Comments by DavidHowe

Michael,

Just go to the 'upload files' link on your page, and upload your
graphic. After your graphic is uploaded, you will be shown some html code
to add to your page to make your graphic show up. Let me know if you run
into any problems.

Upload file link for your page: 

http://www.chessvariants.org/index/memberupload.php?itemid=MSnovachess100

As far as letting other people use my code for the commenting system -- I certainly have no objection. I shall work on packaging the code and documenting how to use it. Perhaps I shall even clean it up and make it more generic. However, that is all in my spare time, of which, I seem to have less and less these days.

My apologies to all the people I haven't gotten back to. Believe me, I still intend to get back to you all. Perhaps over the holidays! ;-)

As far as letting other people use my code for the commenting system -- I certainly have no objection. I shall work on packaging the code and documenting how to use it. Perhaps I shall even clean it up and make it more generic. However, that is all in my spare time, of which, I seem to have less and less these days.

My apologies to all the people I haven't gotten back to. Believe me, I still intend to get back to you all. Perhaps over the holidays! ;-)

In any case, it seems obvious to me that you feel slighted, and that's unfortunate. Please have patience with we mere mortals. We do try...

You can reference the file you uploaded using the following URL:

../membergraphics/MSnovachess100/NovaChess100Release.zip

The other option is to create your own Zillions page for Nova Chess 100, and then we can link the two pages (the game page and the zillions page) together using the indexing system.

I never met him personally, but we corresponded via postal mail while he was in the process of compiling new entries for the next version of the ECV.

Perhaps it makes sense for our site to have recognized people in addition to variants? If so, David Pritchard would certainly be on that list.

Subject-based comments were not being blocked. However they should be now.

How about:

0 Poor
1 Below average
2 Average
3 Good
4 Excellent

As with any rating system, it will only be as good as the quality of its
inputs. If people are generally thoughtful, honest and objective, then I
think the system will work well.

As others have said, the more valuable input is the more qualitative vs.
the quantitative, although quantitative input can have some value that
qualitative input does not have.

So the more ways we give people to give feedback, the better. I do hope
that people will avoid abusing the system for personal gain. Such acts
decrease the value of the system overall and are damaging in the
long-term.

>> 4. not sure about this, but maybe another idea for a game could be 'bizzare' ... of course 'bizzare' games can be completely serious, still, it could be an idea.

Another possible system might involve awarding points over time (everyone gets N points every M days). The points would be of the 'use it or lose it' type, so that point hording would not be possible.

Or perhaps a 'free market' system, where each rater starts out with N points, which the rater uses to 'buy' the right to rate a particular entry from the entry's owner. Eg. Dave has 10 points. He buys the right to rate Peter's Anti-King Chess, which Peter is selling for 3 points. Dave now has 7 points left, and Peter has 13 (assuming he had 10 before the transaction).

The down side to these schemes is that they discourage free expression by putting certain artificial limits on expression.

Hi Joe,

>> Next, how do I sign up?

Go to any of your game pages (the quickest way to do that is to go to your
information page, and click on the 'Items this person invented' link. Any
of the items under the 'Game' section can be submitted for entry in the
rating system. Just display the web page for the game you want to submit,
and you'll see near the bottom, right above the author/inventor line, a
link to 'Submit this game to be available for rating!'. Click on that
link and follow the instructions. You have 7 games you invented, so it
shouldn't be too much of an effort for you to submit them individually. I
just hope Ralph Betza doesn't try to submit all his! ;-)

Note that only GAME pages may be submitted for rating. If you have a game
courier or zillions item that you want to submit, just create a game page
for it first, and then submit the game page. I am limiting ratings to game
pages to avoid one person rating game X's zillions page, while another
person rates game X's game courier preset and yet another person rates
game X's game information page.

All for now. Please continue with the feedback, and thank you for the kind
words. My experience tells me I will be making lots of changes to this
system, so don't be shy about suggestions.

'...Of myself forever reproaching myself, (for who more foolish than I, and who more faithless?)...'

Fergus, I cleaned it up. Editors: please do not categorize a variant of
chess as 'chess'. The 'chess' category is reserved for FIDE chess
information only. There are other categories for slight variations on FIDE
chess (ie. the chess variants using standard FIDE chess equipment
categories).