Proposal to add standardized variation sequences for chess notation

[Mark Davis ☕️]

Amusing at this is, hard to believe that people are spending this much time
on an April Fool's posting.

I'm looking forward to similar postings on checkers and go pieces. As a
matter of fact, one that proposes adding new characters for every possible
configuration of a go board would be imaginative.

And I'm looking also forward to the ♖+ZWJ+⬛️  (etc) proposal.

Mark

Mark

On Tue, Apr 4, 2017 at 3:00 PM, Philippe Verdy <verdy_p at wanadoo.fr> wrote:

>
>
> 2017-04-04 1:30 GMT+02:00 Michael Everson <everson at evertype.com>:
>
>> On 3 Apr 2017, at 23:07, Asmus Freytag (c) <asmusf at ix.netcom.com> wrote:
>> >
>> > On 4/3/2017 2:15 PM, Michael Everson wrote:
>> >> On 3 Apr 2017, at 17:16, Asmus Freytag <asmusf at ix.netcom.com> wrote:
>> >>
>> >>>>> The same indirection is at play here.
>> >>>>>
>> >>>> This is pure rhetoric, Asmus. It addresses the problem in no way.
>> >>>>
>> >>> Actually it does. I'm amazed that you don't see the connection.
>> >>>
>> >> I’ve never understood you when you back up into that particular kind
>> of abstract rhetoric.
>> >
>> > Sometimes thinking through something in abstract terms actually
>> clarifies the situation.
>>
>> Of course I know that’s your view. It’s just never been an effective
>> communication strategy between you and me generally.
>>
>> >>> The “meaning” of a chess-problem matrix is the whole 8 × 8 board, not
>> the empty dark square at b4 or the white pawn on
>> >
>> > In other words, you assert that partial boards never need to be
>> displayed. (Let's take that as read, then).
>>
>> No, I am sure that a variety of board shapes can be set in plain text
>> with these conventions, though the principle concern is classical chess
>> notation.
>>
>> >> The “problem” the higher-level protocol is supposed to solve is the
>> one where a chess piece of one colour sits in an em-squared zone whether
>> light or dark. In lead type this was a glyph issue. Lead type had just
>> exactly what my proposal has: A piece with in-line text metrics, spaced
>> harmoniously with digits and letters, and square sorts with and without
>> hatching.
>> >
>> > Leaving aside the abstract question whether modeling lead type is ipso
>> facto the best solution in all cases…
>>
>> I think it was a good expedient solution in lead type and that this
>> proposal offers a robust parseable digital version of that solution, and I
>> assert people will make use of that data structure.
>>
>> >> OK, then you support the part of the proposal that applies VS1 and VS2
>> to the chess pieces.
>> >
>> > My statement just was that a proposal where piece + VS should be
>> M-square, piece w/o VS should be generic, might make some sense (and same
>> for a suitable "empty" cell).
>> >
>> > The next question would be whether the alternation in background is
>> best expressed in variation sequences or by some other means.
>>
>> I think the value in the data structures I have described is best
>> retained as text. Anything else just seems it would be simply needlessly
>> complex,
>>
>> > If you never need to show just a single field, then I concede that the
>> main drawback of variation selectors for the background style is absent;
>> however, reading ahead in your message, the partial grid appears to be
>> common, therefore the reason to choose an alternate solution to the
>> background style is a strong one.
>>
>> Well, it’s text, Asmus, so you can delete all but one line of a board if
>> you want:
>>
>> ▕▨︁□︀▨︁□︀▨︁♘︀▨︁□︀▏
>>
>> There. So… what are you talking about? It’s a text matrix. It’s like a
>> kind of poem.
>>
>> ▗▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▖
>> ▕□︀▨︁□︀▨︁□︀▨︁♞︀▨︁▏
>> ▕▨︁□︀▨︁□︀▨︁□︀▨︁□︀▏
>> ▕□︀▨︁♔︀▨︁□︀▨︁□︀▨︁▏
>> ▕▨︁□︀▨︁□︀▨︁♘︀▨︁□︀▏
>> ▕□︀▨︁□︀▨︁♚︀▨︁□︀▨︁▏
>> ▕▨︁□︀▨︁□︀▨︁□︀▨︁□︀▏
>> ▕□︀▨︁□︀♙︁♛︀▨︁□︀▨︁▏
>> ▕▨︁□︀♕︁□︀▨︁♖︀▨︁□︀▏
>> ▝▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▘
>>
>> It even looks like one. That’s a meaningful pattern. A kind of writing
>> system.
>>
>
> For me it looks like ASCII art, a hack mixing various characters intended
> for different uses and ignoring all semantics, only working because it
> reuses similar-looking glyphs instead of being an actual encoding.
> That represetnation is absultely not semantically coherent.
>
> If we want to have true checkboard cells, we need characters specifically
> for them, and in them we'll place (or not) chess pieces or any other
> suitable symbol or letter. This means creating clusters (cell+ZWJ+piece).
> This will be coherent.
>
> If we want to have borders for boards, we need coherent characters for
> them (we do not expct them to be combined with pieces, just that they will
> properly glue with cells in the middle of the board, and that their metric
> match them in suitable fonts).
>
> The fact that legacy renderers or fonts won't display that correctly is
> definitely not an argument. Many scripts still have problems being
> represented with legacy renderers or fonts. But the encoding is made to be
> coherent semantically. Fonts and rederers will adapt their properties to
> render what is semantically wanted and that will be also pleasing to read,
> and they still will be able to use various variants (e.g. emoji styles for
> pieces, possibly with 3D effects and colors, possibly animated pieces, or
> alternate decorative patterns in board cells, possibly photographic-based,
> such as wood, marble, grass, sand, glass, iron...)
>
>
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