[Retros] Request for definition of "retro"

[andrew buchanan]

Hi Per,

Thanks for your review of Dittman's "Der Blick Zuruck".

I don't (yet) have a copy of his book, but I am very interested to learn his
definition of what constitutes a retro. I have tried to come up with a
watertight specification, but without success.

For example, if you say that A->B proof games are retros (and I agree they
feel like they are), then you could argue that helpmates are retros. For
surely a h# is an A->B retro except that B is not just a single position,
but the *set* of reachable positions which are checkmate? :-)

This is not quite frivolous. Long helpmates are often best solved by a
retro-analytic strategy (as discussed by Wilts & Frolkin in their book
"Shortest Proof Games").

Article 17 of the Codex (much discussed in this mailing list recently) says:
"Unless expressly stipulated, the 50 moves-rule does not apply to the
solution of chess compositions except for retro-problems."

So to know whether 50M is applying, we need to know whether the animal we
are looking at is indeed a retro-problem. :-)

Hope you (or the august W.Dittman himself) can help here.

Sincerely,
Andrew Buchanan.

-----Original Message-----
From: retros-bounces at janko.at [mailto:retros-bounces at janko.at] On Behalf Of
per olin
Sent: 21 December 2006 22:33
To: The Retrograde Analysis Mailing List
Subject: [Retros] Some retro active thoughts


Some retro active thoughts


Proofgames - A to B chess 

In his book Der Blick zuruck W. Dittmann gives a large overview of the retro
problem genre and its history. Discussed is, among many other things,
whether proofgames are to be considered as retros or not. I have myself had
some doubts, but now we do not have to worry about this anymore.  Dittmann
gives in his thorough way the answer:  yes they are.

One special type of proofgames are the ones not starting with the initial
position (IP), but with a composed position A.  These are in the book called
A to B chess (A nach B Schach).  One very special type of A to B is the
situation, where A = B meaning that the same position has to be reached with
the other party to move (proofgame in an uneven number of halfmoves).  The
foundation for this was outlined by Ceriani in 1949;  later also elaborated
by Bartel.  Dittmann writes that the next steps in A to B Chess were taken
over half a century later in Andernach 2001, which is not correct. The
example when the 2001 tournament was announced was a proofgame with double
Allumwandlung (AUW). This double AUW is also the theme of my pioneer problem
in A to B chess published in Suomen Tehtavaniekat 1/1993.

Also in the book are mentioned proofgames with multiple diagrams and based
on repetition of the same position for the third time.  For the sake of
getting the historical facts right, here my own achievements:  my first
proofgame with more than two positions, in this case five positions, was
awarded 4th Pl. in Springaren  Summer Tourney 1997.   My first proofgame
with elements of repetetion of position was as original in the Finnish
Solving Championship 1992 and published in Suomen Tehtavaniekat 4/1992.
Does anyone know earlier examples?


Need for a database

The above said gives the thought that we should have some type of database
for our retro problems. What would be a better place that the Retro Corner?
It could include first publishing of its type and record achievements; there
could be as retros, constructional tasks, proofgames, fairy conditions etc.
Examples of what would be good to have as centralized common information:

Historical facts
-First proofgame with variation in move order
-First proofgame with single solution 
-First proofgame with two / three solutions
-First retro based on 50 moves rule
-etc

and in the record area

-Longest proofgame from IP 
-Longest proofgame from A to B. Nobody has tried yet!  
-Longest proofgame starting from Random Chess (Fischerandom). Nobody has
tried yet!
-Promotions
-etc 


Compare with endgames

Let's look on how well the endgame study community is doing:  the magazine
EG with primus motor AJ Roycroft publishes copy of all awards in the world.
There is an electronic collection of endgames by H. van der Heijden, who
also provides anticipation services. Is there anything that goes unnoticed
in the endgame world? 

Proofgames and other retros have gained great popularity in recent years.
The Gert Wilts book from early nineties covered everything in proofgames up
to then.  But after that we have had an explosion, which is published all
over the world.  This means that the present results are known to nobody.
Something should be done.

If we don't want to copy the concept of the endgames, then we could have a
database gathering all essential that has been done. So far there are only
part of the new retros reproduced in the Retro Corner. What could prevent us
from republishing all retro problems that are being published in the world
(are there any copyright issues?).  Then we would all be up-to-date!

All problem chess achievements will be put into electronic form sooner or
later; if we do it sooner the task will be easier.

For the moment there is in Retro corner an interesting exercise going on:
proofgames with the minimum number of moves with a specific feature e.g.
with a pawn mating on 2nd/7th rank.  Personally I have not been able to
study all contributions, but I would be really interested to see the end
results.  But where will these be found?  Answer: by going through all
contributions there have been? No, that’s impossible, the answer is in the
suggested database. 

If the idea is good, then we only need somebody to organize it!   Comments
are welcome.

Espoo,  Finland  21.12.2006

Per Olin


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