John Roycroft

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[ John Roycroft, 1988 [1] Arthur John Roycroft, (born July 25, 1929)

an English chess endgame study composer, international judge, and author. He is co-founder and member of the Chess Endgame Study Circle, founded on March 16, 1965, publishing the studies magazine End Game (EG) [2] . Roycroft was its publisher for the first 102 issues, from July 1965 until 1991. Since then, the Dutch-Flemish ARVES, the Alexander Rueb Vereniging voor Schaakeindspelstudie [3] has been publisher, but Roycroft stayed as editor-in-chief until 2007, superseded by Harold van der Heijden [4]. Roycroft’s adaptation of the Guy– Blandford code in the 70s resulted in the GBR code, an efficient way to index any chess position, in particular endgame studies [5].

Selected Publications#

[8]

1970 …#

• John Roycroft (1972). Test tube chess. Stackpole Books

1980 …#

• John Roycroft (1981). The Chess Endgame Study. Dover Publications
• John Roycroft (1983). A Prophecy Fulfilled. EG, Vol. V, No. 74
• John Roycroft (1984). The GBR code. ICCA Journal, Vol. 7, No. 1 [9]
• John Roycroft (1984). Two Bishops against Knight. EG, Vol. 5, No. 75
• John Roycroft (1984). A Proposed Revision of the ‘50-Move Rule’. ICCA Journal, Vol. 7, No. 3
• John Roycroft (1985). Chess-Endgame Data-Base`Oracles’: Necessary and Desirable Features. ICCA Journal, Vol. 8, No. 2
• John Roycroft, Ken Thompson (1986). Queen and Pawn on a2 against Queen. Chess Endgame Consultants and Publishers, London
• John Roycroft, Ken Thompson (1986). Queen and Pawn on a6 against Queen. Chess Endgame Consultants and Publishers, London
• John Roycroft, Ken Thompson (1986). Queen and Pawn on b7 against Queen. Chess Endgame Consultants and Publishers, London
• Jaap van den Herik (1986). Roycroft’s 5-Man Chess Endgame Series. ICCA Journal, Vol. 9, No. 3
• John Roycroft (1987). Expert Against Oracle. Machine Intelligence 11
• John Roycroft (1987). The Experimental Positions of Ideas in Knowledge Synthesis. ICCA Journal, Vol. 10, No. 2
• John Roycroft (1989). The Computer is at it again - Interfering with the Endgame! Britisch Chess Magazine, Vol. 109, No. 10

1990 …#

• John Roycroft (1990). How to Treat Endgame Databases. ICCA Journal, Vol. 13, No. 2
• John Roycroft (1990). Identifying Three Types of Zugzwang. ICCA Journal, Vol. 13, No. 4
• John Roycroft (1991). A Postscript to the Computer’s Involvement. Britisch Chess Magazine, Vol. 111, No. 2
• John Roycroft (1991). A Side-Effect of new Database Knowledge. ICCA Journal, Vol. 14, No. 3
• John Roycroft (1991). A Use for Endgame Databases? ICCA Journal, Vol. 14, No. 4
• John Roycroft, Don Beal (1991). To Make Dumb Endgame Databases Speak. Advances in Computer Chess 6
• Richard K. Guy, John Roycroft, Kenneth Solja (1996). Richard Guy’s Chess Endgame Studies. Prime Actions

External Links#

• John Roycroft from Wikipedia
• John Roycroft | LinkedIn
• Chess Composers | Arthur John Roycroft
• EG issues 1-152

References#

1. ↑ John Roycroft in the Elbe Sandstone Mountains ( Saxony), during a trip of the participants of a chess course held 1988 in Dresden. Photo by Rainer Staudte, Wikimedia Commons
2. ↑ EG issues 1-152
3. ↑ Alexander Rueb Vereniging voor SchaakEindspelStudie - Dutch-Flemish Association for Endgame Study
4. ↑ EG (magazine) from Wikipedia
5. ↑ John Roycroft (1984). The GBR code. ICCA Journal, Vol. 7, No. 1
6. ↑ John Roycroft from Wikipedia
7. ↑ Jaap van den Herik (1986). Roycroft’s 5-Man Chess Endgame Series. ICCA Journal, Vol. 9, No. 3
8. ↑ ICGA Reference Database
9. ↑ GBR code from Wikipedia

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