The FICS SR team is glad to present:
May 2000
Free Internet Chess Server (FICS) News
What's New? - FICS would like to welcome the 1,634 new players that have joined us in the month of April. Among the highlights in this month's newsletter, catering to the lunchtime crowd, we are again featuring the new scheduled tourney on Wednesdays at 11:15 a.m. server time. The time control is 4 0. For those interested in seeing a listing of scheduled mamer tournaments, type 'mam help schedule'. We also have information on the FICS Kasparov Anniversal 5 0 (Birthday) Tournament, which managed to break all existing FICS records for tournament entries. Other news items include the STC Bunch - Team League announcement and the final standings in the Italian Tournament, hosted by frengo(TM). Lastly, the FICS Third Quarterly Computer Chess Tournament final standings are posted. Be sure to read the rest of the May Monthly Newsletter for more FICS news items and other chess related information. Plus, don't forget to check out the links to our previous Newsletter issues, July 1999 to present. You will also find a lot of useful information in our previous 'Server Tip of the Month' sections.
FICS Kasparov Anniversal 5 0 Chess Tournament
The FICS Kasparov Anniversal 5 0 Chess Tournament was held on April 13, 2000 in celebration of Kasparov's birthday. We aimed to get 60 or more players and to hopefully smash all mamer records. A new mamer record was set as 86 players joined!!! Binford, sorcio, pitti, Krastapov, and TheOnlyOne shared first place with a total of six points out of a possible seven. Congratulations to the winners, and a hearty cheer to our server for breaking a record.
You can find more information on this event at http://frengo.spedia.net.
STC Bunch - Team League Announcement
The STC Bunch (Channel 90) is now organizing the 5th
Team League Championships. The tournament is a five round swiss paired
45 45 event with two rating sections; the first will require a team average
of U1800, the second, U2200. The team tournament is scheduled to begin
May 11, 2000 and will last approximately 6 weeks with one week as a bye.
This is not a FICS administered event.
More information may be obtained by contacting nham online, messaging him, or
by visiting the STC homepage at http://www.continet.com/ckmate/league.html.
Reminder to update tzone variable
Just a reminder, some players may need to adjust the time zone in their variables. Also, please re-check the times of scheduled events in order to avoid any confusion. Daylight Savings Time (DST), in the United States, currently extends from the first Sunday in April to the last Sunday in October in most states. See: "help v_tzone" for more information on adjusting your variable setting.
KOTHbot (King of the Hill) Update
Please abdicate as king before joining a mamer tournament. KOTHbot is designed to have the current king open for challenges by any player interested in rated blitz with that player. Since mamer is set up such that the challenges which a player should accept are restricted by tournament pairings that mamer assigns; any player interested outside of a tournament setting cannot access the current King of the Hill. The KOTHbot format and mamer tournament formats should remain separate. Any player joining a mamer tournament as king will be forfeited immediately.
Computer Account Policy Update
If you are the owner of a computer account, please review some changes to the policy about computer accounts on FICS. In particular, subsections (b) and (e) in the help file 'help computers'. It is your responsibility to understand and follow these policies if you operate a computer account.
wulff(C) wins the FICS 3rd Quarterly Computer Chess Tournament!!!
wulff(C) wins The FICS 3rd Quarterly Computer Chess Tournament that was held on Saturday, April 29, 2000. Fourteen computer accounts played to capture the FICS 3rd Quarterly Computer Chess Tournament title. The tournament was a 5-round Swiss with a time control of 5 8. The tournament was open to all FICS registered computer accounts. Congrats to the winners, and thanks to all who participated. You can check out the standings of this tournament by visiting http://www.freechess.org/comptourn/index.html.
Computer Accounts:
In order to be considered for a computer account,
email computers@freechess.org
with the information requested in "help computer_app". The review
process usually takes a few days, you will be contacted about your request.
To see a list of computers registered on the server, type "=computer".
Details about these accounts are given in "help
computerlist". Computers are designated on "who" lists
by (C).
Unregistered computers will be banned from playing rated games.
EscapeArtist Tournament 2000
The Third EscapeArtist (EA) tournament is underway!!! The tournament is an 8 round Swiss, using a 45 5 time control. Unlike the server's mamer tournaments, players have a total of three months to complete their sections. Participants arrange the time to play when it's convenient for both players. If a section starts on March 1st, then the section will end play on May 31st. Each section of EscapeArtist Tournaments are worth 200 FICS Grand Prix Points. Channel 201 is the unofficial channel for these tournaments. More information about this event may be obtained by emailing innocentone. You can also finger EscapeArtist on FICS, or visit the EscapeArtist web page at http://www.angelfire.com/wi/EscapeArtist/EscapeArtist/spring.html.
You can check out the current standings of the Escape Artist Tournament
by selecting the "Current Standings" link off the EA homepage.
Current sections in progress:
May 1 - July 31 (Registration closes April 30, 10:00 p.m. server time)
June 1 - August 31 (Registration closes May 31, 10:00 p.m. server time)
The FICS Grand Prix!!!
The 1999-2000 FICS Grand Prix! This is a 'standard tournament' competition that extends throughout the entire year and keeps score based on scheduled standard tourneys run on FICS. The FICS Grand Prix cycle lasts 52 weeks: Tuesday, September 21, 1999 through Monday, September 18, 2000. During the course of these 52 weeks, a number of Grand Prix events will be held. At the end of the year there is a $150.00 (US Dollars) guaranteed prize fund. You will find information for frequently asked questions, events listings, standings and a complete player list on the Grand Prix website at: http://www.angelfire.com/wi/EscapeArtist/FICSGrandPrix/index.html
The top three participants in a field of 334 players are listed here, bigbad maintains the lead!!!
Rank
Name
GP
Points# of
events1st
place2nd
place3rd
place1
bigbad
3077.10
80
22
27
14
2
SGV
1903.28
32
17
2
11
3
Knightnite
1480.12
27
15
6
4
(The following point totals reflect events posted as of the publication date of this newsletter.)
The FICS Italian Internet Chess Championship Finals were played on April 4th and 5th, 2000. The overall title has gone to Marcello Malloni, handle: nonspiego. The under 1600 title went to Giuseppe Romano, handle: menelao. The under 1300 title was awarded to Andrea Sperandio, handle: Padrino. The tournament organizer was frengo(TM).
You can find more information for the tournament, such as crosstables and many games, in zipped PGN format at The Italian Championship website and the The Italian Chess Webzine. Further information can be obtained by emailing the tournament manager, frengo(TM).
This Week in mamer
*New Feature*
Monday, April 17, 2000
As mentioned above in the FICS Kasparov Anniversal 5 0 Chess Tournament, a new
mamer record was set this week. 86 players joined for the Kasparov Anniversal
5 0 Chess Tournament that was held on April 13, 2000. This happened during
the 5 0 Tornei Italiani Online (TIO).
Updates of mamer events will now be posted on a regular basis. Read "help
mamer" for more information on mamer.
Monday, April 24, 2000.
Three players tied for first place in the weekly 45 5 standard tourney.
Killerman, arvie and TheOnlyOne finished with a score of 2.5/3. Join us next
week and see if you do better than they did :-) To view the complete mamer
tourney schedule, type 'mam help schedule'.
More information can be found at http://www.freechess.org/mamer/tourneys/schedule.html.
"Nightly 5 0" tournaments: These are tournaments held
every night at 10:00 PM server time. As the name implies, they are played
with a 5 0 time control and the tournament is a 5-round swiss paired event.
At the end of the week an overall Champion for the week is crowned, and a FICS
news item is posted with the winners name. There is also an U1600 title
and an upset title. The titles are awarded each week, and are included
on the weekly news items. You do not have to participate every night to
win titles.
The Nightly is an open tourney and all are encouraged to participate. The tourneys also last a little over 1 hr so plan ahead! For more information, contact timp online or message him. You may also find more information on the Nightly web page at http://freechess.cjb.net.
The "Nightly 5 0" Tournament of Champions: Each week,
the winners of the three sections are invited to participate in the monthly
"Tournament of Champions." This tournament is made up of the top 12
players over the cycle plus the 'wild cards'; which are the four highest point
scorers for the entire cycle that did not qualify for the 'Nightly Champion'
title. The weekly cycle for the Nightly runs from Sunday to Saturday.
The 'Tournament of Champions' final is a swiss-paired 16 player format, where participants will play others in their rating class. Each match consists of 5 0 games between the opponents, with the winner being the first person to score 2 points in round 1. This winner then moves on to the next round! For the first and second rounds of the Tournament of Champions, you need to score 2 points to advance, for the semi-final round it is 3 points, and in the championship round the winner is the first to achieve 4 points.
The Tournament of Champions has entered its third cycle of the year! Progress has been a bit slow due to spring break time, but we have made it to the second round. The second round pairings are: Trikmamak-Mojoman, Mikmuwessu-Taffa, msheaf-Epitaph, Iwulu-spdolan. Second round matches are best of three.
Tournament of Champions Cycle 2 Finals Update:
Congratulations to Laazrockit for winning a second consecutive Cycle Championship!
Laazrockit defeated Halcyonn 4-1 in a best of seven match played on FICS.
Thank you to all that participated!
For more details, check out the Nightly webpage at http://freechess.cjb.net.
Suicide on Saturdays (SOS): The SOS (Suicide On Saturdays) is
a tournament run each week on FICS by WarHawk(TM). The tournament is held
every Saturday at 10:00 am server time (CST). The score is kept for each
player who plays in 1 or more tournaments. The weekly tournament is a
5 0 Swiss consisting of 5 rounds. There is also a quarterly Suicide Championship
held for all qualifying participants in the previous three months. Lastly,
there will be an Annual Suicide Championship 4 player 5 0 double round robin!
The quarterly championships will be a qualification tournament for the annual
tournament.
To qualify for a quarterly tournament, you must be in the top 4 scores in the over 1800 section or top 2 from the under 1800 section. If a player is forced to withdraw or is unable to attend, a wildcard slot will be available to the next qualified player from their division. The winner of the under 1800 section gets a lesson from Haley (2362). More information about this event may be obtained by e-mailing timp(TM), contacting him on FICS, or visit the SOS web site at http://www.kingscourt.cjb.net/.
SOS News - Congratulations to Sandstrom!
Sandstrom won FICS first ever SOS Quarterly Championship Tournament held on January 8, 2000. He now qualifies to play in the Annual Server Suicide Championship Tournament. The following shows player standings for the new quarter (Jan, Feb, Mar).
Current SOS Quarterly standings -
First: Knightwizard (22.5)
Second: DChessmaster (22.0)
Third: carlosab (6.5)Other interesting statistics for the previous quarter:
Highest Score (1st place): luvk(39.5)
Highest Rating: Haley(2350)
Most Improved Rating: luvk(+202)
Highest Score(under 1800): cox(15.0)
Most Improved Rating(under 1800): paddles(+141)
Click here for more FICS tournament information!
The FICS Chess Academy provides a medium for the interaction between strong and weaker chess players. Chess advisors, designated by the symbol (CA), donate their time to help weaker counterparts in order to share their knowledge. The most common event is semi-formal analysis of games or positions. There will also be lectures, master challenge sessions, guided group analysis of GM games, and more! Instructors are master or candidate master (expert) strength players and are enthusiastic about helping others improve their chess.
To receive instruction or otherwise participate in the Chess Academy you should follow these steps:
See the schedule for Academy Hours by typing 'help motd'
Use the 'date' command to check the time of day
Add one or more of the following channels:
The proceedings start in channel 65, but often "follow (CA Lecturer)" is used while examining a game or position. Prepare your questions and interesting games before the Chess Academy hour starts. Game submissions for analysis are welcome, and should be e-mailed to: The Chess Academy and/or saved in your journal, accompanied by a message to Academy. Use tells to channel 65 during the Chess Academy Hours ('tell 65 I don't understand the Lucena position'). Chess advisers will have (CA) after their handles.
The FICS Chess Academy weekly schedule for April:
| Day | Server Time |
Academy Event |
| Monday | 13:00 | Group Analysis |
| Wednesday | 15:00 | Group Analysis |
| Thursday | 7:00 21:00 |
Group Analysis Group Analysis |
| Saturday | 15:00 | Group Analysis |
| Sunday | 15:00 | Special Events* |
* Every Sunday at 15:00 server time,
the Chess Academy will hold
Special events such as: team games, simuls and master events.
A total of 1,634 new player accounts have been created for
the month of April.
Currently to date, FICS total size is 64,670 player accounts.
Active accounts in the month of March totaled 11,505.
May's Server Tip of the Month will cover notify lists.
There are three types of notification lists available, these are: notify, idlenotify, and gnotify.
1. The notify list is used to inform you of when a particular person
is logging in, or out. There are three special features about this command.
There is the notifiedby variable, the znotify command, and the summon command.
If a user is on your notify list, you will be informed when a) they log on, b) they log off, and c) if they are on when you log on. The proper formats for this command are '+notify
', '-notify ' and '=notify'. To add a person to your notify list, you type '+notify '. For example, to add DAV to your notify list, you would type '+notify DAV'. To remove a person from your notify list, you would type '-notify '. To see who is on your notify list, you would type '=notify'. Your notify list is limited to 80 names.
An additional feature of this command is the 'notifiedby' variable. To see which users have you on their notify list as they arrive or depart, type 'set notifiedby 1'. This feature enables you to, in effect, extend your notify list. If a user has you on their list, you will be informed when they log on or off.
A second special feature of this command is the znotify command. The znotify command allows you to see a) who is on your notify list and online, and b) who is online and has you on their notify list. Type 'znotify' to see both lists displayed. It will also show if a user on either list is idling for more than a minute. You may cancel that idlenotify feature by utilizing the 'n' feature of this command. Type 'znot n' and the idle times will not be shown.
The third special feature of this list is the summon command. The summon command sends a message to a user indicating that you wish to speak tothem. You can only summon someone in certain circumstances, a) you must be on their notify list, and b) you can only summon that person once every three minutes. When a summons is given, that user is automatically placed on your idlenotify list, so you will know when he/she unidles.
2. The idlenotify list. The idlenotify list is used to inform
you of when a certain person is idling, and has unidled by entering a server
command. The proper format for this command is '+idlenotify
3. The gnotify list. The gnotify list is used to inform you of when
a person on that list has begun to play a game. The proper format for
this command is '+gnotify
Should you have any problems with our 'Server Tip' that you cannot resolve,
you can email our support at: support@freechess.org
for assistance.
Would you like to see previous Newsletter
Issues?
It's a great way to locate other helpful "Tip of the Month" sections
and older news highlights that were covered in past issues.
Click this button if you would like to see more.
The FICS Link Exchange Program:
The FICS Link Exchange program is where registered users can submit their homepage to have a link posted directly from the FICS homepage links section. If you have a personal homepage that you'd like to add to our list, then email MAd your web address for approval. It's as easy as that!
To view our Links section, press the Links button located on the bottom of our menu on the left. From here, you can access the many pages that have already been submitted by our players. Although it is not required, we request you add the FICS banner somewhere on your homepage in order to promote our free chess server. More information about our banner is available on the Links section of the homepage.
We are currently looking for users who want to help us
in promoting FICS.
Among things, we are working on is to get the FICS Banner on your local
chess club and personal web pages. If you have time and want to help us
then send an e-mail to binford@freechess.org
Please send comments and feedback on what you would like to see in future editions.
Edited by: afw(*)
Comments to afw or Oxymoron.