Approach Ko / discussion

RobertJasiek:

Ko is an ambiguous term. It refers to one particular shape, a class of shapes, a particular nature of a fight, the fact that a ko shape is under fight, etc. The most frequent usage is for the 2 adjacent intersections and its basic ko shape. To reduce ambiguity, the nature of a ko should not also be called "ko". Therefore, a new term shall be introduced:

An x-ko is a ko with x approach-moves that one side has to make while for the other side the ko is direct.

So a 0-ko is what was called a direct ko. A 1-ko is an indirect ko with 1 approach move (also called 1-move approach ko or 1-move approach move ko). A 2-ko is an indirect ko with 2 approach moves (also called 2-move approach ko or 2-move approach move ko). Etc.

RobertJasiek: Dieter, do you know the degree of harm you are doing by moving general, essential, elegant information to a discussion page to hide it? Do not forget to update all links like on BQMRJ000. Have you ever considered how tedious old-fashioned terminology of the 20th century can be? "5-step approach move ko that is a flower-viewing ko favouring Black, in that White can make the first ko-capture, in that White has 7 local ko threats, and that has the miai value x."

Dieter: It is perhaps poor timing of mine to edit out some of your personal comments in an attempt to create some other discussion than the ones on tie breakers. I will therefore restore your comments on the original page and leave it to others to judge if they are indeed essential, elegant or general.

I must however ask you not to be too emotionally attached to your signed contributions here, unless you keep them at a separate page. There is a tendency to keep parent pages unsigned and move the personal colour to homepages or subpages.

As for my opinion: the contribution is about ko in general. Moreover, I haven't read anything like it anywhere before, and insofar I can interpret it, it seems to be a very personal taxonomy and judgment you are giving on that page.

RobertJasiek: I absolutely do not expect my (or any other) name to remain attached to the contents after some WME. (It is immaterial who invents a term; this is different from who did, e.g., a mathematical proof. We also do not refer to James Davies whenever we speak of snapback.) I ask for the contents to remain on main page. Also I am not worried at all about your timing of WME.

Bill: I think that terminology pages should be short and sweet. Robert introduces new terminology related to the old term, and perhaps it is an improvement. So it deserves its own page, either stand alone, or a subpage of approach ko.

Herman Hiddema: Perhaps it can be merged into BQMRJ000 and then that page could be renamed to Classification Of Ko's? or Cyclical Plays And Their Values? or a similar title that describes the content better than BQMRJ000. This page could then be linked from the several X-step, X-stage, etc Ko pages.

RobertJasiek: BQMRJ000 is an example page - not a general page. A classification of kos can be 1000 times more demanding than studying numbers of approach moves. The contents of approach kos belongs to the page where x-kos are defined because the former is more specialized than the latter. Ok, if you do not want to be so proggressive, then the contents of both belongs on the same page anyway: Alternative 1: traditional definition. Alternative 2: modern definition. Furthermore, currently the approach ko page misses some alternative traditional names mentioned here: "1-move approach move ko" and "1-step approach move ko". IOW, currently that page is incomplete and one-sided. Made so by the WME.

Dieter: The "modern definition" is your personal project, which belongs on a separate page, since nowhere else in the go world this kind of terminology is used. It may be a fantastic proposal, but it currently does not have the support of a community using it. Should we document all such proposals of Go theorists and keep them on the main page, instead of hiding them as you call it (all info at SL is hidden then)? I think not. Let them have their own page and when people start using 1-ko in a major way, we can merge it back into the main page. The same for "1-move approach move ko." It may be very precise, but it is not used.

RobertJasiek:

1. Why then does SL provide information about specialists' terms at all? It is not supported by the go community. Why then is x-ko on a page called approach ko discussion when you think that it should get its own title?
2. 1-move approach move ko" and "1-step approach move ko" are used a lot in the literature. Some books change between approach ko and approach move ko carelessly. That you have not noticed this does not negate the fact. (I have better things to do than to cite places.)

Dieter: About 2: if that is so, by all means, improve the pages and if you know references, even better. A WME is not final. It is not my page because I WME'd it. I can indeed be wrong, a basic assumption in a discussion. I'd rather see these pages move towards better quality than having these endless debates. About 1: it has its own page now, I don't see the problem. You can continue this debate if you wish, but I suggest we move on.