New tag suggestion

[drahacikfm]

texian:  Yes, 36148 is overloading.  The queen is protecting d7 and a8, and it can't protect both of them.  1.Rxd7 simply wins a piece.  That's not simplification.  The problem continues with 1...Rxa5 2.Rxb7 just to show that Black doesn't win back his piece.  That queen trade is not really part of the tactic.

[texian]

thanks, drahacikfm, for the verification .. perhaps some, if not many, of these familiar exchanges i've noticed involve overloading .. in most of those situations major pieces are involved in a net of mutual defense but an extra piece when won remains uncountered after the exchange .. hard to describe with words, but familiar to me and what i had come to call "First blood" as a pattern that seems to be repeating .. however, i'm still not too good at recognizing it before the fact

fortunately, i didn't tag many as simplification before verifying this with you guys .. i've been carefully tagging and correcting tags as many of the lower rated problems i'm working are either untagged or seem obviously wrong .. i'm often tempted to verify them here, but i already spend far too much time per problem training myself to look ahead .. hopefully, any mistakes will fall out in subsequent tag reviews

i haven't found a way to see all problems i've tagged .. i'm guessing that may be another good reason for acquiring the premium edition

[richard]

texian: Currently there is no way to see a list of problems you've personally tagged (even as a premium user). Per user visibility for tags is something I plan to add as it it also a way of encouraging users to be a bit more accountable for their tags, as well as providing a view of who might have misconceptions on what a tag means, allowing a gentle nudge in the right direction. Despite the current list of tags being created by me (with quite a few user suggestions thrown in), I can't say I'm completely comfortable with my understanding of all of them.

I'd hoped to have gotten the draft version of the tag descriptions up by the end of this week but a combination of traveling and illness didn't leave me with enough time to get it done this week.  For those who noticed my "can't post traveling" message a week or two ago, the traveling is an ongoing thing for the next few months. I'm hoping to have regular internet access during most of my travels and to be able to do CT development when on the road, but there may still be a few days here and there where I don't have adequate access, so there may be times when some patience might be required in waiting for responses to posts or emails.

Regards.
Richard.

[texian]

thanks for the info, Richard .. i'm still awaiting an idea you haven't either thought of or implemented 

i've been carrying on a dialogue with Drahacik on a couple of tagging questions i've encountered and will likely be posting others as i encounter them .. i'm sure you'll see them, but they are at 43061 and 45518_tag in case you missed them

i attached a text file in that 2nd post which i've compiled from this thread and subsequent comments as the very unofficial descriptions i'm using .. i look forward to seeing yours whenever you can get around to it .. remember, if i can help in anyway, feel free to ask, but then that may be more trouble than i'm worth 

[texian]

while surfing around for some on-line introductory reading material to supplement my daily tactics training and play, i discovered an interesting series of articles in Wikibook format .. soon, i realized such a structure might be an ideal way to present and understand CT tags

for example, see Chess/Tactics .. the article is far from complete, but several familiar tags are included, as well as a few others .. i've always been fascinated by Wikipedia and use it frequently .. i often think of contributing some articles on research i've done in other areas (not chess), but never have .. so, i really don't know what it takes to get involved as a contributor .. the nice thing about Wiki is that anyone can, but then the dangerous thing about Wiki is that anyone can

new terms and related concepts i encountered in the article include possible new tags such as:

• Guarding
• Batteries
• Exchange: Material advantage
• Exchange: Doubling pawns
• Exchange: Opening up the king's defenses
• Exchange: Removing a defender
• Exchange: Blunting an attack
• Exchange: Gaining space
• Exchange: Improving a material advantage
• Royal Fork
• Relative pin

i'm not necessarily suggesting these as tags, just offering examples for consideration

since there appears to be no accepted "standard" for defining tactical motifs, it might be worth considering launching a collaborative effort using this article as a stub or creating our own where the terms we use as tags can be defined as well as illustrated .. i know Richard is currently working on a set of "official" descriptions of CT tags .. so, i'm not suggesting re-inventing the wheel here, just a possible alternative to presenting or supplementing it

the Wikibook toolbox provides all the elements required, accessability, ease of use (anyone can do it), and, most importantly, links to CT problems and forum .. additionally, such an approach might provide Richard, already overloaded with things to do, and us, overloaded with problems to work and games to play, with avenues for support and, to a degree, peer review outside our wonderful little corner of the chess world .. we might even attract a few, if not many, new users

anyway, just a little food for thought this nice cool Sunday morning - very unusual for early September in Texas .. catch y'all later, i've got problems to work and things to do

[richard]

Thanks texian,

I've incorporated some of the tags from the main wikipedia page into the tag list, however I hadn't seen the tactics wiki book before (I'd read some of the openings wiki book but hadn't noticed the tactics one!).  Installing a wiki to provide user generated documentation is on the medium term priority list at the moment (suggested by another user, newlook from memory?).  The tactics description could also be integrated into the documentation wiki, but the first version of the description will probably arrive before the wiki is installed so initially it will be a non-wiki page, but I will have a careful look over the wikibook to see if they are using some tags that would be handy to include here.

Regards,
Richard.

[texian]

great .. it's never a surprise to me that you've already got an idea on a list already .. just adding my vote to your tally count

the notation i used for tag sub-sets is something i've been thinking about recently .. i think it might add some clarity to the tags we're using, which obviously have some overlap, without taking up too much screen space  .. personally, i'd like to see sub-sets such as Fork:Knight, Fork: Pawn, etc., and while some of these Exchange tags are not too familiar from CT problems i've seen the concept may be worth considering as you are compiling the "Official" CT Tag Descriptions

• Exchange: Material advantage
• Exchange: Doubling pawns
• Exchange: Opening up the king's defenses
• Exchange: Removing a defender
• Exchange: Blunting an attack
• Exchange: Gaining space
• Exchange: Improving a material advantage

just another two cents i found in my saddlebag

[richard]

Hi Texian,

I've considered "subsetting" some of the tags in the manner you describe, I'm still on the fence on this one , but Fork in particular is a good candidate for subsetting.  I know I'm a lot better at seeing Knight forks than say Pawn forks (especially those against me), so being able to ask for problems with (for example) only "Pawn forks"  would be of some benefit to me and I'd imagine others.


Regards,
Richard.

[drahacikfm]

Richard,

Something along these lines that would be very easy to implement would be an addition to your canned problem sets for premium users:

- first move of solution is a pawn move
- first move of solution is a knight move
- first move of solution is a bishop move
...etc.

This could be very useful for beginners and kids.  Beginners may be overwhelmed by a position with lots of pieces and 40 legal moves.  But if they know they have to make a bishop move, the problem becomes much easier.  And these sets would be 100% accurate, not relying on user tagging.

I guess this could also be added to the search options for searching and for creating personal problem sets.

[richard]

This is something I'll be able to provide down the track (based on some work a friend is helping out with). The problem at the moment is that the client side (the javascript running in the browser) understands a lot about moves and pieces, the generator also understands these things , but the server (as in what serves up problems and processes user searches etc) is very dumb when it comes to chess knowledge and requires some work to give it enough knowledge of the positions to be able to even know that the first move is a pawn move.  My friend's work provides a lot of this knowledge and will allow a lot of improvements to the problem set search as well as providing the basis for a number of other site features.  Still a while away from completion though.

Regards,
Richard.