Talk:List of Go terms

Use the "new section" tab at top to add new comments at the end. Sign comments with four tildes: ~~~~.

Liberty (linked term not defined)

The term 'liberty' has a link to this same page, but there is no definition for it in this page. I can find the term defined in the external page linked to at the bottom.

Should this single definition be added? Should the several similar special terms be mentioned as being found in the external page? Shenme 05:27, 25 November 2005 (UTC)

Less common terms

I haven't seen/heard "kiai", "korigatachi", or "yosu-miru" much in English go books or conversation; these are almost always translated into English equivalents ("fighting spirit", "over-concentrated", "probe"), unlike the reset of the terms here. Would it make sense to either change the headlines of these sections to their English equivalents (as was done with "thickness"), or at least indicate that they're less common? Rictus 19:51, 6 December 2006 (UTC)

2007-02-7 Automated pywikipediabot message

--CopyToWiktionaryBot 00:23, 7 February 2007 (UTC)

Adding pronunciation guildlines

I have never done this before but I thought that this particular page needed pronunciation guildlines to help us beginners with the foreign words in the article. Example: Aji (ah-gee) or is it (ay-gee)? Beautiful article nontheless. 70.152.148.216 02:32, 24 February 2007 (UTC)

These work fine as far as exclusive English-speakers go. I am afraid that this is yet another way to perpetuate the habit of mispronouncing foreign language vowels as a "standard." Dame is da as in "dash", me as in "men", not "ey" as in "face" — except in English where diphthongs "ei, ai, ou, yu" are taken to be single vowels. I am not going to correct it, because I would be overruled by the multitudes. Maybe it's a war that was already lost around the 17th century. Morycm (talk) 07:20, 27 December 2023 (UTC)

Standard Wikipedia policy is to include IPA pronunciations (and then optionally add American-friendly respellings like "ah-gee"). I think the IPA could be helpful for some of these terms. --seberle (talk) 21:45, 2 January 2024 (UTC)

Sente/gote

I removed some content with my previous edit.

"During a game, a player being in gote can gain sente by making a defensive move that not only nullifies the opponent's threat, but also attacks the opponent at the same time." Since I redefined sente/gote to refer to sequences this sentence becomes meaningless.

"comes up at the end of the game" Reverse sente has meaning throughout the game.

"Sente endgame moves allow the player with sente to go around the board whittling away at the opponent's territory. In this situation, a player who has used up his sente moves may look for a play that, while gote, prevents the opponent from making a sente endgame move." This is pure nonsense. A player should in general not prefer a one way sente over a larger reverse sente. This because his opponent will tenuki to play his sente, ref principle of mutual damage. The miai counting value of sente and reverse sente is the same. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Taemyr (talk • contribs) 13:36, 13 May 2007 (UTC).

Well, yes. But miai values are not the whole truth, either. Charles Matthews 13:52, 13 May 2007 (UTC)

This section is starting to become a bit more than a discussion on the terms. I feel it might be better to switch Go_terms#Gote and Sente with Go_strategy_and_tactics#Sente_and_gote. Taemyr 16:16, 13 May 2007 (UTC)

There is a problem when I type "Sente" in the wikipedia search box. I come to this page, about Go, but did want to go to Sente (application). The solution would be a disambiguation page, that offers the choice: either Sente (the go term) or Sente (the application). Please do this in stead of the automatic redirection to Go. Thanks in advance!83.76.182.227 (talk) 09:35, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

Done. HermanHiddema (talk) 09:50, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

This sentence on the page: "Both players will have sente on their turn, and the moves they are making are gote." looks very confusing in the context. It refers to players who have gote (due to the opponent's sente move), but are making sente moves. Do we want to fix it? Or is it just me who is not getting it? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 82.208.33.208 (talk) 22:19, 28 February 2013 (UTC)

Sound-poor?

What is a sound-poor language? Why can't I find anything about it on the internet? Maybe terms shouldn't be used when they are so esoteric and can't easily be researched.

It's not an esoteric term. Japanese have fewer distinct sounds than most other languages. Taemyr 23:53, 9 September 2007 (UTC)

Better translations

It might be good to offer a translation of "Atari", which means a hit or a strike. The same for "Dame", which means no good. Also, "Sente" is not "original hand", it is "before hand". "Original hand" would be "Gente" 元手.

Tesuji

Why does tesuji have its own page, and is not mentioned here? Jdmarshall (talk) 11:36, 18 May 2008 (UTC)

Korigatachi

This is often translated as "frozen shape" to be sure, but the verb koru （凝る） is more often used to mean "stiff" or "overdone". For example "korisugiru" （懲りすぎる） means to overdo (a design). In the context of go, korigatachi clearly means putting too many stones into an area, so we ought to be able to find a better translation than "frozen".BruceThomson (talk) 03:43, 5 July 2008 (UTC)

Sons and Brothers

My Go program (qGo) uses the two terms 'sons' and 'brothers' prominently on the gui display. I don't know what they mean. Could anyone please add their definitions to the article? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 62.73.248.37 (talk) 23:54, 14 November 2008 (UTC)

These are not Go terms, but Computer Science terms. The reflect he underlying representation of the game. See Tree (data structure)/Tree (graph theory) for more details. Stuartyeates (talk) 08:08, 21 November 2008 (UTC)

Merger proposal

I think that Divine_move and Tesuji should be merged into this page.

Currently they are little linked to and contains mainly secondary content, but it fits well withe the content of this page.Stuartyeates (talk) 08:03, 21 November 2008 (UTC) / Stuartyeates (talk) 23:04, 21 November 2008 (UTC)

Tesuji

• Support As the article stands now. It's a shame there is not more content in this page though. There are certainly sources enough on the subject to expand this into a proper article. Taemyr (talk) 07:00, 22 November 2008 (UTC)
• Support, I agree with Taemyr that it could merit a page on its own, but unless someone writes it, it is better to include it in this page for now. HermanHiddema (talk) 11:03, 24 November 2008 (UTC)
• Oppose To an extent, I agree with above. However, of all the Go terms, Tesuji is the one that most merits a page on it's own. We could expand by giving some Tesuji examples (which I will look into). Green0eggs (talk) 15:00, 2 December 2010 (UTC)

Divine move

• Oppose While the term occurs in Hikaru no Go I do not believe it to be part of go jargon. The article should be deleted for lacking notability instead. Taemyr (talk) 07:00, 22 November 2008 (UTC)

I disagree that Divine move / "Hand of God" is restricted to Hikaru no Go. I certainly heard the term before I heard of Hikaru no GoStuartyeates (talk) 05:34, 23 November 2008 (UTC)

• Oppose, not common enough to be on this page, which only lists about 20-30 very common terms. I think deleting the content and linking to Hikaru no Go instead would be better, I've never seen the term used in any book outside Hikaru. HermanHiddema (talk) 11:02, 24 November 2008 (UTC)

• Support I support the merger and not the deletion. I'm pretty sure Divine move is a phrase used before, or at least outside of, Hikaru no Go. Should I be wrong (I'll look into it) then I would oppose and agree with HermanHiddema. Green0eggs (talk) 15:09, 2 December 2010 (UTC)
• Support. Entire article is exclusively about the game term. -- P 1 9 9 • TALK 18:03, 22 August 2011 (UTC)

• Oppose Kami no itte is not a move. It's a perfect way to play. The game winning move is myoshu. --93.73.19.163 (talk) 14:18, 20 September 2012 (UTC)

TOC junk

Is there a way to exclude the extra stuff (i.e. Kanji & question mark) from the table of contents? OneWeirdDude (talk) 23:49, 6 January 2009 (UTC)

Ko?!

Surely the lack of anything about Ko is a major omission...

I agree and have edited as such. Green0eggs (talk) 15:24, 2 December 2010 (UTC)

Thickness

The notion is so difficult to grasp for the kyu players because it is usually explained as it is explained here. The terms outward influence and thickness are confused. Black in the diagram has an outward influence, but both white and black are thick. White more so, because one can't play a kikashi against white position, while a kikashi against black position has won a lot of games by establishing shicho breakers. --93.73.19.163 (talk) 14:54, 20 September 2012 (UTC)

Thickness is really only interesting as a concept when it affects outward influence. When a group is shut in thickness considerations are subsumed in the life or death problem. In the example given whites thickness can be disregarded after you have accounted for the fact that white has 10pts of territory. Taemyr (talk) 14:06, 21 September 2012 (UTC)

This particular sequence is considered joseki because white is thicker, i.e. black needs two moves to make white reply and white has sente. This compensates for black's influence, though there is a small thinness in the black's shape. --93.73.19.163 (talk) 19:17, 21 September 2012 (UTC)

"Divine move" is probably not a Go term

This section is deceiving. I think someone read the manga Hikaru no Go, made a Divine move article, and it got merged into List of Go terms. kami no itte ("divine move") appears to be basically coined by the manga itself. Of course it literally means "divine move" so it's not surprising if it was used SOMEWHERE before the manga, but it's not a specific Go term. Searching in Japanese/English, everything seems to point back to Hikaru no Go. -SpuriousQ (talk) 05:40, 27 October 2013 (UTC)

This simply isn't true. 'Divine move' was used well before Hikaru no Go and refers to moves made in famous historical games.Coastside (talk) 05:29, 5 December 2020 (UTC)

suggestion

It would be nice when hovering over the board position it would highlight the term for that specific position. As far as I understand it this would be an Image map. 87.78.173.93 (talk) 15:50, 10 April 2014 (UTC)

Aji

The text says "The closest English one could use is 'latent potential.' " This strikes me as redundant, ugly, and pointless. "Taste" is accurate and meaningful.

Google Translate gives 潜在的な, senzai-teki-na for both "latent" and "potential." The noun "potential" translates as 電位, which merely moves the metaphor from the mouth to an electric wire, improving nothing.

The second sentence, "Bad aji is when dead stones or weaknesses in one's own formation carry a latent threat of compromising an existing area should the situation become ripe. " also strikes me as problematic. We have that superfluous "latent" again. A threat is a threat; a weakness is not a threat. It is a danger of being threatened. This may be what the writer wants to say, but it is not what is written here.

The last sentence, "Aji is different from a simple defect or weakness in that it can be exploited and/or repaired in multiple ways at multiple stages of the game and the best way or time is not immediately clear; hence the "aftertaste" metaphor" is at best idiosyncratic to the writer. I think it's plain wrong. Still, different people look at things differently. "Bad aji" and some "aftertaste metaphor" also seem to me personal to the article's writer. A Google search on "後味, 囲碁" brings up numerous references to feeling bad after losing, but nothing resembling what the article's writer seems to be reaching for, plausible though it be.

In the same vein, the distinction made seems to me false. All defects and weaknesses can be exploited or repaired at any time, hence a major part of the art of Go is the weighing of the relative saliencies of a variety of threats and weaknesses.

The word "taste" retains the air of savouring these relativities.

"Taste" is the correct translation.

99.231.114.245 (talk) 07:23, 25 October 2014 (UTC)

Disagree. "Taste" might be a perfect translation for the Japanese word. But, like many other Japanese translations it is way too abstract in English to convey the real meaning in go. I feel strongly that the usual words to describe aji are much, much better. "Taste" does not imply that dead stones might suddenly be very helpful later in a game. David Spector (talk) 11:43, 11 October 2017 (UTC)

Moku

I have seen "moku" used to mean "number of points", as in "I won by 10.5 moku". Apparently, it is a real Japanese term. David Spector (talk) 11:39, 11 October 2017 (UTC)

Additional terms

damezumari - shortage of liberties - a situation where playing check puts one's own attacking stones into check, allowing opponent to capture them first.

geta - net - a local capture technique.

shicho - ladder - isn't this discussed somewhere else in the Go articles? If so, add cross reference or relocate it here.

See Haruyama & Nagahara: Basic Techniques of Go, chapter on Tesuji for many other Go terms.

 — Preceding unsigned comment added by 209.159.232.121 (talk) 21:25, 10 August 2019 (UTC) 

undefined terms

Redundant section - got included twice. Admin please remove. Hedles (talk) 23:40, 21 February 2021 (UTC)

Which specific section was included twice? Happy to make the change if it hasn't been resolved already. Darigov Research (talk) 11:42, 21 March 2021 (UTC)

undefined terms

The terms "chain" and "group" are used, respectively, 3 and 23 times in the article without definition. For a more self-contained reference, it would help if they were defined even if they are not 'recognised' Go terms. Hedles (talk) 22:23, 21 February 2021 (UTC)

Do you (or anyone reading) have definitions for what a Chain is and what a Group is? Would be happy to add them if given a definition Darigov Research (talk) 11:43, 21 March 2021 (UTC)

Flashcards link

We wanted to learn all these terms in a flashcard format so we built one and made it freely available. Thought it would be helpful for anyone who wanted to learn the content of this glossary in a flashcard format like Anki to also be able to discover that they exist and have access to it from the source.

Was going to suggest it to be added in the external links section like the following but as it is linking to our own site, following the instructions of the Wikipedia guidelines, thought it would be best to leave this in the talk page for other contributors to see if it would be relevant or see if there was a better place/format to put it

• Flashcard version of the Wikipedia Glossary of Go terms in an Anki-readable format

Darigov Research (talk) 11:38, 21 March 2021 (UTC)

Seki vs Zugzwang

Responding to this revert by IOHANNVSVERVS. I don't have a good source for Seki being compared to Zugzwang. It's a comparison I've seen many times over the years, and always thought it was a helpful one. However, perhaps I've only ever seen it informally, as I can't seem to find it in more didactic material. The closest I found in a short search was the Zugzwang article at Sensei's Library which discusses the phenomenon of Zugzwang as something that can happen in no-pass-go, for situations that would be Seki for normal go. However, we don't even seem to have no-pass-go (or nimgo, conway go) on our Go variants article, so maybe even that is too tangential. Anyway, I do think it is useful to compare the two, but if you need a good source I haven't been able to find one, so I won't put it back. - Rainwarrior (talk) 01:51, 28 July 2023 (UTC)

I don't strongly disagree, just doesn't seem very similar to zugzwang in my opinion. IOHANNVSVERVS (talk) 06:17, 28 July 2023 (UTC)

I agree with IOHANNVSVERVS. Though it is a slightly similar idea, there are important differences. The one reference Rainwarrior found explicitly says: "Normally there is no Zugzwang in Go." It exists in chess because you cannot pass in chess. --seberle (talk) 20:02, 30 July 2023 (UTC)

I am not making any argument that it is a synonym. Zugzwang is not identical to Seki. That was never my point. I feel it's useful to make this comparison. If you understand Zugswang, Seki is the same situation but you can pass. If you understand Seki, Zugswang is the same situation but you have to move. Understanding of one reinforces the other, at least I've always felt so, and seen that expressed in many conversations in the past. That's my argument for including a comparison here. - Rainwarrior (talk) 20:20, 30 July 2023 (UTC)