From: sje@xylos.ma30.bull.com (Steven J. Edwards)
Subject: Minimal notation (Was: What is this notation? Smythescript?)
Reply-To: sje@xylos.ma30.bull.com
Organization: Bull HN, Worldwide Information Systems, Billerica, Mass., USA
Date: 2 Oct 92 10:25:01
	<1992Oct1.161047.16934@midway.uchicago.edu>
	<1992Oct1.225450.16006@husc3.harvard.edu>

#In article <1992Oct1.225450.16006@husc3.harvard.edu> elkies@ramanujan.harvard.edu (Noam Elkies) writes:
# In article <1992Oct1.161047.16934@midway.uchicago.edu>
# eb11@midway.uchicago.edu writes:
# :In article <1992Oct1.022807.28789@cbnewsh.cb.att.com>
# :gls@windmill.ATT.COM (The Ace and Deuce of Programming) writes:
# :>Paul Morphy might still be alive today ... if he had known SMYTHESCRIPT!
# :>
# :>  Game 7       Game 8       Game 9       Game 10      Game 11      Game 12    
# :>Bobby Boris  Boris Bobby  Bobby Boris  Boris Bobby  Bobby Boris  Boris Bobby  
# :>F     F      A     7XXI   F     F      A     7XXI   F     N      A     7XXI
# :>7XXU  7XS    N     S-     7XXU  7XS    N     F-     7XXU  7XS    N     S-
# :>34    T-     7XN   31     34    T-     7XN   34     34    S-     7XN   31
# :
# :Would somebody post a note briefly explaining this notation?
#
# Better yet, a program to translate standard notation to this Smythes-crypt,
# and then stop this silliness once and for all (so we can concentrate on
# more interesting topics like whether Bughouse is solvable :-))?  You might
# as well run algebraic notation through "compress | uuencode".  Alternatively,
# for a really compact and opaque notation, list the legal moves from a given
# position in your favorite lexicographical order, so any move may be specified
# by a single character indicating its place in the lexicographic list and
# a 40-move game may be listed in one 80-character line.

Almost.  The previously announced SAN Kit can do this without too much
massaging at it already has the necessary routines for chess move
generation, Standard Algebraic Notation encoding, and ASCII sorting of
SAN moves.  The resulting canonical move generation ordinals can be
used as a rather compact way of describing moves; in fact, this scheme
is used to compress moves to a single byte in some opening book
repository systems.  However, there are only 95 printable ASCII
characters while there are legal chess positions that have more than
95 available moves.  I don't know what the upper limit is, and I don't
think anyone else knows either.  My program has never generated more
than its current limit of 256 moves per position.  I have seen more
than 128, however; I think the record is somewhere around 190.

So, two ASCII characters per move would work easily.  But I don't see
why anyone other than a program would prefer such.

Concerning Smythescript, I wonder if the self named "The Ace and Deuce
of Programming" could be a few cards short of a full deck.

 [The above opinions expressed are my own; not necessarily held by others.]
      == Steven J. Edwards           Bull HN Information Systems Inc. ==
      == (508) 294-3484              300 Concord Road         MS 820A ==
      == sje@xylos.ma30.bull.com     Billerica, MA 01821          USA ==
"That Government which Governs the Least, Governs Best." -- Thomas Jefferson
Newsgroups: rec.games.chess