Scid error on CCRL pgn file imports

[Adam Hair]

IMO it would be more useful to just clip the round number, and give a warning, rather than aborting the save. So to games get the same round number. Big deal. Presumably that would not render the database completely useless to the user. Better than having software that doesn't want to do anything with it at all...

Maybe, but it's a hack to implement this, and it still leaves one with a database with maxed out Round Names that will again fail shortly.

CCRL are bastardising the PGN format really.

True, using the round tag in a way for which it was never intended is really abuse of the PGN format.

Just as a service to CCRL you could built in an option to do the replacement Round -> Rd on parsing the PGN file, so that no separate session with a text editor is needed.

My intent here is not to argue with the two of you. I appreciate the work that both of you are doing. But, I really think that both of you are wrong about the CCRL's usage of the Round tag.

http://www.chessclub.com/help/PGN-spec

8.1.1.4: The Round tag


The Round tag value gives the playing round for the game. In a match
competition, this value is the number of the game played. If the use of a
round number is inappropriate, then the field should be a single hyphen
character. If the round is unknown, a single question mark should appear as
the tag value.


Some organizers employ unusual round designations and have multipart playing
rounds and sometimes even have conditional rounds. In these cases, a multipart
round identifier can be made from a sequence of integer round numbers separated
by periods. The leftmost integer represents the most significant round and
succeeding integers represent round numbers in descending hierarchical order.


Examples:


[Round "1"]


[Round "3.1"]


[Round "4.1.2"]

Now an example for the CCRL database (just headers):

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[Event "CCRL 40/4"]
[Site "CCRL"]
[Date "2009.03.18"]
[Round "34.13.258"]
[White "Thinker 5.4c Inert 64-bit"]
[Black "Spike 1.2 Turin"]
[Result "1-0"]
[ECO "B09"]
[Opening "Pirc"]
[Variation "Austrian attack, dragon formation"]
[PlyCount "125"]
[WhiteElo "2985"]
[BlackElo "2831"]

[Event "CCRL 40/4"]
[Site "CCRL"]
[Date "2009.03.18"]
[Round "34.13.259"]
[White "Zappa Mexico II 64-bit"]
[Black "Thinker 5.4c Inert 64-bit"]
[Result "1-0"]
[ECO "E32"]
[Opening "Nimzo-Indian"]
[Variation "classical variation"]
[PlyCount "181"]
[WhiteElo "2950"]
[BlackElo "2985"]

[Event "CCRL 40/4"]
[Site "CCRL"]
[Date "2009.03.18"]
[Round "34.13.260"]
[White "Bright 0.4a"]
[Black "Thinker 5.4c Inert 64-bit"]
[Result "1-0"]
[ECO "B76"]
[Opening "Sicilian"]
[Variation "dragon, Yugoslav attack, Rauser variation"]
[PlyCount "109"]
[WhiteElo "2880"]
[BlackElo "2985"]

These are of course sequential games.

It is very easy to think of the CCRL as a large and long tournament. In fact, the progenitor of the CCRL is the CEGT, which stands for Chess Engine Grand Tournament. With that observation, it appears to me that the CCRL's usage of the Round tag is in exact compliance to the standard.

Of course, none of this changes the limit imposed by Scid's database format.

[Norm Pollock]

The "Round" tag is one of 7 required tags for every game in a pgn file. The others being Event, Site, Date, White, Black and Result. I do not understand why they made it "required".

[hgm]

It is very easy to think of the CCRL as a large and long tournament. In fact, the progenitor of the CCRL is the CEGT, which stands for Chess Engine Grand Tournament. With that observation, it appears to me that the CCRL's usage of the Round tag is in exact compliance to the standard.

The point is that in normal usage of language a 'round' is always a group of games advancing the state of the tournament in such a way that most players now have played one more game. That is something quite different from a game number. (Only in the degenerate case of a binary match would a round coincide with game numbers.)

CCRL is using the tag as if it were a game number tag, and it was not intended for that. It would have been more logical to invent your own tag for that.

[Guenther]

It is very easy to think of the CCRL as a large and long tournament. In fact, the progenitor of the CCRL is the CEGT, which stands for Chess Engine Grand Tournament. With that observation, it appears to me that the CCRL's usage of the Round tag is in exact compliance to the standard.

The point is that in normal usage of language a 'round' is always a group of games advancing the state of the tournament in such a way that most players now have played one more game. That is something quite different from a game number. (Only in the degenerate case of a binary match would a round coincide with game numbers.)

CCRL is using the tag as if it were a game number tag, and it was not intended for that. It would have been more logical to invent your own tag for that.

I agree, using the round tag this way surely wasn't intended and is
missleading too. There is software out which simply uses a 'number' tag
for numbering the games in a pgn file and this seems the natural way
to me at least.

Guenther

[Adam Hair]

It is very easy to think of the CCRL as a large and long tournament. In fact, the progenitor of the CCRL is the CEGT, which stands for Chess Engine Grand Tournament. With that observation, it appears to me that the CCRL's usage of the Round tag is in exact compliance to the standard.

The point is that in normal usage of language a 'round' is always a group of games advancing the state of the tournament in such a way that most players now have played one more game. That is something quite different from a game number. (Only in the degenerate case of a binary match would a round coincide with game numbers.)

CCRL is using the tag as if it were a game number tag, and it was not intended for that. It would have been more logical to invent your own tag for that.

I see your point. Though, I can see the point of making use of the Round tag for this purpose rather than have [Round "?"] and an additional Number tag for every game. However, this is stretching the usage of the Round tag a bit, as you pointed out.

[stevenaaus]

Just as a service to CCRL you could built in an option to do the replacement Round -> Rd on parsing the PGN file, so that no separate session with a text editor is needed.

Hmm - It would be nice, but i can't find a way to discretely do it.
Otherwise, there are no options necessary for importing PGN.

Does anyone have a good "search and replace" windows utility for me to link to in the doco ? Probably best not to use a text editor if they can be avoided.
Linux/Mac users can just use sed

Code: Select all

sed -e 's/\&#91;Round/\&#91;Rd/' < CCRL.pgn > new.pgn