January 2012 grading list

General discussions about ratings.
Bill Porter
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Re: January 2012 grading list

Post by Bill Porter » Sat Apr 07, 2012 8:15 pm

Roger de Coverly wrote:Although if you only had 360k diskettes and a processor that ran at 10 mHz, the amount of data you could process was limited.
I was still using an abacus at that time as it was about 100 times faster than my state of the art 10mHz processor.....

Paul Dupré
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Re: January 2012 grading list

Post by Paul Dupré » Thu Apr 26, 2012 9:32 pm

Alex Holowczak wrote:
Paul Dupré wrote:How about this one - Grandmaster Bogdan Lalic - he's famous ffs, how can graders make this error.
Extract from my own personal database
160447J LALIC BOGDAN 236
161854E LALIC BOGDAN 253
163145H LALIC BOGDAN 233
160511C Lalic, Bogdan 241 <= still used today, obviously
In 1994, it would have been the same error as above. He was new to the system and played in different events. Graders had no way of checking up whether he had played anywhere else before he played in their events. And so, four Bogdans appeared in the grading list. In the days before a monthly updating masterlist that was distributed to people in an electronic form, I would imagine this could easily happen.

I imagine 1994 was still the era of doing grading by Committee on bits of paper too. So anything could have happened...
Hogwash!!!

I have in front of me the very first BCF National Grading List dated 1988. Produced using a new Dell computer installed at the offices in St. Leonards.

I'm sure there are many mistakes, however I doubt anyone is in this grading list 4 times. There must have been one person responsible for the grading list and should have spotted four Bogdan Lalic's with extremely high grades.
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Roger de Coverly
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Re: January 2012 grading list

Post by Roger de Coverly » Thu Apr 26, 2012 9:46 pm

Paul Dupré wrote:I'm sure there are many mistakes, however I doubt anyone is in this grading list 4 times. There must have been one person responsible for the grading list and should have spotted four Bogdan Lalic's with extremely high grades.
You would/might spot it if it was in the published list. If because there were so many of them, only one of them had enough games to be published, then you wouldn't. You've probably only got 20 MB to play with, so scope for sophisticated interrogation tools is limited. For that matter, the grading list was always right up against time deadlines. Do you not recall the list that managed to leave half the season out one year? It wasn't until relatively recently and the widespread use of email, that the graders have managed to centrally coordinate the allocation of codes.

(edit) If you look up the combination of Lalic and (include) ungraded, there's only one Bogdan, but two Peters. It looks as if he played in a Surrey rapid event one year and EPSCA events the next, with two different codes been issued. (/edit)

Paul Dupré
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Re: January 2012 grading list

Post by Paul Dupré » Thu Apr 26, 2012 10:11 pm

Roger de Coverly wrote: (edit) If you look up the combination of Lalic and (include) ungraded, there's only one Bogdan, but two Peters. It looks as if he played in a Surrey rapid event one year and EPSCA events the next, with two different codes been issued. (/edit)
2002 Peter Lalic
2004 Peter Buckley => Peter Lalic again later

Easy mistake to make - one person, two names.

Not easy mistake one person, one name, four grading codes.
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Alex Holowczak
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Re: January 2012 grading list

Post by Alex Holowczak » Thu Apr 26, 2012 11:02 pm

Paul Dupré wrote:Not easy mistake one person, one name, four grading codes.
I can't remember whether I mentioned this above, and am too lazy to look, but about 10 years ago, one localish junior to me with a fairly common surname managed to have seven grading codes, by virtue of playing all over the country...

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IM Jack Rudd
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Re: January 2012 grading list

Post by IM Jack Rudd » Thu Apr 26, 2012 11:16 pm

Alex Holowczak wrote: I can't remember whether I mentioned this above, and am too lazy to look, but about 10 years ago, one localish junior to me with a fairly common surname managed to have seven grading codes, by virtue of playing all over the country...
You did, on the previous page.

Paul Dupré
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Re: January 2012 grading list

Post by Paul Dupré » Fri Apr 27, 2012 12:59 pm

Alex Holowczak wrote: A localish junior who made his first foray into graded chess in 2002 travelled up and down the country. Most of his games were done by Bundles, even though Howellian system of just reporting individual results had been in place for at least 3 years by then. He had a fairly everyman name; it wasn't Smith, but it wasn't something odd like Holowczak either. The individual in question proceeded to have seven unique grading references in the end of season grading list! :roll:

All of this was not unreasonable in the era when a new player playing congresses all over the country, and no local organisers had any knowledge of a grading reference for him, or any electronic Checker to check him against. But this was as recent as 10 years ago!
Give me his name and I can check. Stop giving half answers - either give away everything or keep quiet.
Any postings on here represent the truth, and nothing but the truth, so help me God,
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Alex Holowczak
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Re: January 2012 grading list

Post by Alex Holowczak » Fri Apr 27, 2012 1:40 pm

Paul Dupré wrote:
Alex Holowczak wrote: A localish junior who made his first foray into graded chess in 2002 travelled up and down the country. Most of his games were done by Bundles, even though Howellian system of just reporting individual results had been in place for at least 3 years by then. He had a fairly everyman name; it wasn't Smith, but it wasn't something odd like Holowczak either. The individual in question proceeded to have seven unique grading references in the end of season grading list! :roll:

All of this was not unreasonable in the era when a new player playing congresses all over the country, and no local organisers had any knowledge of a grading reference for him, or any electronic Checker to check him against. But this was as recent as 10 years ago!
Give me his name and I can check. Stop giving half answers - either give away everything or keep quiet.
Why do you need to check? I know what I'm saying is true, because I was shown a copy of the masterlist in which it happened. :lol:

Paul Dupré
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Re: January 2012 grading list

Post by Paul Dupré » Fri Apr 27, 2012 2:28 pm

Alex Holowczak wrote:
Paul Dupré wrote:
Alex Holowczak wrote: A localish junior who made his first foray into graded chess in 2002 travelled up and down the country. Most of his games were done by Bundles, even though Howellian system of just reporting individual results had been in place for at least 3 years by then. He had a fairly everyman name; it wasn't Smith, but it wasn't something odd like Holowczak either. The individual in question proceeded to have seven unique grading references in the end of season grading list! :roll:

All of this was not unreasonable in the era when a new player playing congresses all over the country, and no local organisers had any knowledge of a grading reference for him, or any electronic Checker to check him against. But this was as recent as 10 years ago!
Give me his name and I can check. Stop giving half answers - either give away everything or keep quiet.
Why do you need to check? I know what I'm saying is true, because I was shown a copy of the masterlist in which it happened. :lol:
Because you don't seem to be an honest guy. What I hate is bla bla bla without actually saying anything.

Just put up, or shut up.
Any postings on here represent the truth, and nothing but the truth, so help me God,
...and by the way the world is flat.

Alex Holowczak
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Re: January 2012 grading list

Post by Alex Holowczak » Fri Apr 27, 2012 2:53 pm

Paul Dupré wrote:Because you don't seem to be an honest guy. What I hate is bla bla bla without actually saying anything.

Just put up, or shut up.
Charming. :lol:

Roger de Coverly
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Re: January 2012 grading list

Post by Roger de Coverly » Fri Apr 27, 2012 3:13 pm

Alex Holowczak wrote: I can't remember whether I mentioned this above, and am too lazy to look, but about 10 years ago, one localish junior to me with a fairly common surname managed to have seven grading codes, by virtue of playing all over the country...
When Chris Majer was first appointed as Director (as it then was) of Grading around 10 years ago, his mandate was to sort out the problems and delays which had bedevilled the grading system for a number of years. One of his immediate conclusions was that the integrity of the system, to say nothing of its speed of processing was handicapped by a local system of allocating of new codes. As a consequence, he took steps to eliminate the potential duplications at source by centralising their allocation. It's a very obvious reform once you think about it, but the system had been designed shortly before it became normal to assume email and it relied on laborious merging of records by reference to name and date of birth.

Alex Holowczak
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Re: January 2012 grading list

Post by Alex Holowczak » Fri Apr 27, 2012 3:20 pm

Roger de Coverly wrote:
Alex Holowczak wrote: I can't remember whether I mentioned this above, and am too lazy to look, but about 10 years ago, one localish junior to me with a fairly common surname managed to have seven grading codes, by virtue of playing all over the country...
When Chris Majer was first appointed as Director (as it then was) of Grading around 10 years ago, his mandate was to sort out the problems and delays which had bedevilled the grading system for a number of years. One of his immediate conclusions was that the integrity of the system, to say nothing of its speed of processing was handicapped by a local system of allocating of new codes. As a consequence, he took steps to eliminate the potential duplications at source by centralising their allocation. It's a very obvious reform once you think about it, but the system had been designed shortly before it became normal to assume email and it relied on laborious merging of records by reference to name and date of birth.
This was part of the story I was told that led to the above anecdote. I'm astonished that grading worked at all in those days, to be honest.

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Carl Hibbard
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Re: January 2012 grading list

Post by Carl Hibbard » Fri Apr 27, 2012 3:41 pm

Paul Dupré wrote:Just put up, or shut up.
Not needed please try to remain polite in your postings :!:
Cheers
Carl Hibbard

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