Historical video of World Microprocessor Chess Championship, 1985

Recently somebody posted a video of the WMCC held in 1985! (link at the bottom of the page)

This video is of the World Microcomputer Chess Championship (WMCC) held in the World Trade Center, Amsterdam, 1985! Overall 16 teams participated and it was won by Mephisto! In fact, Mephisto had 3 versions running in that tournament and they took the first 3 spots! (The programs were written in Assembly language!!!)

Mephisto was designed by Richard Lang (yup the same guy who later designed Chess Genius)
Mephisto was running on a 16-bit Motorola 68000 microprocessor (back in those days, my company Motorola made microprocessors! Now it is a "software company", having outsourced the manufacturing  unit to Flextronics)

On the rest day, the Dutch GM Gennadi Sosonko (2550) gave a 31 board simul including 10 computers! The simul lasted a whooping 8 hours and he scored 25.5 - 5.5

An interesting position

Blitz Monster Y - Turbostar K

Position after 61. Kc1

In this position, Turbostar played 61... Rb6? and the game ended in a draw after some moves.

Instead 61... Rxb7!! (Engines like Critter find this move and the winning line in a few seconds! ) 62. Rxb7 f2 63. Rb4+ Kf5

 64. Rb5+ Ke6 (64... Kg6?? 65. h5+ and White wins) 65. Rb6+ Kf7 66. Rb7+ Kg6

and the Black pawn cannot be stopped from Queening.

Tournament Crosstable (Top 5)

Rank	Program	Country	Hardware	Score	Games	SOS	SoDOS	Title
1	Mephisto Amsterdam 1	GBR	68020 (32 bit, std. freq.)	8.0	8	29.0	29.00	Champ!
2	Mephisto Amsterdam 3	GBR	68000 (16 bit)	7.0	8	27.5	24.50
3	Mephisto Amsterdam 2	GBR	68000 (16 bit)	7.0	8	27.5	24.25
4	Princhess 6	SWE	6502 (8 bit)	4.5	8	35.0	12.50
5	Blitz Monster Y	USA	6502 (8 bit)	4.0	8	36.0	14.00

source: http://www.grappa.univ-lille3.fr/icga/round.php?tournament=63

PGN download

http://www.grappa.univ-lille3.fr/icga/download_games.php?tournament=63

More details and pics

http://chessprogramming.wikispaces.com/WMCCC+1985

Video (in German) - also features Susan Polgar in the end!

Source : Ed Schroder mentioned about these videos on his site and on talkchess.com.

Chess reading for the week - March 18

Here are some interesting chess posts for the week:

From Indian Express : Interview with Pentyala Harikrishna
Harikrishna is currently rated 2706 and is India #2 and World #43!

"On the possibility of breaking into top 10:
In order to reach the top 10, I have to gain another 35 to 40 points. I need to perform consistently in at least six to seven tournaments in the next seven months. I have to chose the right tournaments to play against good players."

From Vishy Anand on Twitter during round 3
The champ is closely following each game and really appreciates what the players are going through.

From ibtimes.co.uk : Young Norwegian Number One is the David Beckham of Chess
"I have no doubt that when I am playing at my best, I am the best. The ratings don't lie," said Carlsen
Carlsen recently fronted an advertising campaign for the fashion label G-Star Raw alongside the actress Liv Tyler, counts Hollywood actor Ben Stiller as a friend, and was recently offered a role - as a chess grand master - in the film Star Trek Into Darkness."

From chess-news.ru : "When the Brilliant Players Are At the Board"
"We have followed the game closely with Ruslan Ponomariov who gave a live commentary on Chess-News radio. Here we offer you some of his remarks which were available on our Twitter page:
Ponomariov on Ivanchuk-Aronian opening:
"Ivanchuk today plays like Aronian"
"What Ivanchuk does looks more like improvisation than preparation"
"Ivanchuk playes a bit impudently, but it's unclear how to refute..."
"Honeslty, at the moment I'm a bit disappointed in Ivanchuk"
"Ivanchuk's position is way too insecure now"
Ivanchuk has 3 minutes for 17 moves. Ponomariov: "Here he should already play following his intuition and forget that the hands are trembling..."
"It's hard to commentate when the brilliant players are at the board..."
"For Ivanchuk it's already not about winning the tournament; important is that he will at least recover"

From chessbase.com : A bodycheck, a Krushing attack, a rook retreat...
"The London Candidates Tournament is great, but something's missing: not a single female player. For those of you suffering withdrawal our ChessBase Magazine columnist GM Karsten Müller has taken a look back at the Women's World Team Championship and some of the instructive and entertaining endgame it produced"

Revisiting Linares 1998

Today is the day when Anand won his first Linares title in 1998 (yeah Carlsen was just 8 years old!). Anand again won Linares nearly a decade later in 2007 and 2008!
The "Wimbledon of Chess" was played from 22-Feb-1998 to 9-Mar-1998.

XV Ciudad de Linares (ESP), 1998 --------------------------------------------------------------- 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 --------------------------------------------------------------- 1 Viswanathan Anand g IND ** 1= 0= == 1= =1 =1 7½ 2 Alexei Shirov g ESP 0= ** == =1 10 10 11 7 3 Garry Kasparov g RUS 1= == ** == == == == 6½ 4 Vladimir Kramnik g RUS == =0 == ** =1 == 1= 6½ 5 Peter Svidler g RUS 0= 01 == =0 ** 10 =1 5½ 6 Vassily Ivanchuk g UKR =0 01 == == 01 ** 0= 5 7 Veselin Topalov g BUL =0 00 == 0= =0 1= ** 4

Here are some interesting games from each round.

Round 1 - Shirov 0-1 Anand, rest drawn

Shirov - Anand, 0-1

A rare concentration of heavy pieces around a pawn!

Shirov - Anand, 0-1

Final winning position

I consider this a model game where the two Rooks nicely outplay the White Queen.

Round 2 - All games decisive. Anand 1-0 Svidler. Ivanchuk blunders!

Ivanchuk - Shirov, 0-1

Position after Ivanchuk's 30.Rf3??

Black to play and win (solution at the bottom)

Round 3 - Kasparov defeats Anand, Ivanchuk blunders again!

Svidler - Ivanchuk, 1-0

Position after Ivanchuk's 47...Nb7

White to play and win

Round 4, 5 - All games drawn

Round 6 - Shirov on fire, rest drawn

Shirov - Svidler, 1-0

Position after Black's 25...g6

White to play and win

Round 7 - Topalov wins his first, Ivanchuk loses his 3rd

Ivanchuk - Topalov, 0-1

Position after Black's 51...Kg5

Ivanchuk chose the fastest way to lose and
played 52. Rxh4 and resigned immediately

Round 8 - All drawn
Round 9 - Ivanchuk defeats Shirov, rest drawn.

Shirov - Ivanchuk, 0-1

A position that could have been!

Round 10

Topalov - Shirov, 0-1
How did Shirov choose to end the game?

Black to play and win

Ivanchuk - Svidler, 1-0

Can White stop the Black pawn on a3?

White to play and win

Round 11 - Svidler 1-0 Topalov, Shirov 1-0 Kramnik

Round 12 - Kramnik 1-0 Svidler, Anand's master piece!

Ivanchuk - Anand, 0-1

Can you find a win for Black?

Black to play and win

Round 13 (last round) - Svidler 1-0 Shirov, Anand 1-0 Topalov

Anand - Topalov, 1-0

Position after Black's 27...c5

After Anand's Nb6+, Topalov gave up his Queen
and went on to lose 50 moves later

And thus Anand edged out Shirov to win Linares 1998!

Tid bits

• Mighty Kasparov (2825) could only win one game and drew the rest of them to remain undefeated!
• Shirov (placed 2nd) won the most games (five)

Solutions

Ivanchuk - Shirov

30... Rxe4 0-1

Svidler - Ivanchuk

48. Qxe5 dxe5 49. Rxd7 1-0

Shirov - Svidler

26. Bd7 Rd8 27. Be6 Re8 28. Qg5 1-0

Topalov - Shirov

47... Bh3! 48. gxh3 Kf5 49. Kf2 Ke4 50. Bxf6 d4 51. Be7 Kd3
52. Bc5 Kc4 53. Be7 Kb3 0-1

Ivanchuk - Svidler

47. Bc8 Kf7 48. h6 a2 49. Bxe6+ Kxe6 50. h7 a1=Q 51. h8=Q
and White went on to win in few more moves 1-0

Ivanchuk - Anand

21... Bxd5 22. exd5 Rxc2!! 23. Kxc2 Qxa2 24. f4 Rc8+
25. Kd2 Bxf4+ 26. Ke2 Qxb2+ 27. Kf3 Rc1 0-1

Download these games

[Pictures] Ubuntu Tablet OS on my Nexus 7

My curiosity got the better of me and I decided to try the Ubuntu Tablet OS Developer preview on my Nexus 7.

Things I liked (over Android)

• Quick access to apps via Unity sidebar. (Android has "sidebar" and "unity" apps)

Challenges ahead for the Ubuntu OS (in no particular order)

• Keyboard needs a lot of improvement
• Less intuitive (had trouble figuring out how the swipe gestures work)
• Show me the apps! Currently the Twitter, FB and Gmail apps are just shortcuts to the web. Nothing like native apps!
• Google integration. Yes I am a Google power user
• Switching between apps is clumsy (Android intents rock!)
• Closing apps is painful (you need to swipe up from the bottom edge, then press the "X" icon.
• Getting it to work on different screens. Some dummy apps clipped (see Game and Calculator images below)

Pictures

Home screen
(currently it is a static and does not do anything)

Recent apps
(swipe up from the bottom edge)

The Unity bar
(swipe rightwards from the left edge of the screen)

Gallery

 

Videos

       

Dummy Home screen

Dummy Music content

Dummy Call screen

Home screen (downloadable content)

 

Dummy Messages

Dummy Music screen
(does nothing)

 

Game gone for a toss
(does nothing)

Battery panel
(swipe down from the battery icon)

Could not change the Date/Time
(swipe down from the Date icon) 

"Sharing" screen

People home screen

 

Dummy Calculator
(clipped, does nothing)

Notes app
(worst keyboard ever)

Conclusion

Ubuntu Tablet OS has a LOT of work to do. If you are a Ubuntu Tablet OS developer, then you should stop reading this post and get back to work while I get back to flashing Android 4.2.2!

Read Google Books using Chess Book Study Android app

Chess Book Study v2.0.1 now has a full built-in browser based on Zirco, the open-source browser.

With this the good news is that you can use the browser to read Google Books!

Here is how you can do it:

Step 1: Click "Open Web" and type http://books.google.com in the URL bar as shown below.

Once the page is loaded, click "My Library". If you are on a Phone or other small screen device, you may need to scroll to the bottom of the page to see "My Library"

Step 2: Once you click "My Library", Google will ask you to enter your username and password to sign-in. Enter your details and click "Sign in". You can choose the "Remember password" option if you like. Once you are logged in, you can select your book from the "My Books on Google Play" list.

 Step 3: Once you choose a book above, it would load the book details. Now click on the Book Icon (highlighted below). In some cases, you would see a "Read Now" option to the left. If not, simply click the book image.

Step 4: The book will be loaded and you can move through the book.

In the coming months, I shall improve the experience of reading books online.

(Edit Apr 28) Note 0: The app may crash on some devices while trying this method. I am working on it!
Note 1: Google Books are proprietary and closed source. Hence it is not easy for the app to read the books offline.
Note 2: Unfortunately, Amazon Kindle books are not supported since Amazon currently only supports a limited set of browsers.

Which country has the most Titled (GM, WGM, IM etc) Chess players after Russia?

♚ Strongest Nations (by Avg rating of the Top 10 players of that country)

	Country	Avg rating
1	Russia	2747
2	Ukraine	2704
3	China	2669
4	France	2663
5	Hungary	2661
6	Armenia	2661
7	United States of America	2654
8	Azerbaijan	2653
9	India	2639
10	Netherlands	2636

as of 2-Mar-2013

♚ Countries with most GMs

	Country	Avg rating	GMs
1	Russia	2747	216
2	Ukraine	2704	80
3	Germany	2629	80
4	United States of America	2654	77
5	Hungary	2661	52
6	Serbia	2587	52
7	France	2663	47
8	Spain	2589	41
9	Israel	2623	39
10	Poland	2633	35
11	England	2620	35
12	Bulgaria	2614	35

as of 2-Mar-2013

♚ Trivia: Which country has the most Titled (GM, WGM, IM etc) Chess players after Russia?

	Country	Avg rating	GMs	IMs	Total Titled
1	Russia	2747	216	501	2178
2	Germany	2629	80	233	1198
3	United States of America	2654	77	121	583
4	Serbia	2587	52	106	550
5	Ukraine	2704	80	197	493
6	Spain	2589	41	107	491
7	Hungary	2661	52	108	420
8	France	2663	47	95	357
9	Poland	2633	35	101	332
10	Netherlands	2636	30	78	293

as of 2-Mar-2013

I was quite surprised to see that after Russia, Germany has the most Titled players. And Germany has double the number than that of 3rd placed USA!

Germany's top player is Arkadij Naiditsch who is #39 in the rankings. Go Germany!

PS. The number above seem to include non-active players too

Source: http://ratings.fide.com/topfed.phtml