CPT Community

Hi Stefan

Great work so far, as expected, my initial observations are:

1. The original "Blank" screen is confusing until you successfully create a new repertoire.

2. The "Skins" icon is also confusing until you realise they are the "Background colours" I thought they  were navigation buttons. They are probably best hidden away (as they are also available from the dropdown menu).

3. The concept of the "White" / "Black" opening repertoire is great. Listing the openings by name is also excellent.

4. Creating a new file is easy - the wizard will ask you whether it's for White or Black. [note: The file extension should be *.cpt - you may need to check this and rename with the ".cpt" extension (as I did) when re-loading the program as it did not find the previously created file.]

5. Importing from v3.2 / v.3.3 is very easy.  Each repertoire becomes an opening below the White/Black folders (depending on your choice). At this point you think "Should my "Semi-Slav 6. Bxf6" be a variation below "Semi-Slav" , rather than a main opening?

Question: What's the best way of moving, if wanted, an "Opening" [e.g. Semi Slav 6. Bxf6 and Semi-Slav 6. Bh4] into a "Variation" below an existing opening, say called "Semi-Slav" ?

Question: [Refering to Navigation tree/Window]  Are there any limits on the number of  a) Openings within each "White"/ "Black" folder, b) limits on variations within an opening, and c) any limits on sub-variations (or even sub-sub variations)?

6. The arrows indicating "candidate" moves is very informative. [I find arrows better than borders]

7. The main "Opening" folder is called "Standard" with "White and "Black" below it.

Question: How do you create and name other folders at the same level as "Standard" ?

8. Other questions/comments:

a) Can you utislise the sounds to announce the moves (as with Fritz)?

b) Will the DGT Board be supported at a later date?

c) Are (or will ) comments (be) available?  They did not import from the previous version.

d) Position Explorer: The tooltip concept is good - I'm sure this will be invaluable later.

e) Notation: This appears a little feint on both my desktop and laptop PC's

9. ... and finally, The Training Module

Comment:  For me this is the core of the system; it's everything I want - testing myself against my learned lines. If this module mirrors what you have in CPT 4.0 so far, then, please do not let my opponents get their hands on it! Sometimes it would be useful to see what "Opening variation" is selected, as I have often played the wrong moves, not realising I'm in the wrong "Opening" [Well that's my excuse anyway!] 

 Kind regards

 Dave

Dave,

thanks for your detailed feedback - appreciated!

Well, I won't tell your opponents, if you tell your friends about CPT 4! ;)

1) good point. I agree to make it easier for new user there just has to be an example database automatically loaded. Otherwise you have to really know what you are looking for or invest quite some time, before you really grasp the potential of CPT

2) come on, they have such a cool graphic effect if you hover over them and you want me to remove it completely :( OK, I will see. At least there should be some more buttons like open. Right now they are slightly too prominent placed

4) have to check this renaming thing

5) I have to see how I can make inserting variations more intuitive, I'm currently not yet 100% happy with it myself. Once you get the idea it is pretty easy. Open your Opening "Slav". Go to the position which consistitutes the variation "Semi Slav 6. .. Bxf6". Then click on insert "variation". Enter your preferred name. Next navigate to the position which constitutes "Semi-Slav 6. ..Bh4" and do the same. CPT 4 will always only load the Slav opening even if you click on a variation below the Slav opening. These variations are just bookmarks. The opening is like a complete book where as the variations can be considered like titles of this book. Oh, now I might have given already a hint about some future eBook and printing functionality...

From a practical point of view you can have an unlimitted number of openings, repertoires, folders and variations. There will be some physical limitations for your complete database size depending on windows version you are using (32bit or 64bit).

7) Directly under the repertoire main node you can't add any other elements. Everything has to be added under the white and black folder. However, you can rename "standard" or add another repertoire. In the latter you have another repertoire element on the same level as "standard". Why do you want to add another element under the main node of a repertoire? 

8) everything should be back before CPT 4 is released. Regarding e) I noticed this too. I have to check what is causing this.

9) I will do my very best as this is for me still the most important part of CPT too which I'm using frequently myself (even with CPT it takes a looooo of time to learn the Dragon).

Thanks for taking the time to write this comprehensive feedback!

Stefan

Hi Stefan

A quick update with some replies, other observations and further comments:

Point 2) [Skins] You're right they are just too prominently placed!

Point 5) [Sub variations] I have managed to create some sub-repertoires (with some problems as forwarded separately). The "Bookmark" idea, if I understand it properly, sounds good as you should be able to visually mark a position as, say,  a) critical line or , say b) Opponent blunder? and jump to it straight away. I notice, as you say, selecting the sub-variation loads the main variation. I think what would be useful is that if you do select the sub-variation is to have the remaining moves of that sub variation displayed. [It may be that it is and I am just not "seeing" it properly or have not properly loaded the sub-variation as I thought!].

Point 7) [Hierarchy] I have managed to create a new "Main Repertoire" for example called say "Blitz Play" and renamed the "Standard" to say "Standard Play". This latter renaming took effect when I re-selected the "Standard" repertoire. This was the only purpose of my query (to learn how to do it): I too can think of no good reason to have anything other than "White" and "Black" below the main node (-;.

Other Comments and observations:

A) Selecting from the Navigation Tree only works if you click on the name [not the folder]. This can cause you to think it's not working! I find it easier to use the navigation tree rather than the tabs.

B) It's useful to remember that you have to double-click on a move position for it to register not single-click/highlight.

C) The Board tabs have the Variation name with a Cross [X] next to the current open one. It might be user-friendly to either highlight this tab (as opposed to the [X]) and/or better to highhlight the name of the current open board on the Navigation Tree. Just a personal preference.

D) Out of interest does the unique position concept apply to CPT4 as it does in previous versions and on a similar vein, where transpositions occur between openings do these remain wholly within their respective "folders"?

Looking forward to the Training Module, a thought occurred...

Would it be possible to have the same Navigation Tree concept, but with check boxes by their side - the purpose of the check box is to select the variation, sub variation or multiple combinations to be tested on? This way, you choose to be tested on either a particular line, or lines, or even, by checking the top level node, your whole repertoire. Other than that I'd leave the training module as it is in version 3.3!

On a final note, I do tell my friends about your program, unless of course they play chess! I know my reasons for not wanting others to get their hands on this is purely selfish, but in a game relying on accumulation of small advantages this is one big advantage...

Kind regards

Dave

Hi Dave,

Point 5) I'm not sure what you mean with this:

"think what would be useful is that if you do select the sub-variation is to have the remaining moves of that sub variation displayed."

Could you please elaborate a little bit about your train of thoughts?

A) But if you click on the folder what should be loaded? The folder should be expanded, but I'm not sure it does right now. Anything else?

B) Yes. I know that CPT 3.3 had some one-click navigation (e.g. candidate move list) and this was a tough decision. From a UI designer perspective I thought this was not a consistant behavior although more convenient I have to admit. On the other hand if you click on an email in Outlook or other mail clients it is usually loaded in the main window right away. I have to think about this a little bit more.

C) I will investigate this.

D) It was never more unique. In CPT 3.3 only the positions within one sub-repertoire were unique, now they are even unique not just across several sub-repertoires, but even repertoires. Thus you can have only ONE position evaluation no matter whether it is part of your Dragon main repertoire or your "I play blitz against the dragon"-repertoire. Same is true for comments. Oh, even for moves! However, you can decide not to include a specific move for one sub-repertoire, but for another one (also the order can be different for each sub-repertoire). Anything which should be stored only once is stored only once. I'm sure I will discover some aspects I missed though :)

Training: Funny, I had the same idea than I started my work on the training module as selecting the repertoire item was the first thing to implement. At the moment I don't plan to add the repertoire explorer, but to have the same control used (but with checkboxes) which is already used for importing (when you select the opening to import into).

"On a final note, I do tell my friends about your program, unless of course they play chess! "

Thanks, thats just fair and all I asked for! Of course it is great that even backgammon, poker and soft-ball players know about CPT. Heck, they even might have friends too (who play basketball, baseball or cards).

Cheers,

Stefan

Hi Stefan

Apologies for the delay in replying.

Point 5) and A) [sub-variation]

On examination I think my point 5) and note A) are really linked and having retried the software I had probably misunderstood what was or should be happening. When I was selecting the sub-variation (single-click) I was not getting the position at the start of that sub-variation and thus probably tried to solve [albeit poorly] a problem that didn't exist. (-;

I think I am right in stating that if you double-click on the sub variation [the descriptive part not the folder or tag to its left]  the position will be displayed in the active chessboard window at the start of the sub variant move. If so, then I should be able to organise all my learned lines within an opening and easliy jump to them using the navigation tree. Cool!

Training Module: I think understanding how the training module works is key to knowing how best to organise your repertoire. For example in CPT 3.3 sometimes I have split out a single-line from a sub-repertoire into its own sub-repertoire so as to be trained specifically on that line. I know I would like to have this option in v4 (i.e. training on a very specific line). I shall eagerly look forward to it.

Kind regards

Dave