The 81-Square Universe

I asked, because I've bought a new palm the last days: it's a TX

Also I've implemented HighResoluiton in ShogiEV, but that was really a pain and still a few things are not working like I wish.
Also it's stupid work from palm: with the Cobalt-Simulator, all is working very well. But with Garnet (which is on my palm), there are a few things different I have had to make workarounds. The clipping-feature is not working not at all, even drawing normaly at the edge of the screen.
And it can become more worse: also the Garnet-Simulator and my palm are working different in a few things.

At this point it's nothing mystically, that palm has become less important in the PDA buiseness.

I also have tested a lot of viewer-programs and always I prefere freeware, but isilo makes realy a gread job, no other program makes the same.

You mean, instead shogin the game position from Fat Bold Cyclop, calling you side with SFEN?
That's no problem and also possible with the newest version (also with older version, but with the newest one you can configure own buttons.)

Furthermore I'm thinking about getting back info and showing the moves in BCMShogi. I tried it with different arrows, the more thick the more often played that move.
But I'm not su much satisfied with it. Nevertheless, getting "commands" back by a webpage would be an easy thing.

At the moment I'm more thinking about my palm, for example put shogi knowledge to it.
Thinking about making a project, I know, that there are less shogi people in the western world. more less are here in this forum and more less of them own a palm. And last but not least, if there would be really one or two persons, I know that they don't like to work for this project.

So I will be allone at my side ...

I have not tested many viewers. What is your first freware choice ?
As a TX user, you have access to the internet. How is my Shogi Maze on your TX ?

Yes. Still, I didn't use SFEN, but something "personnal" more or less equivalent (bad programming style!). I can do a php page using the SFEN to call the position. I would not do it for myself (I am not really a BCM Shogi user), but I could do it for others if you configure it on the versions you release (or from Fat Bold Cyclop).

I have added a page showing the (partial) usf informations of the games reaching this position. Can BCM Shogi use this kind of info (raw or pasted into a text file to create a .usf file) to create a single game with multiple branches ?
When it will be possible, please tell me how to get "commands" back from a webpage into BCM Shogi ?

Programming is a difficult science, which is not my speciality (you should only recruit people who also have some talent)... and my palm is not of the same generation as yours. Still, I would be happy to hear about your projects for palm. If ShogiEV gets more interesting with newer palms, it would interest me a lot.

Would there be a way to make Shogi MAZE a wiki-style site like Josekipedia? I think if others could contribute, the database could be improved and expanded much more quickly.

I'm still searching and haven't used(tested) them much.
But Plucker seems to be able to make good looking output (even it can't make tables which you are using).

Looks very well.
I've attached a screenshot.
Only the line-breaks are not good. But this depends on the browser and not of your pages. Web Pro can do better work, but there is also to say somthing bad about it.

I don't need it also and there seems not much interest by others, so we better should keep our time instead doing that work.

A COMPLETE SINGLE games with multiple branches seems not a good thing in my eyes. This makes the program very slow ...
Such things are better kept in a DB-program.
I thought about, getting only commands for ONE position.

Sill I'm believing, there isn't a lot of interest, worth this work.

But still for general, I like to explain my thoughts about technical mechanism of "plugins".

1st step: BCMShogi is calling an external site with configurable parameters, like:
http://.../...?SFEN=...
Then this page creates a side with COMMANDS (which I should explain more detailed, but only as example like following):
>>
create Arrow ...
create Arrow ...
<<
And the BCMShogi will show this objects.

Ohhh, I wasn't thinking about writing programs (that's also very time expensive for me).
I believe, I thought more about creating literature (eBooks) for palms.
First there is to search the best program for it. It must be able to show the diagrams. You can make a complete bitmap for each diagram, but that's wasint a lot of memory. Or you can have a set of pieces only ONCE and with them create the board (like shogimaze is doing, but this way didn't work with Plucker).
Or you can also create nice HTML-pages, which will look very nice.
BUT this thing should be possible to view OFFLINE!!!
That's also difficulty. Who knows good programs which can do this??? Blazer can do it, but at the moment, I haven't found any other idea of viewing them ONCE online and saving them (it saves in OWN format!).
Web Pro can do it, but when I've tried it first time, my Palm resets and then it's no longer working (I've also read in internet, it makes "strange" things with SD cards.)
So, what is best???

Still my experience I wrote above means, that there are a lot of problems. In the meanwhile I've tested it also with a TX-simulatur, but this crashes when starting ShogiEV. But on my real TX, it seems working.
So I like to say, I have no idea how it will work with other devices. I wrote it for myself and won't put ANY time to make it work for others (too less Shogi-Palm-Users). So maybe it would be only ucefull for TX-users.

To let people input new games, moves or positions... would mean too much work for me maybe there are some volunteers). What may be possible for my skills could be:
- let some users write some comments to the moves available and display them on a table (to do something like Yamajunn's site).
- let some users write some comments about other moves (but not checking if the move is valid, nor creating a new position) and some text for the comment. Maybe I could also display a .kif file with flash.
I don't know if there would be enough volunteers for adding comments.

Isilo does it very well... but is not free. You can get a Shogi_Maze.pdb file from my previous posts with more than 17 000 positions in it.

ShogiEV is great, and Iwould be happy to hear about ShogiEV developments, even if these are only for TX-users.

I've put a few screenshots on my homepage.

Also I've made some tests of how to best use shogi-literature. I've tested different programs and created different formats. I believe, ALL have advantages, but also all have dissadvantages. It will be time to find the most useable format, now.

And here it is: Shogi4Palm

We are gradually changing the theme of our discussion from “Shogi Maze” to “Shogi for handhelds” but I like this subject very much, and indeed “Shogi Maze” was designed to be viewed on an handheld.

I have created a Tsume Shogi section on Shogi Maze, based on the same interface. I have also converted this with isilox and now my palm is a tsume book with one thousand tsume problems.

I think that the next step for Shogi Maze will be to design an interface giving access to ShogiEV game records. This way I could look at the Shogi Maze offline on my palm and then export some games records to the palm notes, to be viewed under ShogiEV.


Your ShogiEV for TX screenshots are very nice. I like the big boards, and also the board with comments. I have also purchased a TX, so the community of shogi players having a TX now has (at least) two members. Could you please send me your new versions of ShogiEV for TX ?

I would like to know if you plan to program new functions to ShogiEV. In my opinion it would be really great if ShogiEV could handle handicap games.


It would be great to have a FREE program able to handle documents with tens of thousands of pages with diagrams (like those of Shogi Maze or tsume problems), as isilo (20$) does it. Choosing a free program would benefit to the community of shogi players using handhelds.

On the other hand, if we only consider the limited size of the community of players using palm OS handhelds, the point of choosing a free program for the benefit of the community, although generous, may not be a priority. I recognize that I have been selfish when I have paid an isilo licence for my own use, but now that I have thousands of tsume problems in my palm I am quite happy with it.

We could also consider that isilo files might interest other people, as this program is supported by non Palm OS based devices (iphones, smartphones, blackberries, etc.)... although I don't know why I should help isilo to earn money.

That's the reason, I've had already created a new thread: Palm

As I've already told: for this "kind" of visualisation (table), I haven't found a good freeware sollution.
Plucker can't display tables in a good way, also other programs (like Mobipocket) can't convert them.
I believe PalmPDF can do the best job, but I didn't know, how to make automatically one pdf from thousands of HTML files. But it could be done manually.

Blazer seems to make the best job, but NOT OFFLINE!!!
There is still an extension to load HTML files from SD, but this is not freeware.

Isn't there a free webbrowser for Palm TX, which can also load files from SD???
(I've also tried Opera, but I didn't manage it to make it work. )


I have mailed it to you.

Not really.

I wish for myself a SD-support which makes kifu exchanges much easier.
At least an export would be interesing for me, so I can put the played games on tournaments more easily to the PC.

Sill a variation tree would be very interestingly, maybe also with the arrow-objects.
I've took a short look about ShogiEV, but I recognized that implementing it isn't possible.
That would have to be a completeley new program, but then of course no longer ShogiEV, but better BCMPalmShogi.

But at the moment there is no way to BCMPalmShogi.


That's already possible since a long, long time. I've implemented that from beginning on.

I have written above about it.

Still "pure" HTML seems to me a good sollution, but there is need of a free (working) webbrowser for Palm TX which can load files from SD.

Also PalmPDF seems to be a good sollution, but at the moment I don't know automatically good conversion.
PDF can also use images (for pieces) which will be only ONCE in the file, but used many, many times.

Have you also created the HTML-code?
If so, you can change it to create a display using NO tables!!!

Nevertheless it would still be a lot of work, for example because Plucker can not handle frames around the images, but nevertheless it would be possible to create a nice file completely useable with free software.

Here is a samle, viewed with the freeware Plucker (of course the colours are not nice, but I have to change it manualy and so it's a lot of work - but for demonstration, this should be good enough):

P.S. oh, by the way: this Tsume is wrong. If I'm still able to play shogi not like a beginner , the knight at 5d and the pawn at 4d (or the gold at 4c) are not needed and so not allowed to be shown on a correct Tsume.

Thank you very much for the new version of ShogiEV for TX. It is very nice, and works very well !

Yes I have created it (I admit it is bad). I don't know if it is a lot of job to change it to a better html code with no tables. If you make a nice html page (good to be viewed under a TX), I should be able to implement it.

You are right, it doesn't follow the last rule, to remove the unnecessary peaces. Its source is http://www.yigo.org/godata/shogi/tsume/030/030001.kif