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From: mcb@styx.UUCP
Newsgroups: net.games.go
Subject: Re: Comments on Macintosh Go program...
Message-ID: <19925@styx.UUCP>
Date: Thu, 6-Mar-86 15:39:15 EST
Article-I.D.: styx.19925
Posted: Thu Mar  6 15:39:15 1986
Date-Received: Sun, 9-Mar-86 08:42:27 EST
References: <2013@uwmacc.UUCP>
Reply-To: mcb@styx.UUCP (Michael C. Berch)
Distribution: net
Organization: Lawrence Livermore Laboratory, Livermore, CA
Lines: 53

In article <2013@uwmacc.UUCP> myers@uwmacc.UUCP writes:
> First I'd like to congratulate the author for a fine visual representation of
> the board and stones.  There are some things that I would like to see cleaned
> up, though, to make the game much more useful.

Please add my congratulations, too! 

> (1) There should be a utility for taking back the last move, maybe to a depth
> of six moves back.
> 
> (2) The log utility should not work as it does.  Currently, if you want to
> continue a game logged previously and keep logging it, there is no way to do
> it with the same log file (that I have figured out, anyway).  When a log file
> is established, there should be an option to completely record the current
> state of the game rather than automatically just starting from scratch.  When
> a log file is read in, you should be forced to specify exactly how many moves
> into the game (default: the whole way) to auto-play to; then by default you
> should be logging the game to that same file.  To make life easier for the
> logging function, why not just ask when exitting the game whether the current
> board should be saved?

I've also noticed that it does not seem to be possible to interrupt
the replay of a logged game. This might be nice, particularly if after
a few moves of a 280-stone game you decide the replay isn't worthwhile.

> (3) The default game option should be human vs. human rather than computer
> vs. computer.

I'd go with computer vs. human as the default, actually, as the most
common use.

> (4) The debugging display options should be removed from the distributed
> version of the game as the output is pretty cryptic.
> 
> (5) There should be an option to display the number of stones captured thus
> far by each side.  An end-of-game score counting option would be nice, but
> might be a bit tough to code.

We didn't get the source, having no compiler on the Mac, but I think a
scoring module whouldn't be that difficult to implement, assuming the
program has been keeping track of the ownership of unoccupied points
and of the numbers of prisoners captured. No physical rearrangement of
the stones to facilitate scoring (as is usually done by humans) would
be necessary. I've also noticed (at least in the version we got) that
the game does not end when both players pass; it just puts up "your
move" and waits for black (the human) to play.

Again, a fine effort and a wonder to see implemented on the limited memory 
and speed of a Macintosh!

Michael C. Berch
ARPA: mcb@lll-tis-b.ARPA
UUCP: {akgua,allegra,cbosgd,decwrl,dual,ihnp4,sun}!idi!styx!mcb