Portable Notation: Othello, Chess, Bridge and Draughts
Yves Debilloëz
I was looking at a standard for saving and restoring Othello, Connect 4 and
checkers programs. I noticed that there is a portable game notation that
can be extended easily. I have the option of writing my own standard or we
could try to merge all game notations in e.g. XPGN with chess, bridge,
draughts and others supported.
I would like to have your view on this and for the owners of the existing
standards whether or not they are ready to extend.
If not, I am ready to bear the PON (Portable othello notation) and P4N
(Portable connect 4 notation).
Please find a draft on my web-site: http://users.pandora.be/ai/
For your reference included:
Portable Game Notation
http://www.saremba.de/chessgml/standards/pgn/pgn-complete.htm
Document: Portable Bridge Notation (PBN)
Version: 2.0
Date: 1999.09.04
Coordinator: Tis Veugen ( veu...@iae.nl )
Co-editor: Kaj G Backas (k...@compart.fi)
Authors: Readers of the Internet newsgroup rec.games.bridge
Portable Draughts Notation
To differentiate between the different types of draughts/checkers, an
optional
tag pair "GameType" is added, with one of the above
values attached. Futher optional information could follow, in this format:
GameType "Type-number [,Start colour (W/B),Board width, Board height,
Notation
[,Invert-flag]]"
Type-number: this is one of the following type-numbers
0: Chess
1: Chinese chess
2-19: future chess expansion
20: 10x10 draughts (international)
21: English draughts (kings only move 1 step at a time)
22: Italian draughts (as English, Men cannot take kings, must capture max)
23: American pool draughts (as 10x10, not obliged to take max)
24: Spanish pool draughts (as 10x10 rules, but men cannot capture
backwards)
25: Russian draughts
26: Brazilian 8x8 draughts (same as 10x10 rules)
27: Canadian 12x12 draughts (same as 10x10 rules)
28: Portugese draughts
29-49: Future draughts expansion
50: Othello
51.. Future expansion.
Start-colour: Either W or B - white/black side starts (can vary in
draughts)
Board-width: Width of board..
Board-height: Height of board..
Notation: A=alpha/numeric like chess, N=numeric like draughts.
S=SAN - short-form chess notation.
Then follows a number 0-4 telling where square A1 or 1 is
for
the side who starts the game (White or black)
0= Bottom left, 1=Bottom right, 2=Top left, 3=Top right..
Invert-flag: 0 = play on dark squares (like english & 10x10), 1 = play
on light
squares (like italian draughts) This is only needed in
draughts.
pc...@deletethispartfolks.tcp.co.uk
proposition for this. You will find the original article
on
Best
Adrian
DarkSide
if their are people who are interested in finalizing/reviewing (or
whatever) the PGN standard for chess.
Or I am not completely aware of the newest progressions made on the
document.
DarkSide
Ps: http://www.saremba.de/chessgml/standards/pgn/pgn-complete.htm is the
same old document as everyone should be familiar with? Only in a different
look?
Daniel Lidström
http://external.nj.nec.com/homepages/mic/ggsa/ggf
No need to define a new format, really, as this one handles all two player
games. Reminds me of a quote I read somewhere:
"Standards are great. Let's have more!"
/Daniel
"DarkSide" <re...@kvz329.kvz.tudelft.nl> wrote...
pc...@deletethispartfolks.tcp.co.uk
for a long time, and PDN (Portable Draughts Notation)
the natural derivative, also hes been in use a few years.
"Daniel Lidström" <dan...@NOSPAMite.mh.se> wrote:
>DarkSide
SAGE/DYNAMO checkers WWW site (inc shareware versions)
and CHESS GENIUS homepage:
http://www.ChessAndCheckers.com
Richard Delorme
Please, do not create a new (un)portable notation for Othello, use one of
the existing:
Generic Game Format: http://external.nj.nec.com/homepages/mic/ggsa/ggf
Smart Game Format: http://www.red-bean.com/sgf/
IOS Format (obsolete)
Most of the good Othello programs are able to import or export into one of
these formats.
SGF and GGF are also available for many other games.
Richard.