8 ms·

Rebuilding memchess.com from its archive

187 points by grondilu 3y ago

grondilu 3y ago
memchess.com was a neat website to learn chess openings with the spaced repetition method. It was closed around 2020 for some reason. I used code gathered from archive.org[1] and built a version that seems to work. It does not require a subscription/login, instead it stores progress through the HTML5 web storage API[2]. 1. https://web.archive.org/web/20240000000000*/memchess.com https://web.archive.org/web/20240000000000*/memchess.com 2. https://www.w3schools.com/html/html5_webstorage.asp https://www.w3schools.com/html/html5_webstorage.asp
- TylerLives 3y ago
  Have you tried https://listudy.org https://listudy.org ?
  - najdf 3y ago
    https://listudy.org https://listudy.org is a brilliant open source opening spaced repetition trainer. Another one is https://chessdriller.org https://chessdriller.org, though you need to provide the moves yourself for that one. There's also https://chessmadra.com https://chessmadra.com, but I believe their backend is closed-source.
    - krick 3y ago
      I haven't really used any of this stuff. I don't even know why. So I wouldn't really know how people actually use it to make most of it, but I tried just now listudy (a couple of studies) and that memchess clone. Seems pretty much the same thing, but listudy is a bit more structured, with notes and stuff. So I guess my question (to the OP, probably) would be, why memchess (clone)? Is there a reason why I would want to use it instead of/in addition to listudy, or is it just "because why not"?
      - grondilu 3y ago
        The short answer is I tried listudy and I didn't like it. I liked memchess because of how simple it was, and I liked not having to enter my own lines (though I understand this is important for serious study). Memchess is what helped me defeat the strongest player in my local club, so I was quite frustrated when it shut down.
    - Vincenius 3y ago
      I can add https://openingtrainer.com/ https://openingtrainer.com/ to the list. Also a great tool to practice openings
- ta8645 3y ago
  It seems like the variation displayed at the bottom left of the board is trailing the move played, rather than being displayed beforehand as a challenge. This means that when the board is first displayed, there is no indication at all as to which opening you're expected to be recalling. Or am I misunderstanding the expected interaction?
  - amsully 3y ago
    It allows you to flow through lines and play best book moves naturally. You can tell it that you want to focus on particular lines or line and it will let you know when you've made an incorrect move.
- shiroiushi 3y ago
  >It does not require a subscription/login, instead it stores progress through the HTML5 web storage API I wish more websites did this.
  - codingdave 3y ago
    It is awesome for short-term usage, but has a 5 MB limit, doesn't transfer across browsers or devices, and can simply go away if you clear it, reinstall browsers, etc. So it is not reliable in the long run.
    - grondilu 3y ago
      It's not always going to remain limited to 5MB, which is probably much enough for an opening repertoire anyway. Also it shouldn't be too hard to create an export/import button. I'd argue it's more reliable than having your progress stored on a server that can close anytime, as memchess did.
    - lxgr 3y ago
      On Safari, it’s also cleared after 7 consecutive days of not visiting a website, I believe.
laurentlb 3y ago
I've tried quickly on my phone, but it's too hard to use: - I normally prefer to click on the piece and then on the target square. It doesn't work here, I think only drag & drop is supported. - But drag & drop is broken, as it's scrolling the page at the same time as the piece. I like the concept, I'll try again later on laptop.
- bbx 3y ago
  I second that on desktops/laptops as well: being able to click on a piece and then on the target.
- bean-weevil 3y ago
  It works for me on Firefox android (but maybe that's because there's nothing to scroll)
  - regularfry 3y ago
    It means you can't expand the board. I want to zoom in, but if I do that I can't move the pieces without panning the viewport.
- grondilu 3y ago
  I think it's due to the library used : chessboard.js[1] I used the version used in the archive, 0.3.0. It might be old. 1. https://chessboardjs.com/ https://chessboardjs.com/
amsully 3y ago
Great to see this on HN and great work grondilu! Many users of memchess yearned for it to return and it really did disappear suddenly. It fills a great gap between a strategy book/guide and pure tactic trainers. Next step is for it to be refined as it was always a little clunky.
FiReaNG3L 3y ago
Oh god, I'm so thankful for this, I was extremely sad when this disappeared, it was by far the best!
QuadrupleA 3y ago
I find chess goes from tedious and overwhelming in the opening game, to interesting in the midgame, and fascinating towards the endgame. Sad you have to memorize thousands of opening lines to get good at it.
- najdf 3y ago
  If you don't enjoy studying openings, you can get far by just being aware of opening ideas and common traps, and spending the rest of your time on midgame and endgame. Memorizing thousands of opening lines is really only for 2200+ Elo players (global top 20,000), even though Chessable and other marketing teams are doing their best to convince amateurs otherwise.
  - ewitt22 3y ago
    very true
  - seabass-labrax 3y ago
    > ...Chessable and other marketing teams are doing their best to convince amateurs otherwise The study of openings is a very easy thing to 'productise' in comparison to other elements of chess. One's progress with learning openings is particularly tangible and easy to measure, but the law of diminishing returns sets in pretty quickly. There is also the more practical element that openings have names; it's quite difficult as a beginner to talk about more philosophical or abstract parts of the game, such as identifying and referring to the situations when a certain bishop is strong or not. In many ways, the focus on openings is not a new phenomenon - chess opening books always seem to have dominated the genre of chess books. They're also excellent ways for publishers to sell updated editions... New openings are discovered like clockwork; the genre exists alongside sport almanacs and travel timetables as a perfect way to keep the printing presses going!
- url00 3y ago
  You could try Chess 960 (a.k.a. Fischer random) which was designed to avoid opening theory. It's very fun.
thethimble 3y ago
If you’re interested in spaced repetition for chess openings I’d strongly recommend chessbook. Not open source but extremely helpful in discovering interesting variations and remembering them in the long term. https://chessbook.com/ https://chessbook.com/
ewitt22 3y ago
@grondilu - this is awesome! I have been working on something similar for the past few months. Would be cool to connect if you're interested. My email is emorywitt@gmail.com
pajtai 3y ago
This is awesome. If you want help from other contributors, you'll probably find it easier to collaborate if you move memchess into its own repo (vs storing it in the grondilu.github.io repo). Each repo can have a dedicated GH Pages. Really cool!
- grondilu 3y ago
  How do you add a GH page to a repo?
  - kevinbowman 3y ago
    There's a guide at https://docs.github.com/en/pages/getting-started-with-github-pages/configuring-a-publishing-source-for-your-github-pages-site https://docs.github.com/en/pages/getting-started-with-github..., but the critical bit is "In the "Code and automation" section of the sidebar, click Pages."
29athrowaway 3y ago
For Go: https://www.josekipedia.com/ https://www.josekipedia.com/
p0w3n3d 3y ago
I always am fond of projects to rebuild things from the past, as I can already see that systems that I had used for a long time, are already gone. We're losing much more information nowadays, as in 1900-2000 main vessel of knowledge were books and those are available more or less in libraries, but since 2000 knowledge was been published more often in forums and web apps/blogs and those are not storable due to copyright law and privacy issues. This knowledge is or will be lost in a few years. Not speaking of old movies/series etc. Thankfully music is still available on CDs
danmaz74 3y ago
Spaced repetitions for openings make a lot of sense, but in my experience they work better for tactics. I improved a lot with a hacked up solution combining puzzles and spaced repetitions, and then created a website to make it easier for anybody to adopt that approach: https://chess.braimax.com https://chess.braimax.com Lately I've been very busy with my day job, but I'm almost ready to get back to developing that website. Suggestions are welcome.
- najdf 3y ago
  I'm curious how spaced repetition is applicable to tactics? I don't dispute it, it's been popular since The Woodpecker Method [1], but I never quite got the point. Intuitively, spaced repetition helps memorization, but tactics is about learning patterns and maybe generalizing ideas. What's your take on what it brings to tactics? [1] https://qualitychess.co.uk/products/2/327/the_woodpecker_method_by_axel_smith_and_hans_tikkanen/ https://qualitychess.co.uk/products/2/327/the_woodpecker_met...
  - wavemode 3y ago
    It's a common phenomenon - you look at a puzzle, fail to solve it, then look at the solution and move on. Then come back to that same puzzle some days later and still can't solve it/remember the solution. So it's questionable whether you really learned anything the first time. If the exact same position showed up in your game, you'd probably have missed the correct move. That's ultimately the purpose of repetitive training systems like spaced repetition and the woodpecker method (which is somewhat different from spaced repetition, actually).
  - danmaz74 3y ago
    Our brains are great at generalizing. Seeing (and recognizing )the same pattern several times makes it much easier to spot it later. And I found out that this works even better if you focus on a specific pattern for some time, working your way from easier to more difficult examples. I definitely improved a lot with this.
jovial_cavalier 3y ago
It doesn't seem to actually tell me which opening I'm supposed to be doing? I just played "1. d4" and it said it was the wrong. Then after playing "1. e4" it said I'm playing the spanish mainline.

187 points by grondilu 3y ago

memchess.com was a neat website to learn chess openings with the spaced repetition method. It was closed around 2020 for some reason. I used code gathered from archive.org[1] and built a version that seems to work. It does not require a subscription/login, instead it stores progress through the HTML5 web storage API[2]. 1. https://web.archive.org/web/20240000000000*/memchess.com https://web.archive.org/web/20240000000000*/memchess.com 2. https://www.w3schools.com/html/html5_webstorage.asp https://www.w3schools.com/html/html5_webstorage.asp

TylerLives 3y ago
Have you tried https://listudy.org https://listudy.org ?
- najdf 3y ago
  https://listudy.org https://listudy.org is a brilliant open source opening spaced repetition trainer. Another one is https://chessdriller.org https://chessdriller.org, though you need to provide the moves yourself for that one. There's also https://chessmadra.com https://chessmadra.com, but I believe their backend is closed-source.
  - krick 3y ago
    I haven't really used any of this stuff. I don't even know why. So I wouldn't really know how people actually use it to make most of it, but I tried just now listudy (a couple of studies) and that memchess clone. Seems pretty much the same thing, but listudy is a bit more structured, with notes and stuff. So I guess my question (to the OP, probably) would be, why memchess (clone)? Is there a reason why I would want to use it instead of/in addition to listudy, or is it just "because why not"?
    - grondilu 3y ago
      The short answer is I tried listudy and I didn't like it. I liked memchess because of how simple it was, and I liked not having to enter my own lines (though I understand this is important for serious study). Memchess is what helped me defeat the strongest player in my local club, so I was quite frustrated when it shut down.
  - Vincenius 3y ago
    I can add https://openingtrainer.com/ https://openingtrainer.com/ to the list. Also a great tool to practice openings
ta8645 3y ago
It seems like the variation displayed at the bottom left of the board is trailing the move played, rather than being displayed beforehand as a challenge. This means that when the board is first displayed, there is no indication at all as to which opening you're expected to be recalling. Or am I misunderstanding the expected interaction?
- amsully 3y ago
  It allows you to flow through lines and play best book moves naturally. You can tell it that you want to focus on particular lines or line and it will let you know when you've made an incorrect move.
shiroiushi 3y ago
>It does not require a subscription/login, instead it stores progress through the HTML5 web storage API I wish more websites did this.
- codingdave 3y ago
  It is awesome for short-term usage, but has a 5 MB limit, doesn't transfer across browsers or devices, and can simply go away if you clear it, reinstall browsers, etc. So it is not reliable in the long run.
  - grondilu 3y ago
    It's not always going to remain limited to 5MB, which is probably much enough for an opening repertoire anyway. Also it shouldn't be too hard to create an export/import button. I'd argue it's more reliable than having your progress stored on a server that can close anytime, as memchess did.
  - lxgr 3y ago
    On Safari, it’s also cleared after 7 consecutive days of not visiting a website, I believe.

laurentlb 3y ago

I've tried quickly on my phone, but it's too hard to use: - I normally prefer to click on the piece and then on the target square. It doesn't work here, I think only drag & drop is supported. - But drag & drop is broken, as it's scrolling the page at the same time as the piece. I like the concept, I'll try again later on laptop.

bbx 3y ago
I second that on desktops/laptops as well: being able to click on a piece and then on the target.
bean-weevil 3y ago
It works for me on Firefox android (but maybe that's because there's nothing to scroll)
- regularfry 3y ago
  It means you can't expand the board. I want to zoom in, but if I do that I can't move the pieces without panning the viewport.
grondilu 3y ago
I think it's due to the library used : chessboard.js[1] I used the version used in the archive, 0.3.0. It might be old. 1. https://chessboardjs.com/ https://chessboardjs.com/

amsully 3y ago

Great to see this on HN and great work grondilu! Many users of memchess yearned for it to return and it really did disappear suddenly. It fills a great gap between a strategy book/guide and pure tactic trainers. Next step is for it to be refined as it was always a little clunky.

FiReaNG3L 3y ago

Oh god, I'm so thankful for this, I was extremely sad when this disappeared, it was by far the best!

QuadrupleA 3y ago

I find chess goes from tedious and overwhelming in the opening game, to interesting in the midgame, and fascinating towards the endgame. Sad you have to memorize thousands of opening lines to get good at it.

najdf 3y ago
If you don't enjoy studying openings, you can get far by just being aware of opening ideas and common traps, and spending the rest of your time on midgame and endgame. Memorizing thousands of opening lines is really only for 2200+ Elo players (global top 20,000), even though Chessable and other marketing teams are doing their best to convince amateurs otherwise.
- ewitt22 3y ago
  very true
- seabass-labrax 3y ago
  > ...Chessable and other marketing teams are doing their best to convince amateurs otherwise The study of openings is a very easy thing to 'productise' in comparison to other elements of chess. One's progress with learning openings is particularly tangible and easy to measure, but the law of diminishing returns sets in pretty quickly. There is also the more practical element that openings have names; it's quite difficult as a beginner to talk about more philosophical or abstract parts of the game, such as identifying and referring to the situations when a certain bishop is strong or not. In many ways, the focus on openings is not a new phenomenon - chess opening books always seem to have dominated the genre of chess books. They're also excellent ways for publishers to sell updated editions... New openings are discovered like clockwork; the genre exists alongside sport almanacs and travel timetables as a perfect way to keep the printing presses going!
url00 3y ago
You could try Chess 960 (a.k.a. Fischer random) which was designed to avoid opening theory. It's very fun.

thethimble 3y ago

If you’re interested in spaced repetition for chess openings I’d strongly recommend chessbook. Not open source but extremely helpful in discovering interesting variations and remembering them in the long term. https://chessbook.com/ https://chessbook.com/

ewitt22 3y ago

@grondilu - this is awesome! I have been working on something similar for the past few months. Would be cool to connect if you're interested. My email is emorywitt@gmail.com

pajtai 3y ago

This is awesome. If you want help from other contributors, you'll probably find it easier to collaborate if you move memchess into its own repo (vs storing it in the grondilu.github.io repo). Each repo can have a dedicated GH Pages. Really cool!

grondilu 3y ago
How do you add a GH page to a repo?
- kevinbowman 3y ago
  There's a guide at https://docs.github.com/en/pages/getting-started-with-github-pages/configuring-a-publishing-source-for-your-github-pages-site https://docs.github.com/en/pages/getting-started-with-github..., but the critical bit is "In the "Code and automation" section of the sidebar, click Pages."

29athrowaway 3y ago

For Go: https://www.josekipedia.com/ https://www.josekipedia.com/

p0w3n3d 3y ago

I always am fond of projects to rebuild things from the past, as I can already see that systems that I had used for a long time, are already gone. We're losing much more information nowadays, as in 1900-2000 main vessel of knowledge were books and those are available more or less in libraries, but since 2000 knowledge was been published more often in forums and web apps/blogs and those are not storable due to copyright law and privacy issues. This knowledge is or will be lost in a few years. Not speaking of old movies/series etc. Thankfully music is still available on CDs

danmaz74 3y ago

Spaced repetitions for openings make a lot of sense, but in my experience they work better for tactics. I improved a lot with a hacked up solution combining puzzles and spaced repetitions, and then created a website to make it easier for anybody to adopt that approach: https://chess.braimax.com https://chess.braimax.com Lately I've been very busy with my day job, but I'm almost ready to get back to developing that website. Suggestions are welcome.

najdf 3y ago
I'm curious how spaced repetition is applicable to tactics? I don't dispute it, it's been popular since The Woodpecker Method [1], but I never quite got the point. Intuitively, spaced repetition helps memorization, but tactics is about learning patterns and maybe generalizing ideas. What's your take on what it brings to tactics? [1] https://qualitychess.co.uk/products/2/327/the_woodpecker_method_by_axel_smith_and_hans_tikkanen/ https://qualitychess.co.uk/products/2/327/the_woodpecker_met...
- wavemode 3y ago
  It's a common phenomenon - you look at a puzzle, fail to solve it, then look at the solution and move on. Then come back to that same puzzle some days later and still can't solve it/remember the solution. So it's questionable whether you really learned anything the first time. If the exact same position showed up in your game, you'd probably have missed the correct move. That's ultimately the purpose of repetitive training systems like spaced repetition and the woodpecker method (which is somewhat different from spaced repetition, actually).
- danmaz74 3y ago
  Our brains are great at generalizing. Seeing (and recognizing )the same pattern several times makes it much easier to spot it later. And I found out that this works even better if you focus on a specific pattern for some time, working your way from easier to more difficult examples. I definitely improved a lot with this.

jovial_cavalier 3y ago

It doesn't seem to actually tell me which opening I'm supposed to be doing? I just played "1. d4" and it said it was the wrong. Then after playing "1. e4" it said I'm playing the spanish mainline.