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Subject: Re: Full definition for FEN

Author: José de Jesús García Ruvalcaba

Date: 10:22:31 06/05/99

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On June 04, 1999 at 20:20:38, Dave Gomboc wrote:

>On June 04, 1999 at 19:39:36, Mike Leahy wrote:
>
>>On May 27, 1999 at 20:48:55, Dann Corbit wrote:
>>
>>>From the PGN Standard
>>
>>
>>>16.1.4: Examples
>>>
>>>Here's the FEN for the starting position:
>>>
>>>rnbqkbnr/pppppppp/8/8/8/8/PPPPPPPP/RNBQKBNR w KQkq - 0 1
>>>
>>>And after the move 1. e4:
>>>
>>>rnbqkbnr/pppppppp/8/8/4P3/8/PPPP1PPP/RNBQKBNR b KQkq e3 0 1
>>
>>This is problematic.  The position is identical to...
>>
>> rnbqkbnr/pppppppp/8/8/4P3/8/PPPP1PPP/RNBQKBNR b KQkq - 0 1
>
>The position you describe with the string not containing "e3" is not technically
>reachable (even ignoring the ply count for now) because Black can't lose a move
>while White slides a pawn first to e3, then to e4.
>

	If we ignore the ply counts, then the position is reachable: 1. e3 Nc6 2. Bd3
Nb8 3. Be2 Nc6 4. Bf1 Nb8 5. e4
	Of course, the last digit for the fen string would now be 5 instead of 1, since
it follows black's fifth move.

>My personal opinion is that the standard should be that an en passant square is
>only specified if an en passant capture is actually possible, and "-" is always
>used otherwise.  However, this wasn't SJE's choice.  I can imagine various
>justifications that might be made for his choice, but none so strong that they
>override the clarity of our preferred format.
>
>While you are toying around with Bookup EPD handling, please allow assessments
>to be in the range -32768 to 32767, or at least automatically translate between
>this range and the range -10000 to 9999 when importing and exporting into/from
>Bookup.  Currently it is annoying to deal with the issue of checkmates in my
>opening analysis, I have to find that a score is missing in the first place,
>followed by entering it by hand.
>
>>...because the en passant capture is not legal.  Purely
>>positional programs like Bookup are fussy about this.
>>Bookup considers the record with 'e3' as illegal.  Programs
>>like Rebel solve the program by ignoring the en passant flag(!).
>
>Does Rebel ignore the "e3" or "-" if the position actually does allow an en
>passant capture, or just if no en passant capture is possible?  If the former,
>it's buggy!  If the latter, excellent input handling! :)
>
>>Mike Leahy
>
>Dave



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