams. To bring it up to edit with the old diagrams took about 23 seconds. With the FEN diagrams it takes about 7 seconds. To save it with the old diagrams took about 50 seconds but about 10-12 with the FEN diagrams. So it makes editing articles with a large number of diagrams nicer.

There are a couple of drawbacks to the FEN diagrams, though.
 * 1) You can look at the old style editing and see the diagram.  I can't visualize FEN.
 * 2) If you want to make a change to a diagram (e.g. put the king in a different place), it is hard to do with FEN.  Bubba73 You talkin' to me? 03:48, 30 April 2013 (UTC)


 * Is it possible to write a subprogram/routine which reads as input the visually easier 'Chess diagram' position info, and internally generates the equivalent FEN, to feed itself the FEN code? (It would seem to represent the best of both worlds then.) Ihardlythinkso (talk) 06:31, 30 April 2013 (UTC)


 * A few years ago I wrote a program to generate the "chess diagram" format. You can enter the board position visually and enter the header and footer and select parameters small and left/right.  It will also accept FEN input of the position instead of doing the position visually.  Yesterday I modified it so that it will convert an article (or part of it) from the old "chess diagram" format to the new "chess diagram-fen" format.


 * So it has two modes (1) generate an old-style diagram (visual or FEN input) and (2) convert old style to new FEN style. But it wouldn't take much work to have it input FEN and generate the FEN format diagram, if that is what you are asking.  Bubba73 You talkin' to me? 15:15, 30 April 2013 (UTC)


 * But simply inputting the FEN and outputting the FEN diagram doesn't save the user much effort, if any. But what you may be getting at is reading in an FEN, showing it visually, making a change (visually), and then generating the new FEN diagram.  Bubba73 You talkin' to me? 15:26, 30 April 2013 (UTC)


 * No, I think Ihardlythinkso has something else in mind. Divorce the input method from the template output.  The FEN diagram doesn't load faster than the old diagram because FEN is easier to parse than the grid parameter setup (the input), it's faster because it generates more compact HTML (the output).  The old chess diagram basically works by generating an 8x8 table and filling each cell with an image.  Examination of the output from the FEN diagram suggests that it uses a single background image for the board and then uses relative positioning to overlay an image only for filled squares (pieces, X and O marks, etc.).  It seems that it should be possible to write a template that accepts input similar to the current diagram but generates HTML in the style of the FEN diagram.  If this were done I might suggest some changes to the input codes.  The "lx" and "dx" business used by the current diagram template is odd.  More in keeping with traditional notation would be to use upper and lower case for white and black, as FEN itself does.  It's possible that two letter codes were chosen because some popular file systems have trouble with files whose names differ only in case.  Quale (talk) 22:51, 30 April 2013 (UTC)


 * Oh yea, I see. That sounds good.  I don't know anything about writing a template.  Bubba73 You talkin' to me? 23:17, 30 April 2013 (UTC)


 * The FEN diagram template is written in Lua, which is not one of the several languages I know. I also know next to nothing about Wikipedia templates, and on occasion I struggle just trying to use them.  Quale (talk) 23:24, 30 April 2013 (UTC)

=Notation= There seems to be a consensus that algebraic notation is used in all the chess articles. However, there are some details that in my opinion should be sorted out. Whether or not to use a space after the period, how many periods to use, whether to bold the moves or not and when to start a new row. Consider these examples:
 * 1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 (Scotch Game) Nc6 3.d4
 * 1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 (Scotch Game) 2..Nc6 3.d4
 * 1. e4 e5 2. Nf3 (Scotch Game) 2... Nc6 3. d4
 * 1. e4 e5 2. Nf3 (Scotch Game) 2... Nc6 3. d4
 * 1. e4 e5
 * 2. Nf3
 * (Scotch Game)
 * 2... Nc6
 * 3. d4

Opinions? --ZeroOne 15:07, 26 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Attention: 1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 is not Scotch Game! Correct is: 1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.d4 (Scotch Game) Mibelz 22:53, 18 November 2006 (UTC)

Sjakkalle 06:30, 29 Mar 2005 (UTC)
 * 1) On the subject of space or no space after periods I support no space after periods, simply because that has been the most common in the articles.
 * 2) On the subject of Bold/not Bold I think we should use bold sparingly, preferrably only to give main lines of important chess games or very major openings.

I have been trying to use no spaces consistently now to match the majority usage on wikipedia. In printed books, spaces are used, but periods aren't. This is different than what PGN specifies for its exchange format, but PGN does allow it. I think the moves look better without the periods and using an en-space between Black's move and the following move number: Also, the space between the move number and White's move should be a nonbreaking space so that lines break correctly. Unfortunately this is too much of a pain to actually write:
 * 1 e4 e5&ensp;2 Nf3 Nc6&ensp;3 d4 (Scotch Game) 3 &hellip; exd4&ensp;4 Nxd4

so I'm not recommending it. I don't like the look of bold at all. I've seen it in printed books, but I never thought it looked good there either. --Quale 06:38, 30 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Well, I guess someone has to be different. I prefer number + period + non-breaking-space, e.g., ''1. e4 e5''. I think it looks really good, and it's not that hard. If you're near the beginning of a line you can just use an ordinary space (that's pretty usual for commentary). Dwheeler 17:21, August 27, 2005 (UTC)

I prefer using spaces and no periods myself, but almost all the articles use periods, and that's all right with me too. I prefer no space after the period, just because it's simpler. Walter Chan 23:51, 2 September 2005 (UTC)

I prefer to use periods. The sample that Quale put up just seems kind of strange. If I could have my way, I'd have two guidelines - one for the main line:
 * 1. e4 e5
 * 2. Nf3
 * (Scotch Game)
 * 2. ... Nc6
 * 3. d4

and one for the text and variations: If the opening were 1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 (Scotch Game) Nc6 3.d4, that would be different. One continuation might be 3... exd4 4. Nxd4 (this is a long comment) 4... Nxd4. Does anyone like the idea of having two guidelines? To answer the actual questions:
 * periods: definitely yes
 * space: no opinion, but we should have a guideline
 * bold: leave to author
 * one move per line: leave to author

Sim man 19:55, 30 November 2005 (UTC)

My opinion: 1. Have have a period after the move number. I think that is most common in books, but I'm not sure. 2. As far as I can tell, there is at least a half-space after the period and before the move in printed material. Perhaps a full space. So I favor using a space. 3. Bold in main line only 4. elipsis - i used to use 1. ... e5 but I've switched to 1... e5. Bubba73 (talk), 04:34, 2 August 2006 (UTC)

After editing lotsa chess articles, I have a three-part view:

1. It seems there is some format consistency already well established. The common format, when bold isn't used, is periods without spaces. (There is a consistent exception to that though, with openings articles in the lead, when the opening moves are defined. Those instances almost always use space after the period.)

2. But I take issue with replicating the above convention for gamecores presented horizontally in bold. Reason? With all that bold & black going on, allsquishedtogether is harder to read and harder on the eyes. A space after the periods remedies the problem by putting some "air" in the gamescore, for example,

compare:

'''1.d4 Nf6 2.Nf3 e6 3.Bg5 c5 4.e3 cxd4 5.exd4 Be7 6.Nbd2 d6 7.c3 Nbd7 8.Bd3 b6 9.Nc4 Bb7 10.Qe2 Qc7 11.0-0 0-0 12.Rfe1 Rfe8 13.Rad1 Nf8 14.Bc1 Nd5 15.Ng5 b5 16.Na3 b4 17.cxb4 Nxb4 18.Qh5 Bxg5 19.Bxg5 Nxd3 20.Rxd3 Qa5 21.b4! Qf5 22.Rg3 h6 23.Nc4 Qd5 24.Ne3 Qb5''' (diagram) Torre wins with a queen sacrifice, as his rook and bishop form a grindstone that crushes Black with a series of checks and discovered checks. '''25.Bf6!! Qxh5 26.Rxg7+ Kh8 27.Rxf7+ Kg8 28.Rg7+ Kh8 29.Rxb7+ Kg8 30.Rg7+ Kh8 31.Rg5+ Kh7 32.Rxh5 Kg6 33.Rh3 Kxf6 34.Rxh6+ Kg5 35.Rh3 Reb8 36.Rg3+ Kf6 37.Rf3+ Kg6 38.a3 a5 39.bxa5 Rxa5 40.Nc4 Rd5 41.Rf4 Nd7 42.Rxe6+ Kg5 43.g3 1–0'''

to:

'''1. d4 Nf6 2. Nf3 e6 3. Bg5 c5 4. e3 cxd4 5. exd4 Be7 6. Nbd2 d6 7. c3 Nbd7 8. Bd3 b6 9. Nc4 Bb7 10. Qe2 Qc7 11. 0-0 0-0 12. Rfe1 Rfe8 13. Rad1 Nf8 14. Bc1 Nd5 15. Ng5 b5 16. Na3 b4 17. cxb4 Nxb4 18. Qh5 Bxg5 19. Bxg5 Nxd3 20. Rxd3 Qa5 21. b4! Qf5 22. Rg3 h6 23. Nc4 Qd5 24. Ne3 Qb5''' (diagram) Torre wins with a queen sacrifice, as his rook and bishop form a grindstone that crushes Black with a series of checks and discovered checks. '''25. Bf6!! Qxh5 26. Rxg7+ Kh8 27. Rxf7+ Kg8 28. Rg7+ Kh8 29. Rxb7+ Kg8 30. Rg7+ Kh8 31. Rg5+ Kh7 32. Rxh5 Kg6 33. Rh3 Kxf6 34. Rxh6+ Kg5 35. Rh3 Reb8 36. Rg3+ Kf6 37. Rf3+ Kg6 38. a3 a5 39. bxa5 Rxa5 40. Nc4 Rd5 41. Rf4 Nd7 42. Rxe6+ Kg5 43. g3 1–0'''

3. To be consistent with above, I think moves in bold, where ever they appear, should use the spaced format (e.g. instead of 1.Nf3 and 1...Nf6, 1. Nf3, and 1... Nf6) But I have to admit that looks sucky in the TOC, where subsection heads automatically bold moves and TOC delimitors confuse with move notation numbers (e.g.: 2.1 1. Nf3 is confusing).

So perhaps, only a series of moves presented horizontally in bold, should use the spaced format. (If not a series of moves, then non-spaced.) That would seem to be an exception complicating things, but an exception already exists for non-bold spacing in openings articles, where space after periods is used in leads when opening moves are defined.

That raises question, how many moves qualifies as "series of moves"? (Okay, I give up!) Ihardlythinkso (talk) 03:40, 3 January 2012 (UTC)
 * It's a matter of taste, indeed. I prefer no space after the period in all cases (bold or simple). --MrsHudson (talk) 21:44, 3 January 2012 (UTC)
 * My taste obviously differs from yours – bold without spaces for horizontal gamescores, is hard to read and hurts my eyes. But my point was not to solicit what your taste was – I already gathered that from your edits/reverts. There is no Project standard (convention), and obviously there are different tastes. To continue to edit-revert based on differing tastes, ad infinitum, amounts to wasted editing effort and pointlessness (inability to achieve any stable result). Are you content with that prescription?  Obviously I am not. I was trying to get your concurrence about that not being the way to continue. Ihardlythinkso (talk) 05:24, 4 January 2012 (UTC)

=Spelling=

Defense vs. Defence
How should the openings like Modern defense be named? In some talk-page someone stated that the last word (Opening/Defence/Attack) should be capitalized and no one argued. I'm only concerned about the word "defense" - defense or defence? The naming scheme should be consistent. My vote goes to Defense. Many are named as Defences but Defense easily wins the Googlefight and List of chess openings lists way more defenses than defences. ZeroOne 01:26, 8 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Good question. This is really the issue of American vs British English spelling. It's important that the usage be consistent within an article, but I don't think that we need to standardize across the board. Anyone who reads chess texts in English will encounter both spellings anyway. What I've tried to do so far is keep the spelling consistent with the spelling used by the creator of the article. Wikipedia encourages consistency within an article but discourages edits simply to change from American English to British or the other way around. When I write a new article, I spell it "defense" and put in a redirect from "defence" if appropriate. I think many people using the standard British spelling are doing the same in reverse. Quale 02:27, 8 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Yes, I think that's right (just in case it's not clear to non-native English speakers: "defence" is British English, while "defense" is American English). It's important to be consistent within each article, but attempting to use only "defence" or "defense" in all articles may lead to fights (people can get surprisingly worked up about this sort of thing). Incidentally, see Manual of Style for more on this. Camembert 18:58, 8 Apr 2005 (UTC)

White and Black vs. white and black
This is something I've been wondering in the chess articles. Sometimes the players' colors are capitalized, like this: A00 is the Encyclopaedia of Chess Openings designator for unconventional chess openings with an unusual first move from White. Where does this style originate from? I've never seen it in literature but on the other hand I've only read Finnish chess literature. ZeroOne 08:22, 8 Apr 2005 (UTC)

White and Black are used to stand in for the players' names, so the convention in English is to capitalize them just like any proper name. If you can substitute Kasparov or another player's name for White or Black, then White or Black should be capitalized. There is one point that can be slightly confusing. When writing about the color of the pieces or the squares on the board the lower case white and black are used. For the squares usually it's better to write light and dark instead, as in light-square bishop or dark-square bishop. For the pieces, you don't have to do it often because "the player of the black pieces" is just a long winded way to say "Black". A trickier point is whether the names of pieces should be capitalized under certain circumstances. It's always "each side begins with eight pawns", but I often read "trapping White's Queen". Mostly kings and queens seem to be honored with capitalization, but I don't know of a general rule. So far I've been using lower case for the piece names. If this is wrong, someone will fix it up at some point. Quale 18:01, 8 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Grabbing some books near my computer, I see the Oxford Companion to Chess does not capitalise "bishop", "king", "pawn" and so on; neither does Botvinnik's Best Games 1947-1970; nor does John Nunn's Best Games. On the other hand, my 1954 printing of Fine's Ideas Behind the Chess Opening does capitalise "Pawn", "Bishop" and so on. Obviously, it's hard to draw any great conclusions from a quick flick through four books, but my impression is that this kind of capitalisation isn't very common now, even if it once was. I personally give piece names lower-case initials. I agree with you about the capitalisation of "White" and "Black"; I think I made the same point on a talk page once with a couple of examples from the literature, but I can't find it right now. Camembert 18:51, 8 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Pronouns, should we use male, female or neutral?
On the article on the Queen's Gambit Accepted, there have been some edits and some reverts regarding the use of the male pronoun "he". The first one was made by an anon 64.230.179.10 which systematically replaced "he" with "it". That looked so wrong that I changed it back. Later, User:Iansk made another edit taking off the "he"s in order to make the article gender neutral,. This one looks good so I at least will let it stay.

My use of the male pronoun is of course not to imply that only men and boys can play chess. Although Bobby Fischer probably would disagree, girls and women are most certainly capable of playing chess, and are quite capable of defeating the likes of myself (I lost two consecutive games against girls, aged 13 and 11, last November) and even Kasparov (him at the hands of Judit Polgar). The use is because I want to imply that the players are people and not machines, and because nearly all chess books I have read use "he" when referring to the players. I feel that "he" has almost become a gender-neutral pronoun for use when the gender is undetermined.

Question: Should we use the male pronoun "he", the female pronoun "she", or avoid pronouns altogether to keep the chess articles gender neutral? The use of "it" is the only pronoun I will oppose. Sjakkalle 06:23, 18 Apr 2005 (UTC)

The question of gender neutrality is not an issue here because, he and she are just grammatical masculine and feminine pronouns and do not refer to biological gender. It is conventional to use the masculine form in places where a general pronoun is requires. One can, if need arises, use the Singular They, but personally I feel it might sound odd. Kartheeque 06:28, 18 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Good question. I try to be gender neutral when possible. Often this is awkward in English. In those cases I have used either he or she fairly randomly as the mood struck me. Singular they doesn't seem right in the context of a chess player, and I agree that "it" is definitely no good. Quale 06:40, 18 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Several years ago, I (iansk) worked for the chess publisher Batsford as Technical Editor. I still work in publishing. In publishing in general, editors are asked to use 'inclusive' language, avoiding gender-specific pronouns, wherever possible. Ideally, this should be done so that the text reads naturally – too many instances of 'he or she', for instance, make the text clumsy. In chess, one is usually discussing two unidentified players, conventionally personified as White and Black. One can use these 'names' in order to avoid male or female pronouns. Sentences like 'White needs to protect his king' can then be written as 'White's king requires protection', which is clear and unobtrusive. I found, during my time at Batsford, that this was the most effective approach. Iansk 11:01, 25 Apr 2005 (UTC)
 * Indeed. Gender-biassed pronouns in chess articles will expose us to more public ridicule such as the recent American (female) novelists category issue. Tony   (talk)  10:03, 2 May 2013 (UTC)

Does chess move punctuation count as sentence punctuation?
In Stalemate, there is a sentence In the position shown on the left, Keres played '''72. Qe5!!''' Should there be a period at the end of the sentence, or does the "!!" commenting on the move count as terminating the sentence? Bubba73 (talk), 00:11, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

No, it doesn't. The answer is in the question really; they are two different things - just check any chess book with annotated games for confirmation User:Brittle heaven

Well, on page 132 of BCE (Fine and Benko), a !! ends a sentence. On page 136, it doesn't (i.e. it is followed by a period). Bubba73 (talk), 04:15, 24 September 2006 (UTC)

I think !! or ? (as punctuation attached to a chess move) is a proper way to end a sentence, and that you don't need to tack on a period as well. But then as I recall, I was the one who removed the period from that very sentence, so you know my view. :-) Krakatoa 10:04, 24 September 2006 (UTC)

Might have been. I have much of a preference. I just think we should be consistent. I don't know which is more grammatically correct. But here BCE uses one style on one page and the other 4 pages later. To me, though, without a period it is harder to tell if it is the end of the sentence. If it is one of the others such as = or +/-, then what? Bubba73 (talk), 20:20, 24 September 2006 (UTC)

Maybe some would say you can end a sentence with those. But if it's a sentence with text in it (for example -- In the position shown on the left, Keres played 72. Qe5!!=), I, at least, would tack on a period at the end. Krakatoa 21:24, 24 September 2006 (UTC)

Grunfeld and naming conventions
Should Grunfeld be used instead of Grünfeld? Naming conventions (use English) indicates that it should. Bubba73 20:31, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

In my opinion definitely not. I don't even see anything to support your interpretation of the naming conventions. Namely it says that "There is disagreement as to whether German, Icelandic and Faroese names need transliteration for the characters ß, þ and ð. There is disagreement over whether to use œ and æ." Nothing on ü. Before those, it even says that "A survey that ran from April 2005 to October 2005 ended with a result of 62–46 (57.4%–42.6%) in favor of diacritics". Being Finnish, ä and ö are critical parts of my language so I know the need for the diacritics. Kimi Räikkönen, for example, sounds just silly when spelled "Raikkonen", not to mention spelling Teemu Selänne as "Selanne". ZeroOne 22:49, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

At the top it says "Article titles should use the Latin alphabet, not any other alphabets or other writing systems such as syllabaries or Chinese characters. However, any non-Latin-alphabet native name should be given within the first line of the article (with a Latin-alphabet transliteration if the English name does not correspond to a transliteration of the native name)". "ü" is not in the Latin alphabet, and it is not on US keyboards. A transliteration of it is "u", and there are books that do that. PS, I'm talking about in the title only. An American would type in "Grunfeld" in the search field, having ho practical way to type "Grünfeld". Bubba73 23:29, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

Doesn't the search function ignore diacritics anyway? Eliminator JR 00:17, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Aparantly not, because when I enter "Grunfeld 4.Bf4" it doesn't find "Grünfeld 4.Bf4". Bubba73 01:08, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Yes, you're right. Having said that, the main article (which is the only one now remaining) has a redirect from Grunfeld Defence (and Grunfeld Defense) anyway, so it probably doesn't make any difference now. Eliminator JR 01:35, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

In this specific instance, The Oxford Companion to Chess, MCO-14, and NCO all use the Grünfeld spelling, so we should too. I think it's appropriate to use the correct name and add redirects as needed to make it easy to find. WP:ENGLISH suggests use of the most common name in English. Although the Grunfeld and Gruenfeld transliterations were popular in the past, it looks to me that the recent trend is strongly toward using Grünfeld. I think this has to be considered case by case. I involved myself in some ugly business concerning the page titles of some chess bios (Talk:Arpad Elo) and there I felt strongly that the opposite result was correct. Quale 05:26, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

I agree with Quale here who argues for following general convention, due to the presence of diacritics in the most reputable pieces of literature which can be found, we can keep them here as well. We need to be dilligent about placing good redirects however. (I have faced similar problems when writing Norway-related articles since the Norwegian alphabet has three extra letters, leading to all sorts of complications on the English Wikipedia.) Sjakkalle 06:49, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

=Games=

PGN files
I am wanting to add links to PGN files to a number of articles in Category:Chess_games and possibly Category:Chess_openings. I noticed that Immortal game has one [[Media:Immortal game.pgn]] which was according to the history added by User: Camembert. I left a note for him asking for help on how to do this just now but though I woudl ask here as well. From reading through the documentation on uploading files it looks like only a very limited number of file types are supported. Mostly sounds and images. Is there a trick to this or can I just upload PGN and it will work? Also how do you get to the file info page for one of these once its uploaded? Talk 01:57, 22 Apr 2005 (UTC)

I've answered Dalf's question on my user page, but this is probably of wider interest, so I'll respond here too. Sadly, it is no longer possible, to the best of my knowledge, to upload PGN files. It was some time last year (I think) that they, together with uploads of all files not in certain image or sound formats, were stopped, apparently for security reasons (I'm not clever enough to understand exactly what the security reasons were; anybody interested should probably ask at the help desk, since the help pages on the subject seem rather lacking). Files in other formats which had already been uploaded were not deleted, which is why you still see PGN files around the place.

As for getting to the description page of these files: as far as I know, there's no way other than manually editing the address in your browser's location bar. So, for instance, to get to the PGN file Dalf mentions, one browses to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Immortal%20game.pgn

If I'm wrong about this, and there really is a way to still upload PGN files, I'd be very happy if somebody could let me know, since I have quite a few floating about my hard drive that would find happy homes in articles. --Camembert 14:08, 23 Apr 2005 (UTC)

"Games Collections" section on the chess template
The chess template may provide a way to solve a problem which has been bugging me for a while: links to games collections. In the "External links" section of nearly every major chess player, there is to a collection of their games - sometimes more than one link. chessgames.com seems to be the preferred link to use, but sometimes others are used. Recently there was a discussion here on whether another site's list of games (chessworld.net) was spam. The problem was, these different sites all might have slight advantages over one another. So should every player's page have links to their games at 2, 3, 4 or more sites? So instead, why not have EVERY player's page link to a page called something like "chess games collections", using the chess template? That page could provide detailed links to chessgames.com and whatever other games collections are out there. That way, rather when deciding whether or not an external link to a games page is spam, do it once on the "chess games collections" rather than 100 different times on 100 different player pages. Does this idea have merit? Rocksong 01:19, 20 December 2006 (UTC)

This is an interesting idea. My main concern with it though is that you'd lose one-click access to the games collection for a particular player; you'd have to manually search by name once you get to the external site. I like the ChessGames links in particular because they have biographical information, statistics, and user comments in addition to the games collection (which I find actually kind of sucks, since you cannot download a collection as PGN). What if we keep both the individual ChessGames links on player pages and have a Chess Game Collections article? SpuriousQ 02:16, 20 December 2006 (UTC)

Perhaps the "chess games collections" page could have all the relevant links: Kasparov's games at chessgames.com, Karpov's games at chessgames.com, etc. Of course that's still one extra click to get from Kasparov's page to Kasparov's games. I guess I'm suggesting trading off a small amount of browsing convenience, and in return gaining a large amount of editorial convenience (easier control of the spam links). Rocksong 04:57, 20 December 2006 (UTC)

It is an interesting idea, Rocksong, but I am rather against it because it means much more inconvenience for the readers. No only one click more, but also deciding which database to choose and searching in it. We, editors, should took the responsibility and decide what to link. Moreover, as SpuriousQ already mentioned, the purpose of the links is not only collection of games, but also more biographical information, and that is exactly why ChessGames is preferred at this time. - On the other side, I strongly support your idea to create an auxiliary article about collections of chess games and chess information on the web, maybe not in the main namespace. It should be linked from this wikiproject to help editors. Ioannes Pragensis 08:26, 20 December 2006 (UTC)

=Categories=

Categories for chess player biographies
Right now WP doesn't consistently use categories in the biography articles we have on chess players. The master category is Category:Chess players, with subcategories Category:Chess grandmasters and Category:Chess players by nationality. Naturally the Chess players by nationality category is broken down further, but we're missing a lot of nationalities that we should have. (Category:Jewish chess players is also a subcat. Strictly speaking "Jewish" is not a nationality, but there have been so many important Jewish players including many world champions, so I think this deserves a category and belongs as a subcat to Chess players by nationality.)

Here are my questions/suggestions. Any thoughts? Quale 21:33, 7 Jun 2005 (UTC)
 * 1) Currently many chess grandmasters are in both the Category:Chess players and Category: Chess grandmasters cats. My suggestion is to put the GMs only in the GM subcat.  Then the master category can include notable chess players who played before the FIDE GM title was instituted in 1950 (remembering that the Czar named the original 5 GMs in 1914) and other notable chess players like Stanley Kubrick who were not professionals.  Would that be OK?
 * 2) We need more categories in Category:Chess players by nationality. Unfortunately as an American I'm ignorant of some of the subtleties.  Category:British chess players probably can include the English and the Scotts, but I'm not sure what to do about the Irish and the Welsh.  There don't seem to be too many notable Irish players, though.
 * 3) What should we do with the former USSR? Should the category be USSR chess players?  Soviet chess players?  Something else?  Just categorize them in their home republic?
 * 4) How many cats by nationality do we want to put on a single player? Boris Spassky can be categorized as a Russian and a French chess player.  Many strong U.S. players are from former Soviet republics.  I think it's OK to categorize these players in both (or sometimes 3) cats that would apply.

I'm quite okay with all those suggestions. My opinions on the questions you asked are: Ireland is a sovereign nation, and if there are enough players from there, it needs its own category, Wales is not sovereign and can be classified under "British" however. Regarding the CIS countries, I think we should just classify them under the current republics (Russia, Ukraine, Estonia, etc.). About players who could belong in two or more national categories, I see no real reason not to do so, even though I have some reservations about placing Bobby Fischer in Category:Icelandic chess players. Some months ago we had the Category:Female chess players, but it was deleted and replaced with List of female chess players. IMO, that was a pity because it's quite tough to navigate using that list, but I was outvoted. Sjakkalle (Check!)  06:57, 8 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Thanks, good points. I think we're safe with Fischer because he will never be an Icelandic chess player (a cat we don't have yet, but there are some notables there) unless he plays serious chess again. I thought about this a little bit with Irina Krush. Although she was born in the Ukraine, I think she moved to the U.S. while quite young. I think perhaps she didn't play enough (or maybe any) significant chess in the Ukraine, so putting her in Category:Ukrainian chess players probably wouldn't be right. I wasn't around when WP removed Category:Female chess players and I don't watch the cat deletions anyway, but I probably would have voted to keep. We could consider a Category:Chess women's grandmasters since the WGM is a different title than GM. I think there are about 6-10 women with both titles and they would go in both cats. Clearly any woman with the GM title is a very special chess player. Quale 07:32, 8 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Use of {chessplayer-stubs}  I just moved A. A. Troitzky from Chess-stubs to Chessplayer-stubs. I think since the article is about a person, it is better in the new place, but he's not known as a chess player. Are there any objections to moving all articles about people related to chess to chessplayer-stubs? Sim man 01:27, 3 December 2005 (UTC)

Chess in the Soviet Union
We've kind of danced around how to categorize chess players from the former Soviet Union. So far, we've tried to categorize them in the appropriate Category:Chess players by nationality subcat for their home republic. I think we should continue to do this, but I also think we need to put them in a Category:Soviet chess players or Category:USSR chess players. The era of Soviet dominance of chess is important enough that it should be reflected in our categorizations, and we also have the difficulty that sometimes categorizing by home republic alone doesn't really fit well. No one should ever forget that Paul Keres was Estonian, but (please forgive me if this is a bad example) Efim Geller seems to be more accurately described as a Soviet than a Ukrainian, although of course both are correct. I think we should use both cats. What do our chess biographers think? Quale 05:40, 21 May 2007 (UTC)

Absolutely support, with a slight preference for the former ("Soviet" rather than "USSR"). I also agree that both cats should be used (i.e. keep Latvian, Estonian, Ukrainian etc). Peter Ballard 06:01, 21 May 2007 (UTC)

I agree with both Quale and Peter. The "Soviet School of Chess" is a topic which books have been written about, so it justifies a category for players who were of master strength during that era. Sjakkalle 06:17, 21 May 2007 (UTC)

That seems fine to me. Bubba73 19:58, 21 May 2007 (UTC)

It's been done in related fields (see Category:Soviet sportspeople) and it certainly makes sense here. On an unrelated note, welcome back, Sjakkalle! youngvalter 22:03, 21 May 2007 (UTC)

OK, I went through the cats we have for the former republics of the USSR and added Category:Soviet chess players to the appropriate pages, or at least the ones that seemed appropriate to me. It wasn't always possible for me to determine whether the cat was appropriate, so I erred on the side of not adding it if I was unsure. That means I have surely left a few bios out of the cat that should be in, but I hope I haven't put any in (or at least not many) that shouldn't be. Roughly the criteria I used, was add Soviet chess players if There's a problem with some use of the Category:Chess players by nationality subcats—I think they're used too liberally. Irina Krush was in Category:Ukrainian chess players. Admitedly this is a borderline case. She learned the moves in Ukraine at age 5 and then left promptly later that same year. No indication of tournament play or chess training in Ukraine, so I don't think that cat is appropriate and I removed it. Ukrainian-Americans would make sense, and then when category intersection is available some people might find it helpful. We also have had Bobby Fischer repeatedly put in Category:Icelandic chess players which in my view is just dumb. If Fischer plays a serious game of chess as an Icelandic citizen or does any significant chess writing as an Icelander the cat would be appropriate. I'm not holding my breath. If Karpov completely quit competitive chess today, and then 12+ years later retired to Aruba, would we categorize him as an Aruban chess player? (Karpov still plays exhibitions, which is more chess activity than Fischer has done in the last 25 years.) Taken to the logical extreme, Sergey Karjakin should be in the Soviet chess players cat since he was one year old before the USSR broke up. To me this is just common sense, but as has been often noted, common sense isn't very common. Sorry for venting.... Quale 15:47, 22 May 2007 (UTC)
 * article describes the player as "Soviet" (not many of these)
 * played in USSR Chess Championship or other Soviet tournament
 * received title (IM, GM) while in USSR
 * trained in Pioneer school (this is mentioned in a few bios)
 * lived in USSR as an adult (or obviously entire life) with strong reason to believe significant chess activity before emigrating or the USSR dissolved

The Soviet case is a special example, as made by history. I think that a dual or perhaps triple classification for certain players is best, according to circumstances. For Keres Estonian/Soviet, for Bronstein Ukrainian/Soviet, for Korchnoi Soviet/Swiss, for Gulko Soviet/ American, for Bohatirchuk Ukrainian/Soviet/Canadian, for Flohr Czechoslovakian/Soviet, for Lilienthal Hungarian/Soviet, and so on. For some it may be Soviet/Russian, or Russian/Soviet, if they were ethnic Russians, born before the founding of the USSR, or having lived after it ended. Best, Frank Dixon May 22, 2007.

Dears! The Soviet case is not a special example, as made by history! You ought to remember about other empires like Russia, Austria-Hungary (18th-20th c.) or even United Kingdom and Yugoslavia (20th c.). So, Category:Soviet chess players is as good as Category:Yugoslav chess players or Category:British chess players. By the way, Bobby Fischer - an American champion - as an Icelandic citizen (by his own choice) is an Icelandic chess player, like Alexei Shirov is Latvian/Spanish or Miguel Najdorf - Polish/Argentine. It has sense more than classification for Fricis Apšenieks as a Soviet chess player (because of occupation of Latvia by Soviets, one year before his death). And other example: such players like Winawer, Rosenthal, Sittenfeld, Taubenhaus, Salwe, Rubinstein, Flamberg, Przepiórka, Cukierman, Tartakower, Popiel, etc., were "Russian" or "Austrian" chess players because of occupation of Poland. All the best, Mibelz 20:20, 28 May 2007 (UTC)

No, I think it's clear that Fischer is not an Icelandic chess player, because he doesn't play chess any longer, and quit over a decade before he became an Icelandic citizen. To my knowledge, Fischer has not played a single tournament under the flag of Iceland. I don't think he writes about chess as an Icelandic citizen either. If a New York lawyer retires to Puerto Rico, that does not make him a Puerto Rican lawyer, since he never practiced law there. The cases of Shirov and Najdorf are completely unrelated as they have and had extensive chess careers following their changes in citizenship. If Fischer resumes his chess career in Iceland, that would change. It could be as easy as Fischer playing for Iceland in a single Olympiad. Quale 22:20, 28 May 2007 (UTC)

Hi Quale! In my opinion, Category:Chess players by nationality cannot include such categories like Category:Soviet chess players, Category:Austria-Hungarian chess players, Category:Czechoslovakian chess players, Category:Yugoslav chess players, etc. They were countries, not nationalities. There is also some problem with Category:British chess players because of Category:English chess players, Category:Scottish chess players and even Category:Irish chess players.... Mibelz 21:01, 28 May 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for your attention to these details. I think your concern is valid, and I think that renaming the parent cat to Category:Chess players by country would make sense. This would put it in line with Category:Sports by country, which includes Category:Sport in the Soviet Union and Category:Sport in Yugoslavia as subcategories. Although Sports by country doesn't have corresponding subcategories for Czechoslovakia or Austria-Hungary this doesn't necessarily mean they are unwanted, as it could simply be that they hadn't yet been needed. As for Poles during Russian occupation of Poland, I'm willing to follow the lead of others. Generally I think they are considered simply Polish and not Russian. Frédéric Chopin is perhaps a comparable case, and I've never seen him referred to as Russian. I'll let those who are more familiar with the details (as you probably are yourself) figure out how to handle these. Quale 22:20, 28 May 2007 (UTC)

Category:Yugoslav chess players
Our page for Dragoljub Minić currently says that he was Croatian, but an anon commented that he was a Serb. His places of birth (Titograd) and death (Novi Sad) strongly suggest Serb is correct. Does anyone know for sure? I have also asked at WikiProject Serbia hoping to get some help. Quale 03:50, 7 June 2007 (UTC)

Why not call him Yugoslav, since that is who he played most of his chess for? Peter Ballard 03:58, 7 June 2007 (UTC)

I support creation of Category:Yugoslav chess players, which should be made a subcat of Category:Chess players by nationality and Category:Chess in Yugoslavia. This would be much like the case of the Soviet Union which we discussed a short time ago. When Minić died in 2005 Yugoslavia had already broken up, but my guess is that he wasn't active in serious chess at that time. This cat would be helpful for cases like Milan Vidmar who died in 1962, and who is generally described as Yugoslav. Quale 05:09, 7 June 2007 (UTC)

=External links=

Links to chessworld.net
Hi all,

I have a question regarding links to chessworld.net. In September, one-purpose accounts User:Juicy Plums and User:Son of Zeus started to add them in huge quantities. I tried to stop them, and had a long discussion with them and with User:Kingscrusher (Tryfon), who is the webmaster of chessworld.net and appeared to defend them (he looked like their puppetmaster, read the discussion on my talk page). The negotiations were hard and ended with an agreement in the sense that Tryfon will not add the links in the future and I will not remove them. Then after two months or so, a new one-purpose account User:No65560 appeared and started the link-bombing again, in the same style as the late Son of Zeus/Juicy Plums/Trifon. Later, two "normal" users started a conflict about this: User:Eagle 101 removed all the links as linkspam and User:LittleOldMe added them back because he thinks that they are legitimate.

Now, my stance is slightly against the links, at least in cases where there is already a link to Chessgames.com. But this is only a weak opinion. What I think is that we should discuss it now and decide: Either I should add that the ChessWorld.net article has been deleted (PRODed, not AfDed).
 * Chessworld.net links are legitimate and should stay and we will defend them (and perhaps create a template similar to the Chessgames template), or
 * We will tolerate them but not support them, or
 * We will regard them as spam and combat them.

What is your opinion? Ioannes Pragensis 16:51, 17 November 2006 (UTC)

My vote: regard links to chessworld.net as spam and combat them. Chessgames.com is much better resource. Just consider a random page which has links to both sites: Semyon Alapin. Information about him on chessgames.com is much better and rich in content then on chessworld.net. There is no reason at all to put links to chessworld.net if you can link to corresponding Chessgames.com page instead. Andreas Kaufmann 19:37, 17 November 2006 (UTC)

I don't know much about it, I haven't seen the links. I thought about removing this link from chess strategy and tactics yesterday, but I didn't. Bubba73 (talk), 00:06, 18 November 2006 (UTC)

I (weakly) lean towards deleting the links. However, I do have a problem with giving chessgames.com special treatment. It may be the best games resource today, but will it always be? p.s. Thanks Ioannes Pragensis for alerting me to the existence of this project page. Rocksong 10:17, 18 November 2006 (UTC)

* In the actual games. † Links back to Wikipedia

My conclusion is that there is too much overlapping, and the extra features of ChessWorld are not enough to have both links. In addition, ChessWorld is a game site, ChessGames is a database site; and the interface is much better. '''They're not spam, but have no place in Wikipedia. Therefore, treat as spam.''' └ VodkaJazz / talk ┐ 10:27, 18 November 2006 (UTC)

We need to think long and hard on whether or not we even want any of these links. Please stop in #wikipedia-spam on the irc.freenode.org network to talk to some of our spam fighters. Right now we are regarding that site as spam. Eagle (ask me for help) 17:19, 18 November 2006 (UTC)

I added back numerous links to ChessWorld.net that because they had been summarily removed as spam. The majority of these articles had no link to ChessGames.com. How a table of comparisons is relevant in these instances is beyond my comprehension.

However, my main gripe is with the treatment that was meted out to the newcomer who added the links. If the administrator who reversed all the edits had, instead, been selective and only reversed those that already had a link to ChessGames, and substituted the others with a link to ChessGames, then I would have left well enough alone. In my opinion, reverting edits indiscriminately, in order to prove a point, is even worse than spamming.

I hope that once consensus is reached, if someone ignorant of the consensus adds an external link considered to be spam, that the dealings with that individual will be to encourage compliance rather than an immediate threat of a block. Please don't bite the newbies! LittleOldMe 13:36, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

Allow me only a small comment, LittleOldMe - I very much appreciate your openess to newcomers and wholeheartedly agree with you that we should help them. But if you look at the list of No65560's contributions (here), you see that he 1) does nothing more than adding the links, and 2) he adds them in a quick tempo and sorted in the alphabetical order (Balinas, Banikas, Baracz,..., Miton, Mkrtchian). This is not how newcomers work - in my opinion, this is rather how a professional linkspammer operate, who has a prepared list of links which he wishes to add. Therefore the question is not a question of newbies, but a question whether we like these links or not, regardless of No65560's feelings. Greetings Ioannes Pragensis 08:31, 21 November 2006 (UTC)

In those cases we need to link to games I go for chessgames.com, because it has a good interface and a reasonable databse with all games we are likely to ever want to link to. (It is not the best or largest database around however, the best I have found is www.chesslive.de, but the only way to access games there is by performing a search, so we cannot link to games found there). I don't think the links to the chessworld.net databases really qualify as "spam" however, the links are to valid chess information so I'm a bit on the fence here. Sjakkalle (Check!)  07:59, 21 November 2006 (UTC)

Agree with Sjakkalle, which is to say I don't have a strong opinion. I can't say that chessworld.net links are spam, but I don't know if every chess player article should have an external link to that site. I think I will have to defer to other people's judgement on this. Maybe the discussion will sway me one way or the other. Quale 00:57, 22 November 2006 (UTC)

Results of the discussion Since there were no new comments since 22nd, allow me to close the discussion. The results are: Thank you all for your time and wish you happy editing. Ioannes Pragensis 16:35, 24 November 2006 (UTC)
 * Where there is a link to chessgames.com, we will treat the links to chessworld.net as SPAM and combat them.
 * Where there is no link to chessgames.com, the discussion has no clear conclusion. Therefore I think that we should TOLERATE links to chessworld.net in such cases.
 * As Rocksong pointed out, we should be open to change the decision in the future, because the quality of game servers can change with time.

Forgive me for my late response to this contentious thread. I have been travelling extensively and have only just returned home.

I have to respond to these comments on two counts. As I made abundantly clear some time ago, I am not using multiple identities and my contributions were, and have been, made on my own initiative. I do not take 'orders' or 'advice' from others to form my own views and comments, and I find the implication that I am being manipulated as a mere puppet gratuitously offensive.

The whole tenor of these comments suggests to me, and to any independent observer, that there is considerable confusion among the respondents over the concept of spam and over the alleged differences between chessgames.com and chessworld.net. The general implications above are that chessgames.com is good and chessworld.net is bad. Clearly, this is arrant and immature nonsense. The two sites are different in nature and whilst both offer a database of quality games the chessworld.net site, as well as being primarily a playing site, actually offers significantly more games to the interested browser. There is also what can only be described as an arrogant presumption that chessgames.com is better '...because it has a good interface and a reasonable database with all games we are likely to ever want to link to.' The relative merits of various interfaces are matters of subjective rather than qualitative judgement and, in addition, the write clearly would have no concept whatsoever of which games any individual may or may not wish to link to. The whole concept of Wiki, in my, perhaps naive, opinion, is to allow a free and open access to a wide range of views and material unfettered by the selective views of a minority of users who, I would have to assume, have no more and no less authority to comment than any other user.

Finally, the view that No65560's contributions are the work of a 'professional linkspammer' shows a clear lack of understanding. A moments brief thought would have perhaps shown that the process of adding a series of links is, or can be, a relatively rapid process, not necessarily an indication of a 'professional' and the fact that the entries were in alphabetic order is more a reflection that the information was based upon a list of players in alphabetic order. Even the most naive newbie is more than capable of ordering thoughts and ideas in a logical basis. Son of Zeus 14:27, 29 November 2006 (UTC)

Hi all

Sorry for coming late into the discussion. I want to show the impact using an example of having a non-standard games database of very limited games like the chess games.com site, and I would like to use the player "Gavin Crawley" as an example. http://www.chessgames.com/player/gavin_crawley.html - 17 games in the database only as of 30th November 2006.

This was a player who didn't perhaps reach GM title but was exceptionally talented. He won the "Chess for peace" tournament among others in his team, with several victories against UK GMs. From the current Chessgames.com profile of him, he has:- +1 -8 +8 i.e. won 1, lost eight and drawn eight. This in my view shows this player in a really bad out-of-context light. It is because of the limited number of games available at chessgames.com. Do a search on Gavin Crawley on the Chessworld.net masters collection database:-

http://www.chessworld.net/chessclubs/statistics_pgn_tester.asp?whichpage=1&fr=1053&GameWhite=Crawley&ExactMatchWhite=0&OpeningAnalysisWhite=0&OpeningAnalysisBlack=0&ExactMatchBlack=0&GameResult=0&GameType=0&IgnoreColours=0&FENStringSearchEnabled=0&KeepFilters=1&showmovescore=0&showmovescorefirstline=0&suppressfilterheader=0&generatetournamentinfo=0

and you will see a very different statistical picture. The Chessworld.net masters collection also has a built in move-explorer, showing the Wins/Draws/Losses of this player - to the public free member. I can easily insert a new tab to get to this page for any player. When there are less than 1000 search results, the "move explorer" kicks in. The profile of Gavin Crawley is now very positive with 70 results found, and 31 wins found. This is in stark contrast to the Chessgames.com database.

So does Wiki want to mis-represent players abilities or not?! That is a key question which I am prepared to take the very highest levels of Wiki and message the entire Chessworld.net site about this injustice. If you wish to take a hand-tailored database of less than 500,000 games, and then use that to search for players games, I put it to you and any authority, there is a major risk of mis-representing the achievements of the chess player in question. This has also been put forward by the chessgame readers themselves as one of the biggest things they want - a bigger database of games.

Chessworld.net offers a bigger database of games, and therefore the opportunity to see the "rarer" games, or the games of famous players in their earlier years, etc. Who are you people to judge what games are not worthy of consideration to include or not?! If you want to filter out just the highest quality games on the Chessworld.net database, then by all means using the rating filter and just filter out players over 2600 Fide (another thing you cannot do with the Chessgames.com database as a free user or even paid user as far as I am aware). By all means use filter facilities to find high level games, but the importance of having a complete games database is the single biggest downfall of the Chessgames.com site in my view. It makes it absolutely prone to bias and judgement of the database compilers themselves and not the database users.

Chessworld.net deserves to be linked to - we have a dedicated server machine to our master collection, and the wider chess community deserves to get a richer view of chess players - not just the odd hand-picked game. Kingscrusher 18:17, 30 November 2006 (UTC)

Links to chessbook.net
I've brought this issue up here, since lack of communication among chess editors in the past has hurt the quality of articles. added links to chessbook.net on several chess opening articles, which User:Silly rabbit and I reverted. reverted our changes, citing similarities between chessbook.net and chessgames.com - see comments here. I removed the links to chessbook.net in the first place because its homepage states it is a "database of online blitz chess games", which aren't treated seriously by most chess players, and particularly not as a source of opening theory. On the other hand, chessgames is a general database, and almost all the games it contains are serious tournament games, which are much more valuable. Judging from the widespread use of Template:Chessgames player, there seems to be consensus that chessgames.com is indeed a useful resource, but I'm not convinced that chessbook.net is nearly as helpful. Thoughts, anyone? youngvalter 04:28, 24 May 2007 (UTC)

I'm glad you brought this up, because I was concerned about this also. I like the look of the chessbook.net pages and they aren't weighed down by ads (actually they're a much cleaner design than chessgames.com), but the quality of the data is very suspect. The page for 1.e4 (http://www.chessbook.net/chess/openings.html?id=e39e95497cbddb19&oid=e4b2e8637acf37d5) shows nearly twice as many double king pawn replies as Sicilians, which just seems wrong to me. The proportion of draws is way too low, which makes sense for blitz games, but doesn't even come close to the reality of good tournament play. I don't think the data is high enough quality to provide any value. I suggest we ax the chessbook.net links. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Quale (talk • contribs) 04:40, 24 May 2007

The fast chess article needs to be expanded, the chessbook site might be a useful resource there. ZeroOne 05:30, 24 May 2007 (UTC)

I'll admit that I did not examine the ChessBook.net homepage very closely (not that it has very much to say! :-) because my concern was the allegation of WP:SPAM, which I found to be totally unwarranted, as I documented on Silly rabbit's talk page as my sole reason for restoring the links. Having said that, even though I've been a member of the USCF for over four decades, and wrote my first chess playing algorithms in Fortran back in the 1970s, I really do not feel that I am in a position to judge the quality of the data base that provides their information ... I merely observed that the way in which the information is presented to readers looks as if ChessBook.net is using Very Similar (if not identical) algorithms to the ones used by ChessGames.com, that differ only in the cosmetics of how the information is displayed, and that it seemed like a reasonable companion (not the same as an alternative) to their information. I would prefer that the links be retained with some sort of cautionary warning (perhaps in an article for ChessBook.net) that their information is derived from online blitz chess games as opposed to OTB tournament games used by ChessGames.com, so that readers may take the information with an appropriate grain of salt and judge it for themselves, since Wikipedia is not censored. However, if there is a legitimate WP:Verifiability issue with their source data base, then I guess I won't object too strenuously to the deletion of links to their site, so long as: Now that I've contributed my 2¢ worth, I'm ready to MOVE ON ... Happy Editing! &mdash; 07:02, 24 May 2007 (UTC)
 * 1) the WP:V problems are documented somewhere in case this issue comes up again,
 * 2) the edit summaries for deletions/reverts point to that documentation,
 * 3) the deletions are not justified as being WP:SPAM links, and
 * 4) editors who attempt to add links to ChessBook.net in the future be notified on their talk page as to the reason for the revert, so that (a) they are "in the loop" and do not abandon participation in Wikipedia because of a Bad Experience with faceless editors, and (b) they won't try to do it again. (I have already done just that for 81.84.238.135, BTW.)

I think that even if the site is not spam and Wikipedia is not censored, we should also keep Wikipedia is not an indiscriminate collection of information. I think that blitz games are completely without importance for "serious" opening variants, and I can imagine the use of them only in cases of wild openings like 1.a3 which do not have much support in standard databases. In every case, the nature of the source must be clearly described, as 68.239.79.82 says. Happy Editing, too. Ioannes Pragensis 07:36, 24 May 2007 (UTC)

I agree that as Wikipedia is not an indiscriminate collection of information as Ioannes has pointed out, the links to chessbook.net should be removed. I also think that for chess openings articles, links to chessgames' Openings Explorer tool should be removed as well, since it requires a subscription for full access. youngvalter 01:03, 27 May 2007 (UTC)

I don't think that WP:NOT applies here, because that official policy has to do with the inclusion of information, not reference links to supplemental information, so having External links like these in chess opening articles: are perfectly appropriate in this context, IMHO, because they provide relevant information that is updated in real-time, not an indiscriminate collection of static information ... the question under discussion here is if links to one site's information should be excluded forever because the source of its data base is of questionable quality ("online blitz games" as opposed to "OTB tournament games.") And if you applied WP:EL in this situation, then you must also remove all citations from all articles that link to the NYT website, because it also requires registration for full access ... OTOH, links to NYT book reviews are a perfect example of the kind of denied access links that I delete whenever I encounter them (citing that very MOS guideline), although I usually replace them with a  that has a   value extracted from the EL reference so that it can be verified from microfiche at a local library ... I just omit (or remove) the   that automagically links the   value. &mdash;68.239.79.82 18:17, 27 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Chess Opening Explorer: 1. Nf3 on ChessGames.com
 * Chess Openings - Réti Opening on ChessBook.net

Again, I don't think online blitz games have any relevance to opening theory. In particular, this database seems only to incorporate games played on FICS, so it's not even comprehensive. Also, I was under the impression that one could register for free on NYT and get access to most of the content. Chessgames.com requires a paid subscription for full access to its Openings Explorer tool, however. And the information it provides can be found elsewhere, e.g. on NICBase. youngvalter 04:24, 3 June 2007 (UTC)

The idea of the site seems to be using blitz games to learn what the average player plays. You get a chance to study opening variations that grandmasters and high-level players usually dismiss as inferior, but yet are playable by most of us. The statistics are very meaningful for those that regularly play online chess. Take a look at the about page here. João Fonseca 19:35, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

=Other=

Help on a Knight's Tour image
Hi! I'm working on an article on The Turk, the chess playing automaton hoax. The machine was able to do the knight's tour, which we have an article of with a free image of a way to solve the knight's tour. I'm not good with images, but if I were to provide a picture from the book to someone to create an image of the knight's tour (I'm assuming since it's simply a chess puzzle that was completed by someone 300 years ago, copyright isn't an issue for the derivative), would someone be able to help? Thanks. badlydrawnjeff 02:49, 20 December 2006 (UTC)

Hi, we already have an article about the knight's tour, and the picture is there - use it if you wish. Greetings, Ioannes Pragensis 08:11, 20 December 2006 (UTC)

Yes, but it's not the format in which the Turk solved it, which is more of what I'm looking for. If I had any graphic abilities, I'd do it myself... badlydrawnjeff 11:42, 20 December 2006 (UTC)

OK, I understand. Why not take the image from the book? Is it copyrighted? Ioannes Pragensis 12:21, 20 December 2006 (UTC)

It appears to be (as the image gives the impression of it being made for it), and I wouldn't want to risk it anyway if it wasn't clear. An original derivative of the mapping would solve the quandry. I could possibly get away with a fair use rationale for it, but I know other people have made boards like this before and I haven't used any other fair use images on the article yet. badlydrawnjeff 13:11, 20 December 2006 (UTC)

Then try Graphic Lab - they should help you with creation of a vector graphics. Good luck! Ioannes Pragensis 14:25, 20 December 2006 (UTC)

Perfect, thank you! badlydrawnjeff 14:45, 20 December 2006 (UTC)