text:
Talk:Chess engine

old talk
I have disambiguated many references on this page that formerly linked to unrelated articles because the chess engines in question had the names of common items. However, as I was in the P's (I was working alphabetically) I began to wonder if this is in the Wikipedia's best interest. Certainly, to add "(chess)" to the links on this page is productive, as it eliminates references to unrelated articles, even if it only creates a redlink in its place. But, as I disambiguated these dozens of chess engines on other article pages, I found that I was just adding redlink after redlink to the bottoms of articles and disambiguation pages. AFAIK, dab pages aren't really supposed to link to nonexistent articles if possible. I also felt really bad tacking on this barely related redlink notice to some wonderfully written pieces of brilliant prose. What should be done here? I know I've left the job half-finished...should I revert or continue? —Ed Cormany 22:15, 13 May 2004 (UTC)

 * Adding red links to disambiguation pages is absolutely fine. I'd say it's quite useful, in fact, because there may be several reasonable ways to disambiguate something, and if you don't add them, people won't know know what other articles are pointing to (for instance, there may be a risk of somebody linking to Adam (chess engine) rather than Adam (chess) unless there's a pointer to the latter from Adam). And putting a link at the bottom of an article (even a really good one) doesn't really take away from the article itself, IMO, so I wouldn't say there's anything wrong with what you're doing.

 * That said, I wouldn't worry too much about carrying on with it if you find it boring or have pangs of guilt or whatever. Most of the engines listed on this page are rather obscure and I doubt we'll have articles on them any time soon. I doubt we'll even have links to them from any article other than this. So although it's a job that will probably need to be done at some point, it's not a pressing issue, and nothing much will be hurt if it isn't done right now. --Camembert

 * Thanks. Your words are encouraging.  I'm not sure if I'll carry through to the end of the alphabet or not, but I may well now. =)  —Ed Cormany 01:38, 14 May 2004 (UTC)

 * The other thought is that having red links eventually adds up if a topic *is* referenced from multiple places--might appear on a most-wanted list or, when someone is considering whether to create a new page and is staring at a blank "Editing" page, they can click What Links Here and see whether there are articles that reference it. Sometimes helps me decide whether to create an article that will fill in a few red links automatically. Anyway, nice job (as I also said on your user page).  Elf | Talk 04:15, 14 May 2004 (UTC)

Most of the programs on this list should not have encyclopedia articles. There just is not enough to say about them to ever get a verifiable article that will ever be greater than stub-length. I am going to unlink all but the ones which already do have an article. Please do not re-create the link until you also create the detailed article about the engine itself. (And as a caution to new users, people who create many self-evident articles with the sole content of "XYZ is a chess engine" as a way around this principle have been accused of vandalism for that behavior.) Rossami (talk) 03:08, 11 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Shouldn't there be a category for computer chess players too? --Malathion 5 July 2005 02:46 (UTC)
 * Yes, it happened. See Category:Chess engines. --IanOsgood 17:06, 26 September 2007 (UTC)

Licensing
Is it possible to add information about the license of each engine, such as GNU, BSD, closed-source, or whatever? Nicholasink 15:11, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

I think that the title of the page should be more explicit, and that a phrase in the beginning of the document should present the target of the list and what is allowed. Is the target of the list presenting what is a chess engine and how it works? In this case the list should only contain the most representative engines. Is the target to present the best engine available to the public in order to chose one that fit your need? In this case the list would contain only the best one. I would perhaps let this page in this actual state - open  to all chess engines  - and create a new one with a link to it. So there would be less problems. Outsiders with new engines could put there engine one the wikipedia and have less excuse to pollute the page you have in mind.

List is of dubious value
This list is of dubious value. To the layperson, it is just random names. It does not distinguish between software and dedicated computers. It does not distinguish programs of historical interest from those of current interest. Half these engines are non-notable personal projects. Any static list will become obsolete almost immediately. I recommend removing the list entirely, perhaps merging the notable programs into computer chess, perhaps introducing categories instead. --IanOsgood 20:37, 14 August 2006 (UTC)
 * "Listcruft is exactly what I was talking about. I'd propose this page for deletion, but it seems to have a lot of history, therefore interest. Could we at least categorize the links on this page a little? I propose at least deleting every item that does not have an internal or external link. --IanOsgood 00:26, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

Note: around this time the page was renamed from List of chess engines to Chess engines.

Free chess engines

 * List of non-notable engines removed, so there is no temptation to add them back to the article. --IanOsgood 16:57, 4 November 2007 (UTC)

Took out those engines that now have links Laetoli
 * Could you please give your reference for the ELO ratings? Peferably list both the testing agency, date of testing, and the reference hardware used. Without a reference, the ratings could be removed at any time. Also think hard about the notability of these engines. We don't wan't this page to turn back into a link farm. --IanOsgood 21:38, 2 November 2007 (UTC)
 * I took the ELO rating from three sites and normalised the data because the ELOs depend on CPU speed. If you want I can link to those sites or I can show my data and how I derived it. What do you think?
 * As regards notability, I see your point but a lot of people like to run compative tournaments or play against an engine with a specific strength, i.e. no one can beat Rybka, so I think they're all useful. Writing a chess program is not trivial with scarcely any prospect of financial gain, so I doubt anyone is going to do it in order to harvest links.
 * What I had intended to do once I'd gathered all the engines plus data is list them according to ELO strength and include the author's name and country they come from. If you prefer we can dump those for which I cannot find ELO rankings.
 * I noticed someone removed the approximate sign (~) I'd put that in to show that the rating were just that (they're rounded to the nearest 5). Laetoli —Preceding comment was added at 23:00, 2 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Merging data from multiple sources constitutes original research, and so does not belong on Wikipedia. Please reference a single source for ratings, or remove them altogether. We already give links to the major rating lists if folks want to go look up ratings themselves.
 * If you want to work on the page, you could cull the list only to those few dozen free engines that are near the top of one of the rating lists, as a measure of notability. --IanOsgood 04:35, 4 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Okay, I concede defeat. Took out Ikarus (private engine & not freely available) and put in authors and country codes. I hope this is alright by you. Also gave link to ratings page. Laetoli —Preceding comment was added at 12:16, 5 November 2007 (UTC)

The list of "Freely available chess engines" includes Ruffian 1.0.1 as "(latest free version)". In fact the latest free version is Ruffian 1.0.5, available from the Arena download page. Version 1.0.5 is usually regarded as the latest free version of Ruffian in computer chess community - it is tested in CCRL 40/40, CCRL 40/4, CEGT 40/20, CEGT 40/4, FACE. Also WB/UCI chronology lists Ruffian 1.0.5 as the last free version. Ruffian 1.0.5 was first released on 2003-03-19, AFAIK. 333ES (talk) 08:56, 6 August 2009 (UTC)

The official web page for Ruffian, however, does not agree with any of the aforementioned sources, which only has Ruffian 1.0.1 available to download. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 202.170.162.99 (talk) 21:21, 11 May 2010 (UTC)

Please elaborate on the comment for reversing changeset 14:20, 11 May 2010. The comment makes no sense. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Corrie.engelbrecht (talk • contribs)

 * Sure. I was suspicious when I saw several of the engine ratings drop by over a hundred points (for example, Booot, crafty). Looking closer, I saw many version regressions (for example, Crafty from 23.0 down to 22.1). I thought I saw that you were not using any of the open source versions of engines in your update.  (Open source engines are colored orange in the CCRL list, free but closed source engines are colored green.) For the purposes of this list, both types are considered free engines.  Maybe that wasn't the problem; I see that some of your ratings are for open source engines.  Did you check that you had the top rated free version of the program?  Many of the engines have been updated since the last edit.  Maybe the "best versions only" list would be more useful: http://www.computerchess.org.uk/ccrl/4040/  --IanOsgood (talk) 22:34, 11 May 2010 (UTC)

The change you reverted included exactly the information you say you want. The header of the ratings column was changed to say that it was the best version according to the ratings. It is possible that there are omission, I will add those later, but I am going to reinstate the changes I made because you have presented no evidence that your reversal was warranted. Please take more care before doing things like this, because you did not do due dilligence before taking your actions, and this is wasting my time, and yours. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Corrie.engelbrecht (talk • contribs) 00:37, 12 May 2010 (UTC)

 * OK. I'll help. --IanOsgood (talk) 02:46, 12 May 2010 (UTC)

 * Thanks for being so friendly. Now I sound like a bully:) And thanks for the help! --Corrie.engelbrecht (talk) 07:05, 12 May 2010 (UTC)

Proposed page move
I propose that this page, currently at Chess engines should be move to Chess engine to conform with WP naming conventions regarding plurals of nouns. The page cannot be moved by a non-administrative user because the redirect page Chess engine has a history. BlueValour 23:25, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

 * NOTE: move was made. --Guy Macon (talk) 19:47, 30 March 2012 (UTC)

Source Code
It would be nice to list which engines are provided with source code. I know the following do: Amundsen, Amy, Arasan, BBChess, Crafty, Faile, Fruit, Glaurung & Scatha, GNU Chess, Knight Cap, Nero, Pepito, SJeng, Toga II, Witz. (add more if you know)

This article should merge with Computer chess
Subject says it all Rocksong 23:16, 15 February 2007 (UTC)
 * Oppose - Computer chess is already long and a merge of the two articles would push it over the top. I agree that some rationalisation is needed but length indicates two articles though not necessarily split as now. BlueValour 05:45, 16 February 2007 (UTC)
 * Oppose - As per Bluevalour. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Aarontay (talk • contribs) 05:47, 16 February 2007 (UTC).
 * Oppose - This page started out as a "list" article, with only minimal explanatory paragraphs. Such a (large) article should remain separate from the (large) main topic article. I would instead suggest refactoring by moving content related to computer chess theory back into the main computer chess article. --IanOsgood 17:12, 26 September 2007 (UTC)

Then what is the difference between the subject matter of the two articles? "Computer chess" and "Chess engine" are almost synonyms. Rocksong 06:20, 16 February 2007 (UTC)

 * Not quite. Of course any chess program by definition would have an engine (the component that actually runs the algorithms), but in the Computer chess circles (as you probably already know), chess engine typically refers to the relatively new idea (1990s?) of splitting a chess program into two parts so the engine or brain can be ported to run on any other interface that runs the same protocol. It is allied to the concepts of Xboard Communication Protocol, UCI, etc and there has being a trend in the past 2 decades for modular engines to be released even by commercial packages. It is also a more specialized term than computer chess which is devoted generally to computer chess programming techniques (and history of). You can argue whether this concept is notable, but it is clearly distinguishable from computer chess topic.Aarontay 07:10, 16 February 2007 (UTC)

But that's not what this article is about. All the "chess engines" concepts are (AFAICT) already there in Computer chess, and don't need to be duplicated here. Apart from the section "Increasing strength" (which I think is out of place and belongs in Computer chess), this article more about listing/comparing the different engines, so it should be renamed to reflect that. So I guess I've changed my mind and I'm proposing a rename (to keep the article focused) rather than a merge. To put it another way, "Computer chess" is the main computer chess article, and this is one of the sub-articles, and should be named to reflect that. Rocksong 10:20, 16 February 2007 (UTC)

 * Actually that's what the article is about as can be seen by the first two sections, though it seems that it was duplicated in the main computer chess article as well. I agree "The increasing strength portion" is not quite relevant here. As you know, the main effect of this chess engine portability factor is that it makes engine versus engine contests a lot easier, and as a result, many hobbyist focus exclusively on chess engine strength that is perhaps why it was added here. If you give me a week, I can expand the first two sections with more meat (history etc). A seperate issue is what to do with the lists of chess engines as discussed above, that one I'm not too concerned. I propose keeping the chess engine article, and moving the lists to another article. Aarontay 02:38, 17 February 2007 (UTC)

 * But in any case, this article is not about "chess engines" as you have defined. It even lists dedicated hardware. If you look through the history of the article, you will see that until Oct-Nov 2006 it was almost nothing but a list of chess engines/computers. Since then well meaning editors have added extra comment, but honestly I think it is unnecessary and distracting, duplicating what is already in the very thorough Chess computers article. Now in my opinion, the fact that engines can be separate to the interface is pretty uninteresting, and really only deserves a sentence or two in Chess computers. (The real revolution has been that computers have become so powerful that almost all chess computers are now software - back in the 80s / early 90s you could buy a "chess computer", now these things I think are extinct.) Let's just focus on improving the main computer chess article, rather than doing the same (or very similar) work in two different articles. Rocksong 06:58, 18 February 2007 (UTC)

 * IMHO This sounds a lot like "I'm not interested hence it is not notable". I submit that the majority of editors including the originator of this article actually recognize this concept, though many are newcomers so they are not able to place it in context, but enough "well meaning editors" do. You are a well meaning editor as well, but correct me if I'm wrong but you are not quite familiar with computer chess as opposed to other well meaning editors in this article? Aarontay 14:19, 18 February 2007 (UTC)

 * Heh, above I accidentally wrote Chess computers instead of Computer chess. Ironically it turned out not to matter because Chess computers (and for that matter Chess computer) is a redirect to Computer chess). It really doesn't make sense to me that typing "Chess computers" brings up one article, while typing "Chess engines" brings up a quite different article, especially since the "Chess engines" article lists not only chess "engines", but also computers. I still think it makes sense to rename this article to "List of chess engines", and incorporate any discussion portions into Chess computers. Rocksong 07:03, 18 February 2007 (UTC)
 * I see that people have being overly generous with the use of redirects. But I suspect if it were up to you, there would only be one article - Computer chess. As I said, I don't particularly care for lists so if you want to move the lists to Lists of chess engines great, But Chess computers would imply hardware or even specialised hardware, so I'm not sure why you think the discussion here is suitable to be placed there. Aarontay 14:19, 18 February 2007 (UTC)

 * If it were up to me, there would be one main article - Computer chess - with lots of sub-articles. The reality is that chess computers have evolved gradually, from specialised-hardware-only 20 years ago, to almost invariably software-only now. Because the change was gradual, and the concepts overlap so much, the chess hardware and software articles need to be tightly coupled. In any case, there is no division at the moment: Computer chess has a lot on software-only, while Chess engine has some stuff on specialised hardware. I don't want people to waste time on two parallel articles. Rocksong 23:10, 18 February 2007 (UTC)

 * And I don't want to dumb Wikipedia down. No offense but to say that software and hardware needs to be tightly coupled, shows a studied ignorance of the origins of the field. Computer chess as a field has always focused on AI and algorithmic advances (Turing and Shannon) independent of the exact medium used as typified by Turing's historic paper/hand simulation of a chess program. That has nothing at all to do with specialized hardware vs software. Aarontay 07:55, 19 February 2007 (UTC)

 * You don't get my point, do you? That hardware and software can do the same thing. Look I'm not for dumbing down, I'm for avoiding duplication. I offered the suggestion to help avoid duplication. If you don't want to take that suggestion, than I guess I can't stop you. Also I strongly advise against calling other editors ignorant. Rocksong 08:46, 19 February 2007 (UTC)

 * As a compromise, I've changed the chess computer redirect to point to chess engine. This seems more appropriate, looking at the backlinks. --IanOsgood 17:12, 26 September 2007 (UTC)

Personal programs
What is the purpose of these without qualifying why they are here? (i.e. defeated a nother notable program) People can't buy or even download these and it doesn't seem much more than a list of names, less useful than the freely downloadable programs that we are not allowed to add to the page. Laetoli
 * Good point. This section is perhaps a relic of the initial categorization of the flat list of names. The only two notable ones are Ikarus and Ferret (winners of the World Computer Speed Chess Championship). I would not mind deleting the section entirely. --IanOsgood 18:16, 6 November 2007 (UTC)
 * I've removed the section and added a reference line to Ikarus & Ferret at the end of the list of free engines.Laetoli —Preceding comment was added at 15:51, 12 November 2007 (UTC)

Chess engine rating lists
I have removed the text "results are statistically significant" because the engines are rarely differentiated from those a few places above and below them to a 95% statistical significance. For example, if you look at http://www.computerchess.org.uk/ccrl/4040/ you will see that most of the engines could rise or fall several places within the given margins of error. On this list, only the top engine, Rybka, is safe in its position within the given margins of error. The 21st placed engine, Delfi, could fall to 28th place within the given margins of error even if those below 28th failed to rise (which they probably would if Delfi lost games to them, as may well be the case in this scenario). Laetoli
 * There was a similar wording at Chess engine rating lists:

 * [...] list uses statistically significant measurements of chess engine strength, [...]

 * I changed it to:

 * [...] list uses confidence interval estimates of chess engine strength, [...]

 * which is hopefully more to the point here. GregorB (talk) 09:54, 27 April 2008 (UTC)

Merge proposal
I think it would make sense to merge List of chess engine rating sources into this article, section "Chess engine rating lists". Please leave your comments about the proposed merge here. GregorB (talk) 21:41, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

 * Agree It seems like a good idea to me. Bubba73 (talk), 21:51, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

 * Since there was no objections, I merged it - for better or for worse.

 * Sadly, references from the List of chess engine rating sources are now the only references this article has. I hope this will improve in the future.

 * There are only four engine rating lists in the table. For more about the criteria used to include them (and exclude others), see Talk:List of chess engine rating sources. I think these four are probably the only notable rating lists (other than some specialized lists, covering e.g. palm devices and the like, that could still be added to the article). GregorB (talk) 15:23, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

Chess Computer should redirect to Computer Chess, not here
I'm sorry if I not some semantic genius, but when I type in "Chess Computer" I would expect to go to the article describing the history of chess-playing computers, not this article. At the least, the top of this article should contain a link to Computer Chess. 129.210.217.63 (talk) 22:16, 3 February 2009 (UTC)

NOTE: Chess Computer was changed to redirect to Computer Chess --Guy Macon (talk) 19:51, 30 March 2012 (UTC)

Reads well
The article is pretty good in my opinion, thought its coverage just right...--Billymac00 (talk) 04:19, 11 May 2009 (UTC)

Weid doesn't have any downloads
Weid chess engine doesn't have any engine downloads. Just an opening book that's all... So is that really an engine if there is no engine? :) 72.245.213.213 (talk) 20:45, 2 August 2010 (UTC)

 * I'm not familiar with Weid, but if it is as you say, then it is not an engine. Bubba73 (You talkin' to me?), 21:57, 2 August 2010 (UTC)

I've seen it play in a few tournaments years ago and the author posts on talkchess.com from time to time. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 41.3.90.237 (talk) 18:18, 15 December 2010 (UTC)

Ratings table
Could anyone tech savvy enough center the text in most of the columns? I think it will look much better. Especially the column for Engine/platform entries. Year started and Rating could also use centering. Nghtwlkr (talk) 09:41, 24 May 2011 (UTC)

 * I centered the text in the ratings table. The other tables look best left-justified. --Guy Macon (talk) 20:06, 30 March 2012 (UTC)

revamping the lead paragraph
Ok, right now the grammar in the lead paragraph is so horrible I can barely make heads or tails of the thing nor do I find the content informative in the least regard. I'm thinking we can just restart the thing fresh from scratch again. How about something more like: “ A chess engine, in computer architecture, is the core and most important chess component distinct from all the other components, such as the user interface and move history, encompassing both hardware and software capable of searching and/or analyzing chess positions striving to find the best move for a particular side in a given situation. ” ? I know, its one massive run-on but I think it does the article justice -- in contrast with what we have now. Any other options? -- T he l azy l eo  ( talk ) 10:18, 2 March 2012 (UTC)
 * I just rewrote the lead paragraph. Please check it and make further improvement if you can. Thanks! --Guy Macon (talk) 20:33, 30 March 2012 (UTC)

x64 in Rating list table
Is the x64 really needed? Each and every entry has a x64 at the end - it is standard nowadays! It might be better to enter 32b in case a 32 bit engine apears in the top 3. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 80.171.10.41 (talk) 22:26, 30 December 2011 (UTC)

OK, noone is reacting. As EVERY entry has "x64" as a supplement I propose again to remove that as it is completly redundant nowadays! — Preceding unsigned comment added by 213.39.170.129 (talk) 19:36, 28 January 2012 (UTC)

I changed it and removed the 'x64'! It is simply standard and doesnt need to be mentioned at all. In case a 32bit engines will be in the TOP3 somewhere it can be refered to as w32/b32 or something similar! — Preceding unsigned comment added by 80.171.41.233 (talk) 20:01, 4 May 2012 (UTC)

I introduced a question about x64 and waited for more than 3 monthes as I consider it as irrelevant as EVERY engine is x64. Nghtwlkr introduced it again with the remark "it is important". Much more important woudl be that every engine is a windows engine but this is not mentioned as everyone expects this. No he changed it back to x64 again without any reasoning. I will remove it again as I give a reasoning. (And I repaet, 32 bit is irrelevant and becomes more irrelevant every day!) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 80.171.41.131 (talk) 17:26, 22 May 2012 (UTC)

 * Sorry I missed your original post. There is no law of nature that says the top-rated programs all have to be x64, even though they currently are. The author of, say, Redqueen could come up with a clever improvement next week that catapults the strength of his 32-bit chess engine to the top of all the ratings lists. Or it could happen that in a few years Intel will bring out a 128-bit CPU and Stockfish will be immediately recompiled for it, gaining strength and putting it at the top of the list. If you knew for a fact that all future top chess engines will be x64 forever, I would agree with the deletion, but you don't know that. --Guy Macon (talk) 17:49, 22 May 2012 (UTC)

 * Sure, there is no law for that, but there is the general rule of avoiding redundances! Right now ALL Engines ARE 64bit and that is well know. In case a (one) 32bit engine or in the future a (one) 128bit engine might come up one can name that in the beginning and when it becomes standard it can be removed again. I will remove the X64 again! — Preceding unsigned comment added by 213.209.110.45 (talk) 12:36, 25 May 2012 (UTC)

 * I just reverted your attempt to shove your version down our throats. Please read WP:CONSENSUS. --Guy Macon (talk) 13:15, 25 May 2012 (UTC)

Impractical tournament volumes?
In fact, the number of games that need to be played between fairly evenly matched engines, in order to achieve significance, runs into the thousands and is, therefore, impractical within the framework of a tournament.

The link supporting that statement is broken. More to the point, why would tournaments with thousands of games be impractical? Computer processing is fast, so that a reasonable tournament could have short time controls. The same two engines can play as many simulated games as you have CPUs, right? And they can certainly play one game after the next without ever resting.

I'm not an engine developer so I don't know that anything I just wrote is accurate, but it should be clear that this point is non-trivial and therefore that the article needs to explain why thousands of games per tournament is impractical. - Thanks, PhilipR (talk) 00:37, 25 October 2012 (UTC)

 * The problem is in your assumption: "Computer processing is fast, so that a reasonable tournament could have short time controls." yes, Computer processing is fast, but chess engines are designed to use that processing power to best advantage at lightning chess to tournament time controls. A chess engine could be designed to play best at thousands of moves per minute, but real programs are optimized to use the time they have well.

 * The reference, which you can find at

 * http://web.archive.org/web/20110714104652/http://www.mizarchessengine.com/columns/testing-a-chess-engine/

 * (I will update the page if the server doesn't come up soon)

 * says "So after 4500 games we can say that A is better than B with 95% of confidence". Even if you play speed chess at five minutes per side, that's over a month to complete one pairing, and about a year for a 10-engine round robin, assuming you own ten fast computers. By which time at least three of the engines will have a new version. If you only have one computer, that's ten years. --Guy Macon (talk) 01:33, 25 October 2012 (UTC)

 * Thanks for the info. I would actually not be surprised if one person or group of people (1) found it sufficiently important to know which engine performs best (2) had that many computers to tie up for that long. This is even truer if we relax the assumption of fast computers -- tech geeks often have a bunch of outdated ones that still have reasonable processing power.

 * But I'm also not understanding your assumptions. As you stated, I calculate that one match of 4500 games would take 31.25 days. I don't understand why a 10-engine round robin would take more than 5 * 9 times that, or 1406 machine*days. Five computers can host ten engines, and each engine would play the other nine.

 * But if you need 4500 for a two-engine match, you certainly don't need a round-robin of 4500 games each to declare a winner with 95% accuracy. For example, wasting time on the #1 engine versus the #10 engine adds no predictive value to identifying the best of the bunch, once you've identified them as "pretty good" and "relatively bad", respectively, with some confidence. Intuitively I'd guess this scales much better than you think, like maybe with the square root of number of engines, so sqrt(10)*4500 = 14230 games total might be enough. But that's just an intuitive guess. The point is, it's a lot less than 45000.

 * It's an interesting theoretical problem to envision how to design a tournament in minimum number of games to declare a winner with 95% confidence. Surely you'd want to run a bunch of round robins in sequence (rather than pairing up the same two for 4500 games) and then use your growing evidence to start eliminating contenders.

 * Finally, I get that speed chess conditions aren't optimized to display the true power of each engine, but they seem a lot more satisfying than sticking everyone in a tiny-sample tournament declaring a champion. -- Regards, PhilipR (talk) 04:44, 25 October 2012 (UTC)

 * Looking over your comments, I believe that you are correct and that I overestimated the number of round robins needed. I am going to run this past the fine folks at Wikiproject Statistics to see if someone has analyzed round robins and published. --Guy Macon (talk) 01:04, 26 October 2012 (UTC)

 * Guy, that reference is a blog/self-published which does not qualify as a reliable source for the purposes of Wikipedia. Quale (talk) 05:22, 25 October 2012 (UTC)

 * That reference (one URL change, same reference) has been in the article since 14 November 2007 with no objections and was written by Nicola Rizzuti, author of the Mizar chess engine, so it could be argued that he fits the description (WP:SPS) of an established expert on the topic of chess engines. That being said, the basic math behind sample size and confidence levels is well documented in the statistics literature, so if you seriously doubt Rizzuti's conclusions, I can dig up a cite from the academic literature that says pretty much the same thing -- it takes a lot of samples to be sure with 95% confidence which of two closely ranked chess engines is really better. Or I can bring it up at WP:RSN and get a second opinion about reliability, but it would be best to see if the site being down is temporary before doing that. --Guy Macon (talk) 07:19, 25 October 2012 (UTC)

 * I actually think the statistics are correct, but they aren't particular to computer chess. The same situation arises in human chess, or in fact any other two-player competition. In fact, it's essentially the same as Checking whether a coin is fair.  As you say, there are sources unconnected to computer chess that will support the claim if computer chess sources aren't available.  The author of a chess engine might be considered a subject matter expert, but it isn't apparent that writing a chess engine makes one an expert in statistics.  All that said, I'm not especially concerned, but I did want to point out that this is a self-published source. Quale (talk) 23:53, 25 October 2012 (UTC)

 * Point well taken about expertise in chess engines and statistics. --Guy Macon (talk) 01:04, 26 October 2012 (UTC)

Private
What are the criteria for inclusion in the list of "private" engines? Should this list even be in the article? - dcljr (talk) 23:55, 28 January 2013 (UTC)
 * I don't think it belongs. I wrote more at External links/Noticeboard, but that discussion hasn't garnered much participation yet. Quale (talk) 02:52, 29 January 2013 (UTC)
 * I have deleted that entire section per discussion at the external links noticeboard. Of course the question of criteria for classifying chess engines still exists -- it has just moved to list of chess engines. Oops. Didn't follow the link. It redirects here. Perhaps we should talk about having a "List of chess engines" page. --Guy Macon (talk) 20:12, 29 January 2013 (UTC)

Chess engine torture tests
If I can find enough well-sourced material, I would like to add a section to the article about test positions that are constructed to test / confuse chess engines. I found a couple at

http://blog.chess.com/zaifrun/cool-endgame-study---test-your-engines

http://blog.chess.com/zaifrun/test-your-chess-engine

but I have a feeling that there might be a collection of them somewhere. Does anybody know of one? --Guy Macon (talk) 20:16, 29 January 2013 (UTC)

Is this a WP:LINKFARM?
Please see discussion at External links/Noticeboard --Guy Macon (talk) 14:01, 27 January 2013 (UTC)

 * No response here, so I am implementing the recommendation of the external links noticeboard --Guy Macon (talk) 02:59, 29 January 2013 (UTC)

 * What have you done? Before you came along and messed it up the page categorized the different chess engines. Now it doesn't. How is that progress? Where would one look on Wikipedia to see which chess engines fit into which category? Do you expect people to literally search out each chess engine to find out whether it's pedagogical or open source or proprietary? Or do you intend to create separate pages for each of those lists? No? I didn't think so. Why would you remove useful information from a page? It doesn't make any sense. Don't hide behind policies - use some common sense. Either put the page back the way it was or create the necessary separate pages to replace what you've destroyed. Don't just go around wiping out useful information: that is just anathema to the spirit of wikipedia. 'Recommendations of the external links noticeboard'?! If you don't like lists of external links then just internalize them all. Many of those links were already internal. Where they weren't and the page exists in wikipedia, link to it. Where it doesn't, create the page, or don't link it at all and just put a phrase next to the name of the engine with a few pieces of key information. Destroying it without ensuring the info is somewhere else on wikipedia in an easy to access format is both morally reprehensible and lazy. Play well, Alex. Chessbloke (talk) 21:30, 3 February 2013 (UTC)

 * I am open to discussing this, which until you posted the above appeared to be uncontested (contested edits should get more scrutiny). This will go a lot smoother if you dial the aggression back a notch and present your case in a calm. logical manner. Before we go any further in this discussion, please read What Wikipedia is not and What Wikipedia is not
 * Re: "Don't hide behind policies - use some common sense", where do you think those policies came from? They came from the common sense of the Wikipedia community -- a bunch of editors just like us. If you believe that one of the policies does not make sense, you are free to suggest changes to the policies and see if the community agrees. --Guy Macon (talk) 01:35, 4 February 2013 (UTC)

 * The possibility of putting the links in a separate "List of chess engines" page was mentioned. I think that could be OK, and if you can be a bit calmer about this you might be able to find something that works.  I have to say that I think that this article was improved by removing the linkfarm.  Quale (talk) 03:06, 4 February 2013 (UTC)

 * I have no problem with creating a "List of chess engines" page and putting the deleted material there. The only question is whether anyone objects to that, in which case we need to discuss it further.

 * If you look at these two links Link 1 Link 2 you will see that on 00:47, 17 October 2006 (UTC) this page was renamed / moved from "List of chess engines" to "Chess engine" with the edit comment "More than a list" (that page was created on 15-16 March 2004: Link 3) --Guy Macon (talk) 09:49, 4 February 2013 (UTC)

 * Like Quale and Guy Macon I think the article is greatly improved by removing the link farm. As it stood it was something more suited to Wikia than an encyclopaedia like Wikipedia. A move to improve is in no way morally reprehensible and lazy. --Biker Biker (talk) 22:25, 4 February 2013 (UTC)

 * Not aggression; righteous indignation. Here's my case: the information was valuable, instead of putting in the effort of converting the information into a format compatible with the policies of wikipedia you simply deleted it. That is either laziness or vandalism, both of which are morally reprehensible. The policy is fine and sensible, my criticism was of your use of the policy to justify lazy editing a.k.a. deleting things which don't comply with policies instead of converting the things into a format which is suitable for an encyclopedia. If you lack the skill (as I do) or or the energy to improve this page rather than delete bits of it then do nothing to it. Play well, Alex. Chessbloke (talk) 19:31, 5 February 2013 (UTC)

 * I placed a standard warning on the Chessbloke's talk page using Template:Uw-npa2. I encourage him to review WP:NPA, WP:CIVIL, WP:OWN and WP:CONSENSUS before responding. --Guy Macon (talk) 19:57, 5 February 2013 (UTC)

 * I think it would make more sense to create a new page for listing the chess ratings and dump the "linkfarm" there where people would be more interested in that sort of thing. -- T he l azy l eo  ( talk ) 08:02, 6 February 2013 (UTC)

 * Or we could put them in List of chess software. That article would be improved if we split the list of software into engines and engine-plus-GUI (excluding engines that just tack on XBoard or WinBoard). --Guy Macon (talk) 08:21, 6 February 2013 (UTC)

 * I'm in favor of dumping it there and revamping that article with the added data. -- T he l azy l eo  ( talk ) 08:27, 6 February 2013 (UTC)

 * Any objections? If not, Chessbloke, would you like to take the lead on improving List of chess software as discussed above? --Guy Macon (talk) 11:46, 6 February 2013 (UTC)

 * There are more kinds of chess software than just engines and GUIs. See Category:Chess software for some examples.  This of course is fixable by adding more sections, but section on engines will dwarf the others. Quale (talk) 20:01, 6 February 2013 (UTC)

 * Chessbloke has indicated elsewhere that he will not be updating List of chess software as discussed here. I can do it, but I am a bit swamped on a hot project so I won't be able to get to it right away. If anyone is interested, please jump in. It's certainly worth having such a list. --Guy Macon (talk) 15:28, 7 February 2013 (UTC)

Hash Size?
What about hash sizes for engines, doesn't that also determine the playing strength of the engine by changing the speed it calculates? Houdini 3 came with a manual that states a formula to calculate the ideal hash size given the average search speed of the engine on one's hardware and the average time per move but my own testing has showed Houdini gets faster node searches with basically no hash. Is this a situation like Houdart described for hyperthreading, where hyperthreading increases the search speed but makes the whole process less efficient therefore is not recommended? 108.223.240.62 (talk) 22:33, 29 August 2013 (UTC)Dark_wizzie

 * It's actually a lot more complex than that. See [ http://rjlipton.wordpress.com/2012/05/04/digital-butterflies-and-prgs/ ]. --Guy Macon (talk) 01:21, 30 August 2013 (UTC)

takeback
Can a person beat a program if the person has no time controls and can use other programs and can take back as many moves as they want? I came here hoping to find answer — Preceding unsigned comment added by 47.72.78.79 (talk) 07:05, 22 October 2017 (UTC)

Alpha Zero
I'm new to wikipedia so forgive me. But shouldn't the AI engine that can consistently BEAT Stockfish 9 be mentioned? Should an AI Engine section be added? What about Leela AI? — Preceding unsigned comment added by JBunco (talk • contribs) 05:17, 26 July 2018 (UTC)
 * AlphaZero would probably be fine for the "dedicated hardware" section, or a new "AI engine" section; feel free to add either. But (a) the latest information I can find says that it was tested against Stockfish 8, not 9, and (b) since Stockfish was on significantly inferior hardware compared to AlphaZero - and the hardware wasn't even optimized for Stockfish's approach whereas AlphaZero's was - saying that it can "consistently beat Stockfish" is a bit unfair. Jtrevor99 (talk) 15:01, 26 July 2018 (UTC)

cheating
Section needed on use of chess engine in cheating 217.155.25.156 (talk) 16:43, 22 September 2022 (UTC)

title: Talk:Chess engine


text:
Bicker

Bicker may refer to

 * Petty arguing
 * Bicker, Lincolnshire
 * Bicker, a practice in the eating clubs at Princeton University and Mount Olive College
 * Bicker (family), a Dutch Golden Age family, headed by Andries Bicker
 * Bicker Isles, an island group in South Australia

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

title: Bicker


text:
Enforcement

Enforcement is the proper execution of the process of ensuring compliance with laws, regulations, rules, standards, and social norms.

Governments attempt to effectuate successful implementation of policies by enforcing laws and regulations. Enactment refers to application of a law or regulation, or carrying out of an executive or judicial order.

Theories of enforcement
Enforcement serves a number of functions; the enforcement of social norms can ensure conformity within insular communities, the enforcements of laws can maximize social benefits and protect the public interest, and enforcement may also serve the self-interest of the institutions that oversee enforcement. Enforcement can be effectuated by both public institutions and private, non-governmental actors. Enforcement is often accomplished through coercive means or by utilizing power disparities to constrain action. Some scholars, such as Kate Andrias, have also argued that institutions enforce rules when deciding "when and how to apply" laws and regulations.

Delegation of enforcement powers
Some governments will delegate enforcement powers to subordinate governmental entities or private parties. In the United States, for example, the federal government and state governments often delegate a range of enforcement powers to administrative agencies. There has been considerable debate in legal scholarship about the degree to which governments should oversee and supervise institutions to which enforcement powers have been delegated.

Enforcement mechanisms
In 2017, of 265 policies for ocean protection only 13% had specific enforcement mechanisms.

Enforcement mechanisms are major component of governance structures. It has been suggested that an effective global public health security convention would require a governing body (or bodies) to enforce the framework with appropriate enforcement mechanisms. Similar approaches include the concept of "climate clubs" of polities for climate change mitigation. In such, "border adjustments [...] have to be introduced to target those states that do not participate [...] to avoid shifting effects with ecologically and economically detrimental consequences", with such "border adjustments or eco-tariffs" incentivizing other countries to adjust their standards and domestic production to join the climate club. The Paris Agreement may lack enforcement mechanisms.

On a national level, penalties for non-complying countries could include: Benefits for countries could include:
 * public reprimands
 * economic sanctions
 * denial of benefits, such as those related to travel, trade, and tourism
 * public disclosures of compliance, which could act either as an incentive or penalty
 * tariffs
 * tangible resources, such as financial aid or technical assistance
 * other support
 * access to data and information, recommendations and guidance, or other services provided by a governing body
 * tariffs

Selective enforcement
Institutions may choose to exercise discretion, thereby enforcing laws, regulations, or norms only in selective circumstances. Some scholars, such as Joseph H. Tieger, have suggested that selective enforcement is an inherent component of all enforcement regimes, because it is impossible for enforcers to observe and catch every violation. Other scholars, such as Margaret H. Lemos and Alex Stein, have suggested that "strategic" enforcement is a cost-effective method of achieving social benefits; by focusing enforcement on the worst violators, other violators will "downscale" their activities so that they do not appear to be the worst offender.

title: Enforcement


text:
Liechtenstein national football team

The Liechtenstein national football team (Liechtensteinische Fussballnationalmannschaft) is the national football team of the Principality of Liechtenstein and is controlled by the Liechtenstein Football Association. The organisation is known as the Liechtensteiner Fussballverband in German.

The team's first match was an unofficial match against Malta in Seoul, a 1–1 draw in 1981. Their first official match came two years later, a 0–1 defeat from Switzerland. Liechtenstein's largest win, a 4–0 win over Luxembourg in a 2006 FIFA World Cup qualifier on 13 October 2004, was both its first ever away win and its first win in any FIFA World Cup qualifier.

Conversely, Liechtenstein is the only country that lost an official match against San Marino, albeit in a friendly match. Liechtenstein suffered its biggest ever loss in 1996, during 1998 FIFA World Cup qualifiers, losing 1–11 to Macedonia (now North Macedonia), the result also being Macedonia's largest ever win to date. The team's head coach is currently Konrad Fünfstück.

History
Liechtenstein are only a relatively recent affiliate to FIFA, and did not participate in any qualifying series until the UEFA Euro 1996 qualifiers. There they managed to surprise the Republic of Ireland by holding them to a 0–0 draw on 3 June 1995. On 14 October 1998, they managed their first victory in a qualifying campaign after winning 2–1 against Azerbaijan in a UEFA Euro 2000 qualifying match.

Since then, the presence of Liechtenstein clubs in the Swiss league system and of a handful of professional players (most notably Mario Frick) has seen the side's competitiveness improve slightly. The Euro 2004 qualifiers saw Liechtenstein improve to the extent they restricted England to 2–0 wins. Also at this time Liechtenstein lost 1–0 against San Marino, considered to be the weakest national team. As of 2023, it is San Marino's most recent (and only) victory. The 2006 FIFA World Cup qualifiers, however, brought even better results as two wins over Luxembourg and draws against both Slovakia and Portugal meant that Liechtenstein finished with 8 points.

In the UEFA Euro 2008 qualifiers, Liechtenstein beat Latvia through a solitary goal from Mario Frick. The result caused the Latvian manager to resign after the match. They repeated their heroics against Iceland managing to beat them 3–0 on 17 October 2007 for their second qualifying group win. On the 26 March 2008 Liechtenstein had an embarrassing 7–1 loss to fellow small nation in Europe, Malta. This was recorded as Malta's largest win.

The Liechtensteiner Fussballverbund voted Rainer Hasler to be their "Golden Player" — their best player over the last 50 years — to mark UEFA's golden jubilee.

In the 2010 FIFA World Cup qualifiers, Liechtenstein secured a scoreless draw against Azerbaijan and a 1–1 draw against Finland, finishing bottom of Group 4 on two points.

In the UEFA Euro 2012 qualifiers, Liechtenstein were narrowly beaten 2–1 by Scotland in Hampden Park thanks to a goal by Stephen McManus in the seventh minute of additional time. They produced a shock 2–0 win at home against Lithuania; their goals were scored by Philippe Erne and Michele Polverino. In the following qualifying game, they managed a scoreless draw away to Lithuania.

In the qualifiers for the 2014 FIFA World Cup, the Blue-Reds were humiliated at home in their opening game against Bosnia-Herzegovina (1–8). The team loses many of its qualifying matches and earns its only two points in draws against Latvia and Slovakia. The team finished bottom of its group.

For the UEFA Euro 2016 qualifying campaign in France, Liechtenstein managed to finish second-bottom of the group and take five points, managing a goalless draw at home against Montenegro, an away win against Moldova, one goal to nil, thanks to Franz Burgmeier's ninth goal and then a 1–1 home draw in the return against the same Moldovans, the group's red lanterns with three fewer units.

During the 2018 FIFA World Cup qualifiers, The Blue-Reds lost all 10 of their matches and finished bottom of their group with no points scored and just one goal scored (away against Israel) compared to 39 conceded.

In 2018, Liechtenstein entered the first ever UEFA Nations League, in group 4 of league D. Their first Nations League match saw Armenia beat them 2–1 away. Liechtenstein were able to claim their first Nations League victory, beating Gibraltar 2–0 at home. Liechtenstein finished bottom of their group with just one win and a draw, also at home, against Armenia (2–2).

During the UEFA Euro 2020 qualifiers, Liechtenstein managed to pick up two points thanks to two draws, one away to Greece (1–1) and the other at home to Armenia (1–1), but finished bottom of their group with 2 goals scored and 31 conceded.

In the 2020–21 edition of the Nations League, Liechtenstein failed to gain promotion to League C, with a single win (2–0 at San Marino), two draws (0–0 at home to San Marino and 1–1 at Gibraltar) and one defeat (0–1 at home to Gibraltar, their direct rival who eventually gained promotion). The Blue-Reds disappointed by failing to win a single match at home, once again falling behind Gibraltar in the standings as they had done in the previous edition, and being dominated overall in the goalless draw with San Marino.

The 2022 FIFA World Cup qualifiers once again saw Liechtenstein finish bottom of their group, with just one point from a 1–1 draw away to Armenia, and 9 defeats, with 2 goals scored and 34 conceded.

The 2022–23 edition of the UEFA Nations League was also a disappointment for Liechtenstein, who finished bottom of their group with 6 defeats in as many games played and just one goal scored, away against Andorra (1–2), their worst record in this competition in 3 editions.

On 7 June 2024, a few days before the start of UEFA Euro 2024, Liechtenstein managed a stunning 0–0 in a friendly taking place in Bucharest, against the national football team of Romania, who qualified to the tournament undefeated.

Results and fixtures
The following is a list of match results in the last 12 months, as well as any future matches that have been scheduled.

Manager history

 * 🇱🇮 Erich Bürzle (1990)
 * 🇩🇪 Dietrich Weise (1990–1996)
 * 🇦🇹 Alfred Riedl (1997–1998)
 * 🇱🇮 Erich Bürzle (1998)
 * 🇩🇪 Ralf Loose (1998–2003)
 * 🇦🇹 Walter Hörmann (2003–2004)
 * 🇨🇭 Martin Andermatt (2004–2006)
 * 🇨🇭 Urs Meier (2006)
 * 🇨🇭 Hans-Peter Zaugg (2006–2012)
 * 🇦🇹 Rene Pauritsch (2013–2018)
 * 🇮🇸 Helgi Kolviðsson (2018–2020)
 * 🇱🇮 Martin Stocklasa (2020–2023)
 * 🇦🇹 Rene Pauritsch (2023)
 * 🇩🇪 Konrad Fünfstück (2023–)

Current squad
The following players were called up for the friendlies matches against Albania and Romania on 3 and 8 June 2024 respectively.

Caps and goals are current as of 8 June 2024, after the match against Romania.

Recent call-ups
The following players were called up in the last 12 months and are still eligible to represent.

PRE

Notes:
 * PRE = Preliminary squad
 * INJ = Injured
 * SUS = Suspended for a match

Player records

 * Players in bold are still active with Liechtenstein.
 * Players in bold are still active with Liechtenstein.

FIFA World Cup

 * *Draws include knockout matches decided via penalty shoot-out.

UEFA European Championship

 * *Draws include knockout matches decided via penalty shoot-out.

In literature
Prompted by the team's poor record in competitive games, British writer Charlie Connelly followed the entire qualifying campaign for the 2002 FIFA World Cup. As recorded in the subsequent book Stamping Grounds: Liechtenstein's Quest for the World Cup, Liechtenstein lost all eight games without scoring a goal.

title: Liechtenstein national football team


text:
Hunsrückisch

Hunsrückisch is a German dialect spoken in the Hunsrück region of Germany (Rhineland-Palatinate). This mountainous region of Germany has long been an exporter of emigrants to Brazil, United States, Canada, Australia and other parts of the world.

Hunsrückisch was spoken in Edgar Reitz's acclaimed television series Heimat.

Germany
Whilst the Hunsrück region of Germany is well-defined, the distribution of Hunsrückisch itself is less so. On the one hand, the dialect extends beyond the Hunsrück area, but there are clear linguistic differences between the Hunsrückisch spoken in one locality and in another, and no uniform form of the dialect exists. That is made more difficult by the lack of written resources for the dialect. Since the 1990s, there has been an ongoing attempt to more scientifically document local dialects in the Mittelrheinischer Sprachatlas. The Rheinisches Wörterbuch entries of 1928-1971 have also been fully digitalised since then by the University of Trier.

As with almost all German dialects, the Hunsrückische dialect can be subdivided into many small local dialects, which each village having its own strand. The small-scale divisions of this linguistic area stem from how kingdoms in the Hunsrück area were often divided with borders that even cut through villages. The religious divisions in the predominantly protestant or catholic areas also contributed towards this linguistic separation.

A considerable and accelerated reversal of the active use of the Hunsrückisch dialect has also been noted. Younger generations sometimes no longer speak dialect and rarely understand unique words pertinent to that dialect. Societies dedicated to preserving local culture and history, as well as individuals themselves, have been trying to stem this trend via modern communication and documentation methods.

Brazil
There is a variation of the dialect in southern Brazil and in the southeastern state of Espírito Santo (municipalities of Marechal Floriano, Domingos Martins and Santa Leopoldina), named Hunsrik.

Throughout its almost 200-year history in Southern Brazil and Espírito Santo, Hunsrückisch has been greatly influenced by other German dialects such as East Pomeranian, Swabian, and Austro-Bavarian; by other immigrant languages; and by Portuguese. Through Brazilian Portuguese, it has also incorporated Amerindian terminology, notably for fauna, flora and toponyms.

Brazilian Hunsrik is spoken in the states of Rio Grande do Sul, the nearby state of Santa Catarina, in other parts of southern Brazil like Paraná, and in the Southeast region such as Espírito Santo and São Paulo. It's the second most spoken language in Brazil, after Portuguese.

Phonology
Hunsrückisch can roughly be classed under two dialect sub-groups. The first of these is the Rhenish Franconian languages, for Hunsrückisch spoken from the Nahe (Rhine) until approximately just beyond Kastellaun. The second of these groups is Moselle Franconian, for Hunsrückisch spoken between Kastellaun and Moselle. The main linguistic characteristic which separates these two groups of Hunsrückisch is the dat/das divide. In the North, such as in Idar-Oberstein, Gemünden, Kirchberg, and Boppard, the definite article is pronounced dat. Roland Martin states, however, that a more important division between the groups is his proposed Bad Sobernheim Isogloss which focuses on the east and west. To the east, one hears Herrd (Hirte, "shepherd)", Gorrjel (Gurgel, "throat"), and Rerre (Räder, "wheels"), whereas to the west Heerd, Goorjel, and Rierer are heard. Palatalization also occurs, with Dorf (village) becoming Dooref, Kirche (church) becoming Keerisch, and Berg (mountain) becoming Beerisch.

Georg Diener references other phonetic differences in different isoglosses. For example, in the west of Hunsrück o and eu are used, with u and au being used in the region east of the Mastershausen-Buch-Mannebach-Nörtershausen line: Bruure (Bruder, "brother"), Hau (Heu, "hay"). In the near east such as in Bubach, but not in Simmern, r is also pronounced as an apical consonant.

In Hunsrückisch d/t is often replaced with r, such as in Peere for Peter, or Fäärerre for Federn (feathers). When appearing between two vowels g is not pronounced, hence Aue (Augen "eyes") and saan (sagen "to say"). The dialect is also notable for its openness of the mouth when being spoken, as evident in a local saying from Bubach:

 * Hunsrückisch: Bräämerre: Et git kä brärer Blaad as en bräd, bräd Bräämerreblaad.
 * Standard German: Brombeeren: Es gibt kein breiteres Blatt als ein breites, breites, Brombeerblatt.
 * English: There is no wider leaf than the leaf of a wide, wide, blackberry leaf.

Grammar
The grammatical rules of Hunsrückisch resemble those of Standard German.

Gender
In contrast to the Standard language, Bach (stream) and Salat (salad) are feminine and not masculine — die Bach, die Salaad instead of der Bach, der Salat. Feminine die Brille (glasses) and die Butter become masculine de Brill and de Bodder in Hunsrückisch.

Female referents are usually of the masculine gender, such as de Marri (Maria), de Suffi (Sophia). Die Fraa (Frau "woman") becomes neuter, like in dat Fraamensch (lit. "the woman-human"), when appended with -mensch. Diminutives of women's names are also neuter like in Standard German — dat Kattche (Katharina) — but are also often complemented with the name of the locality in which they reside, or with a family name.

Tenses
In Hunsrückisch the perfect tenses are predominantly used. The preterite is reserved for only a small number of verbs, such as saht (sagte "said") and fung (fing, "caught"). Conjugation largely occurs on the basis of Standard German conjugation.

Cases
As is extant in Standard German, the Nominative, Accusative, and Dative are present in Hunsrückisch. The genitive case, as often comes to be in German dialects, is not used and is replaced with the dative. Thus dessen Bruder becomes dämm seine Brorer.

Plural Formation
In all cases except one, plural formation is identical to that of Standard German. The only exception occurs when the Standard German plural form is -en, in which case the plural in Hunsrückisch is -e.

 * die Zeitung, die Zeitungen (the newspaper, the newspapers) > die Zeidung, die Zeidunge.

Regionalisms
A number of words occur in Hunsrückisch which are either not found in Standard German, or occur rarely/in different contexts in Standard German.

Other influences
Because of its proximity to France, the Hunsrückisch dialect spoken in the Hunsrück region has experienced unique influences from the neighbouring French through the centuries. During Napoleonic times, the Hunsrück region was briefly incorporated into France.

title: Hunsrückisch


text:
Intersession

Intersession is a short break or mini-term between the traditional, standard academic terms. An intersession may be a period of a few weeks between semesters or quarters during which students can take short, accelerated classes or complete other academic work.

Examples
At Johns Hopkins University, intersession is a "period of about three weeks in January set aside for voluntary activity on the part of both faculty and students." Most of the courses are unique to Intersession, not offered during the fall, spring, or summer semesters. Students have many options to pursue during intersession. Many courses are traditional classroom courses that fall under the category of "Academic Exploration". Other courses fulfill different purposes and fall under other categories; these include "Leading Social Change", "Career Development", and "Personal Enrichment". During this time, students can also choose to study abroad or elsewhere in the United States. Freshmen students at Johns Hopkins are also eligible for the B'More program, where participants select a course whose content relates to the Baltimore's history, culture, politics or health issues.

At Princeton University, the intersession is the week-long break for students following their first semester exams. Because exams are conducted after the holiday break in the month of January, Intersession provides a respite before beginning the second semester's studies.

At Washington & Jefferson College, Intersession is a three-week term in January. During the Intersession term, students have the choice of studying abroad, completing an external internship, or taking a specially-designed Intersession course. These Intersession courses are more focused than regular courses and provide professors with an opportunity to teach non-traditional subjects. Past Intersession courses have included "Emerging Diseases: Global and Local" in the biology department, "Corporate Failures, Frauds, and Scandals" in the business department, and "Vampires and Other Bloodsuckers" in the English department, "Holocaust Survivor Narratives" in the German department, and "Alternative Radio" in the communications department.

title: Intersession


text:
User talk:Potequalsgood

Hey, we don't mind you making legitimate articles, if you want to make a real article about your high school you are welcome to do so. But please don't create junk articles describing people as "nigs", etc. The particular cliques at your school and your opinions of them are not suitable article topics. Adam Bishop 22:23, 13 May 2004 (UTC)

title: User talk:Potequalsgood


text:
Blackhawk, California

Blackhawk is an unincorporated planned community and census-designated place located in Contra Costa County, California, United States, east of Danville and Oakland. As of the 2010 census it had a population of 9,354. Governed by county rules/regulations and a homeowner association (HOA), Blackhawk has a country club, two golf courses, sports complex, restaurants, and the adjacent Blackhawk Plaza. 24-hour security plus additional law enforcement contracted through the Contra Costa County Sheriff's Office is provided by HOA dues. The area is covered by the San Ramon Valley Fire Protection District. The ZIP code is 94506. The community is inside area code 925. Blackhawk is known for its uniform architecture and suburban lifestyle, with the median household income being $167,875 and median home price of $1,117,500.

Blackhawk Ranch, 1917 to 1979
Blackhawk Ranch was established in 1917 by Ansel Mills Easton and his son-in-law William Q. Ward, in an area east of the San Ramon and Sycamore Valleys. The name came from a famous Irish racehorse named Blackhawk that Easton's family had once owned. The land passed through the hands of several owners, including Raymond Force (the owner of the Caterpillar Tractor Company), the Hawaii-based sugar and pineapple company Castle & Cooke and Howard Peterson (owner of Peterson Tractor).

In 1975, Peterson sold the land to Florida developer Ken Behring, who planned a housing development of 4800 dwelling units over 4200 acre of land. Critics charged that the plan would have various negative impacts, related to urban sprawl, environmental damage and violations of the County General Plan. A group of environmentalists and local residents called Amigos de Diablo organized against the Blackhawk Development Corporation, but were sued for libel. The Blackhawk Development Corporation finally reduced the number of homes planned to 2400 and offered more than 2000 acre of open space to Mount Diablo State Park.

Communities
Blackhawk is divided into seven individual gated communities scattered along Blackhawk Road, connected by a 3 mi long jogging trail.

In addition to Blackhawk, there are also numerous surrounding communities, including:
 * Hidden Oaks consists of 206 homes and in 1978 was the first Blackhawk community to be completed. Most homes are on half-acre lots.
 * Oakridge consists of medium-sized homes ranging from 2000 to 3000 sqft, though a few large estates reside on the top of a private court.
 * Saddleback, the second community completed, is home to some of the most lavish homes in the entire Blackhawk development, most lots being no less than 5 acre in size.
 * Silveroak is an upscale condo complex.
 * Silver Maple is designed around one of the main Blackhawk Country Clubs's golf holes, though no roads connect it to the rest of the main Blackhawk Country Club. It consists of approximately 110 custom homes between 2500-5000 Square Feet.
 * Blackhawk Country Club ("Main Gates") is the largest of the six communities.
 * Alamo Creek
 * Bettencourt Ranch
 * Northridge
 * Monterosso
 * Wendt Ranch

Blackhawk Country Club
Opened in 1979, Blackhawk Country Club is a highly exclusive 4,800 acre (19 km$2$) country club community at the base of Mt. Diablo where luxurious residential neighborhoods are surrounded by thousands of acres of permanent open lands. Eagle Ridge Dr. gives way to a separate gate which leads to extremely exclusive estates, including the 28673 sqft Behring estate.

In the middle of Country Club West is the 6,904 yard (6,313 m) Lakeside golf course, designed by Bruce Devlin and Robert Von Hagge. The Lakeside course hosted the CVS/pharmacy LPGA Challenge, an event on the LPGA Tour from 2005 -2010. The newer 6,700 yard (6,126 m) Falls golf course, designed by Ted Robinson, winds through Country Club East. Blackhawk's Tennis Club includes 20 tennis courts, a clubhouse and a pro shop. The Blackhawk Swim Club includes a competition-sized pool, a spa and dressing rooms and offers instructional programs. The 25 acre (100,000 m2) Sports and Recreation Center includes basketball courts, outdoor volleyball courts, a children's play park, Olympic-sized pool, sports fields and an amphitheater.

Land use

 * 4,800 acres (19 km$2$) total
 * 2,000 acres (8 km$2$) contiguous designated for expansion of adjacent Mt. Diablo State Park
 * 1,000 acres (4 km$2$) for natural hillside, parks, golf courses and sports fields
 * 2,400 home sites total
 * 45 acres (182,000 m2) developed as a 450,000 square foot (42,000 m2) commercial center

Blackhawk Plaza
Blackhawk Plaza, opened 1989, is an outdoor shopping center encircling a long duck pond located near the Blackhawk Country Club. It includes retail stores, restaurants, a movie theater, and two museums, including the Blackhawk Museum.

Demographics
The 2010 United States Census reported that Blackhawk had a population of 9,354. The population density was 1,609.7 PD/sqmi. The racial makeup of Blackhawk was 6,882 (73.6%) White, 172 (1.8%) African American, 15 (0.2%) Native American, 1,801 (19.3%) Asian, 8 (0.1%) Pacific Islander, 75 (0.8%) from other races, and 401 (4.3%) from two or more races. Hispanic or Latino of any race were 464 persons (5.0%).

The Census reported that 100% of the population lived in households.

There were 3,345 households, out of which 1,241 (37.1%) had children under the age of 18 living in them, 2,661 (79.6%) were opposite-sex married couples living together, 155 (4.6%) had a female householder with no husband present, 86 (2.6%) had a male householder with no wife present. There were 76 (2.3%) unmarried opposite-sex partnerships, and 21 (0.6%) same-sex married couples or partnerships. 355 households (10.6%) were made up of individuals, and 145 (4.3%) had someone living alone who was 65 years of age or older. The average household size was 2.80. There were 2,902 families (86.8% of all households); the average family size was 3.00.

The population was spread out, with 2,271 people (24.3%) under the age of 18, 502 people (5.4%) aged 18 to 24, 1,394 people (14.9%) aged 25 to 44, 3,875 people (41.4%) aged 45 to 64, and 1,312 people (14.0%) who were 65 years of age or older. The median age was 48.0 years. For every 100 females, there were 96.3 males. For every 100 females age 18 and over, there were 94.6 males.

There were 3,477 housing units at an average density of 598.3 /sqmi, of which 3,345 were occupied, of which 3,044 (91.0%) were owner-occupied, and 301 (9.0%) were occupied by renters. The homeowner vacancy rate was 1.3%; the rental vacancy rate was 3.8%. 8,400 people (89.8% of the population) lived in owner-occupied housing units and 954 people (10.2%) lived in rental housing units.

Popular culture
Blackhawk is mentioned in the hit song "Salvation" by the punk band Rancid, as a place "where all the rich people hide."

Blackhawk is also mentioned in The Lonely Island's short film The Unauthorized Bash Brothers Experience as the place where the titular Bash Brothers reside.

A further reference is made in the song "Spike" on the album Money Money 2020 by the group The Network  which includes members from Green Day.

title: Blackhawk, California


text:
Audio Units

Audio Units (AU) are a system-level plug-in architecture provided by Core Audio in Apple's macOS and iOS operating systems. Audio Units are a set of application programming interface (API) services provided by the operating system to generate, process, receive, or otherwise manipulate streams of audio in near-real-time with minimal latency. It may be thought of as Apple's architectural equivalent to another popular plug-in format, Steinberg's Virtual Studio Technology (VST).

Because of the many similarities between Audio Units and VST, several commercial and free wrapping technologies are available (e.g. Symbiosis and FXpansion VST-AU Adapter). Celemony Software and PreSonus have also developed the Audio Random Access (ARA) extension, which works for both AU and VST, allowing greater integration between the plug-ins and DAW software.

Use
Audio Units allows sound file audio time stretching and pitch scaling (e.g., timestretch), sample rate conversion, and streaming over a local area network. It also comes with a set of AU plug-ins such as EQ filters, dynamic processors, delay, reverb, and a Soundbank Synthesizer Instrument.

AU are used by Apple applications such as GarageBand, Soundtrack Pro, Logic Express, Logic Pro, Logic Pro X, Final Cut Pro, MainStage and most 3rd party audio software developed for macOS such as Ableton Live, Amadeus Pro, Ardour, Audio Hijack, DaVinci Resolve, Digital Performer, Gig Performer, REAPER, and Studio One.

Competing technologies

 * Avid's Avid Audio eXtension (a successor to the RTAS format)
 * Digidesign's Real Time AudioSuite (now obsolete)
 * LADSPA and Disposable Soft Synth Interface (DSSI) for Linux
 * LV2 (crossplatform successor to LADSPA)
 * Microsoft's DirectX
 * Steinberg's Virtual Studio Technology

title: Audio Units


text:
All rights reserved

"All rights reserved" is a phrase that originated in copyright law as part of copyright notices. It indicates that the copyright holder reserves, or holds for their own use, all the rights provided by copyright law, such as distribution, performance, and creation of derivative works; that is, they have not waived any such right. Copyright law in most countries no longer requires such notices, but the phrase persists. The original understanding of the phrase as relating specifically to copyright may have been supplanted by common usage of the phrase to refer to any legal right, although it is probably understood to refer at least to copyright.

In the past, the phrase was required as a result of the Buenos Aires Convention of 1910 which mandated that some statement of reservation of rights be made in order to secure protection in signatory countries of the convention. It was required to add the phrase as a written notice that all rights granted under existing copyright law (such as the right to publish a work within a specific area) were retained by the copyright holder and that legal action might be taken against infringement.

Since copyright law is neither straightforward nor widely understood in its details – nor is the Buenos Aires Convention's previous requirement, and the current deprecation of the phrase, common or lay knowledge, it continues to hold popular currency and serve as a notionally-useful convention widely used by artists, writers, directors, photographers, designers, and other content-creators with the intention that it should function as both sign and warning that the content alongside which it appears cannot be copied freely. It is unclear, however, if the phrase has any legal effect in any jurisdiction. In spite of this, its popular use continues.

Origins
The phrase originated as a result of the Buenos Aires Convention of 1910. Article 3 of the Convention granted copyright in all signatory countries to a work registered in any signatory country, as long as a statement "that indicates the reservation of the property right" (emphasis added) appeared in the work. The phrase "all rights reserved" was not specified in the text, but met this requirement.

Other copyright treaties did not require this formality. For example, in 1952 the Universal Copyright Convention (UCC) adopted the © symbol as an indicator of protection. (The symbol was introduced in the US by a 1954 amendment to the Copyright Act of 1909. ) The Berne Convention rejected formalities altogether in Article 4 of the 1908 revision, so authors seeking to protect their works in countries that had signed on to the Berne Convention were also not required to use the "all rights reserved" formulation. However, because not all Buenos Aires signatories were members of Berne or the UCC, and in particular the United States did not join UCC until 1955, a publisher in a Buenos Aires signatory seeking to protect a work in the greatest number of countries between 1910 and 1952 would have used both the phrase "all rights reserved" and the copyright symbol.

Obsolescence
The requirement to add the "all rights reserved" notice became essentially obsolete on August 23, 2000, when Nicaragua became the final member of the Buenos Aires Convention to also become a signatory to the Berne Convention. As of that date, every country that was a member of the Buenos Aires Convention (which is the only copyright treaty requiring this notice to be used) was also a member of Berne, which requires protection be granted without any formality of notice of copyright.

title: All rights reserved


text:
Jay Bell

Jay Stuart Bell (born December 11, 1965) is an American former Major League Baseball shortstop and former manager of the Rocket City Trash Pandas of the Southern League. He played for the Cleveland Indians (1986–1988), Pittsburgh Pirates (1989–1996), Kansas City Royals (1997), Arizona Diamondbacks (1998–2002) and New York Mets (2003). He was the bench coach for the Cincinnati Reds, and was the bench coach for the New Zealand national baseball team that competed in the 2013 World Baseball Classic.

Career
Bell played his high school baseball at J.M. Tate High School, located in Cantonment, Florida. A first-round pick of the Minnesota Twins in 1984, Bell made 129 errors over his first three minor-league seasons. The following year he was traded to the Cleveland Indians in a deal that brought starter Bert Blyleven to the Twins. When he finally reached the majors in 1986, he faced Blyleven in his first major-league at-bat. During this moment, Bell ripped the first pitch he saw from Blyleven for a home run.

Bell maintained his reputation as one of the best shortstops in the 1990s. His range was only average but he had a great knowledge of the hitters and positioned himself well. He won a Gold Glove Award in 1993, breaking a string of thirteen straight National League Gold Gloves at shortstop by Ozzie Smith. It was also the first Gold Glove by a Pirate shortstop since Gene Alley's back-to-back honors in 1966 and 1967. Though mostly a singles and doubles hitter at first, Bell was also an expert at bunting. Bell did show early signs of his power potential hitting 21 home runs in 1997 and 20 in 1998. A trial switch to second base at end of the '98 season became a permanent move the next spring. Bell belted 36 of his 38 homers from his new position, a total exceeded only by Rogers Hornsby, Davey Johnson and Ryne Sandberg among second basemen. One of those round-trippers was a sixth-inning grand slam off the Oakland Athletics pitcher Jimmy Haynes on the final game before the All-Star break, which won $1 million for an Arizona fan, Gylene Hoyle, who had correctly predicted the batter and the inning for a bases-loaded blast. Bell won the World Series with the Diamondbacks in 2001, serving as the winning run in Game 7 when he reached base on a ninth-inning bunt before Luis Gonzalez singled to deliver a walk-off series victory over the New York Yankees.

In his career, Bell batted .265, with 195 home runs, 868 runs batted in, 1,123 runs scored, 1,964 hits, 394 doubles, 67 triples and 91 stolen bases. As a player, Bell was well known for wearing eyeglasses on the field.

Coaching career
After the 2006 season, Bell retired as bench coach of the Arizona Diamondbacks in order to spend more time with his family, who are located in Phoenix, Arizona and Tampa, Florida. He currently has a ballfield named after him in Phoenix, called Jay Bell Field. He became eligible for the National Baseball Hall of Fame in 2009. 75% of the vote was necessary for induction, and 5% was necessary to stay on the ballot. He received 0.4% of the vote and dropped off the ballot.

Bell serves as a member of the advisory board of the Baseball Assistance Team, a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization dedicated to helping former Major League, Minor League, and Negro league players through financial and medical difficulties. In 2012, he served as the hitting coach for the Mobile BayBears, the Double-A affiliate of the Diamondbacks. Bell was hired as the hitting coach for the Pittsburgh Pirates on October 31, 2012. On November 11, 2013, Bell was named bench coach of the Cincinnati Reds. On October 22, 2015, it was announced that the Reds would not renew Bell's contract. On January 13, 2017, Bell became the manager for the Class A (Advanced) Tampa Yankees.

On August 29, 2017, Bell became the manager of the Scottsdale Scorpions of the Arizona Fall League. On January 25, 2018, Bell was named the manager of the Trenton Thunder, the New York Yankees AA affiliate and in 2019 he was promoted to manager of the Scranton/Wilkes-Barre RailRiders, the Yankees AAA affiliate. On January 6, 2020, Bell was announced as the manager of the Rocket City Trash Pandas, the Double-A affiliate of the Los Angeles Angels, for their inaugural season. Rocket City took the place of the relocated Mobile BayBears. He left following the 2021 season.

title: Jay Bell


text:
Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Motorist

This is one of two dicdefs by the same user. The other is immediately below. - Lucky 6.9 22:29, 13 May 2004 (UTC)
 * The user seems to be a high school student who is actually trying to do the right thing. Suggest someone contact the user and help him make it into a proper article or let him decide to delete it. GreatWhiteNortherner 02:34, May 16, 2004 (UTC)
 * Redirect to Driving. --Zigger 22:01, 2004 May 16 (UTC)
 * Transwiki to Wiktionary and delete. -- Cyrius|&#9998 00:02, May 17, 2004 (UTC)


text:
Prospect Avenue

Prospect Avenue may refer to:

 * Prospect Avenue (Kansas City, Missouri), a street that runs close to U.S. Route 71
 * Hollywood Boulevard, Los Angeles (named Prospect Avenue between 1887 and 1910)
 * Prospect Avenue (Brooklyn), New York City

New York City Subway stations

 * Prospect Avenue (IRT White Plains Road Line), in the Bronx; serving the trains
 * Prospect Avenue (BMT Fourth Avenue Line), in Brooklyn; serving the trains

title: Prospect Avenue


text:
Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Enforcement

This is the aforementioned second dicdef. - Lucky 6.9 22:29, 13 May 2004 (UTC)
 * Redirect to Police. --Zigger 22:06, 2004 May 16 (UTC)
 * Transwiki to Wiktionary and delete. -- Cyrius|&#9998 00:02, May 17, 2004 (UTC)


text:
User:JonMauser

M.S. in Biology (University of Portland, 2003) B.S. in Biochemistry (University of Portland, 2002) B.S. in Biology (University of Portland, 2001)

title: User:JonMauser


text: User talk:68.211.164.142

title: User talk:68.211.164.142


text:
Inc.

Inc. or inc may refer to:

 * Incorporation (business), as a suffix indicating a corporation
 * Inc. (magazine), an American business magazine
 * Inc. No World, a Los Angeles–based band
 * Increment, in computer programming languages, particularly assembler mnemonics
 * Incumbent, the current holder of a political office

title: Inc.


text:
Pronic number

A pronic number is a number that is the product of two consecutive integers, that is, a number of the form $$n(n+1)$$. The study of these numbers dates back to Aristotle. They are also called oblong numbers, heteromecic numbers, or rectangular numbers; however, the term "rectangular number" has also been applied to the composite numbers.

The first few pronic numbers are:

 * 0, 2, 6, 12, 20, 30, 42, 56, 72, 90, 110, 132, 156, 182, 210, 240, 272, 306, 342, 380, 420, 462 ….

Letting $$P_n$$ denote the pronic number $$n(n+1)$$, we have $$P_{{-}n} = P_{n{-}1}$$. Therefore, in discussing pronic numbers, we may assume that $$n\geq 0$$ without loss of generality, a convention that is adopted in the following sections.

As figurate numbers

The pronic numbers were studied as figurate numbers alongside the triangular numbers and square numbers in Aristotle's Metaphysics, and their discovery has been attributed much earlier to the Pythagoreans. As a kind of figurate number, the pronic numbers are sometimes called oblong because they are analogous to polygonal numbers in this way:

 * {| style="text-align: center"

 * - valign="bottom"
 * style="padding: 0 1em"|[[Image:GrayDot.svg|16px|*]] [[Image:GrayDot.svg|16px|*]]
 * style="padding: 0 1em"|[[Image:GrayDot.svg|16px|*]] [[Image:GrayDot.svg|16px|*]] [[Image:GrayDot.svg|16px|*]] [[Image:GrayDot.svg|16px|*]] [[Image:GrayDot.svg|16px|*]] [[Image:GrayDot.svg|16px|*]]
 * style="padding: 0 1em"|[[Image:GrayDot.svg|16px|*]] [[Image:GrayDot.svg|16px|*]] [[Image:GrayDot.svg|16px|*]] [[Image:GrayDot.svg|16px|*]] [[Image:GrayDot.svg|16px|*]] [[Image:GrayDot.svg|16px|*]] [[Image:GrayDot.svg|16px|*]] [[Image:GrayDot.svg|16px|*]] [[Image:GrayDot.svg|16px|*]] [[Image:GrayDot.svg|16px|*]] [[Image:GrayDot.svg|16px|*]] [[Image:GrayDot.svg|16px|*]]
 * style="padding: 0 1em"|[[Image:GrayDot.svg|16px|*]] [[Image:GrayDot.svg|16px|*]] [[Image:GrayDot.svg|16px|*]] [[Image:GrayDot.svg|16px|*]] [[Image:GrayDot.svg|16px|*]] [[Image:GrayDot.svg|16px|*]] [[Image:GrayDot.svg|16px|*]] [[Image:GrayDot.svg|16px|*]] [[Image:GrayDot.svg|16px|*]] [[Image:GrayDot.svg|16px|*]] [[Image:GrayDot.svg|16px|*]] [[Image:GrayDot.svg|16px|*]] [[Image:GrayDot.svg|16px|*]] [[Image:GrayDot.svg|16px|*]] [[Image:GrayDot.svg|16px|*]] [[Image:GrayDot.svg|16px|*]] [[Image:GrayDot.svg|16px|*]] [[Image:GrayDot.svg|16px|*]] [[Image:GrayDot.svg|16px|*]] [[Image:GrayDot.svg|16px|*]]
 * 1 × 2||2 × 3||3 × 4||4 × 5
 * }
 * }

The $n$th pronic number is the sum of the first $n$ even integers, and as such is twice the $n$th triangular number and $n$ more than the $n$th square number, as given by the alternative formula $n^{2} + n$ for pronic numbers. The $n$th pronic number is also the difference between the odd square $(2n + 1)^{2}$ and the $(n+1)$st centered hexagonal number.

Since the number of off-diagonal entries in a square matrix is twice a triangular number, it is a pronic number.

Sum of pronic numbers
The partial sum of the first $n$ positive pronic numbers is twice the value of the $n$th tetrahedral number:
 * $$\sum_{k=1}^{n} k(k+1) =\frac{n(n+1)(n+2)}{3}= 2T_n $$.

The sum of the reciprocals of the positive pronic numbers (excluding 0) is a telescoping series that sums to 1:
 * $$\sum_{i=1}^{\infty} \frac{1}{i(i+1)}=\frac{1}{2}+\frac{1}{6}+\frac{1}{12}+\frac{1}{20}\cdots=1$$.

The partial sum of the first $n$ terms in this series is
 * $$\sum_{i=1}^{n} \frac{1}{i(i+1)} =\frac{n}{n+1}$$.

The alternating sum of the reciprocals of the positive pronic numbers (excluding 0) is a convergent series:
 * $$\sum_{i=1}^{\infty} \frac{(-1)^{i+1}}{i(i+1)}=\frac{1}{2}-\frac{1}{6}+\frac{1}{12}-\frac{1}{20}\cdots=\log(4)-1$$.

Additional properties
Pronic numbers are even, and 2 is the only prime pronic number. It is also the only pronic number in the Fibonacci sequence and the only pronic Lucas number.

The arithmetic mean of two consecutive pronic numbers is a square number:
 * $$\frac {n(n+1) + (n+1)(n+2)}{2} = (n+1)^2$$

So there is a square between any two consecutive pronic numbers. It is unique, since
 * $$n^2 \leq n(n+1) < (n+1)^2 < (n+1)(n+2) < (n+2)^2.$$

Another consequence of this chain of inequalities is the following property. If $n$ is a pronic number, then the following holds:
 * $$ \lfloor{\sqrt{m}}\rfloor \cdot \lceil{\sqrt{m}}\rceil = m.$$

The fact that consecutive integers are coprime and that a pronic number is the product of two consecutive integers leads to a number of properties. Each distinct prime factor of a pronic number is present in only one of the factors $n$ or $n + 1$. Thus a pronic number is squarefree if and only if $n$ and $n + 1$ are also squarefree. The number of distinct prime factors of a pronic number is the sum of the number of distinct prime factors of $m$ and $n + 1$.

If 25 is appended to the decimal representation of any pronic number, the result is a square number, the square of a number ending on 5; for example, 625 = 252 and 1225 = 352. This is so because

 * $$100n(n+1) + 25 = 100n^2 + 100n + 25 = (10n+5)^2$$.

title: Pronic number


text:
Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Egg and Spoon

This page is an archive of the discussion surrounding the proposed deletion of the page entitled Egg and Spoon.

This page is kept as an historic record.

The result of the debate was to delete the article.

Vanity, unfunny. - Lucky 6.9 22:36, 13 May 2004 (UTC)
 * Not vanity, but definitely unfunny and not remotely encyclopedic. May it be deleted.  Isomorphic 23:23, 13 May 2004 (UTC)
 * Delete, this was already speedily deleted once, as well. Adam Bishop 00:35, 14 May 2004 (UTC)
 * Delete. Alcarillo 06:40, 14 May 2004 (UTC)
 * Deleted again (the first time was not by me) on the principle of the less time wasted the better. Andrewa 07:10, 14 May 2004 (UTC)

This page is now preserved as an archive of the debate and is no longer 'live'. Subsequent comments on the issue or the deletion should be placed on other relevant 'live' pages. Please do not edit this page.


text:
Kaput and Zösky

Kaput and Zösky: The Ultimate Obliterators is a Canadian-French 2002–03 animated cartoon series based on the comic book series from the cartoonist Lewis Trondheim called Kaput et Zösky. 26 episodes were produced.

Some of the stories featured in the comics have been converted into the series that ran on weekends and late at night in the United States on Nicktoons, Australia on Network 10's Cheez TV and Toasted TV, United Kingdom on Channel 4 and Channel 5's Shake! and in Canada on Teletoon.

Premise
Bloodthirsty conquerors, Kaput and Zösky travel the universe, landing on planets and trying to conquer them. They are not the most able tyrants, however, and have trouble holding any planet for more than a few days, if they can even manage to dominate it in the first place. In fact, they spend as much time running for their lives as they do enslaving and slaughtering innocents. Kaput and Zösky are a dynamic, if generic, duo. Zösky is a cunning, level-headed pseudo-intellectual who always has a plan. Kaput, on the other hand, is short-tempered and volatile; his strategies always involve "crisperizing" everything in sight. Kaput is a short and dumpy little terrorizer with a brilliant red mohawk, and Zösky is a tall and thin tyrant with a set of yellow antennae. Their exploits almost always end in the same way for the two space tyrants; the two barely escape from their fates by flying off in their dumpy little spaceship, leaving a red smoke trail behind.

Characters
Kaput - Kaput is the short and fat one of the duo, and the exact reverse of Zösky. While Zösky is clean, methodical, and thorough, Kaput is all mayhem and prefers to fire at will. He has red hair in the shape of an unruly mohawk and a prominent underbite. His crisperizer is red as are the buttons on his outfit, and he has short boots. Kaput is considered an object of derision to most, due to his fat body and his manner. He is also allergic to moles and swells up when he is near them. Kaput is voiced by Rick Jones.

Zösky - Zösky is the thin one of the duo, and more of the planner. He seems to be well-versed on matters beyond Kaput's control, and is quite easily agitated by Kaput's mayhem and discord. His home planet is Lamamma, He also wishes to first use his mind to dominate rather than brute force. Zösky is tall and thin, has yellow antennae which resemble bunny ears, and squinted eyes. His crisperizer and the buttons on his shirt are yellow, and sports tall boots. To some characters in the show, Zösky is considered attractive, perhaps due to his British accent and his suavè manners. Zösky can't stand carrots, contrary to some characters believing that he is a rabbit and thus likes them. Zösky is voiced by Mark Camacho.

Minor characters
Crazy Joe - A crazed, dirty mercenary, Crazy Joe is after Kaput and Zösky to try to "cream them". It was never revealed what he had against them, but it possibly has to do with Kaput borrowing a massive amount of money off of Crazy Joe. He was brainwashed so that he would be little more than a lackey to them, but soon came to his senses and resumed his pursuit of the two. He is shown being short and having the same build as Kaput as well as being tan and having tentacles at the bottom of his body. His ship resembles Kaput and Zösky's ship. Some events had occurred in the show where the deranged villain was forced to join forces with Kaput and Zösky, such as the instance where the three were sent to a mental asylum.

Office Lady - The Office Lady helps the two on their assumption of power on the office planet. She is a character which is dressed in a suit and wears an air helmet. She translates all of the employee complaints to Kaput and Zösky. Towards the end of her appearance, she advised the two to leave before lawyers came to "instigate proceedings on work-equipment deterioration and attempted intimidation". The Office Lady is voiced by Helen King.

The Great Ghandizen - The Great Ghandizen is a squat, little ruler with an arsenal of crushing devices with which to crush offenders. He made a massive amount of contributions to his planet and is long-lived, being about 600 years old. The Great Ghandizen is voiced by John Stocker.

Marvin the Enchanter - Marvin is a birdlike, bespectacled wizard with a white beard famed for his ability to perform magic of an awesome ability. He assists Kaput in trying to take the crown of the planet by magically attaching the sword Exkaliput, a clear parody of Excalibur to his hand. Marvin is also a play on Merlin of King Arthur lore. Marvin the Enchanter is voiced by John Stocker.

Bobo Bibola - Bobo Bibola is a genie who is the denizen of a lamp which very seldom opens. He is against granting Kaput and Zösky wishes because he is tired of doing favors when he gets nothing in return. Bobo Bibola is voiced by John Stocker.

Ghost King - The Ghost King is not exactly dead, nor alive, but he is invisible and considered a ghost. He takes control of inanimate objects because he lacks a body. He is also furious at Kaput and Zösky for ruining his kingdom.

El Kinga - The current ruler of Diskotekus and a good dancer, El Kinga is a large two-headed ruler, one head sports a pompadour and the other, blond hair. This ruler is not only the leader of his/her planet, but also the most revered dancer.

Ichabob the Liberator - A native to a planet held in discord for many years, Ichabob is commonly known as Ichabob the Liberator. He has a long, unkempt beard and tattered clothes from staying underground for so many years. He was unwittingly freed from prison by Kaput and Zösky when he pretended to be a crazed prisoner. He speaks in a strong Scottish accent.

Max - Like many of the other characters, Max made only one appearance in the show. He is a cheery and helpful mechanic who installs a travelling device in the ship belonging to Kaput and Zösky. He wears traditional mechanic garb and speaks with a New York accent. With his moderation, the two conquerors made it to uncharted lands far away from the rest of the galaxy.

Mermaid Queen - The Mermaid Queen is a large, corpulent sea creature who is the queen of the planet H2O. She was shown as the bride to Kaput when he was forced to marry the queen in order to gain the crown. She speaks in a strong New York accent in the voice of a man. When angered, she emits a large, blinding cloud of ink, like an octopus.

Boudini - Boudini is a wizard of the planet Hokus Pokus. He is the ruler and an accomplished magician. He wears a pointed black outfit as well as a magic scepter with which to perform magic of all varieties. Boudini had plans for Zösky, in the hopes of disappearing him, for he thought that Zösky was a rabbit. Kaput rescued Zösky by dressing like a woman, who had caught Boudini's eye, because there were no more women on Hokus Pokus (they had all disappeared, an apparent nod to the David Cronenberg film Crimes of the Future.) Boudini was converted into a large, savage beast when Kaput stole his scepter and has apparently remained that way since.

"Cabbie" - The cabbie is a sluglike character who speaks with a strong New York accent and drives the two conquerors around on Rycta Ryctim, while bearing in mind the planet's cardinal rule; obey the traffic signs. He refers to Kaput and Zösky as "touristás".

Heads and Tails - These two (they are two different personalities with one body) are the instruction manual of the planet Gamma Blorg, and are conjoined twins. One speaks in a strong British accent and has a tiara as well as red hair, is named Heads, and the other, Tails is a moose head with a Canadian accent. They argue continuously and have a cauldron as a body.

Show history
"Kaput and Zösky: The Ultimate Obliterators" had made its debut sometime on September 3, 2002, though when it is not revealed exactly, but for a short time, this show had made a niche in TeleToon and Nicktoons Network. While it was shown on Nicktoons, most of the episodes that were made were exempted from airing until sometime in January 2007, when "new episodes" had made their way onto the network. In total 26 half-hour episodes (78 shorts) were produced.

Home media
There were four Kaput and Zösky DVDs released in 2005 by Filmoption International and Direct Source Special Product Inc. The DVDs include 8 episodes each and are very rare to find. The DVDs include episodes that were not aired on Nicktoons Network until late in the show's run as they were considered "unsuitable for television." Between late 2013 and early 2014 though, the entire series was released to Starz Media's YouTube page.

title: Kaput and Zösky