scid vs chessbase
Dr. David Kirkby
I downloaded chessbase light and thought it was a pretty rotten
application, but many seem happy with the commercial version. I'm just
interested how scid compares with chessbase, and what (if any)
advantages chessbase has. The two main attractions for scid for me are
that
a) It's free
b) It runs under UNIX (A Windoze version is available too).
One of the problems I have is that I don't really know how best to use
these database programs, so don't know what features are useful and
what are not. I guess with time I will learn more about the advantages
of using them.
Dr. David Kirkby
email address can be found at:
http://atlc.sourceforge.net/contact.html
CeeBee
wrote in rec.games.chess.computer:
> Would anyone who has used scid and chessbase comment how they compare?
> I downloaded chessbase light and thought it was a pretty rotten
> application, but many seem happy with the commercial version. I'm just
> interested how scid compares with chessbase, and what (if any)
> advantages chessbase has. The two main attractions for scid for me are
> that
>
> a) It's free
> b) It runs under UNIX (A Windoze version is available too).
>
> One of the problems I have is that I don't really know how best to use
> these database programs, so don't know what features are useful and
> what are not. I guess with time I will learn more about the advantages
> of using them.
CB Light is an old application based on CB6. In the mean time, CB9 is
probably peeking around the corner.
CB Light and the current CB8 are hardly comparable.
SCID is a fine application, which works well and can teach you want you
want with a database for free. Many stick with it because it's all they
ever need.
The components in CB8 are more integrated than in SCID, and I found CB8
to be working more intuitive. Also there's a smooth design, and the
possibility to work with both the native CB format databases and PGN as
well.
Futhermore repertoire options and search masks in CB are more
sophisticated, and if you need that, CB will better cater you.
Don't forget there's also Chess Assistant on the market. There's a
freeware download of CA Light at http://www.convekta.com/downloads.asp
Give it a try as well, maybe you're more inclined to Convekta's baby
than to ChessBase's kid.
Good luck.
--
CeeBee
"I am not a crook"
JVarsoke
> Would anyone who has used scid and chessbase comment how they compare?
I own CB7, CB8 and scid. I bought CB out of typical new hobbiest
enthusiasm; obviously spending $150 would improve my game
tremendiously! Of course, it didn't.
The 2 biggest advantages of CB8 are 1) it is more user friendly. 2)
it reads CB formatted files (like those sold for opening instruction).
And really, being "more" user friendly in no way means it is user
friendly. The interface is not very intuitive and things are
organized poorly. But still, slightly better than Scid.
As for its power, versitility and usefulness, I'd say unless you're
interested in doing something very specific that only CB8 does, you
probably won't want of anything by using Scid.
Since I encountered Scid, I've wished I had my $150 back.
I suggest you try Scid, if you find it lacking something that you're
willing to pay $150 for, then buy CB8. Of course, you might instead
just send Shane (scid author) an email and request the features -- and
perhaps send HIM the $150 ;).
-tt
pgeorges
> I own CB7, CB8 and scid. I bought CB out of typical new hobbiest
> enthusiasm; obviously spending $150 would improve my game
> tremendiously! Of course, it didn't.
>
> The 2 biggest advantages of CB8 are 1) it is more user friendly. 2)
> it reads CB formatted files (like those sold for opening instruction).
> And really, being "more" user friendly in no way means it is user
> friendly. The interface is not very intuitive and things are
> organized poorly. But still, slightly better than Scid.
>
> As for its power, versitility and usefulness, I'd say unless you're
> interested in doing something very specific that only CB8 does, you
> probably won't want of anything by using Scid.
>
> Since I encountered Scid, I've wished I had my $150 back.
>
> I suggest you try Scid, if you find it lacking something that you're
> willing to pay $150 for, then buy CB8. Of course, you might instead
> just send Shane (scid author) an email and request the features -- and
> perhaps send HIM the $150 ;).
I did the same, by buying Fritz 8 and Chessmaster 9000. The later has
great tutorials, but for game analysis I still prefer Scid + Crafty
(clearer, more efficient).
And moreover, I don't have to quit Linux to play chess :-)
So yes, it's more efficient to send money directly to Scid's author,
even if Scid is free ...
Chris Scebelo
"JVarsoke" <usenet.9...@spamgourmet.com> wrote in message
news:bfa58f21.04010...@posting.google.com...
Jack
> SCID is a truly great product and for free it's even greater.
>
I'd have to agree that SCID is a killer application. Very simple,
clear, and easy to use. I've tried chessbase lite but find it's
many cryptic buttons simply too confusing. The most important
function I use in SCID is the tree function, and I like the way
the tables are presented. Chessbase lite has a wierd way of presenting
the stats.
Douglas L Stewart
buying Chessbase after trying SCID for a while.
For me it really came down to what I wanted to spend my time on - studying
chess or working on my computer. I chose chess. I just didn't want to
spend the time it took to find my own reference databases and search for new
games. I wanted to throw money at that problem and let someone else worry
about it.
That isn't to say that SCID is bad, because I was very impressed with it,
although I wish it was written in some other language. I just wanted to
focus my time on my chess study and have easy access to a real big game
database. If you're low on funds SCID will definitely keep you happy.
My computer chess tools are:
* Bookup to track my opening repertoire (I bought Bookup first plus it seems
to be better suited for that task)
* Chessbase
* Fritz
* Mega database 2004 and Endgame Turbo II
"Dr. David Kirkby" <see_my_signature_f...@hotmail.com> wrote
in message news:c99d2c79.04010...@posting.google.com...
Euc1id
too. But I'm a windows guy, and I don't like Scid. Too unintegrated from a
modern windows design standpoint. For me there's no question: CB8 wins by a
furlong. However I don't think many people really need CB8. Many of the same
features are built into the Fritz8/Shredder7 GUI, so I'd try them first. Buy
CB8 only if you need more database operations and versatility. Of course if
you're filthy rich, just buy CB8 straightaway and you've got the best.
--
Euc1id
"Dr. David Kirkby" <see_my_signature_f...@hotmail.com> wrote
in message news:c99d2c79.04010...@posting.google.com...
Dr. David Kirkby
> "Dr. David Kirkby" <see_my_signature_f...@hotmail.com> wrote
> in message news:c99d2c79.04010...@posting.google.com...
> > Would anyone who has used scid and chessbase comment how they compare?
> > I downloaded chessbase light and thought it was a pretty rotten
> > application, but many seem happy with the commercial version. I'm just
> > interested how scid compares with chessbase, and what (if any)
> > advantages chessbase has. The two main attractions for scid for me are
> > that
> >
> > a) It's free
> > b) It runs under UNIX (A Windoze version is available too).
> >
> > One of the problems I have is that I don't really know how best to use
> > these database programs, so don't know what features are useful and
> > what are not. I guess with time I will learn more about the advantages
> > of using them.
> >
> > Dr. David Kirkby
> >
> > email address can be found at:
> > http://atlc.sourceforge.net/contact.html
> I've been running Linux for years and I'm an open source fan, but I ended up
> buying Chessbase after trying SCID for a while.
Interesting you say that.
> For me it really came down to what I wanted to spend my time on - studying
> chess or working on my computer. I chose chess. I just didn't want to
> spend the time it took to find my own reference databases and search for new
> games. I wanted to throw money at that problem and let someone else worry
> about it.
I'm still sure I know the real reason for using these database
programs. I can store my own games, there's a nice interface to crafty
for analysis, but what do you mean by 'reference database' ? There
seems to be 1001 (well actually several million) games avaiable all
over the place in PGN format. Clearly the quality of the games varies
when you have several million, but there are plenty of ways of obtain
tens, perhaps 100,000's games in PGN format. So what exactly is a
'reference database'?
Does chessbase export PGN format games? If so (apart from any
copyright reasons) is there any reason you can't distribute the
'reference database', or is it only readable by chessbase?
> That isn't to say that SCID is bad, because I was very impressed with it,
> although I wish it was written in some other language. I just wanted to
> focus my time on my chess study and have easy access to a real big game
> database. If you're low on funds SCID will definitely keep you happy.
How do you use chessbase or scid best for 'chess study'? Sorry to
sound so ignorant of the matter, but I'm just keen to know the real
reason for using these programs. Sure I can search for GM games and
see how they opened, but I guess I must
> My computer chess tools are:
>
> * Bookup to track my opening repertoire (I bought Bookup first plus it seems
> to be better suited for that task)
> * Chessbase
> * Fritz
> * Mega database 2004 and Endgame Turbo II
Quite a bit of $$'s I expect you spent on that lot.
Dr. David Kirkby.
Euc1id
programs. I can store my own games, there's a nice interface to crafty
for analysis, but what do you mean by 'reference database' ? There
seems to be 1001 (well actually several million) games avaiable all
over the place in PGN format. Clearly the quality of the games varies
when you have several million, but there are plenty of ways of obtain
tens, perhaps 100,000's games in PGN format. So what exactly is a
'reference database'?
A: 'Reference database' is just a big database that the software uses for
it's internal workings. I haven't found it of any importance. You can
designate any of your databases as the 'reference database'. You must do so,
or Chessbase refuses to perform certain operations. I find it more of a
nuisance than of any value. Don't worry about it, because it's not
important!
Q: Does chessbase export PGN format games? If so (apart from any
copyright reasons) is there any reason you can't distribute the
'reference database', or is it only readable by chessbase?
A: Chessbase can import or export games in PGN format if you wish. However
it ordinarily stores them in its own format which uses a lot less space. PGN
format is a memory hog. I'm not sure what you mean by "distribute" a
database. You can export any games/databases with Chessbase. Again, there's
nothing special about the 'reference database', which only causes confusion
and has no value. Forget about it!
Q: How do you use chessbase or scid best for 'chess study'? Sorry to
sound so ignorant of the matter, but I'm just keen to know the real
reason for using these programs. Sure I can search for GM games and
see how they opened, but I guess I must
A: It depends on what you want to do. It's versatile. It will generally
accommodate your wishes/needs. For example I use it primarily to manage my
databases. I have several large databases from different sources. I make
various opening books from them, which I can access either with Chessbase or
Fritz, Shredder, etc. Typically I want to know the statistics for a
particular opening position, which is fast & easy after you've set up
opening books associated with each database. Occasionally I want to access a
particular game(s) corresponding to an opening position, which is of course
easy to do with any database. I note that the Fritz7-8/Shredder7 GUI works
just as well as Chessbase for most of these operations, so most people don't
really need Chessbase.
--
Euc1id
Andy Prap
Chess Databases are all of them a question mark when you start using
them. A suggestion is to start with something free as CB Light and
SCID. CB Light has a limitaion in the number of games you can store.
Regarding SCID a first approach you can find is at
http://www.freewebs.com/pc-chess/. There you will find also files to
fill your database, as well as some hints on SCID. Some other issues
can be seen in SCID Forum.
Regards
Andy (Dr.Ing.)
Noah Roberts
> I'm still sure I know the real reason for using these database
> programs. I can store my own games, there's a nice interface to crafty
> for analysis, but what do you mean by 'reference database' ?
In SCID, and probably the rest as well, it means a database that you use
as a reference while analyzing your games. It should contain a large
supply of GM games that you can use to search for openings and various
positions.
There
> seems to be 1001 (well actually several million) games avaiable all
> over the place in PGN format. Clearly the quality of the games varies
> when you have several million, but there are plenty of ways of obtain
> tens, perhaps 100,000's games in PGN format. So what exactly is a
> 'reference database'?
When I got scid there was a reference database available for download at
the same site. It was already filtered and split into sections based on
year.
>
> Does chessbase export PGN format games? If so (apart from any
> copyright reasons) is there any reason you can't distribute the
> 'reference database', or is it only readable by chessbase?
I believe there are several chessbase reference databases distributed in
PGN. CeeBee posted a site that contained a bunch of PGN files a couple
of months ago I believe...may have been someone else.
>
> How do you use chessbase or scid best for 'chess study'? Sorry to
> sound so ignorant of the matter, but I'm just keen to know the real
> reason for using these programs. Sure I can search for GM games and
> see how they opened, but I guess I must
You can search your reference database for positions in your own games
and see what GM's did or find out that no GM reached this position. I
am sure there are other things you can do as well.
NR
Douglas L Stewart
studying
> > chess or working on my computer. I chose chess. I just didn't want to
> > spend the time it took to find my own reference databases and search for
new
> > games. I wanted to throw money at that problem and let someone else
worry
> > about it.
>
> I'm still sure I know the real reason for using these database
> programs. I can store my own games, there's a nice interface to crafty
> for analysis, but what do you mean by 'reference database' ? There
> seems to be 1001 (well actually several million) games avaiable all
> over the place in PGN format. Clearly the quality of the games varies
> when you have several million, but there are plenty of ways of obtain
> tens, perhaps 100,000's games in PGN format. So what exactly is a
> 'reference database'?
I own a number of chess books, but I have moves come up in my games all the
time where the move looks reasonable (and usually is), but I'm not quite
sure how to proceed against it. What I really want to do at that point is
after the tournament research to see if the position has occured before and
what people usually play against it. Chessbase (and SCID) will let you know
what moves are played how often and what the winning percentage is, but if
you're looking at low quality games the information isn't as meaningful.
My reference database consists of Chessbase's Megadatabase (a few million
games, a reasonable number of which have been annotated), the games that get
downloaded automatically by The Week in Chess, and whatever other games seem
important enough for me to put in there.
> Does chessbase export PGN format games? If so (apart from any
> copyright reasons) is there any reason you can't distribute the
> 'reference database', or is it only readable by chessbase?
I would think the annotations might be considered copyrighted. You'd have
to buy the Megadatabase from Chessbase to import into SCID or get it from
someone else. I really don't know what the legality of that is, but it
seems a little questionable to share the database in whole. Maybe if you
stripped out the annotations.
> > That isn't to say that SCID is bad, because I was very impressed with
it,
> > although I wish it was written in some other language. I just wanted to
> > focus my time on my chess study and have easy access to a real big game
> > database. If you're low on funds SCID will definitely keep you happy.
>
> How do you use chessbase or scid best for 'chess study'? Sorry to
> sound so ignorant of the matter, but I'm just keen to know the real
> reason for using these programs. Sure I can search for GM games and
> see how they opened, but I guess I must
I'll be the first to admit I am not strong enough to find the best plan in
every position, even in my favorite openings. By having access to
Grandmaster strength games you can search for positions toward the end of
your 'book' lines you play, and play through games to see how they develop.
You can take the plans that you like and try to incorporate them into your
own games.
> > My computer chess tools are:
> >
> > * Bookup to track my opening repertoire (I bought Bookup first plus it
seems
> > to be better suited for that task)
> > * Chessbase
> > * Fritz
> > * Mega database 2004 and Endgame Turbo II
>
> Quite a bit of $$'s I expect you spent on that lot.
Well I bought Bookup first back in the mid 1990's. I bought Fritz 6+ months
ago (it was only around $50). I got the rest of it as a Christmas present
this year.
CeeBee
> I believe there are several chessbase reference databases distributed in
> PGN. CeeBee posted a site that contained a bunch of PGN files a couple
> of months ago I believe...may have been someone else.
http://www.uib.no/people/pfvaf/chesslib/free.htm
is more than enough. You can add the missing 2000-2003 files by
downloading them from TWIC:
http://www.chesscenter.com/twic/twicp.html
http://www.chesscenter.com/twic/twicp1.html
CeeBee
wrote in rec.games.chess.computer:
> Does chessbase export PGN format games? If so (apart from any
> copyright reasons) is there any reason you can't distribute the
> 'reference database', or is it only readable by chessbase?
CB8 exports and imports PGN. PGN however is simple text based, having
some advantages (simple, standard) and some disadvantages (limited
annotation possibilities compared to CB format, and very big files).
The discussion about sharing this database for free has been discussed
often. It's clear that ChessBase put quite some effort in assembling
this collection, so you could well argue that the collection as a whole
could be considered copyrighted.
> How do you use chessbase or scid best for 'chess study'? Sorry to
> sound so ignorant of the matter, but I'm just keen to know the real
> reason for using these programs. Sure I can search for GM games and
> see how they opened, but I guess I must
Most people use their database for storing some games of their own, do a
bit of move analyzing with a chess engine, or looking for some stats
about openings. That is perfectly okay. If you have these objectives as
well, it really would be a bit stupid to spend a lot of money on CB8 or
CA7 when a product like SCID is around for free.
You must also realize that a product like CB was developed for
professional use. With a proper and complete reference database Garry
Kasparov can find out in one minute what the opening repertoire of his
opponent next day is, what his or her success rate with those openings
was, against who, etc. For quality's sake my games are not included in
those databases - anywhere on the world, so you would have to miss that
advantage if you'd play me....
One example: I have build an opening repertoire, and based a very
elaborate home built-opening key on it, making it able to quickly browse
through the opening key per move say for a game I'm analyzing, or a cc-
game opening I'm playing. It also allows me to quikcly find new games
for my opening repertoire by installing that opening key into the new
database I want to search.
Or - I want to learn more about the endgame. In that case you want to
search for situations like: black is a pawn down, white has a passed
pawn, black has one light piece left: a bishop, white has only a knight.
Both sides have either one or either two rooks. The white king is behind
the pawn. Give me some situations to see how white does, and if it's
possible to promote the pawn.
Especially rook and pawn endgames are tough, and there's a wealth of
examples to be found in a big database.
What about tactical themes? How to find a queen _sacrifice_, leading to
a mate in a few moves? How to find examples of triangulation, or a
Lucena position?
Or - one of the sides has exchanged a knight and a bishop for a pawn and
a rook on f7 or f2. This must have been played in one sequence:
bishop/knight takes pawn, rook takes bishop/knight, bishop/knight takes
rook, king takes bishop knight.
For the next 15 moves at least this material balance must be kept. Is
this a viable way to play a game? In what circumstances is this exchange
good, in which situation bad?
Or - in a variation of the Sicilian you encounter problems with the d6
pawn hanging undefended. Give me games in which a d6 pawn hangs, is
undefended, but nevertheless the game was won by black with less
material difference than a light piece (one or two pawns).
Or - somewhere on the black kingside there's a king, somewhere on the
white queenside there's a white king, but only the white king castled,
and not the black king. Somewhere on the black kingside there's also a
white queen, and either a black queen or two black rooks. Both sides
have an equal amount of pawns and light pieces, but it doesn't matter if
these are knights or bishops.
Or more simple ones - give me the stats of games where two rooks are
exchanged against a queen.
These are the kind of things you can also study with a database, because
you can find it with a well defined query.
You can understand that you need a big and high quality database to
cater your questions (or a lot of smaller ones you search
simultaneously), and a database application to cater your whims.
If you look at the above examples and you wonder what I'm talking about
- you just made the decision. In that case SCID is more than you'll ever
need.
Noah Roberts
> I own a number of chess books, but I have moves come up in my games all the
> time where the move looks reasonable (and usually is), but I'm not quite
> sure how to proceed against it. What I really want to do at that point is
> after the tournament research to see if the position has occured before and
> what people usually play against it.
Some online tournaments explicetly allow the use of databases during
play but not the use of an engine. For instance at itsyourturn.com it
is acceptable to use a database or book while playing in a tournament
but it is not acceptable to use an engine to analyze the positions until
after the result.
NR
Simon Waters
>
> I would think the annotations might be considered copyrighted.
Most people accept annotations are copyrighted.
> You'd have
> to buy the Megadatabase from Chessbase to import into SCID or get it from
> someone else. I really don't know what the legality of that is, but it
> seems a little questionable to share the database in whole. Maybe if you
> stripped out the annotations.
I don't think anyone is 100% clear on the copyright position of chess games.
I would support the view that since they are usually an entirely factual
record of a public event or spectacle they are in the public domain.
However even if they are in the public domain, and this is disputed by
some, whether a collection of public domain records is public domain may
depend on where you live (there is a US/Europe split here), and what the
selection criteria was.
There are more than enough examples of good chess available freely and
without restriction for all but the very top of the chess elite I
suspect. Certainly most of my opening blunders have either been made
before, or sidestepped before, in games I already own copies of.
Chess openings exhibit more fashion than progress, if you learn any
reasonably sound opening well eventually it'll become fashionable again,
especially if you kill a few giants with it.
My main use of chess databases is to review the approaches different
players took to playing a particular opening when I am trying to learn
it - for this I find SCID's opening analysis very easy to use - but you
do have to tell it how many games to include or it can go a bit mad.
Douglas L Stewart
research to see if the position has occured before...', I am referring to my
OTB play in USCF tournaments. Obviously I don't use the database during the
middle of tournament games.
"Noah Roberts" <nrob...@dontemailme.com> wrote in message
news:bta1kl$a5e$1...@quark.scn.rain.com...
Peter Sch?fer
http://jose-chess.sourceforge.net
it's free, it runs on Windows and Linux.
It doesn't match Scid in database functionality,
but the UI is more intuitive (I hope ;-)
-- Peter
Robert Pawlak
>> these database programs, so don't know what features are useful and
>> what are not. I guess with time I will learn more about the advantages
>> of using them.
David,
I might suggest that you look at my book "The Chess Software Sourcebook". It
deals with many of the questions you have been asking.
Bob Pawlak (remove 1et.tw to e-mail)
Chess Assistance
http://www.chessassistance.com
Chess Reviews
http://www.chessreviews.com
Andy Prap
Hi! Is there anything you wrote about SCID? Thanks
Andy
Dr. David Kirkby
Thanks for that reference. It was hard to find the book, as the link
to it on the FAQ at the chessassistance site:
http://www.chessassistance.com/SiteFAQ.html
points at http://members.aol.com/mlkienholz/treehaus/index.html
which is a broken link. However, I did finally find an index
somewhere. It looks as a few pages might be of interest, but a lot of
it seems to be devoted to Windoze software, which I'm less interested
in. If I see it in a bookshop I'll take a look and decide whether it
is for me or not.
BTW, it is next to impossible to read anything on the site using
Netscape 4.x under Solaris. I run an HTML syntax checker against the
site using one of the many sites on the internet to check web pages:
and it finds lots of errors in the html, which probably explains why
Internet Explorer can deciper it, but Netscape can't. IE is very
tolerant of bad html, which is in my opinon a rather bad thing, since
whatever you are using to generate html is not doing a very good job
at it.
David Kirkby.
Mike Ogush
see_my_signature_f...@hotmail.com (Dr. David Kirkby)
wrote:
Re: reason for using a database program
Look at Steve Lopez' Technical Notes weeb pages at
www.chessbaseusa.com or www.chessbase.com. Steve discusses why
someone woud want to use a chess database. Especially look at the
series of articles son on "Chess Database Basics"
Some things I have used a chess database (chessbase 8)for:
a) Find all games that I can that reached a particular position and
create a tree of all the moves made and responses and counter
responses etc. for the next several move, which suggests possible
plans for the position. I also look at the number of games that each
position (after an alternative move is played) occurred in as well as
what the performance numbers were for that move.
b) When I am learning a new opening I create an opening report whihch
shows typical variations, piece placement and maneuvers as well as
pointing to the games where these took place.
c) Find a set of games with a particualr characteristic (pawn
structure (e.g. isolated QP, queenside pawn majority), maneuvers (e.g.
capture of the pawn at f2 by black or f7 by white or material (e.g.
bishop vs. knight with equal pawns ending) to play over to learn basic
ideas. For example I recently searched all of my games to find out
which ones reached particluar types of endings and to determine which
types of endings that I don't full understand and thereby focus my
study on my weaknesses,
Re: Reference database
Within Chessbase 8 there are several features that use a database that
is designated as the 'reference database'. I have cut and pasted
(from the Chessbase help file) the description of a few of these
features
1) find-novelty - ChessBase lists the games in the reference database
which are closest to the current game.
2) opening report - ChessBase will go through the million or so games
in your reference database find those that match the position of the
current game and generates a comprehensive report on what it finds.
3) player dossier - This generates a report with the complete personal
and chess profile of a player. The report contains biographical data
and pictures, statistics on the player’s games, his or her openings,
career, results against individual opponents and a selection of
spectacular positions for training purposes.
4) Also in chessbase you can search for games in the reference
database without having to the window displaying all the databases
that Chessbase is aware of.
Some of these features are also in scid and I believe it uses a
reference database for the same purpose.
>
>Does chessbase export PGN format games? If so (apart from any
>copyright reasons) is there any reason you can't distribute the
>'reference database', or is it only readable by chessbase?
>
>> That isn't to say that SCID is bad, because I was very impressed with it,
>> although I wish it was written in some other language. I just wanted to
>> focus my time on my chess study and have easy access to a real big game
>> database. If you're low on funds SCID will definitely keep you happy.
>
>How do you use chessbase or scid best for 'chess study'? Sorry to
>sound so ignorant of the matter, but I'm just keen to know the real
>reason for using these programs. Sure I can search for GM games and
>see how they opened, but I guess I must
>
>> My computer chess tools are:
>>
>> * Bookup to track my opening repertoire (I bought Bookup first plus it seems
>> to be better suited for that task)
>> * Chessbase
>> * Fritz
>> * Mega database 2004 and Endgame Turbo II
>
>Quite a bit of $$'s I expect you spent on that lot.
>
I also bought similar software over the course of several years
costing between $300-500. Almost all of it purchased before scid was
available.
>Dr. David Kirkby.
I have also downloaded scid and played around with it some. However,
because I already have Chessbase 8 and am used to the interface I
would not switch unless there was some feature SCID had that Chessbase
didn't.
Mike Ogush
Robert Pawlak
>which is a broken link. However, I did finally find an index
>somewhere. It looks as a few pages might be of interest, but a lot of
Actually, if you look through it, more than a few pages are relevant to your
current situation.
Thanks for the pointer to the problem with the link. It was working the other
day, before someone fixed it ;-).
>and it finds lots of errors in the html, which probably explains why
>Internet Explorer can deciper it, but Netscape can't. IE is very
>tolerant of bad html, which is in my opinon a rather bad thing, since
>whatever you are using to generate html is not doing a very good job
>at it.
As for HTML "errors", yours is actually the first complaint I've had.
Unfortunately, I gave up a long time ago on NS 4.X. No offense, but it needs to
be relegated to the dust bin of history. There are too many problems with it
rendering CSS, and interpreting DHTML properly. If you try a more recent
browser (recommended), you will find that the site displays properly. Since you
seem to be a fan of open source, I might suggest you use a recent build of
Mozilla. I don't know off the top of my head wether there is a version for
Solaris, but you should be able to hack something together.
Also, I looked at the site for checking HTML compliance. The "errors" found on
the page fall into the following categories:
1. An inability of the validator to parse javascript within the page. <-Not my
problem
2. Inability of the validator to deal with XHTML compliant code <- Not my
problem
3. Some things flagged are simply warnings <- When I have nothing better to do,
I'll fix it.
Dr. David Kirkby
> Also, I looked at the site for checking HTML compliance. The "errors" found on
> the page fall into the following categories:
>
> 1. An inability of the validator to parse javascript within the page. <-Not my
> problem
I don't think that's the issue.
> 2. Inability of the validator to deal with XHTML compliant code <- Not my
> problem
I'm not a professional web designer, but I think if it's XHTML
compliant, then it should say that on the very first line, rather than
say HTML 4.01 Transitional. If I'm right, Netscape (and the validator)
don't make sense of the xhtml, since they have been told it is HTML
4.01 Transitional.
The body that sets the standard (W3C) has a validator too. Again, that
thinks it not XHTML, but instead HTML. I don't think the other
problems are minor either, but here's not the place to discuss it.
David Kirkby.
Noah Roberts
> rjpa...@aol.com1et.tw (Robert Pawlak) wrote in message news:<20040105210234...@mb-m01.aol.com>...
>
>
>
>>Also, I looked at the site for checking HTML compliance. The "errors" found on
>>the page fall into the following categories:
>>
>>1. An inability of the validator to parse javascript within the page. <-Not my
>>problem
>
>
> I don't think that's the issue.
>
>
>>2. Inability of the validator to deal with XHTML compliant code <- Not my
>>problem
>
>
> I'm not a professional web designer, but I think if it's XHTML
> compliant,
It isn't. XHTML code should have <br /> instead of <br> as well as img
tags. This is a mixture of html and xhtml code, which is not a good idea.
then it should say that on the very first line, rather than
> say HTML 4.01 Transitional.
Correct.
If I'm right, Netscape (and the validator)
> don't make sense of the xhtml, since they have been told it is HTML
> 4.01 Transitional.
The netscape you are using can't make sence of either AFAIK.
>
> The body that sets the standard (W3C) has a validator too. Again, that
> thinks it not XHTML, but instead HTML. I don't think the other
> problems are minor either, but here's not the place to discuss it.
Most are warnings and errors caused by scripts but are not errors. Also
of interest is the "error" on line 157, which is actually caused by the
validator itself as it altered the source so that the <img tag is never
closed. Even more interesting is that the w3.org validator also did this.
Yes, the html code is not 100% valid, there are problems in it, but it
does display in recent browsers. Netscape 4 was definately broken and I
don't think fixing the errors in the website will fix the display in
that browser.
On the other hand, the author may want to pick either html or xhtml.
Simply fixing two meta tags appears to be all in the way of being html
but I didn't fully look. As for making it xhtml I think that would be a
lot of work: "error (5): reached max_errors; too many errors/warnings to
print for http://www.chessassistance.com/" and I told it to surpress
warnings :P Check this site: http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/#diffs
NR