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Domain: chessbase.com

Stories and comments across the archive that link to chessbase.com.

Stories · 60

  1. Mir Deathwatch

    Science · Space · · posted by michael · from the it's-the-final-countdown dept. · 168 comments
    Well, everybody and his brother wants to let us know that Mir is coming down, really, they mean it this time. Pick your favorite site to track its descent: Yahoo | NY Times | United States Space Command | Heavens Above | BBC. But Frederic Freidel provides an oddly personal note: what goes up must come down.

    Jacek Fedorynski took a look at Guess When Mir Will Splash and drew up this nice histogram of the guesses. He also notes that the median guess for Mir's return to Mother Earth was 2001-03-19 10:11:01, so the collective wisdom of slashdot was off by a few days.

    Nowhere in this slashdot story do we mention either the stupid Taco Hell advertising campaign or the space fungus or the Crashing Mir Space Station Detecto-Hat.

  2. Christmas Chess Puzzle

    Xmas · · posted by ryuzaki0 · from the time-to-work-the-brain dept. · 4 comments
    While you might have just finished your third round of egg-nog, it's time to use the old noggin. Some of you may remember last Christmas' chess puzzle - well, I've been talking to Fredric Friedel again - check out more details below - or jump to the puzzle itself but read the setup below.

    Frederic Friedel of Chessbase writes: "Christmas -- time to drive Slashdot folks nuts again, with a little chess puzzle. Frederic Friedel of ChessBase did it last year, and has a new brain-teaser for us today: "A game ends with the move 6.gxf8=N mate. How did it go?" Starting from the initial chess position you have to find six moves that lead to a white pawn on g7 capturing a black piece on f8, promoting to a knight and delivering mate. Naturally both sides cooperate to achieve the goal. Further details are to be found on Frederic's puzzle page. It is easier than last year's puzzle. If you find the correct solution do not post it in this forum or any newsgroups and spoil the fun for everyone else. Nobody will admire you for it, and some will be extremely annoyed."

  3. Christmas Chess Puzzle

    Xmas · · posted by ryuzaki0 · from the time-to-work-the-brain dept. · 4 comments
    While you might have just finished your third round of egg-nog, it's time to use the old noggin. Some of you may remember last Christmas' chess puzzle - well, I've been talking to Fredric Friedel again - check out more details below - or jump to the puzzle itself but read the setup below.

    Frederic Friedel of Chessbase writes: "Christmas -- time to drive Slashdot folks nuts again, with a little chess puzzle. Frederic Friedel of ChessBase did it last year, and has a new brain-teaser for us today: "A game ends with the move 6.gxf8=N mate. How did it go?" Starting from the initial chess position you have to find six moves that lead to a white pawn on g7 capturing a black piece on f8, promoting to a knight and delivering mate. Naturally both sides cooperate to achieve the goal. Further details are to be found on Frederic's puzzle page. It is easier than last year's puzzle. If you find the correct solution do not post it in this forum or any newsgroups and spoil the fun for everyone else. Nobody will admire you for it, and some will be extremely annoyed."

  4. Christmas Chess Puzzle

    Xmas · · posted by ryuzaki0 · from the time-to-work-the-brain dept. · 4 comments
    While you might have just finished your third round of egg-nog, it's time to use the old noggin. Some of you may remember last Christmas' chess puzzle - well, I've been talking to Fredric Friedel again - check out more details below - or jump to the puzzle itself but read the setup below.

    Frederic Friedel of Chessbase writes: "Christmas -- time to drive Slashdot folks nuts again, with a little chess puzzle. Frederic Friedel of ChessBase did it last year, and has a new brain-teaser for us today: "A game ends with the move 6.gxf8=N mate. How did it go?" Starting from the initial chess position you have to find six moves that lead to a white pawn on g7 capturing a black piece on f8, promoting to a knight and delivering mate. Naturally both sides cooperate to achieve the goal. Further details are to be found on Frederic's puzzle page. It is easier than last year's puzzle. If you find the correct solution do not post it in this forum or any newsgroups and spoil the fun for everyone else. Nobody will admire you for it, and some will be extremely annoyed."

  5. Christmas Chess Puzzle

    Xmas · · posted by ryuzaki0 · from the time-to-work-the-brain dept. · 4 comments
    While you might have just finished your third round of egg-nog, it's time to use the old noggin. Some of you may remember last Christmas' chess puzzle - well, I've been talking to Fredric Friedel again - check out more details below - or jump to the puzzle itself but read the setup below.

    Frederic Friedel of Chessbase writes: "Christmas -- time to drive Slashdot folks nuts again, with a little chess puzzle. Frederic Friedel of ChessBase did it last year, and has a new brain-teaser for us today: "A game ends with the move 6.gxf8=N mate. How did it go?" Starting from the initial chess position you have to find six moves that lead to a white pawn on g7 capturing a black piece on f8, promoting to a knight and delivering mate. Naturally both sides cooperate to achieve the goal. Further details are to be found on Frederic's puzzle page. It is easier than last year's puzzle. If you find the correct solution do not post it in this forum or any newsgroups and spoil the fun for everyone else. Nobody will admire you for it, and some will be extremely annoyed."

  6. Chessbase and Christmas Puzzlers

    News · News · · posted by Hemos · from the using-the-noggin dept. · 84 comments
    A number of you might remember our Christmas Chess Puzzler. Frederic Friedel and I have stayed in contact over the last couple of months and he recently put together a piece talking about the puzzler and Slashdot, as well as narratives of other chess puzzlers. Frederic runs Chessbase, one of the best chess resources I've seen. That leads to an interesting question: Would you folks like occasional puzzlers like this? Post your feeling on it below.

  7. Chessbase and Christmas Puzzlers

    News · News · · posted by Hemos · from the using-the-noggin dept. · 84 comments
    A number of you might remember our Christmas Chess Puzzler. Frederic Friedel and I have stayed in contact over the last couple of months and he recently put together a piece talking about the puzzler and Slashdot, as well as narratives of other chess puzzlers. Frederic runs Chessbase, one of the best chess resources I've seen. That leads to an interesting question: Would you folks like occasional puzzlers like this? Post your feeling on it below.

  8. Chessbase and Christmas Puzzlers

    News · News · · posted by Hemos · from the using-the-noggin dept. · 84 comments
    A number of you might remember our Christmas Chess Puzzler. Frederic Friedel and I have stayed in contact over the last couple of months and he recently put together a piece talking about the puzzler and Slashdot, as well as narratives of other chess puzzlers. Frederic runs Chessbase, one of the best chess resources I've seen. That leads to an interesting question: Would you folks like occasional puzzlers like this? Post your feeling on it below.

  9. A Christmas Chess Puzzle

    News · News · · posted by Hemos · from the fun-with-the-mind dept. · 281 comments
    Frederic Friedel writes "Here's a nice little chess puzzle I got from Grandmaster John Nunn many years ago. It looks incredibly simple, but even the strongest players in world have been stumped by it. The problem can be stated in one simple line: A game begins with 1.e4 and ends in the fifth move with knight takes rook mate. What are the moves? If you want to read a couple of stories on it, go to Chessbase. There is a very special prize to be won if you are able to solve it -- a book signed by some of the world's top chess players, testifying that the winner is The Greatest. "

    Update: 12/25 11:50 by michael : Well, I thought I figured it out, but I was wrong.

    1. e4     b8-c6
    2. a4     b4
    3. a1-a3  c2
    4. a3-d3  b4
    5. g7-e2  d3++
    -->

    Just to clear up some confusion below, the condition is simply that a knight makes the last move of the game, which is a capture of a rook on move five (either color), and this results in checkmate for the other king. Either the knight or some other piece could be giving the check. One poster below reasons that black would be the one giving the checkmate - this is very sound reasoning. :) You just have to think outside the box.

  10. A Christmas Chess Puzzle

    News · News · · posted by Hemos · from the fun-with-the-mind dept. · 281 comments
    Frederic Friedel writes "Here's a nice little chess puzzle I got from Grandmaster John Nunn many years ago. It looks incredibly simple, but even the strongest players in world have been stumped by it. The problem can be stated in one simple line: A game begins with 1.e4 and ends in the fifth move with knight takes rook mate. What are the moves? If you want to read a couple of stories on it, go to Chessbase. There is a very special prize to be won if you are able to solve it -- a book signed by some of the world's top chess players, testifying that the winner is The Greatest. "

    Update: 12/25 11:50 by michael : Well, I thought I figured it out, but I was wrong.

    1. e4     b8-c6
    2. a4     b4
    3. a1-a3  c2
    4. a3-d3  b4
    5. g7-e2  d3++
    -->

    Just to clear up some confusion below, the condition is simply that a knight makes the last move of the game, which is a capture of a rook on move five (either color), and this results in checkmate for the other king. Either the knight or some other piece could be giving the check. One poster below reasons that black would be the one giving the checkmate - this is very sound reasoning. :) You just have to think outside the box.