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Style to display chess moves

Recently User:Neo Purgatorio changed a lot of opening articles to go from explicitly mentioning the move number to implicitly using a numbered list to get it (e.g. diff, so :1. Na3 vs. # Na3). We discussed it a bit on their talk page. I realized that it doesn't look like WP:CHESS currently has any guidelines or suggestions on how to display moves? Anyway, I think that maybe we should have such a guideline added.

I think it should recommend the existing style and discourage the numbered list style. Reasoning: chess moves are not really a numbered list. The move number is a primary part of the text, not just a count of items - imagine if there's 4 buildings with names prepended with "1/2/3/4", we wouldn't use a numbered list but rather include these as part of the name. It is surprising and confusing to go into edit source and have the move numbers "disappear". Additionally, most browsers copy & paste will exclude numbered list counts, which is explicitly not desired. Try going to Descriptive_notation#Example and copy pasting the move list (which uses the numbered list style); you'll end up with no move numbers. Copy-pasting a directly written version works fine, though. The two styles display basically identically, so why would we want to go with the harder-to-edit, harder-to-copy version? (Also, machine ingestion is mostly not our problem, but automatic analysis of text also probably wants to see the move numbers explicitly.) And while it can be worked around, it's extra-annoying to use a numbered list style if the move list doesn't start at 1 (doable, but why are we doing this extra work again?). I don't really see any advantages of using the numbered list style, but I'll let Neo Purgatorio or others make the case for why they're worth considering. SnowFire (talk) 15:48, 23 May 2024 (UTC)

I'm personally fine with either being done here; my impression on the articles, since I'm not all that familiar with chess notation but have grasped the basics of it, was that they were meant to be numbered but simply were not and thus could have used numbered lists. I was looking at it through a formatting standpoint, but I did try to check WP:CHESS to see if there was anything specific on it. I do think the point you've made about not being able to copy chess notation as a result of numbered lists has merit. Neo Purgatorio (talk) 16:01, 23 May 2024 (UTC)

I've gone ahead and reverted the changes I've made; this discussion should still probably play out, however, since there aren't any guidelines here relating to what to do. Neo Purgatorio (talk) 05:10, 24 May 2024 (UTC)

Gadgets now loadable on a per-category basis

I know that there was work in progress on creating a chess game extension, in place of trying to deploy the chess game gadget. Note it is now possible to trigger a gadget loading by placing a page in a configured category. mw:Template gadgets has a bit of description. The first request on English Wikipedia is to support a gadget that implements Conway's Game of Life; see Talk:Conway's Game of Life#Template gadget request. Thus it is finally possible to deploy the existing chess game gadget, with it being loaded only on the pages where it is needed. isaacl (talk) 23:26, 29 May 2024 (UTC)

Izaak Appel

Appel was a strong Polish/Jewish player who "disappeared" while living in Lviv (or possibly Kyiv) following the 1941 Nazi invasion of Ukraine. He was almost certainly killed in 1941, but as is often the case the precise circumstances of his death are unknown. Currently we have a very unsatisfactory situation where his "disappearance" is sourced to a self-published Bill Wall page. Can we find something better? Gaige maybe? It would be better if we could say something like "Appel died in unknown circumstances following the 1941 Nazi invasion of Ukraine". MaxBrowne2 (talk) 01:32, 30 May 2024 (UTC)

Unfortunately all that Gaige says on page 12 of Chess Personalia is

Appel, Izaak         POL

   *    c1905

   †    c1941

Quale (talk) 02:40, 30 May 2024 (UTC)

Akira Watanabe (chess)

Would someone from WP:CHESS mind taking a look at Akira Watanabe (chess) and assessing the subject's notability (as chess player)? I'll ask something similar at WT:JAPAN given that the subject might possobily be notable for reasons other than chess, but the current focus of the article and claim of notability seem to be the subject's chess achievements. The article also appears to be a translation of the Japanese Wikipedia article ja:渡辺暁 (based on User talk:Ebefl#Ways to improve Akira Watanabe (chess)) but is lacking proper attribution per WP:TFOLWP. A lack of proper attribution cn most likely can be "fixed", but a lack of notability can't. For reference, the Japanese Wikipedia article does seem to be pretty much the same content-wise and is also basically only supported by a single WP:PRIMARY source (the other sources listed as "references" seem more like "explanatory notes").-- Marchjuly (talk) 21:51, 23 June 2024 (UTC)

I made a couple of quick searches but didn't find anything interesting. There is a book, "How to Play Chess Like Akira Watanabe", by John C. Murray, which I thought might be promising, but it is "independently published" (roughly equivalent to self-published). I also found an article in the Yale Bulletin about him, but it was from when he was a visiting scholar at Yale, and I would hesitate to call that "significant coverage". Bruce leverett (talk) 02:08, 24 June 2024 (UTC)

Should Titled Players Who Cheated Online Have it Mentioned on Their Wiki Page?

Someone added: "In 2024, Malak Ismayil’s account was banned on Chess.com under the website’s Fair Play Policy." They linked to her chess.com page, where her account is closed. I am removing it for there being no independent sources, but I'd like a second opinion. Malak Ismayil - Wikipedia Bres2 (talk) 03:11, 31 August 2024 (UTC)

Only with proper secondary sourcing. Good call. I am not ready to allow someone's career to be destroyed based solely on the actions of a chess.com admin. Marcus Markup (talk) 08:49, 31 August 2024 (UTC)