Comments/Ratings for a Single Item

A couple of considerably improved Spy icons:

I think I'll keep the other one, though, in case I ever need a Courier.

That sounds right; in principle this method for assigning images in Game Courier needs all images in one directory, and it doesn't matter which. It doesn't have a special facility like the ID to look for images in other directories.

I am not sure the following trick would work, though. Path names can be absolute (when they start with slash) or relative, and it is possible to specify a path to another directory that is not a sub-directory of the current one by using .. for indicating the parent directory. So if the specified piece directory is /graphics.dir/alfaeriePNG, and you specify an image filename as ../../membergraphics/MSdealers-chess/mypiece.png it could indicate a piece elsewhere. I am not sure whether the browser or server would not block the use of .. for security reasons, though.

(In the ID this trick would not work, because the image names must be specified without the color prefix, which would no longer be prefixes, but have to go somewhere in the middle if you would try to use a path name, so I had to make a special provision there for the use of 'guest piece'.)

I've already downloaded the entire Alfaerie set from the applet, plus a few dozen icons from the "Alfaerie Expansion Sets" mass-converted from gif to png, and put them into the same network drive directory along with all of the pieces I've created, using names I'm satisfied with (almost two dozen of them, including a few that I'm not using right away but think should be available).

(And looking at the original crocodile, gryphon, and dragon from that set does make me feel a little better about my dolphin and turtle.)

Are those Alfaerie icons you have created available for other people? Have you drawn them as .SVG?

As for availability, not yet, but they will be once I upload them and Dealer's Chess gets approved.

As for SVG, sorry, no. I wish I could, but I'm stretching myself enough already making them as PNGs.

I think the Game Courier Preset for this game is ready to go. I'm not clear on how to get it listed on the Index or anything, though.

You make a page with a link to it. When you're signed in, goto the menu with your name at the top and select the menu item "Post Your Own Game". It will give you an option for submitting a Game Courier Preset. Choose that, fill in information about, and on the next form, enter the content of your page.

Thanks, Fergus! It turns out that I'll have to wait until some of my waiting variants are approved, but now at least I know how to do it.

On my Likebook Mars, which displays red as black, the shades, while distinguishable, are close together, particularly in A2 mode. So, I would recommend another color for the light squares.

I'll also mention for H. G. that the text with a red background appears all black on my Likebook Mars, making it unreadable.

I switched around to another color option (which is also easier on my eye). Hopefully it doesn't make it worse on your other devices.

On my Kindle Scribe, which displays red as white, all the spaces are white, making the board appear completely uncheckered. I do see the pieces on it, though, even though I don't see them on my desktop.

On my Kindle Scribe, which displays red as white, all the spaces are white, making the board appear completely uncheckered. I do see the pieces on it, though, even though I don't see them on my desktop.

I am trying this code, but there is a bug preventing it from working. Instead of appending .svg to the file name, as I have instructed it to, it is appending .pgn. This is probably a typo for .png, as that is a graphics format, and .pgn is a format for storing chess games. Also, since we're able to use SVG images now, it should allow svg as a value for graphicsType or graphSuffix.

It wouldn't have rendered the Bowman, Helepolis, or Spy anyway, as those are compound images. (Or would it? I'm not sure.) Still, it's good to know that for something like Hundred Acre Chess (which doesn't use those) that's an option, or soon will be.

PS: I switched to white/fuschia. How is it now?

Your fuschia squares are still white on my Kindle Scribe. On my eink devices, colors with a high red value do not work well. They are too dark on the Likebook Mars and too light on the Kindle Scribe. I recommend staying away from red squares unless H. G. makes them render as a medium grey on eink like I did with red pieces using showpiece.php.

How about purple and light grey?

The ID already makes an attempt to recognize e-ink devices (by their color depth), for the purpose of suppressing color highlighting, and forcing the use of marker symbols instead. (Which otherwise would require useMarkers=1.) I could also make that affect the background color of messages like 'Checkmate!'. For the initial message that appears above the board the HTML setting the background is just part of the message, but it is not very critical that this should be red. I could switch it to green.

The ID accepts any string as graphicsType, and would append it to the filenames as an extension (i.e. separated by a dot) if it is not set to the empty string. Except when there is a % in the filename; then the extension (and graphicsDir prefixing) is suppressed, to allow 'guest images' of another, explicitly mentioned type.

The problem with the Diagram below is that it uses the key graphSuffix for specifying the graphics type, which is not recognized by the definition parser. (And then ignored. Perhaps I should emit a warning for unrecognized parameters, instead of the usual meaasge above the board.) The confusion probably arises from that graphSuffix is the internal name of the variable used in the JavaScript for this. The variable names do not always coincide with those of the parameters, as the idea of using the original content of the Diagrams HTML tags to define the Diagram (rather than extra JavaScript between <script> tags) evolved only later, and the variable names did not always seem optimal.

The failed attempt to specify the graphicsType does expose the typo in the default value for this; I will fix that.

[Edit] OK, I think I fixed everything, both in betza.js and betzaNew.js. The default graphicsType is now png, and the red highlighting in the text above the board is now changed to #808080 when the colorDepth of the screen is <= 16. It also displays an error message for the last non-fatal error. (Flush cache to use new version!)

When the Berserkers appear on this diagram, it'll be ready to be moved into the main article. (Unless it needs to be recolored, which it very well might.)

Well, not really, because it relies on images from an external website, which is something we want to discourage. Especially since this is a http website: most people won't be able to see those images at all, since CVP became a https site. It requires a non-default setting of the browser to see them.

I'm still seeing a black bar above the board on my Likebook Mars. Tell me how you check the color depth with Javascript, and I will report back the values I get.

The failed attempt to specify the graphicsType does expose the typo in the default value for this; I will fix that.

Let me know when you have. Web Developer Tools in Firefox is still telling me the images have the .pgn extension.

  if(screen.colorDepth <= 16) useMarkers = 2, realColor = '#E0E0E0', light = '#FFFFFF', hicol = '#808080'; // assume grey-scale display

'hicol' is what is used as background color on highlighted messages, 'realColor' and 'light' the square shades. I have not tested it on an e-ink device.

I have fixed the default extension. You did flush the cache? (If e-reader browsers have such a thing...)

screen.colorDepth

My desktop computer, my Likebook Mars, and my Kindle Scribe all report a value of 24. So, this isn't useful for distinguishing between them.

You did flush the cache?

I did that in Firefox on my Likebook Mars, but I saw no improvement. On my desktop, I clicked on Reload Skip Cache, and when I inspected the Javascript-produced HTML with Web Developer Tools, I couldn't find any IMG tags for the pieces. I changed graphSuffix to graphicsType in a preview, but it didn't change the result.