Show HN: Scannable Chess Scoresheets • Hacker News Board

Re: Show HN: Scannable Chess Scoresheets

#31

Post by gmiller123456 » Thu, Feb 14, 2019, 8:34 PM UTC

gk1 wrote: post #8

This is neat. For anyone wondering why not just record the moves on your phone: Digital devices are not allowed at over-the-board tournament games.

As others have pointed out, there are digital scoresheets. But further, digital devices are not banned at OTB tournaments, most players will have a cell phone, and might even text or take calls. It's only in high stakes tournaments that you'll see cell phones banned, but even then it's only for the players. It's still perfectly legal, and extremely common for the game to be video recorded.

Re: Show HN: Scannable Chess Scoresheets

#32

Post by samirm » Thu, Feb 14, 2019, 8:40 PM UTC

are chess players required to write down their moves?

or could the event organizers set up some overhead cameras

or make a smart board

and automate the entire thing that way?

Re: Show HN: Scannable Chess Scoresheets

#33

Post by samcal » Thu, Feb 14, 2019, 8:48 PM UTC

samirm wrote: post #32

are chess players required to write down their moves? or could the event organizers set up some overhead cameras or make a smart board and automate the entire thing that way?

The answer is yes to all 3! There are cameras and smart boards at the highest level, but chess players are still required to write down their moves. Archaic for sure, but tradition is strong with these old games.

Re: Show HN: Scannable Chess Scoresheets

#34

Post by gmiller123456 » Thu, Feb 14, 2019, 8:53 PM UTC

indy7500 wrote: post #15

V-2 wrote: post #12

Nice idea, but doesn't the fact that each letter / digit has to be in a separate box (if I understand this right) defeat the purpose? Normally at tournaments they would hand you a score sheet that doesn't have this crossword-like layout.

Hmm... I see why it's a hassle. How does it defeat he purpose though?

The USCF rules state that the TD can require players to use a specific scoresheet. It's not generally used in most casual tournaments, but almost mandatory for tournaments that matter.

Re: Show HN: Scannable Chess Scoresheets

#35

Post by doodpants » Thu, Feb 14, 2019, 8:56 PM UTC

indy7500 wrote: post #29

parimarjan wrote: post #26

This is definitely a real problem for some people - a chess organizer friend of mine recently spent 4-5 hours entering games from a scoresheet into the computer every night. This solution is pretty nice - but it is possible to imagine that such a solution might work directly on horribly written scoresheets, using handwriting recognition + the kind of constraints mentioned by indy7500 - that would be pretty amazing fr…

(I am OP) I thought about doing it that way but found that handwriting recognition was pretty weak as of now and wanted to try something solid. The reason is, usually, handwriting recognition would take into account the following characters (it doesn't recognize individual characters at a time, it looks at a database of handwritten whole words). That would be the ideal if done well, of course.

I have no experience with handwriting recognition, but intuitively it seems like the facts that:

a) the grammar for chess move notation is fairly limited; and

b) each move must be valid relative to the current game state

can be used as contextual clues to resolve ambiguous characters. Of course, this means you can't use an off-the-shelf handwriting recognition package that recognizes whole words like you describe, but requires a custom per-character recognizer. (But then, isn't that what you're doing already?)

Re: Show HN: Scannable Chess Scoresheets

#36

Post by [deleted] » Thu, Feb 14, 2019, 8:59 PM UTC

samcal wrote: post #33

samirm wrote: post #32

are chess players required to write down their moves? or could the event organizers set up some overhead cameras or make a smart board and automate the entire thing that way?

The answer is yes to all 3! There are cameras and smart boards at the highest level, but chess players are still required to write down their moves. Archaic for sure, but tradition is strong with these old games.

[deleted]

Re: Show HN: Scannable Chess Scoresheets

#37

Post by yesenadam » Thu, Feb 14, 2019, 9:00 PM UTC

samirm wrote: post #32

are chess players required to write down their moves? or could the event organizers set up some overhead cameras or make a smart board and automate the entire thing that way?

>are chess players required to write down their moves?

Not at fast time controls, or with little time left.

"If a player has less than five minutes left on his clock at some stage in a period and does not have additional time of 30 seconds or more added with each move, then for the remainder of the period he is not obliged to [record moves]." http://www.fide.com/FIDE/handbook/LawsOfChess.pdf

And smart boards are expensive.

Re: Show HN: Scannable Chess Scoresheets

#38

Post by radiator » Thu, Feb 14, 2019, 9:21 PM UTC

gmiller123456 wrote: post #31

gk1 wrote: post #8

This is neat. For anyone wondering why not just record the moves on your phone: Digital devices are not allowed at over-the-board tournament games.

As others have pointed out, there are digital scoresheets. But further, digital devices are not banned at OTB tournaments, most players will have a cell phone, and might even text or take calls. It's only in high stakes tournaments that you'll see cell phones banned, but even then it's only for the players. It's still perfectly legal, and extremely common for the game to be video recorded.

I am not aware of what you mean by "high stakes tournaments". All official tournaments, even when only amateurs play, actually ban cell phones since about 15 years ago.

https://www.fide.com/FIDE/handbook/Anti%20Cheating%20Guideli...

11.3.b. During play, a player is forbidden to have a mobile phone and/or other device capable of processing or transmitting chess analysis in the playing venue. If it is evident that a player brought such a device into the playing venue, he shall lose the game. The opponent shall win. The rules of a competition may specify a different, less severe, penalty.

Re: Show HN: Scannable Chess Scoresheets

#39

Post by bambax » Thu, Feb 14, 2019, 9:35 PM UTC

> No recording errors: if it's "Bg4" and you write "Bg5", we can't help :(

You can help by checking the legality of the current move (which you seem to already do) and also the rest of the game?

Re: Show HN: Scannable Chess Scoresheets

#40

Post by munk-a » Thu, Feb 14, 2019, 10:14 PM UTC

radiator wrote: post #38

gmiller123456 wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As others have pointed out, there are digital scoresheets. But further, digital devices are not banned at OTB tournaments, most players will have a cell phone, and might even text or take calls. It's only in high stakes tournaments that you'll see cell phones banned, but even then it's only for the players. It's still perfectly legal, and extremely common for the game to be video recorded.

I am not aware of what you mean by "high stakes tournaments". All official tournaments, even when only amateurs play, actually ban cell phones since about 15 years ago. https://www.fide.com/FIDE/handbook/Anti%20Cheating%20Guideli... 11.3.b. During play, a player is forbidden to have a mobile phone and/or other device capable of processing or transmitting chess analysis in the playing venue. If it is evident that a pl…

That rule only seems to apply to devices the player controls themselves, so if the tournament had a recording device or if both players jointly sponsored a recording device it doesn't appear it would trigger that rule.

I'd also imagine that this rule's enforcement would be relaxed when, for instance, a player sets up a phone to record the game and has no access to that phone during the game, since any information the phone is recording (and any resulting processing for cheating) would be inaccessible to the user during the game.