Evolution of a Go program

About the development of Moyo Go Studio, software to (help) play the Oriental game of Go. Go is a two-player zero-sum game of perfect information. It is considered much harder than Chess. Currently, in spite of enormous effort expended, no computer program plays it above the level of a beginner.

Sunday, August 13, 2006

Goodbye Freeware & Forum

The forum hasn't been active for months so I decided to take the link off the front page (it can still be found here). There are several reasons I am doing this - one is totally uncontrollable SPAM. I have installed countless anti-SPAM mods and although they worked for a while, I was getting a handful of SPAMS a day. And not just for Viagra either. Until I have a waterproof solution, the forum is gone. I do not know of any free alternatives to the hopelessly inadequate phpBB. I don't want to spend more time on it. It has served its purpose and now there is a Help file. I'll use the forum as a to-do list and as the source for a FAQ. Of course I can be reached, as usual, on support@moyogo.com.

I have also taken the Freeware SGF editor out of circulation, as well as the Pro game collection. The freeware editor is a headache to support, in spite of my proficiency with IFDEFS, software consisting of 1,000,000+ lines likes to exist in an as simple possible, single version! I am strenghtened in my decision due to the fact that my freeware SGF Editor was boycotted by Sensei's Library and GoBase. I don't see a compelling reason why I should invest a lot of time maintaining a free version if most of the major Go websites are scared of it :)

Make no mistake about it - Moyo Go Studio is hugely popular, in as much as fledgling Go software can be. I can already live of it, if I were to move to Papua New Guinea or Eritrea (I wish I wasn't so afraid of flying and that I had less stuff).

The Pro game collection has been mirrored by some folks, as well as put on P2P networks, so in an effort to keep my operating costs down, they are removed from my site as well.

This leaves me more time to concentrate on my core business: Building the best Go software!

posted by Franciscus @ 10:20 PM