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Axd
PageType: HomePage     Keywords: Clubs & Places, Software

my pic - took me a while to get it ... right LOL

Hello, world!

I'm Alexander Duytschaever, aka "Alex".

I learned about Go some time around 1985 while still in my hometown, (Gent, 5103N00344E, that's in Belgium, I was born there in 1967) when I stumbled upon a book written by Leon Vié (thx Frank Segers who helped me with the author's name). The black and white patterns fascinated me, and still do.

I remember I tried to introduce Go in a Shogi club that met in some cafe (forgot the name - it's a shop now) not far from the Botermarkt/Belfortstraat, without much success however. A few years later I had the occasion to start really discovering Go together with a former colleague, Christophe Fichefet. We later tried the ASCII interface of NNGS - a rather unsatisfactory way to play - until DGS and KGS came in sight.

I discovered DragonGoServer in June 2003; this refuelled my addiction for this so fascinating game. ([ext] invite me, my user ID is [ext] axd). Later I also joined KGS (same id).

[ext] BGF member since January 2004.

Feel free to browse my Go webpage at [ext] http://users.pandora.be/dual/go (especially the wallpaper section!)


Clubbing!

I'm living in Hasselt (Belgium, 5090N00554E) and would like to create a Go club here to group players living in the (Belgian) Limburg region.

Candidate/temporary locations:

Fitlink
A room somewhere on the Universitaire Campus?
to be investigated
Cultureel Centrum?
Stedelijk Conservatorium?
[ext] Japanse Tuin
might be an interesting place to organise club meetings and tournaments. (closed in the winter.)

[email] mail me if you are interested, or leave a message on DGS ([ext] message:axd) or KGS.


Literature

GO, Het oudste denkspel, Léon Vié, 1979 (?), Uitg. J.F. Duwaer & Zn.
If I remember well, this was the book that introduced me to the game.
GoForBeginners (Dutch)
first book I bought - my sole reference for years (because I didn't have anything else)...
GoAndGoMoku (Dover, 2nd ed.)
I liked this book because it dated back to the years '30
KawabatasMasterOfGo (Dutch, De meester van het go-spel, BZZToH 1987)
found at [ext] De Slegte

Still busy reading:

TesujiTheBook
StrategicFundamentalsInGo
OpeningTheoryMadeEasy
The33Point

Free SGF editors I recommend:

MultiGo
easy to use, quick, promising
cGoban2
the client used on KGS, can also be used as SGF editor
Jago
I don't use it often any more, but it is nice if you want to play across the Internet without a need for a Go server.

Various links

BeginnerStudySection
maybe a good starting point
Uxs
Kris created an interesting summary of terms/concepts
DietersIdeasOnGoTheory
HandicapForSmallerBoardSizes
nice to know what handicap to use on smaller boards
DGSWishlist
I always want more features!!!
RGGFAQ
Chris Lawrence (holosys)
made some [ext] gorgeous pics of his freshly acquired Go set
[ext] http://www.kurokigoishi.co.jp/
that's where I hope to buy a goban one day...
[ext] Chess and GO no-brainers?

ComputerAssistedGo?

This is a scratch space for a candidate ComputerAssistedGo? page, for discussing and collecting tools and concepts to be used during analysis as well as during play and to discuss ethics, future and possibilities of this extension to the human mind (Go playing using assistance software, not to replace human decision making - the borderline is very fuzzy, yes).

Although technically already feasible (and in some extent already in use), I think in the future a separate type of online playing might exist, where consenting players are assisted by software while playing.

My approach might tell more about my lack of Go knowledge (or a naive view of things) rather than introduce new ideas: do I underestimate the possibilities of such software, will it never really be useful? Maybe I will change my mind as I dig deeper into Go, only to find how foolish I was to reflect on this matter? Comments about this are welcome as well.

Some question to debate over:

  • is this (ethically) permitted?
  • Will this negatively impact the game of Go?
  • Does it make sense to advocate against it?
  • The borderline with true Go-playing software, where the move decision is taken by software, is very thin here; how do we subdivide this domain into "acceptable" tools and "not acceptable" (in this context, as the use of any tool is already unacceptable in the "classic" sense); what tools are available?
  • can advances in technology (processing speed, memory...) make this cyberGo unacceptable (i.e. it should never be acceptable that of two people playing cyberGo, the one with the better machine would have the edge - maybe a weak argument...)

Related pages

Some notes:

  • manual features (Player decides on values)
    • persistent concepts (are not linked to a move, cannot be stored in current SGF versions):
      • persistent concepts are stored in their layers that can be switched on/off
      • symbols can be added and deleted
      • (visual representation of) status of groups; alive-dead-weak-strong groups
      • confirmed territory - points (help counting during the game) - neutral - undecided
      • allow to classify potential playing points with a prio and/or value; drag the label to another classified point to reshuffle priorities; supported by special variant to variations concept aimed at evaluating the value of a point (what if Black plays first/what if White playes first => resulting value)
    • automatic replies
    • manually built game tree to explore variations
      • current move sequence highlighted in other branches, to find recurring patterns (Directed Acyclic Graph, Transposition ?)
      • allows to indicate preferred responses; allow automatic replies based on the currently built game tree;
  • automatic features (mainly counting stuff)
    • automatic ladder detection, life & death of groups? - probably not acceptable
    • present groups with 1-2-N liberties left -> ko threats, atari, double atari threats; Benson's Algorithm
    • strength and liberties of friend/foe contact groups, in relation with own group status
    • influence function - voronoi??
    • Adjusted Length Analysis
    • QARTS
    • ModularThinking support
    • manually indicating a shaded area (as in Kombiloo) for local evaluations: can be automated by taking the smallest involved area over all subbranches
  • databases, dictionnaries of any kind are not acceptable?
  • window tracking: the cyberGo application monitors and mirrors the current user board (presented in another application window). the idea is to be able to use this app together with any Go client.
  • Speculation
  • options
    • possibility to switch between SGF sibling style and children style?

Scratchpad for candidate Go Variants

  • add-on to the "fog of war" concept in PhantomGo: each side divides the complete goban into arbitrary sectors, each allocated to a team member responsible for it. moves and inter-member communication is time-delayed by the server.
  • extension of the toroidal board idea: tile an (NxM) goban to produce a toroidal playing space. Then, introduce a "shear" by sliding two adjacent tiles X points along a common edge in one direction. The resulting tiling gets a sheared appearance. Now apply a second shear operation of Y points along the other edge: a XxY sized "gap" will appear and serves as a secondary goban.
% please correct term "sheared" if the term is not correct

Some pages that might become interesting:

  • SLWishlist?
  • DesigningAGoClient? (features that should be present in a Go client software)
    • variations, SGF merge of different reviews of the same game
    • ko idication
    • playback features
      • highlight a square, show move history only inside/near that square

Orphans I'd like to adopt for a while, because they do not deserve to be deleted...

DesigningAGoServer
needs to be repositioned

And before you leave my page...

Leave your message here if you feel the need for it...


http://www.dragongoserver.net/ratingpng.php?uid=3209&startyear=2003&startmonth=8&size=500.png http://kgs.kiseido.com/servlet/graph/axd-en_US.png


My own little sandbox...

Diagrams

I wonder if it would be better to use a specific convention for diagram titles on SL. The idea is that every diagram is a continuation of a previous one (except if a root diagram), and thus the title should be <parent diagram title>.<variation in that parent>

[Diagram]
Dia 1

[1]

[Diagram]
Dia 1.a

[2]Continuation from Dia 1: W4 tenuki



[Diagram]
Dia 1.b

[3]Continuation from Dia 1:



[Diagram]
Dia 1.b.a

[4]Continuation from Dia 1.b



[Diagram]
Dia 1.b.b

[5]Continuation from Dia 1.b



(continued...)



This is a copy of the living page "Axd" at Sensei's Library.
(OC) 2004 the Authors, published under the OpenContent License V1.0.