Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Chess/Archive 39

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Archive 39

Decoy vs. attraction

What is the difference between Decoy (chess) and Attraction (chess)? The definitions in those articles look almost the same. Or are these the same topic (in which case the articles should be merged)? —Mx. Granger (talk · contribs) 02:34, 25 May 2023 (UTC)

Not only are they the same topic, but one of them explicitly links to the other in the first paragraph. A merge certainly seems like a good idea. Bruce leverett (talk) 04:09, 25 May 2023 (UTC)

Our glossary entries are misleading then. (Calling attraction a subset of decoy, involving a sacrifice and the king. But even if a subset, a merged article c/ explain same.) --IHTS (talk) 05:32, 25 May 2023 (UTC)

@Bruce leverett and Ihardlythinkso: Thanks. Any thoughts on which title would be better for the merged article? —Mx. Granger (talk · contribs) 05:45, 27 May 2023 (UTC)

IMO, unless we alter the glossary entries, since attraction is a type of decoy, decoy is the umbrella term, so the better merged article title. --IHTS (talk) 05:53, 27 May 2023 (UTC)

I've merged the articles to Decoy (chess) as suggested. Further improvements would be welcome. —Mx. Granger (talk · contribs) 20:06, 29 May 2023 (UTC)

Decoy vs. deflection

Finished w/ a set of article improvements, then also resolved best as feasible a conflict between glossary entires decoy & deflection (where Pandolfini describes deflection as "an inverse" of decoy, but that's inconsistent w/ Hooper & Whyld entry, which implies also the Pandolfini def). Was about to define a REDIRECT for "Deflection" to Decoy, but alas!, we already have a stand-alone on deflection. If Hooper & Whyld's decoy is accepted, then there's no real distinction between decoy & deflection, and so the current article Deflection (chess) s/ also, same as the attraction article, be merged. (Yes? No?) --IHTS (talk) 10:32, 2 June 2023 (UTC)

If yes, Mx. Granger plz perform the merge. ;) --IHTS (talk) 10:53, 2 June 2023 (UTC)

List of chess gambits

I truly hate this article but my attempts to get it deleted have been unsuccessful. "Gambit" is not a useful classification for chess openings, some like the "Queen's Gambit" are not really gambits, and some lines that involve sacrificing material are not conventionally described as gambits. Anyway I've eviscerated it of all unsourced lines. I've probably thrown out a few babies with the bathwater but I'm fed up with the lines that someone on chess.com played last week getting listed with no source. MaxBrowne2 (talk) 14:51, 20 May 2023 (UTC)

Since you posted this, someone has expanded the article in the most ridiculous possible way. So obviously things are still in flux, and I don't want to go on at great length either here or in the article's talk page.

As of your comment of 20 May, I noticed that almost all the citations were to Hooper & Whyld. This heavy reliance on a tertiary source was a bad sign, just sayin'.

I also noticed that almost none of the listed gambits was itself notable (i.e. no blue links). This prompted me to go back to WP:CSC and reread the part about how there are two kinds of lists: lists in which every item must be notable, and lists in which none of the items are notable.

It appears that when you nominated the article for deletion in 2018, it looked very different from what it looked like on May 20 2023. Perhaps the reason for the drift has something to do with not having good explicit criteria for inclusion in the list. Is the Queen's Gambit a gambit? "Everybody knows" that it's not a real gambit because White can easily regain the pawn, but in practice, the easy method of regaining the pawn is seldom followed, and in a couple of my own games, it really became a gambit. In any case, it cannot be assumed that Wikipedia readers know that the Queen's Gambit is not "really" a gambit. We're here to teach them stuff like that. Is the Benko Gambit a gambit? It certainly is, but as of April 2023, it wasn't in the list, and it wasn't in the list at the time of the 2018 AfD, either. Bruce leverett (talk) 03:56, 23 May 2023 (UTC)

They're being sourced to chess.com now which is not ideal, chess.com is not an authority on opening names and includes a lot of dross like the Coca Cola Gambit (3 successive terrible moves) which is little more than a meme. At least the Oxford Companion is reputable. MaxBrowne2 (talk) 04:38, 23 May 2023 (UTC)

I agree with Max and share his dislike of proliferation of entries of dubiously named garbage openings. I differ a little in that I think chess gambits seems as though it could be a fair topic for a list article, but I think Bruce is correct that these openings lists articles are inevitably going to be overrun with low quality entries. I fear the only way to prevent this would be to delete the article and today I would support deleting list of chess gambits. Unfortunately, Max has tried that and prospects for removal seem dim. The only thing I can think to do now is to try to uphold some minimal requirements for reliable sourcing and hold our noses. If I lower my expectations of the list to simply legal chess openings that have been given a name by some not completely worthless source, I might be able to stomach it better. Or maybe more likely I'll just try to ignore the list. Quale (talk) 04:40, 15 June 2023 (UTC)

Stupidhouse

@The Master of Hedgehogs: It takes more than a cute name to get into Wikipedia. Do you have a reliable source for this? I acknowledge that the criteria for notability for chess variants might have nuances that I am not familiar with. Bruce leverett (talk) 21:56, 26 June 2023 (UTC)

Chess variant pages has stupidhouse info ChameleonGamer 22:56, 26 June 2023 (UTC)

The chess variant pages claim to be "user-generated content", which makes them ineligible to be a WP:RS. Bruce leverett (talk) 14:16, 27 June 2023 (UTC)

It's not so black & white. Depends who wrote the Chess Variants.org article. (E.g. if article author is Jean-Louis Cazaux, it's reliable. Also articles written by Hans Bodlaender are usually well-documented w/ references, often including the primary sources by game inventors.) --IHTS (talk) 15:38, 27 June 2023 (UTC)

I see that this one is by Bodlaender, and it links to documentation of an actual tournament. (I presume the documentation is there, although I temporarily can't get at it; the link is to the Variant Chess site, which no longer has a direct link to the August 1999 issue.) So it passes the sniff test in spite of the ... stupidness. Bruce leverett (talk) 16:35, 27 June 2023 (UTC)

Stupid House is in:

• Pritchard, D. B. (2007). Beasley, John (ed.). The Classified Encyclopedia of Chess Variants. John Beasley. p. 327. ISBN 978-0-9555168-0-1.
• Beasley, John (Autumn 1999). Jelliss, George P. (ed.). "A Wild Weekend in Geneva". Variant Chess. Vol. 5, no. 33. British Chess Variants Society. p. 3. ISSN 0958-8248.

--IHTS (talk) 16:23, 27 June 2023 (UTC)

New fairy chess piece articles

Perhaps members of this wikiproject would be interested in assessing the newly created articles Fool (chess), Chessplus, and Wizard (chess) to see if they plausibly meet any notability guidelines. --JBL (talk) 00:07, 17 June 2023 (UTC)

This is IHTS's territory. I think he'll be happy to work with another editor who shares his interest in chess variants. MaxBrowne2 (talk) 08:10, 17 June 2023 (UTC)

These are policy issues, which this editor generally doesn't weigh in on but does *Comment in policy discussions. My comment re Chessplus: currently has inadequate refs (not close to WP:GNG). My comments re Fool & Wizard: the article author admits these are specialist pieces out of Omega chess, which to me doesn't qualify as stand-alone article, and ditto re refs are inadequate. But there are more generic problems: e.g. in Courier chess the Schleich piece (Pritchard, 1994, p. 74) "Schleich (spy, sneak, fool)" has been wlink'd to the Fool article, which is clearly wrong/misleading/contradictory. But more generally, none of these game-specific pieces deserve articles and sufficient refs w/ be impossible to come by. (From Pritchard 1994 p. 227: "Variant inventors frequently give their pieces unorthodox names, a practice that can sometimes cause confusion, in particular where these names are commonly applied to other pieces. Combination pieces are the favorites." Then he goes on to list nearly 70 such piece names.) That said, there are some fairy pieces that s/ and do have articles (e.g. Princess (chess) and Empress (chess)), because they're repeated in major/well-known/historic variants, but probably in-depth significant coverage of same w/ also be hard to come by. (Go figure!) Under those considerations this editor was somewhat sad to see user Master of Hedgehogs's recent article addition for unicorn piece denied [1], since methinks that piece might just qualify similar to princess & empress, with a little work it's hard to see why not (see Draft:Unicorn (chess)). --IHTS (talk) 11:34, 17 June 2023 (UTC)

I thought a unicorn was a 3-d chess piece that moved diagonally in all 3 directions. MaxBrowne2 (talk) 23:45, 17 June 2023 (UTC)

You thought right, for Raumschach. Unicorn also exists in Grande Acedrex. --IHTS (talk) 01:13, 18 June 2023 (UTC)

I changed the Schleich thing mate ChameleonGamer 22:57, 26 June 2023 (UTC)

I have nominated the fool and wizard articles for deletion -- see Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/Wizard_(chess). --JBL (talk) 17:42, 2 July 2023 (UTC)

No Castling Chess

I decided to kickstart an article for this chess variant which was invented by GM Kramnik in 2019. It was previously explored by Deepmind, and an annual NC tournament has been held in Dortmund for 3 years, won by GM Caruana this year. If anyone is interested, I encourage you to contribute and expand this article. Thanks, 9ninety (talk) 05:42, 9 July 2023 (UTC)

Requested move at Talk:Larsen's Opening#Requested move 26 July 2023

There is a requested move discussion at Talk:Larsen's Opening#Requested move 26 July 2023 that may be of interest to members of this WikiProject. SilverLocust 💬 11:47, 26 July 2023 (UTC)

In particular, the proposal is to move Larsen's Opening (i.e., change the title) to Nimzowitsch–Larsen Attack (or alternatively Nimzo-Larsen Attack or Nimzo–Larsen Attack). SilverLocust 💬 11:54, 26 July 2023 (UTC)

WP:NCHESS: which "grandmaster"?

WP:NCHESS says "A chess player is presumed to meet the general notability guideline if he or she ... has been awarded the title of grandmaster." That linked article, Grandmaster (chess) gives multiple definitions of "grandmaster" in the lead:

• Grandmaster (GM) is a title awarded to chess players by the world chess organization FIDE. Apart from World Champion, Grandmaster is the highest title a chess player can attain.
• There is also a Woman Grandmaster title with lower requirements awarded only to women.
• There are also Grandmaster titles for composers and solvers of chess problems, awarded by the World Federation for Chess Composition (see List of grandmasters for chess composition). The International Correspondence Chess Federation (ICCF) awards the title of International Correspondence Chess Grandmaster (ICCGM). Both of these bodies are now independent of FIDE, but work in co-operation with it.

So which meaning of "grandmaster" does WP:NCHESS mean? Only the first one? Does a Woman Grandmaster qualify? How about a Chess Composition Grandmaster, or an International Correspondence Chess Grandmaster? Would those qualify? --GRuban (talk) 02:51, 30 July 2023 (UTC)

There are no hard and fast rules, but if a player has significant coverage in reliable sources then they merit an article. MaxBrowne2 (talk) 02:55, 30 July 2023 (UTC)

Well, yes, if a subject definitely meets the GNG, we wouldn't need to consult NCHESS! But I can ask the members of this project, if it came down to an articles for deletion discussion, would your opinion be that someone who meets any of the multiple meanings of Grandmaster (chess) qualifies or not? --GRuban (talk) 03:26, 30 July 2023 (UTC)

The short answer is that the "grandmaster" meant was the first of your three choices. Nobody has ever asked this before, so I thought that it was obvious, but perhaps not.

WP:GNG is not any more or less authoritative for chess than for other subjects. But to determine whether a subject meets WP:GNG, you may have to do some non-trivial research, including finding the subject in foreign-language sources. WP:NCHESS is a handy way of estimating whether or not you will find the coverage you are looking for; if a subject doesn't meet WP:NCHESS, you may well want to give up before even starting the research. Bruce leverett (talk) 04:40, 30 July 2023 (UTC)

Chess World Cup 2023

I propose we move this article to "FIDE World Chess Cup 2023". This is the title used in the official website, and would be consistent with the other world championship cycle tournaments FIDE Grand Swiss Tournament 2021 and FIDE Grand Prix 2022, and also FIDE World Fischer Random Chess Championship 2022. However, considering that we don't call it the "FIDE World Chess Championship" even if they insist, it still makes sense to change "Chess World Cup" to "World Chess Cup", which seems to be the actual name of the event. There's also an argument for "FIDE World Cup", which is what it is almost exclusively referred to by FIDE and even other sources, and if we're keeping consistency with the FIFA World Cup for example. However that event is obviously much more recognizable and such a title would make it unclear that this is a chess tournament. Any thoughts? 9ninety (talk) 15:08, 31 July 2023 (UTC)

European Chess Union uses my first suggestion. 9ninety (talk) 02:19, 1 August 2023 (UTC)

Credibility bot

As this is a highly active WikiProject, I would like to introduce you to Credibility bot. This is a bot that makes it easier to track source usage across articles through automated reports and alerts. We piloted this approach at Wikipedia:Vaccine safety and we want to offer it to any subject area or domain. We need your support to demonstrate demand for this toolkit. If you have a desire for this functionality, or would like to leave other feedback, please endorse the tool or comment at WP:CREDBOT. Thanks! Harej (talk) 18:14, 5 August 2023 (UTC)

2023 FIDE Circuit

There is a draft at Draft:2023 FIDE Circuit, but it is a bit on the light side for references to establish general notability. If an editor from this project could find and add some, that would be great. Newystats (talk) 08:50, 7 August 2023 (UTC)

• I have added a few. This really should suffice, methinks. Edwininlondon (talk) 21:23, 16 August 2023 (UTC)

Thanks, this looks better now, I've submitted and approved this. Greenman (talk) 09:58, 17 August 2023 (UTC)

Thanks! Newystats (talk) 12:05, 17 August 2023 (UTC)

GOAT

I have started a discussion about the GOAT issue here: Talk:Magnus Carlsen#GOAT again. Khiikiat (talk) 19:09, 20 August 2023 (UTC)

Articles to merge - how to stop the bot resurrecting it?

There was a proposal to merge the articles Sicilian Defence, Dragon Variation with Sicilian Defence, Accelerated Dragon. The discussion was inactive and there was a clear consensus not to merge so I closed it. I edited Wikipedia:WikiProject Chess/Article alerts to remove the proposal, but the bot keeps readding it. I don't want to get into an edit war with a bot, how do I get it to stop doing that? MaxBrowne2 (talk) 09:45, 24 August 2023 (UTC)

OK I think I've got it sorted, I removed the header templates from the two articles. The bot should remove it at the next update. MaxBrowne2 (talk) 10:53, 24 August 2023 (UTC)

Karpov biography

Hi all, any suggestions/recommendations for the best biographies out there? Personal biogs rather than just dissection of his games, or perhaps, his life around his chess puts it better. Thanks in advance for any assistance! SN54129 17:36, 26 August 2023 (UTC)

Requested move at Talk:R Praggnanandhaa#Requested move 28 August 2023

There is a requested move discussion at Talk:R Praggnanandhaa#Requested move 28 August 2023 that may be of interest to members of this WikiProject. UtherSRG (talk) 11:26, 28 August 2023 (UTC)

Einstein v Oppenheimer

I am trying to make Draft:Einstein versus Oppenheimer into the main space. The user that reviewed the draft asked me to write here to get an additional perspective. Could experienced user here take a look at it and provide some feedback?--ReyHahn (talk) 14:54, 29 August 2023 (UTC)

Help with Mikhail Chigorin Club

Hey WikiProject chess! I'm in need of a bit of help with the Mikhail Chigorin Club draft article. Any help would be appreciated.

Thanks,

The Master of Hedgehogs is back again! 21:02, 19 September 2023 (UTC)

Owen's Defence / Matovinsky Gambit

Hi, Just a brief note to say that there is currently a discussion taking place at the Owen's Defence talk page regarding whether or not the Owen's Defence article should be dominated by a very long section on an obscure subvariation (the Matovinsky Gambit). To avoid a situation where the section is being removed and reinstated it would be useful if other editors could drop by and give their opinions so that a consensus can be reached on how best to proceed. Many thanks, Axad12 (talk) 06:03, 25 September 2023 (UTC)

Portal:Chess

Hello all,

Is there interest in maintaining Portal:Chess ? Should it be kept? Or perhaps quietly redirected to Portal:Games, or brought up for WP:MFD? It doesn't appear to have been maintained much in the past few years. It has 9,404 incoming links, a huge amount, but only 20-40 hits per day (pageview stats). That is a truly miserable amount of pageviews for something so highly linked. And since a Portal is just a meta-tool rather than an article itself, a lack of pageviews is concerning in a way that an article on an obscure chess player having low pageviews isn't.

As a bit of backstory, there were some bitter Portal debates back in 2019 that tried to cleanup a proliferation of created-and-abandoned portals. To the extent there's anything useful on the Portal page, it can become part of this Wikiproject's pages instead, or perhaps part of Outline of chess.

I bring this up because there's a concurrent debate at the Video Games Wikiproject about possibly deprecating their portal (see WT:VG) that currently has near-unanimous support for deprecation, but it might be slightly awkward to propose that for deletion while there are still other unmaintained gaming-related Portals with even fewer views. But if several WikiProjects agree that it's not worth it at the same time and explicitly say that they don't want their Portal anymore, that might resolve any "consistency" arguments. (Or, alternatively, make clear that there is a difference of opinion.) Regardless, I think it's a good idea on the merits to deprecate the chess Portal - it was a fine idea Back In The Day that just didn't work out. SnowFire (talk) 23:40, 25 September 2023 (UTC)

Template names

which would be the better name for a template, Template:French_chess_grandmasters, or Template:Polish GMs? ping me if you respond. Masohpotato (talk) 01:57, 26 September 2023 (UTC)

I am converting templates to GMs instead of chess grandmasters because that seems more concise but if people are really against it I can revert it. Masohpotato (talk) 01:58, 26 September 2023 (UTC)

I would not think that conciseness was important in template names; conversely, a template name should be self-explanatory, particularly for non-chess-players, who are by far the majority of Wikipedia readers. Bruce leverett (talk) 03:04, 26 September 2023 (UTC)

Agree with Bruce L. above. If you want to create redirects from shorter versions, whatever, but "GMs" is not obvious to the general Wikipedia audience, so just spell it out as "grandmasters". Also, I see you've edited the articles after you moved the template - there's no need to do that. Redirects are WP:NOTBROKEN. SnowFire (talk) 03:28, 26 September 2023 (UTC)

It is a very bad idea to use "GM" or "GMs" instead of "grandmaster" or "grandmasters" in a Short Description. The Short Description appears when someone types the player's name to Google, and Google gives a short description along with a link to the article. Only a microscopic percentage of Google users know what GM stands for. I urge you in the strongest terms to undo the changes you have made to the Short Descriptions of English, Mexican, and Bangladeshi player biographies, and not do any more of those. It's late at night here, but perhaps tomorrow I can help with undoing these several dozen changes. Sorry, I hallucinated last night that you had been modifying Short Descriptions. Your actual changes, which were to template names, are not such a big deal. I still think that "grandmaster" would be better, but it's not an emergency. Bruce leverett (talk) 04:04, 26 September 2023 (UTC)

Formulas for rating calculations

In World Chess Solving Championship it seems that the formulas for rating calculation are inconsistent with the formulas used in the wfcc website. Also see Talk:World Chess Solving Championship. The user who has put the formulas there is no longer active. Bob.v.R (talk) 07:59, 23 September 2023 (UTC)

I have updated the formulas. Bob.v.R (talk) 07:13, 27 September 2023 (UTC)

Soviet Women's Championships

USSR Women's Chess Championship has this citation for everything: "All data have been kindly provided by Alexey Popovsky, owner of the website Rusbase." That link is to a website that has quite a lot of information about Soviet and Russian tournaments, but not, as far as I can tell, information about the Women's championships of either Russia or the Soviet Union. Can someone show me what I'm missing, or possibly point me to another website? Bruce leverett (talk) 03:14, 6 October 2023 (UTC)

Notification of AfD

See Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Kingpin (chess magazine). AndyTheGrump (talk) 22:01, 21 October 2023 (UTC)

I think we've got an "internetism" bias here. Kingpin was at its peak in the 80s and 90s, the pre-internet days. It attracted a lot of GMs and prominent chess writers at the time, and was certainly well known in the chess scene even beyond the UK. References to Kingpin can be found in many chess books, but there's not so much about it online. MaxBrowne2 (talk) 22:12, 22 October 2023 (UTC)

Discussion at Talk:Shogi § Tsume

 You are invited to join the discussion at Talk:Shogi § Tsume. -- Marchjuly (talk) 22:56, 9 November 2023 (UTC)

Requesting some assistance

Hello WikiProject Chess, I need some help. I've been working on the 2023 IBSA World Games page - I've got most of the sports covered but I don't understand chess well enough to write about it with any confidence. Would someone be interested in helping out?

It wouldn't need to be more than a paragraph and I've got scorecards and some sources.[2][3][4] MsJoat (talk) 11:45, 30 August 2023 (UTC)

Hi MsJoat, and sorry for the delay in responding; I've filled out the section. The one thing that's missing are the women's silver and bronze medal winners. Cobblet (talk) 17:53, 14 November 2023 (UTC)

Genderizing every chess player category, one country at a time

We have thousands of articles about chess players. Materialscientist has unilaterally taken it upon himself to genderize every chess player by nationality category, so Category:American chess players becomes Category:American male chess players, Category:German chess players becomes Category:German male chess players etc. This is completely unnecessary and creates a lot of work. It was evidently a unilateral decision by this editor, who is also an admin. I have tried raising it on his talk page but no luck so far. MaxBrowne2 (talk) 16:03, 14 November 2023 (UTC)

Here is his unilateral overturning of long-established practice, based on the erroneous assumption that men's and women's competitions are usually separate. It's only really in Europe, more specifically Eastern Europe, that women only tournaments are even common. MaxBrowne2 (talk) 16:44, 14 November 2023 (UTC)

Maybe the place to leave a note is Category talk:Chess players. I will try to get to this later tonight. Bruce leverett (talk) 22:43, 14 November 2023 (UTC)

I started a clumsy CfD (I'm not familiar with that process) at Wikipedia:Categories_for_discussion/Log/2023_November_14#Category:American_male_chess_players.MaxBrowne2 (talk) 02:10, 15 November 2023 (UTC)

Have pawn storm article content assessment rating reevaluated?

I recently made a series of edits that greatly expanded the pawn storm article. Beforehand, it was a very short stub and evaluated as a stub under the content assessment rating chart. However, I took it upon myself to expand the article, and now, there's a greater amount of information than there was before. I also added several more sources to support the information I added and added another example game from the Classical World Chess Championship 1995. Is it possible to have the article reevaluated to perhaps increase it from stub to another rating (or keep it as a stub if it is still found to be too short, which I don't think will be the case)? SonOfYoutubers (talk) 00:18, 21 November 2023 (UTC)

Shortcut for User Page

What is the shortcut that I would link in my user page to signify I am a member of WP:CHESS like I have done with WPVG on User:AcecatYT? Acecat (talk) 15:08, 21 November 2023 (UTC)

There are two methods. See Category:WikiProject Chess participants for details. Bruce leverett (talk) 03:07, 23 November 2023 (UTC)

Match score formatting

Is there a standard format for match and tournament scores? The Chess scoring article was using an en dash for A–B type scores (though in the table the en dash had spaces either side, while the example used an unspaced minus sign instead of a dash...), and it also used en dashes for plus/minus scores, instead of the hyphen-minus or minus sign characters. For now I've switched that article to use to unspaced en dashes for dashes, and minus sign characters for minus signs, but I can't see anything about score formats in the Wikiproject conventions section; one option would be to expand the scope of the "Half points" subsection to something like "Scores and half points"? --Yodin^T 17:54, 24 November 2023 (UTC)

Have Nelson M. Lopez article content assessment rating evaluated

I made the Nelson M. Lopez article on the national master, but it has not been evaluated on the content assessment rating, so would it be possible to have that done? Thank you! SonOfYoutubers (talk) 00:49, 21 November 2023 (UTC)

I don't like to be the one to break it to you, but this article doesn't belong in Wikipedia. Since Mr. Lopez has given up his "day job" to do chess instruction, no doubt he is hoping for a jolt of publicity from the Wikipedia article about him. But Wikipedia is not an appropriate place for that; Wikipedia is an encyclopedia.

For some examples of articles about American chess players comparable in age to Mr. Lopez, look at Elshan Moradi or Hikaru Nakamura. The comparison between Nelson M. Lopez and either of these articles can only be embarrassing to Mr. Lopez. To use standard Wikipedia jargon, Mr. Lopez is just not notable enough.

I would have to add that Wikipedia has rules against writing an article about one's self or about someone to whom one is closely related or connected; see WP:COI. Enough said. Bruce leverett (talk) 03:33, 21 November 2023 (UTC)

I don't necessarily understand your argument? Firstly, I want to address that I am in no way affiliated with Nelson Lopez; I am not him, nor am I a family member, or any other sort of affiliation. Secondly, I'm more than sure that he deserves an article. I first wrote the article as a draft and then submitted it for review, where it got accepted and moved to the mainspace, so that should be proof enough that, according to a reviewer who likely knows the rules very well, it is indeed acceptable for wikipedia and by wikipedia standards. I also wanted to note that, according to wikipedia's rules for notability, an article must have at least one good, reliable source, such as the NYT, which there is indeed a NYT article that mentions Nelson Lopez. Just because he is not an extremely high achieving player like Hikaru or Elshan doesn't mean he doesn't deserve an article; one does not need to be the best in their sport to deserve an article. If that were the case, dozens, maybe even hundreds of other players wouldn't have an article. I'm not quite sure how your statement relates to my request either. SonOfYoutubers (talk) 05:08, 21 November 2023 (UTC)

He certainly isn't notable as a player, a US National Master title doesn't mean much, and there are plenty of stronger players who don't have articles (including your previous respondent). He is essentially a YouTuber/content creator. Whether or not he qualifies for a wikipedia article on that basis I'm not sure, but I doubt it. MaxBrowne2 (talk) 00:11, 23 November 2023 (UTC)

Your expectation on notability is particularly high. Yes, he is not the strongest player in the world. He is certainly not one of the best in the world. But is he still a strong player, yes. He obviously doesn't play nearly as competitively as he used to, but he has plenty of chess knowledge in the palm of his hand. I don't think I need to repeat this, but I will anyways since you're still doubting that he deserves an article. I first wrote the article as a draft, finally submitting it for review after a couple days. I found plenty of sources on him, including a NYT article where they interviewed him for an article wondering on how chess can get you scholarships. About a day after submitting, it got accepted and moved to the mainspace, where it remains right now. In other words, according to a reviewer who reviewed the article, it is eligible for wikipedia. When it comes to whether someone deserves an article, it's typically based on notability in terms of news coverage. They don't necessarily have to be an extremely strong player to get an article, they just have to be notable and have news coverage, which Nelson does have. His main job now is obviously content creation (which is still based around chess), but he still is active in some high-level matches, such as of recently, where he participated in a club match between the Marshall Chess Club and the Texas Chess Center. He didn't perform very well, however, to be fair, none of his team really did, considering they played against one of the best chess clubs in the US. I'm not quite sure why his notability is being questioned when it was already reviewed before and accepted from the draft. I'm not quite sure why the "strength" of the player is being used as a way to measure their notability, when that's not how notability works. My original request was simply to rate based on the content assessment, whether it's a list or start or C-class, etc. Importance, such as low, mid, high, etc, can be used to rate his importance in chess. In fact, if that's what you're questioning, then yeah, even I'd agree he'd probably be low. But for notability, I'm more than certain he's notable. SonOfYoutubers (talk) 01:06, 23 November 2023 (UTC)

I checked some of your sources and some of them are pretty sketchy, of the "passing mention" variety. Take the NYT article, which I managed to screen grab before the paywall notice came up - it actually specifically says he wasn't accepted into Texas Tech on the basis of his chess.

"Nelson M. Lopez II, a freshman from North Carolina who won the 2006 national high school championship, said he applied to the university because of the strong team. “It was a real big deal,” said Mr. Lopez, who does not have a chess scholarship but instead has a full academic scholarship."

Some of them, like challenging GM Nataf in an "all comers" exhibition event when he was 10, or scoring 4/9 in some tournament or other, are embarrassingly trivial. The whole thing reads like a puff piece, and wikipedia is not the place for that. MaxBrowne2 (talk) 01:21, 23 November 2023 (UTC)

He got a full academic scholarship because the school took notice of his skills, but maybe his grades were also good, which obviously is unknown, but there's a reason he got a full scholarship. You can be a good player but if your grades are also good, then they're probably going to more-of pay attention to that. Plus, he played in the chess team of UT, also joining for that. Either way, I mainly wrote the article to record his chess career, also including other things, like his IT career, since for a biography, that should be mentioned too. I already got it reviewed and accepted, so that's enough for me, I only really came here for an assessment to see what rating my article is out of curiosity, but if it's being challenged, then I'll simply leave it be. There was another article that I wrote on an Indian grandmaster that I noticed had not been written about and then decided to write a biography on, and I was going to submit here, but I probably will leave that be as well as this just shows me that requests of those kinds aren't really taken. SonOfYoutubers (talk) 01:48, 23 November 2023 (UTC)

The point of mentioning that he did not get a chess scholarship was to point out an error in the article that was not backed by the cited source. He may have applied to the university because of the chess team, but he was accepted on academic performance, not chess performance.

In my opinion the reviewer made a mistake, perhaps blinded by the quantity of references. Multiple trivial and passing mentions do not add up to notability. MaxBrowne2 (talk) 01:59, 23 November 2023 (UTC)

I'd be interested to see your article about the Indian grandmaster. We are chronically short on people to write articles about really notable chess players. My guess is that if the guy is a grandmaster, he's probably notable (also see WP:CHESS). However actually finding the coverage of a guy, if it is in a foreign language, can be challenging. You seem to have some grasp of the mechanics of writing a Wikipedia biography, so good things might happen.

There are some chess players who are notable in spite of being not so terribly strong, e.g. Alexandra Botez. But she is seriously famous -- if you look at the References section of that article, there are quite a few that are pretty heavyweight. I'm not seeing that with your article, or should I say, your guy isn't there yet.

So according to me (and, I suppose, User:MaxBrowne2), you got a "false positive" from the reviewer, perhaps because he/she didn't know what to look for in chess-related material. I'm sorry about that. It's not a capital crime, but by and by, some zealous editor will notice the problem and will start an WP:Articles for Deletion process, and a bunch of hard-core editors of chess-related articles will jump on it, and the result will not be hard to predict. Bruce leverett (talk) 03:02, 23 November 2023 (UTC)

That would be Rahul Srivatshav Peddi. He only just sneaked in temporarily to cross the 2500 live rating mark, making him one of the lower rated GMs, but he's a GM nonetheless and merits an article on that basis. That said, the article has similar issues - too many trivial details, too many passing mentions in the citations, disguising the fact that apart from actually getting the GM title, his achievements in chess are not especially remarkable. MaxBrowne2 (talk) 03:18, 23 November 2023 (UTC)

I'm going to be honest, your bar for achievements is incredibly high. I mean, he's only just 21 years old (about), and got a GM title at 19, which for me is a pretty high merit in chess. Obviously there are players with higher achievements, however, I'd still consider getting a GM title at 19 incredible. When times comes, other achievements he gets in chess will be recorded on his article, which is the point of making the article, to not only provide information on him but to act as a basis for other information to be added onto the article. That's the point of wikipedia anyways, to make contributions and edits to pages with time and with new information. SonOfYoutubers (talk) 03:46, 23 November 2023 (UTC)

You're right, that was harsh, GM at 19 (or any age for that matter) is a notable achievement. I'm still reminded a bit of Draft:William Graif which has plenty of sources but most of them turn out to be non-notable sources, local sources, passing mentions, trivial coverage, non-notable achievements etc. Grandmasters like Rahul shouldn't need any of that. MaxBrowne2 (talk) 08:37, 23 November 2023 (UTC)

I do agree with a couple of my citations being relatively trivial, in fact, I decided to remove a sentence that was unnecessary. However, I do still have plenty of sources that aren't just passing mentions and aren't just small news outlets. It'd probably be a great idea to keep an eye on Rahul for the future to see any other achievements he'll get, which, with his young age and mind, I'm sure will be many, so that they can be recorded on his page. For now though, I don't believe there is much improvement I can do on the article, but again, with time and new information, edits will be made. SonOfYoutubers (talk) 19:07, 23 November 2023 (UTC)

As an aside, Nelson Lopez deletes any negative or critical comments from his youtube site. In the dubious line against the Dutch Defence 1.d4 f5 2.h3 Nf6 3.g4 (goes back to Mayet in 1839 but he insists on "Korchnoi Attack"), I asked why he didn't prep his students for the critical move 3...d5!. He just deleted it. This tells me he's a snake oil salesman, promising quick gains in chess.com ratings without actually doing the work to become a good player. MaxBrowne2 (talk) 20:44, 23 November 2023 (UTC)

Well, I don't know about that, because I've never heard of that before. Typically, I've seen him make videos and also comments during livestreams about alternative lines or mistakes he's made during a game. Not doubting you, but I've never personally seen that before. SonOfYoutubers (talk) 20:50, 23 November 2023 (UTC)

I think Lopez is probably notable, but as a YouTuber, not as a chess player. I respect it was done in good faith, but his chess career can probably he trimmed down some in the article - even for the Kasparovs of the world, the super-early tournaments while 9 years old generally aren't that interesting, it can be assumed anyone who hit NM probably won some low-level tournaments. SnowFire (talk) 04:39, 28 November 2023 (UTC)

How is he notable as a YouTuber? Notability is measured in coverage by reliable sources -- is Chess Vibes covered significantly? The References in this article don't cite any such coverage. BTW I think the youtube channel is cute, but my personal opinion doesn't count, coverage counts. Bruce leverett (talk) 04:45, 28 November 2023 (UTC)

While all the tourney reports were obviously insubstantial, I assumed that some of the other references in the article went a little deeper than they actually did (e.g. the NYT story, the chess.com links - but in reality they're just passing mentions). I actually agree upon closer inspection, and have added a notability tag. (No hurry on acting on it, very possible more sources do exist, but if nothing substantial arises in ~3 months...) SnowFire (talk) 20:33, 28 November 2023 (UTC)

Dennis Monokroussos

I kind of wanted to save this article but in the end I couldn't justify it. Go to the deletion discussion and state your case. MaxBrowne2 (talk) MaxBrowne2 (talk) 23:58, 1 December 2023 (UTC)

Grammar of checkmate patterns

A lot of articles on mating patterns were recently edited to add the definite article "the" before the names of checkmate patterns. I strongly disagree with this and have accordingly removed it from Fool's mate and scholar's mate. Both of these are universally treated as already-definite by virtually every chess book. This applies to virtually all checkmate patterns named after people (including generic classes such as fools and scholars). I want to see the reasoning behind this ill-advised change and if not, I will find and revert it all. Jasper Deng (talk) 10:48, 25 December 2023 (UTC)

Good article reassessment for Endgame tablebase

Endgame tablebase has been nominated for a good article reassessment. If you are interested in the discussion, please participate by adding your comments to the reassessment page. If concerns are not addressed during the review period, the good article status may be removed from the article. ~~ AirshipJungleman29 (talk) 17:32, 25 December 2023 (UTC)

WCC list formatting update

Hey! For the past few days I've been working on eventually getting List of World Chess Championships to featured list quality, and I've finished reformatting the tables. I've made a few specific decisions I'm unsure of (using the score directly instead of W,L,D—so I'd really appreciate the input before I think about copying it over. Thanks in advance! Remsense留 20:30, 3 January 2024 (UTC)

Using the score is fine. But the list of pre-1886 "unofficial championships" or "predecessor events" has to be removed – it doesn't meet any of the standard WP:LISTCRITERIA and is classic WP:SYNTH. Cobblet (talk) 02:15, 4 January 2024 (UTC)

Cobblet, I agree, though I hadn't acted on it yet—so far I've only redone the material that is already there. I'm just trying to make sure everyone thinks the new presentation is an improvement before I can really get into the meat of inclusion and referencing itself. — Remsense留 02:28, 4 January 2024 (UTC)

Requested move at Talk:Gambit#Requested move 5 January 2024

There is a requested move discussion at Talk:Gambit#Requested move 5 January 2024 that may be of interest to members of this WikiProject. Vanderwaalforces (talk) 17:06, 5 January 2024 (UTC)

1.Nf3 Nf6 2.g3 b5

Can someone help me with sources for Draft:Spassky Variation? It's a sound opening, even Carlsen has been known to play it, and it has independent significance. It tends to slip through the cracks in opening coverage. MaxBrowne2 (talk) 13:44, 1 January 2024 (UTC)

Happy new year! We already discuss this move order under Polish Defense; I'm not sure it merits an independent article. Keene's Flank Openings had a couple of pages on it, although the name "Spassky's Variation" hasn't really caught on. Neil McDonald's King's Indian Attack: Move by Move also had some coverage. A couple of repertoire books for Black have recommended the related lines 1.d4 Nf6 2.Nf3 e6 3.g3 b5 (John Cox, Dealing with d4 Deviations) and 1.d4 Nf6 2.Nf3 e6 3.g3 d5 4.Bg2 b5 (Boris Avrukh, GM Repertoire 11). Cobblet (talk) 20:19, 3 January 2024 (UTC)

I think it should be treated as an independent opening whether you call it a Reti Variation or a KIA variation, and whether you call it a Polish or Extended Fianchetto or Spassky.Variation. It usually leads to independent lines unless white plays an early d4 (which most 1.Nf3 2.g3 players won't do). The main line appears to be 3.Bg2 Bb7 4.0-0 e6 5.d3 with a KIA setup, but sources are a little sketchy. MaxBrowne2 (talk) 01:40, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

Is chessgames.com a WP:RS?

It's one of the worst websites I've ever had to regularly use in almost every other aspect, but generally the quality of the historical material is pretty okay. I suppose it's not a big deal, since its posts usually include further citations for material, but still: is it a weak RS in itself, or should citing it directly be avoided? Remsense留 04:14, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

We use it as a convenient way to link to individual games so that readers can play through them if they want, but not as a source for historical material. It's user-generated content, but as with forums, blogs etc it might point you in the direction of actual reliable sources. MaxBrowne2 (talk) 04:29, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

MaxBrowne2, right, good. While I'm at it, have you seen List of World Chess Championships? I wanted to take the temperature of what contributors think. Remsense留 04:36, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

Category:Chess gambits

Proposal is to delete the new category "Chess gambits" and restore all these openings to "Chess openings". Wikipedia:Categories_for_discussion/Log/2024_January_5#Category:Chess_gambits MaxBrowne2 (talk) 08:43, 5 January 2024 (UTC)

Relisted with new link, please participate if you regularly edit chess articles. MaxBrowne2 (talk) 23:30, 15 January 2024 (UTC)

Good article reassessment for Rules of chess

Rules of chess has been nominated for a good article reassessment. If you are interested in the discussion, please participate by adding your comments to the reassessment page. If concerns are not addressed during the review period, the good article status may be removed from the article. ~~ AirshipJungleman29 (talk) 13:08, 5 February 2024 (UTC)

Categories for (W)CMs

Is it intentional that there has been no Category Woman Candidate Masters and Category:Candidate Masters? While there are not too many CMs with a Wikipedia page, there are quite a few WCMs like Dinah Margaret Norman, Emiko Nakagawa, Marjorie Herrera, Eglantina Shabanaj. There are some CMs too but it will be trickier to find them not a proper query, just for demo.

Would it be okay to go ahead and create them? Konstantina07 (talk) 13:22, 22 February 2024 (UTC)

Looking over WP:OVERCAT, I do not see any obvious objection to your proposed categories. I think the names of the categories should start with "Chess", i.e. Category:Chess Candidate Masters, following the pattern of Category:Chess FIDE Masters. Bruce leverett (talk) 15:30, 22 February 2024 (UTC)

I went ahead and created them; is there a good way to semi-automate identifying adding articles to the category or this can only be done manually? Konstantina07 (talk) 13:13, 23 February 2024 (UTC)

Match score formatting

Is there a standard format for match and tournament scores? The Chess scoring article was using an en dash for A–B type scores (though in the table the en dash had spaces either side, while the example used an unspaced minus sign instead of a dash...), and it also used en dashes for plus/minus scores, instead of the hyphen-minus or minus sign characters. For now I've switched that article to use to unspaced en dashes for dashes, and minus sign characters for minus signs, but I can't see anything about score formats in the Wikiproject conventions section; one option would be to expand the scope of the "Half points" subsection to something like "Scores and half points"? --Yodin^T 17:54, 24 November 2023 (UTC)

With no objections, I've expanded the scope of the section to Wikipedia:WikiProject Chess § Scores and half points; please amend if there are any problems with it! --Yodin^T 03:41, 28 February 2024 (UTC)

Chessable

I'm reaching out here out of a question that some of you may have encountered before: What template is most appropriate for chapters of Chessable courses? Is this a {{cite book}} (as if it were an e-book) or {{cite-web}} (as if it were merely a website)? I'm currently going with the former at Draft:Devin gambit, as read mode seems something like an e-book, but I'm wondering if any of you have dealt with this before. — Red-tailed hawk _(nest) 03:58, 28 February 2024 (UTC)

There are a couple of Chessable citations in the London System article that I updated quite heavily last year, so I had a look to see what was done there.

At the time I updated the article I wasn't sure of the correct citation style. The article was copy edited for house style by user Ihardlythinkso, and I guess it must have been him who altered the citations to {{cite AV media}}. No doubt this is correct, although some Chessable courses (not the ones cited in that article) are text only and don't have an AV element, unless you count the move trainer as being 'V'. Hope this helps... Axad12 (talk) 08:56, 29 February 2024 (UTC)

Thank you for that. I had been more or less only been using the written book text as a source, though I agree it makes sense to use the {{cite AV media}} for the Chessable videos. — Red-tailed hawk _(nest) 18:43, 2 March 2024 (UTC)

No problem. Good luck with the Devin Gambit draft.

Incidentally, if you ever feel like starting an article on the (different but not entirely unrelated) Gibbins-Weidenhagen Gambit (1.d4 Nf6 2.g4) I would happily contribute. Axad12 (talk) 19:29, 2 March 2024 (UTC)

I've got some sources that cover both; my plan is to cover the Gibbins-Weidenhagen (or Bronstein) Gambit next, after I can finish up the section on the 4. Nxg4 lines in the current one. I'm a bit saddened that I can't find anything on 4. d4 in the Devin Gambit; it was Esipenko's choice against Mamedyarov, but I'm having trouble finding any written analysis of that move choice that isn't a mere blog post or lichess study. — Red-tailed hawk _(nest) 21:14, 2 March 2024 (UTC)

The Devin Gambit is a bit outside of my repertoire so I'm afraid I can't help there.

The best source on the GWG (to my knowledge) is the series of 3 long articles on the schach-bremen.de website (which thankfully my browser automatically translates to English). If you know of any better source then do let me know.

I did once try to get hold of the two German book(let?)s on the subject from the 1990s, but the postage from Germany was prohibitive. To be honest I got the impression that Jurgen Tonjes had condensed all the most important info from those sources into his schach-bremen articles (but I stand to be corrected).

Magnus Carlsen gave the GWG a spin at Titled Tuesday back in December 2023 vs GM Aryan Tari (seems like Carlsen intends to play every opening at least once in his career...)

There is also a Vachier-Lagrave game from back in 2019 (vs Wei Yi).

GM Andrew Tang seems to be the GWG specialist and has used it to rack up victories against Firouzja and Andreikin amongst others. Axad12 (talk) 22:04, 2 March 2024 (UTC)

I will attempt to get what I can from the German articles (I could find the three articles about it, but my lack of German knowledge is a bit of a burden here). Schiller's Unorthodox chess openings from 1998 has eight pages (203-210) dedicated to the opening. The theory is likely going to be dated somewhat in both cases, since the website is now over 20 years old and Schiller's book is over 25 years old. — Red-tailed hawk _(nest) 22:02, 3 March 2024 (UTC)

The best insight into the current theory may be the 16 games by GM Andrew Tang (+14 -2) played between 2020 and 2023. Seems like these were mostly bullet games, however, so I guess he was using the GWG because it's obscure and hard to refute with only a minute on the clock, rather than because he had some ground-breaking theoretical novelties.

To be honest, a Wikipedia article on the GWG would only need to address the theory at a fairly superficial level re: the pros and cons of accepting/declining the gambit plus a few sample lines taken from the occasional GM games. Axad12 (talk) 22:55, 3 March 2024 (UTC)

To follow up on this all, there appears to be a free community chessable course at <https://www.chessable.com/the-devilish-devin-gambit/course/140860/> which is explicitly about this gambit. I'd ordinarily have no questions on using this if the author were a titled player (as they'd be something of a subject matter expert on chess), but it's made by a club player whose day job appears to be some sort of economics role for the Central Bank of Ireland. I'm looking and I see some evidence that there's playtesting and quality control on Chessable's end (c.f. editorial control and a reputation for fact-checking in the reliable sources guideline), and the main reason I'd like to use this source is to annotate a game that includes a tournament game between two GMs that includes 3. ...Bb4+ rather than just have some pictures of certain positions with little accompanying text.

My instinct here is saying that the source is OK in this context—I know we don't use Lichess studies, but I think the editorial control on Chessable's end distinguishes the community Chessable courses from studies on Lichess— though I wanted to see if there are any other opinions here. I'll be moving the draft to mainspace shortly; if there's no objections, I'll try to annotate the Wei Yi vs Levon Aronian game using the course as a source. — Red-tailed hawk _(nest) 17:18, 19 March 2024 (UTC)

I'm not sure what the chapter and verse is here, but personally I wouldn't have any objection given the nature of the subject. Axad12 (talk) 18:39, 19 March 2024 (UTC)

Are you saying you have annotations by a strong player, rather than just "a club player"? I would not recommend using annotations by a club player in a Wikipedia article. Given that Aronian and Wei Yi are super-GMs, you should be able to find annotations by someone real somewhere. Bruce leverett (talk) 21:42, 19 March 2024 (UTC)

With regard to the author in the case quoted above, if his Chessable username 'pafiedor' relates to Pawel Fiedor then his standard play FIDE rating is 1485 (according to fide.com). If that is the case then I'd be inclined to reverse my previous comment. Axad12 (talk) 23:15, 19 March 2024 (UTC)

Playing strength does not directly correlate with annotation quality. Reshevsky's books are notoriously poor, but I'd have no problem recommending a Graham Burgess or Tim Harding book. An amateur who has done their research and knows how to write can produce good annotations. When it comes to chess writing, Elo isn't everything. (That said 1485 is pushing it). MaxBrowne2 (talk) 23:17, 19 March 2024 (UTC)

That's about where I am on this. It's just a bit hard to find commentary on this opening for high-level games, since the opening is fairly rare (and has been used by very strong players only very recently). — Red-tailed hawk _(nest) 01:33, 21 March 2024 (UTC)

It's disappointing to run across a very high-level game (or more than one such game) for which there is no very high-level commentary. But we are an encyclopedia, we can wait. If the opening is worth writing about, soon enough the writing will come; and if it doesn't come, maybe the variation is not encyclopedia-worthy after all. Bruce leverett (talk) 03:18, 21 March 2024 (UTC)

That's fair. I think the opening's gotten enough coverage for an article, but you're right there's no need to rush with commentary for an illustrative game regarding the 3. ...Bb4+ line. I shouldn't need to stretch sourcing for that sort of thing. — Red-tailed hawk _(nest) 04:07, 21 March 2024 (UTC)

My feeling on this is as follows:

There will already be entire chess opening articles on Wikipedia that were written by players rated at less than, say, USCF Expert level (i.e. rating of 2000-2199). No one is worried about that as long as the articles are basically correct and informative and they quote appropriate WP:RS sources.

However, in the case in point, the value of a 1485 player adding commentary on a super GM game is going to be limited, and the point of quoting it as a source will be low.

If you are higher rated than 1485 then you might as well add your own commentary.

If you aren't then you can probably generate commentary of higher value than a 1485 player by simply putting the game through the Stockfish analysis engine [5], picking out some salient sub-variations and adding some relevant gloss. If a stronger player later comes along and disagrees with what you've said then obviously they can change it for themselves. That's just the normal Wikipedia process on any article (chess related or otherwise).

However, three further points...

a) on your draft article, why is it necessary to add commentary on a Super GM game at all? Most Wikipedia chess opening articles only talk about the opening moves in general terms without going into detail on specific games (and without discussing very much after the opening has ended except on a thematic level). Illustrative games normally sit at the end of the article, free of commentary.

b) if you feel that the commentary in the source you cite is clearly more insightful than that of a 1485 player then that raises the issue that you raised earlier on the relevance of whether or not there was editorial oversight prior to publication, but I'm not sure that we will get a consensus on whether that can be established or whether it is relevant.

c) there are already plenty of Wikipedia articles about openings more obscure and unorthodox than the Devin Gambit (e.g. article on 1.Nh3, etc.). I don't see anyone claiming that those articles are any the less (or that their notability is in question) due to the lack of expert commentary on Super GM games featuring those openings. Axad12 (talk) 03:47, 21 March 2024 (UTC)

To briefly respond in part: The reason I was seeking to include an illustrative game of the variations was that something like the GA Budapest gambit has an illustrative game, and I've generally seen illustrative games in other articles (though in some, like Queen's Gambit Declined, Cambridge Springs Defense, it's without commentary). I haven't written a chess openings article before, so I'm admittedly a bit new in terms of the general style and conventions here. — Red-tailed hawk _(nest) 03:59, 21 March 2024 (UTC)

If it helps, I was in the same position as you last year. I saw that there were some openings articles which were poorly written stubs so I rewrote them myself pretty much from scratch and expanded them to full articles. If you have a look at them it may help re: issues like format, level of analysis etc. in minor openings. The articles are King's Indian Attack, Nimzowitsch-Larsen Attack, London System, and Hippopotamus Defence. The content/format seems to be non-controversial as the articles have only seen minor (mostly copy-editing) adjustments since they went up. Axad12 (talk) 04:26, 21 March 2024 (UTC)

Mark Schulman (chess player)

Are there enough sources to justify an article? He played in 3 Canadian championships and 1 Olympiad in the 1960s. Since I wrote my piece in the Afd discussion I did find an article by Daniel Yanofsky in the book "100 years of chess in Canada"(available only in snippet) which at least gives us a date of birth. Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/Mark_Schulman_(chess_player). MaxBrowne2 (talk) 03:59, 25 April 2024 (UTC)

Multiple off-by-one ratings

I'm seeing numerous incorrectly-populated ratings. For example, according to FIDE, Gukesh's rating is 2763. However, it's being automatically populated as 2764. Greenman (talk) 10:52, 3 May 2024 (UTC)

Chess players' notability

Greetings, all. I suggest the criterion #1 of WP:NCHESS is changed in order to reflect the fact that both men's and women's title of grandmaster is adequate when considering a chess player's notability. (Please take a look at a relevant recent discussion in the AfD page.) The proposed new text would read as follows:

1. Has been awarded the title of Grandmaster through either men, women, or combined competitions.
   

-The Gnome (talk) 12:41, 4 May 2024 (UTC)

• The proposed wording does not add any content to the existing wording. The phrase "through either men, women, or combined competitions", besides being less than perfectly grammatical, does not qualify the previous part of the sentence in any way. So I did not know what you had in mind. I turned to the AfD discussion (thanks for the link), and I now have an idea what you might have meant. Perhaps you would like WP:NCHESS to mention the WGM title as well as the GM title. I definitely don't like this idea, but before I go on about it, I'll stop and check that that is what you had in mind. Bruce leverett (talk) 22:23, 4 May 2024 (UTC)

Yes, I find the notion that women athletes who compete in women-only sports and achieve the same awards or titles as men (e.g. chess grandmasters, Wimbledon tennis tournament winners, Olympic track and field medalists, etc) should have their awards or titles treated in exactly the same way as men's, as far as their use to indicate notability is concerned. -The Gnome (talk) 11:40, 5 May 2024 (UTC)

WGM titles are not parallel titles. They are lesser titles available to women, on the way to the same titles at the top that are available to everyone. The highest level of women competition does not involve WGMs; they are contested by GMs who are women. Accordingly, sources don't care about women who are WGMs just because they are WGMs; there are enough women GMs to care about. It's better to focus on reasons other than their titles that might generate SIGCOV. Bodhana Sivanandan, for example, meets GNG despite not even being a WGM.
Regardless, NCHESS can be used as guidance when looking for topics to create articles on but it ought not to be used as an argument in AFDs. And it is already too lax. Not all GMs are actually notable. — Usedtobecool ☎️ 12:14, 5 May 2024 (UTC)

Agree with Usedtobecool. A crucial point here is that the WGM title is a separate title from the GM title. Hypothetically, as a woman is ascending the ladder of chess, she might get both. Separate certificates, separate lapel pins, etc. Bruce leverett (talk) 14:03, 5 May 2024 (UTC)

For most WGMs, the next step on the ladder is to get the IM title (as many women have done, including by playing in all-woman tournaments). The unceremonious treatment of Dutch IM Lars Ootes in a recent Afd shows that IMs are not always considered notable, so presumably WGMs are not always considered notable either. MaxBrowne2 (talk) 06:30, 6 May 2024 (UTC)

I wouldn't call the deletion of the article about Lars Osten as "unceremonious treatment." It was a 2-1 decision. As to your deductive presumptions, well, they're personal opinions and no more, in the absence of supporting data. A good point about ELO ranges was made, though. -The Gnome (talk) 18:35, 8 May 2024 (UTC)

Some of the replies seem to have some misconceptions. Sportsfan77777 (talk) 15:23, 15 May 2024 (UTC)

• Women's titles are parallel titles. If you go to a GM's FIDE page (e.g. [6]), you will see both titles listed, not just GM. I get why because of the rating requirements you want to think of it as just one ladder you can climb, but really it's two separate ladders you can climb together. The FIDE title regulations page ([7]) expresses the same sentiment. Sportsfan77777 (talk) 15:23, 15 May 2024 (UTC)
• Regarding IMs, a male player having the IM title may not be inherently notable, but a female player having the IM title is. Every single woman with the IM title already has a page. Sportsfan77777 (talk) 15:23, 15 May 2024 (UTC)
• For WGMs, there are ~2000 GMs compared to only about ~500 WGMs. In that sense, the WGM title is more exclusive. I think it's fair that if we think the GM title implies notability, the WGM title should as well. (The reality is probably neither really imply notability. A fairly high fraction of GMs or WGMs are notable, but not 100% in either case.) We already have over 400 (I think 450?) WGM pages out of 500 WGMs. That's a pretty good percentage around 80-90%, probably similar to the percentage for GMs. Sportsfan77777 (talk) 15:23, 15 May 2024 (UTC)

  WP:AfD discussions involving biographies of chess players always revolve around "significant coverage"; the strength of the player or the title held seldom figure into the discussion. This is the widely recognized, but largely unwritten, weakness of WP:NCHESS, which for this very reason cannot even remotely approach authority as a test of notability, but can only serve as a guideline.

  You observation that the WGM title is as good a predictor of notability as the GM title, if not better, is something I hadn't thought of, but it makes perfect sense. Women are still quite rare in organized (adult) chess, and wherever they go, all eyes are upon them. This translates to more coverage, for better or for worse, in publications of all kinds, all the way up to our reliable sources. In spite of what I wrote earlier in this conversation, I could hardly object if WP:NCHESS were revised to reflect this. Bruce leverett (talk) 23:22, 15 May 2024 (UTC)

While discussions involving biographies of chess players should indeed revolve around significant overall coverage in sources, the additional criteria for notability available through WP:NCHESS can stand on their own. As to your remarks about WGMs, we're in firm agreement. That's why I proposed a change in the wording. Suggestions? -The Gnome (talk) 07:37, 17 May 2024 (UTC)

Your observations, Sportsfan77777, are spot on. -The Gnome (talk) 07:37, 17 May 2024 (UTC)

Style to display chess moves

Recently User:Neo Purgatorio changed a lot of opening articles to go from explicitly mentioning the move number to implicitly using a numbered list to get it (e.g. diff, so :1. Na3 vs. # Na3). We discussed it a bit on their talk page. I realized that it doesn't look like WP:CHESS currently has any guidelines or suggestions on how to display moves? Anyway, I think that maybe we should have such a guideline added.

I think it should recommend the existing style and discourage the numbered list style. Reasoning: chess moves are not really a numbered list. The move number is a primary part of the text, not just a count of items - imagine if there's 4 buildings with names prepended with "1/2/3/4", we wouldn't use a numbered list but rather include these as part of the name. It is surprising and confusing to go into edit source and have the move numbers "disappear". Additionally, most browsers copy & paste will exclude numbered list counts, which is explicitly not desired. Try going to Descriptive_notation#Example and copy pasting the move list (which uses the numbered list style); you'll end up with no move numbers. Copy-pasting a directly written version works fine, though. The two styles display basically identically, so why would we want to go with the harder-to-edit, harder-to-copy version? (Also, machine ingestion is mostly not our problem, but automatic analysis of text also probably wants to see the move numbers explicitly.) And while it can be worked around, it's extra-annoying to use a numbered list style if the move list doesn't start at 1 (doable, but why are we doing this extra work again?). I don't really see any advantages of using the numbered list style, but I'll let Neo Purgatorio or others make the case for why they're worth considering. SnowFire (talk) 15:48, 23 May 2024 (UTC)

I'm personally fine with either being done here; my impression on the articles, since I'm not all that familiar with chess notation but have grasped the basics of it, was that they were meant to be numbered but simply were not and thus could have used numbered lists. I was looking at it through a formatting standpoint, but I did try to check WP:CHESS to see if there was anything specific on it. I do think the point you've made about not being able to copy chess notation as a result of numbered lists has merit. Neo Purgatorio (talk) 16:01, 23 May 2024 (UTC)

I've gone ahead and reverted the changes I've made; this discussion should still probably play out, however, since there aren't any guidelines here relating to what to do. Neo Purgatorio (talk) 05:10, 24 May 2024 (UTC)

Gadgets now loadable on a per-category basis

I know that there was work in progress on creating a chess game extension, in place of trying to deploy the chess game gadget. Note it is now possible to trigger a gadget loading by placing a page in a configured category. mw:Template gadgets has a bit of description. The first request on English Wikipedia is to support a gadget that implements Conway's Game of Life; see Talk:Conway's Game of Life#Template gadget request. Thus it is finally possible to deploy the existing chess game gadget, with it being loaded only on the pages where it is needed. isaacl (talk) 23:26, 29 May 2024 (UTC)

Izaak Appel

Appel was a strong Polish/Jewish player who "disappeared" while living in Lviv (or possibly Kyiv) following the 1941 Nazi invasion of Ukraine. He was almost certainly killed in 1941, but as is often the case the precise circumstances of his death are unknown. Currently we have a very unsatisfactory situation where his "disappearance" is sourced to a self-published Bill Wall page. Can we find something better? Gaige maybe? It would be better if we could say something like "Appel died in unknown circumstances following the 1941 Nazi invasion of Ukraine". MaxBrowne2 (talk) 01:32, 30 May 2024 (UTC)

Unfortunately all that Gaige says on page 12 of Chess Personalia is

Appel, Izaak         POL

   *    c1905

   †    c1941

Quale (talk) 02:40, 30 May 2024 (UTC)

Should Titled Players Who Cheated Online Have it Mentioned on Their Wiki Page?

Someone added: "In 2024, Malak Ismayil’s account was banned on Chess.com under the website’s Fair Play Policy." They linked to her chess.com page, where her account is closed. I am removing it for there being no independent sources, but I'd like a second opinion. Malak Ismayil - Wikipedia Bres2 (talk) 03:11, 31 August 2024 (UTC)

Only with proper secondary sourcing. Good call. I am not ready to allow someone's career to be destroyed based solely on the actions of a chess.com admin. Marcus Markup (talk) 08:49, 31 August 2024 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Juan Manuel Bellón López

I find it incredible that anyone would consider a 5 time Spanish national champion and ten-time national representative of any sport non-notable, or allege that they're only known because of their wife or daughter, but here we are, and now we are in danger of a pile-on by clueless deletionists. MaxBrowne2 (talk) 08:58, 6 September 2024 (UTC)

Akira Watanabe (chess)

Would someone from WP:CHESS mind taking a look at Akira Watanabe (chess) and assessing the subject's notability (as chess player)? I'll ask something similar at WT:JAPAN given that the subject might possobily be notable for reasons other than chess, but the current focus of the article and claim of notability seem to be the subject's chess achievements. The article also appears to be a translation of the Japanese Wikipedia article ja:渡辺暁 (based on User talk:Ebefl#Ways to improve Akira Watanabe (chess)) but is lacking proper attribution per WP:TFOLWP. A lack of proper attribution cn most likely can be "fixed", but a lack of notability can't. For reference, the Japanese Wikipedia article does seem to be pretty much the same content-wise and is also basically only supported by a single WP:PRIMARY source (the other sources listed as "references" seem more like "explanatory notes").-- Marchjuly (talk) 21:51, 23 June 2024 (UTC)

I made a couple of quick searches but didn't find anything interesting. There is a book, "How to Play Chess Like Akira Watanabe", by John C. Murray, which I thought might be promising, but it is "independently published" (roughly equivalent to self-published). I also found an article in the Yale Bulletin about him, but it was from when he was a visiting scholar at Yale, and I would hesitate to call that "significant coverage". Bruce leverett (talk) 02:08, 24 June 2024 (UTC)

Hi Bruce leverett. Was wondering whether you or anyone else could take another crack at assessing whether there's really anything here per WP:BEFORE. The article hasn't been improved by its creator since my original post and I haven't been able to really find anything about this player on Google either related to chess. The corresponding article on Japanese Wikipedia also hasn't been recently improved; so, there's nothing to get from there. -- Marchjuly (talk) 21:33, 18 September 2024 (UTC)

I did not find anything new.

I didn't realize, when we discussed this in June, that he had won the national championship of Japan three times; you can see this in Japanese Chess Championship. This is criterion 3 of WP:NCHESS, although, of course, one can see from the FIDE ratings that the Japanese championship is not a very strong one. The Polish version of the page has a link to the complete results of a more recent Japanese championship, from 2010, in which he finished third; it is from the FIDE website.

The Polish version of the page has a link to an article by Alex Baburin on chess in Japan, but when I click the link I get "Forbidden", and a google search for Baburin chess Japan doesn't show anything. The same Polish version also has a link to an article by Watanabe about chess in Japan, from msoworld.com (published by Mind Sports Organization Worldwide, Inc.) Of course we shouldn't routinely cite autobiographical material, but it's interesting. He mentioned at the time that he had a "weekly column" on the internet about chess, in Japanese.

He has written three beginner's books (this is clearer in the Japanese version of the page). I think that if these were successful, that is, popular, books, they would meet criterion 5 (or even 6). I do not know how to evaluate how successful those books are (were). At least one of them was not self-published. Bruce leverett (talk) 01:25, 19 September 2024 (UTC)