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BGonline.org Forums
Computer-friendly nactation methodology for variant/family symbols
Posted By: Matt Ryder
Date: Friday, 4 February 2011, at 5:12 a.m.
In an attempt to extend the nactation system to cover non-standard openings and complex situations in the middle to late game, Nack has introduced a series of hierarchical font-style variations of base nactation symbols.
So for example, the H hierarchy might look something like this: [H, h, H, h, H, h, H, h, H, h, H, h ] etc.
I have various practical concerns with this approach, for example:
• It’s difficult to distinguish italics or boldface in hand-written nactation transcriptions.
• File names don’t permit such font-style extravagances.
• Excel must be coaxed into compliance. (see this recent thread)
• Database fields typically only permit plain ascii characters.
• Plain-text editors such as Notepad cannot be used.
• HTML tags must be painstakingly employed on the web.
Etc!
As with most inventions infused with genius, nactation has its share of eccentricities. Generally I try to work around the quirks. However encoding these font-style hierarchies in a database has become so arduous that I'm compelled to take action. (Necessity is the mother of invention!)
To get around the frustrating limitations, I’m now employing my own system for extended families that use only the first two (plain alphabetical) characters of Nack’s hierarchy in each case.
Think of this as nactation binary, where the capital letter represents 0 and the lower case letter represents 1. So for the H hierarchy example above, H = 0 and h = 1.
My own 'binary' version of Nack’s H hierarchy looks like this: [H, h, hH, hh, hHH, hHh, hhH, hhh, hHHH, hHHh,hHhH, hHhh etc.]
At first glance this may look like gibberish, but if you’re familiar with binary, it doesn’t take long to train your brain to read the hierarchy depth for a given character.
Decimal (hierarchy depth) Nack's symbol Binary Nactation binary 0 H 0 H 1 h 1 h 2 H 10 hH 3 h 11 hh 4 H 100 hHH 5 h 101 hHh 6 H 110 hhH 7 h 111 hhh 8 H 1000 hHHH 9 h 1001 hHHh 10 H 1010 hHhH 11 h 1011 hHhh H hierarchy expressed in nactation binary
This works equally well for other nactation symbols. So depth 5 M would be mMm, depth 3 S would be ss and so on. The system is perfectly extendable, so it answers Tim Chow's concerns about the limits of nactation. Depth 3059 T would be tTttttttTTtt :-)
This works well for most nactation characters, but because Nack has fused the U and V families, we have a wrinkle there. I would dearly love to eliminate the unnecessary V character altogether:
Decimal (hierarchy depth) Nack's symbol Binary Nactation binary 0 U 0 U 1 V 1 u 2 u 10 uU
3 v 11 uu 4 U 100 uUU 5 V 101 uUu 6 U 110 uuU 7 v 111 uuu U/V hierarchy converted to U hierarchy expressed in nactation binary
However, as the U/V hierarchy appears to be entrenched, and deviation may cause symbol confusion for current nactation users, I'm forced to compromise with a quaternary (base-4) system in this single case.
So U = 0, V = 1, u = 2, v = 3
Decimal (hierarchy depth) Nack's symbol Quaternary Nactation quaternary 0 U 0 U 1 V 1 V 2 u 2 u
3 v 3 v 4 U 10 VU 5 V 11 VV 6 u 12 Vu 7 v 13 Vv U/V hierarchy expressed in nactation quaternary
For me, the benefits of adopting a computer-friendly nactation methodology is clear. In 99% of cases, the nactation symbol is identical to the existing system. It would be nice to maintain the 1-character nactation standard, but in extreme variant situations, I think an extra character or two is warranted.
Please note that right now I'm simply using these methodologies for my own ends (ie to better store nactation and nacbracs in plain-text contexts on my side). I will write routines to convert nactation binary and quaternary to Nack's symbol equivalents for display purposes here and elsewhere. I offer this as food for thought only. Should Nack consider incorporating these ideas (or some variant thereof) in a future system I would certainly use it, as I feel the current approach is somewhat impractical.
Matt R.
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