Posts Tagged ‘361points’
If you want to improve, play a lot of fast games
Friday, February 9th, 2007
I added some details to the “play a lot of fast games” advice – see this page. Just briefly, it’s not about playing with time limits that make you cry all the time, but it is about pushing yourself to play with lower time limits than what you are comfortable with.
Added ratings…
Sunday, February 4th, 2007
… page ratings, that is.
At the end of most of my pages on 361points.com I added a simple feedback form, something like: “If you haven’t already, please rate this page” and there are 3 choices. For instance, have a look at the end if this article. The purpose is for me to track what’s good and what’s not, and figure out what to improve on the site.
This is the first dynamic feature I added to the site, so please excuse the looks and eventual bugs – I am learning these things as I go, I am something like 30 kyu at web programming 
The intended functionality: once you click submit, the page is refreshed and you won’t see the feedback form again, at least not for a while, while you view the page from the same computer. If you have cookies disabled, I guess you’ll see the form again – no need to submit again, though.
Please let me know if you see anything out of order – thanks!
The intended functionality: once you click submit, the page is refreshed and you won’t see the feedback form again, at least not for a while, while you view the page from the same computer. If you have cookies disabled, I guess you’ll see the form again – no need to submit again, though.
Please let me know if you see anything out of order – thanks! Learned the rules – where next?
Friday, February 2nd, 2007
I got a request from someone on godiscussions.com to have a look at a game he played and comment on it – which I did. The game is between 2 players who recently learned Go.
That inspired me to write some steps that people who are just starting Go should follow in the beginning to speedup their learning process and to make sure they are moving in the right direction. I posted them in the end of my “What is Go?” page, and I’m reproducing them here:
If you just learned the rules of Go, you may wonder what are the next steps in your Go career. Here is what I think you should do:
- Play something like 50-100 games with another beginner. Teach the rules to a friend, or a family member, or a coworker – and play a lot of games together, just concentrating on capturing stones. Whoever captures more stones wins. In case you cannot find someone to play with, see step 4 below: play on an online Go server instead.
- Read the “Lessons in the fundamentals of Go” book. It will not only mention the step 1 above, but it also provides a lot of very useful information about Go: fundamental concepts, how to study, and many interesting things about the professional Go world.
- Read the Graded Go problems for beginners book. This will teach you about basic Go tactics.
- Play a lot of games online. Try to apply what you read from books in your games. Register with some online Go server (there are links to several of them here) and get to play with various opponents of different levels – it is important to get exposed to various playing styles.
- Follow my “how to improve” list
- Check the list of books I recommend – some of which I consider “must reads”.
Hello, happy Go world!
Wednesday, January 31st, 2007
I have added a blog to my 361points.com Go site – and this is the first entry.
I used to have an older Go site at igo.resurse.com, where I wrote mainly about my experience as an insei in Japan (which was waaay back in 1994-95). I decided recently that I want to make it into a new site and add much more to it. That’s how 361points.com came to life. For now I moved and rearranged a little bit the old content, but I also started adding new things, most notably a series of Go lessons.
Hope to hear your comments and ideas about how to make 361points.com better, and by that I mean more useful and interesting to you. So please don’t hesitate to add your comments here.
