gojac
I learned go while doing my masters degree in electronic engineering (digital signal processing, specifically). These days I waste too much time on my job, some (not enough) on sport, etc. to play much go. But I still enjoy the occasional game and teaching the basics to beginners.
I only started playing Go seriously at the end of February 2005, though I knew the rules and played two or three 9x9 games in previous years. I learned by playing games on DGS, KGS, and in "real life" on Thursday evenings at the Stellenbosch Go Club, South Africa. I am now in Switzerland though.
Reverse Rank history:
- Suffered unstable KGS rank due to too little activity, but lost "?" on 13 October 2006 to have rank 5kyu (following KGS ranking system modification)
- ?doublecheck?: Won "most improved 10kyu to 19kyu", September 2005 to September 2006 - 16kyu to 7kyu. Note that from April to September (6 months of the 12) I hadn't improved my rank, it was all in the first six months. Since the Cape Town Open, I've not been playing go a lot.
- 5th in the Stellenbosch Club Second Quarter Handicap Tournament, though lost all my games, 5th by SOS and a bye.
- 7kyu after winning all my games in the Cape Town Open on 1 April 2006, including an upset win against David (same one as below). Seems I'm quite erratic in performance?
- Participated in Stellenbosch Club First Quarter Handicap Tournament - 8th, had an upset loss against David.
- Demoted and re-promoted in the 2006 South African Open, blunders!
- 8kyu on 23 February 2006 (the deciding game was against an over-ranked player, doesn't feel as nice a promotion)
- 9kyu on 22 December 2005 (DGS on 12 May 2006, DragonTourney2005 final)
- 10kyu by 14 November 2005 (DGS on 11 May 2006, DragonTourney2005 final)
- 11kyu by 4 November 2005 (DGS on 22 December, KGS on 23 December)
- Won the Stellenbosch Club Fourth Quarter Handicap Tournament.
- 12kyu by 30 September (DGS on 22 September after winning a DragonTourney2005 game on time. KGS with "?" on 17 December, without "?" on 22 December)
- 13kyu by 23 September (DGS on 1 September, thanks to a DragonTourney2005 resignation, KGS on 16 October)
- 14kyu by 20 September (national ranking system update) (DGS on 23 August, KGS on 1 October.)
- Came third in the Stellenbosch Club Third Quarter Handicap Tournament
- 15kyu by 19 August (DGS on 12 August, thanks to DragonTourney2005. KGS on 25 September.)
- Won the Stellenbosch Second League on 2 August.
- 16kyu by 24 June (Won a scratch "2nd league" game against a 15kyu, resulted in both of us ending at 16kyu. DGS on 9 August, thanks to DragonTourney2005. KGS on 22 August.)
- 17kyu by 3 June (Briefly on KGS around 14 June, back on 22 July. DGS on 27 July, thanks to DragonTourney2005)
- Came second in the Stellenbosch Club Second Quarter Handicap Tournament - I was entered as 22kyu though...
- 18kyu by 18 May (national ranking system update) (KGS briefly on 14 June, only back on 17 July. Skipped 18kyu on DGS.)
- 19kyu on 13 May (DGS on 18 May, KGS before 15 May)
- 20kyu on 5 May (DGS on 14 May, KGS on 26 April, briefly)
- 21kyu on 11 April (KGS&DGS by 26 April)
- 22kyu on 1 April (KGS&DGS by 17 April)
- Joined Stellenbosch club on 11 March, 2005, at 23kyu.
Game count (KGS games against SAGC members counted twice, since they're usually also logged at the Stellenbosch club):
- 30 August 2005: ~250 games?, 15k: 108 KGS games (includes a few on smaller boards). 55 games logged at the Stellenbosch club (some are now counted twice, as they were KGS or DGS games). 39 "finished" games on DGS (about three timed out, ten were on smaller boards), 14 still running. About 2? games on IGS. Probably >20 19x19 games against GnuGo. Less than 10 other (unlogged) games. (SAGC 15k, DGS 14k, KGS 16k)
- 16 October 2005: Another 40 games, 12k: another 10 KGS games, 8 DGS games. 26 games logged at Stellenbosch Club, of which 4 were DGS or KGS.
- 14 November 2005: Another 29 games (total ~320?), just got promoted to 10k: another 2 KGS games, 7 on DGS and 20 games logged at Stellenbosch Club.
- 22 December 2005: Another 24 games (total ~345), finally got 9k promotion, after delaying a few weeks with stupid errors: 14 club games, one one colour go game, 4 KGS games, 5 DGS games.
- 24 February 2006: 8k promotion, 18 games (total ~365) 15 club games, 1 KGS game, 2 DGS games, came too easy thanks to an over-ranked player.
- 5 April 2006: 7k promotion on previous weekend's games, 19 games (total ~384), 17 club games, 2 DGS games.
Nick origin: the "GoJaC" nick originated 1996, when I was 14: it was my original gaming nick. It is therefore pure coincidence that it starts with "Go".
Some Go Bookmarks For Myself
- Stellenbosch Go Club
- My KGS games
- My KGS rank graph (the graph started out at 14k after I resigned against a person with 28k? rank that turned out to be around 13k... so the system thought "I must be just below 13k then")
- My DGS games (you have to be logged in to see this page, possibly as guest)
- My DGS rank graph (you have to be logged in to see this page, possibly as guest)
- The Interactive Way To Go This is where I started, and I think I recommend any other beginner to take a look!
- River Mountain Go - I only read this once I was already about 21k, but it looks useful.
Contact Me
Feel free to leave me a message below. If you need to contact me, you can also consider email or IM (Jabber or Google Talk)..
For people wanting to get in touch through email or IM, here is a casual-reading-or-spambot-proof description of my contact details: my username for Google Talk, Google Mail and jabber.org consists of my first name and the first characters of each of the words of my surname. A total of 7 characters thus.
Haai, Hugo
Ek sien jy het Go ontdek en dit gaan nie sleg nie. Het self een aand deur die Neelsie gedwaal en gaan sit vir 'n ronde Go saam met die club. Baie interessant, jammer ek kom nou nooit daarby uit nie. Maar sien hier is darem 'n klub in die stad ook. Ek hoop dit gaan nog goed daar.
Roux
Hey Roux, hoop jy kry eendag kans om bietjie te gaan speel in die Kaap. As jy 'n "regular" word daar sal ek jou seker een of ander tyd raakloop, ek sal nog gaan "kuier" daar op 'n Dinsdagaand, ek het nie enige ander verpligtinge dan nie.