The meaning of the word system in opening names

even more candid of me: This mathematical foundation of alpha-zero and leela-chess-zero, might be a more convincing argument to explain the impression of human like behavior. That and the reinforcement learning scheme used, which is borrowed from vertebrate animal (never sure where i should but a boundary there) behavior.

This is not a case of material remote conversions being backshovelled to human postion in the face called the root of the search, where no material story in human sight, "therefore" positional human signals must have been programmed in.

Do we really think like a tree, if not exposed to programming for CPU architecture of the silicon kind? (or if forgetful about it?).

ok i stop the escalation here... back to chess systems. i hope that i have established my motivation for anything transposition and making sense of it for human chess. current bone to chew: systems.

Usually means that you do pretty much the same set up regardless of what the opponent move.

Or that the same attacking patterns keep applying. In most openings this is not true, but remains a constant with systems.

Thanks. I wonder though, how some system could transpose into many different prefix branches of the opening tree, versus short range transpositions... This might depend on depth of systems key signature moves or position sub-structures (or how many of such and possibly some meta ordering at plan scale of their likely presence). I might have stretch the notion too far there. but in ignorance how can i assume that the only examples i have seen are representative of all the systems or contain the core features of all of them.

Who gives openings system tags.. is it tournament commentators, or players developping such systems in tournaments displays, or correspondance explorers.. I know one could ask the same about any opening names.. but system is more than just a players name or where it was first played or recorded. or better yet where on instance of opening sequence part of the system might have been played.

some how there could be a genesis of the tag...... to qualify a set of opening sequences as part of a system...

these are added questions.. of course.. not priority... i am still at the gathering intel from many sources.. i find the opening explorer here and the new puzzle page interactive enough for fast approach, might not be encyclopedic. and not structure as i would hope.

but if history of opening naming involving the addition of system tag can help get a sense of how wide the meaning field could stretch, that would be valuable hints..

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chess_opening#Opening_nomenclature
> Opening names usually include one of the terms "opening", "variation", "defense", "gambit" etc, however the terminology is inconsistent and imprecise, and is not a useful basis for classification.[18] Broadly, these terms are used as follows:
........
> System : A method of development that can be used against many different setups by the opponent. Examples include London System, Colle System, Réti System, Barcza System, and Hedgehog System.
..........
>Chess openings are primarily categorized by move sequences.[20]
[20] This is in contrast to shogi opening theory, which generally categorizes openings by form regardless of the move sequences that brought about the form in what are sometimes called systems in western chess.

@kindaspongey said in #15:
> web.archive.org/web/20140627122941/http://www.chesscafe.com/text/heisman105.pdf

Thanks, it does seem appropriate. Basically it starts with a question about differentiating or contrasting commonalities from 2 sets of openings:: worth quoting here: (careful now. contrast between 2 groups, each having their commonalities within).

> what characteristic separates the following two sets of openings?
> Set 1: King's Indian, King's Indian Attack, London, Modern Defense, Colle
> Set 2: Grünfeld Defense, Sicilian Dragon, Closed Ruy Lopez, Winawer French, Alekhine's Defense

> The answer is that group A can be played as a "system" – that they are not dependent on the opponent's sequence of moves.

That i understand as one aspect of system given my limited experience, and previous participant definitions which I agree with, and also contain the notion of key moves (which i understand as result formation or structures, one sided, given the other aspect just mentioned.

But then i get a bit confused or wonder if i missed something already.

> The second group requires a particular position to be reached for both sides, even if transpositions may allow these positions to occur from other move orders.

I don't understand the transposition added characteristics.. Can this answer be understandable by itself without needing the knowledge of the openings in question? (some would automatically say no, experience or die, but experience can wait a bit for some global approach guiding, i am not in a hurry, and would rather first understand the point that the data is supposed to support. I like question driven experience and hypothesis building and testing. and this pdf seems to propose something like that.

particular position to be reached from both sides. requirement to what already? I assume for continuing with promised odds of opening theory about that line?

why the even if transpositions would allow "branching into" same both sided formation definition or signature or structure or conformation or configuration (or ?).

answering myself, for realizing that move ordering independence is not really the determining property of a system? That the difference is the one sided structure requiremnt (but that is not explicit in the set A answer, perhaps it was assumed).

I guess I might not be getting the meaning of the word "setup"
as in cooperative convention to keep within the known path or as in on-board both side structure?

It seems to me that set A had a one sided configuration goal independent of opponent move sequence, while set B statement seems to insist that while it may also have some diversity of paths or move sequences ordering on both sides, there is a requirement of both side having made some key moves. So in system, it is not just the move ordering it is also the moves themselves that the system is robust against.

Are we back to the agreed previous definition then.. perhaps more precise?

I am not sure if this will be much help, but, for what it is worth, I was just recently looking at (I think) an example of transposition. A game ( www.365chess.com/game.php?gid=1551805 ) started with 1 e4 Nc6 2 Nf3 e5 3 Bc4 Nf6 4 Ng5 Bc5. That is not the traditional Traxler move order (1 e4 e5 2 Nf3 Nc6 3 Bc4 Nf6 4 Ng5 Bc5), but (as I understand it) the game is still classified as a Traxler because it arrived at the same position as the one that arises from the traditional Traxler move order.

thanks. I put that in study just to be more educated, since you put it in for me (see below).

My difficulty with the pdf discussion Q and A, is not with the transposition concept per say.

Set A (system group), does also involve transpositions, as I assume that indepedent of opponent move sequence also include opponent move order, and (a bit more unsure of myself) own move ordering (i might be influenced by the key moves or formation targets part of earlier definition and possibly assumed but not explicited in this pdf discussion.

So it was about why even bring it out for Set B of opening designations. I ended up proposing a possible understandig of that last question of mine. in that the set A has that non explicited requirement about one side static formation objective, or key moves.

but i understand that the same position can be obtained by simple move reordering of predecessor position sequences (or move sequence prefix, which phrase is more telling and yet precise, and yet not over-detailed... doomed we are!).

but while on transposition. There are transpositions that are not move reordering only. Ìf material attrition, there could be simplifications in 2 paths (on the position set viewed as graph nodes, where moves are edges for those following that subthread), which might lead to same position, but not exact same move prefix. Is that a valid claim? other possibilities. Not a crucial point, but i did ask myself that, on more than one distraction train of thought.

maybe i could work with your example to illustrate, even if not best play, that previous paragraph or realise it does not make sense. counter-examples are more telling than examples... (proof by contradiction i think).


(WIP, notice that in order to only share a link i have to neutralize its click friendlyness as below, otherwise I get the above, right in the readers face, even if not intended for the thread reading flow. optional link intent could be a feature). lichess.org/study/ ZvroF4z2

lichess devs passing by should go read the editorial comments. this example has a contiguous sequence of transposition from position 3.1. The study automatic opening information tool shows how much the tree forceps applied to opening knowledge for a game supposedly deterministic with its full position information as state, can be a headache. Even the arbitrary conventions that the tree imposes in position attribution of opening knowledge have inconsistent impact through this 5 transposition in a row sequence.. This is a good exception test i would say, that is lucky @kindaspongey.

or i maybe many of the early opening move reordering are likely to have troubling effect even past the first transposition, and last of the transposition train, like here. I am still working of my composition from there for 2 paths that are not strict reordering but could have different depths and not same move list to the first transposition (or not if easier). so examples of wider set of transposition. I wonder if there are statistics on the nature of transpositions (which are about the path leading to the position of interest).. are they all strict move reordering. doubtful.. but how to create an example? anyone. i know tangential perhaps.. but not really.. experience wise.. it seems of the same kind of "logic" as systems.. (that's an intuit).

When it's not normal opening, it's system.