psgo_emitter is a (Windows) console utility to create go diagrams for go life-and-death problems (tsumego).

Requirements

• Unless you are using pre-built executable, you'll need Python 3 and asciimatics package.

• I recommend to use in a console window some font with good unicode support; "DejaVu Sans Mono" is what I am using (but search for "ascii").

• LaTeX and psgo package to use the resulting files. I recommend to use MiKTeX distribution unless you know what you are doing.

Limitations and/or TODOs

• NO UNDO

• Only positions in the bottom left corner are supported.

• Nothing like marks, etc. Just black and white stones. Numbered stones in solution diagrams.

• Maximum 9 numbered stones per solution diagram.

Examples of the result

LaTeX code emitted

For the problem:

    \begin{psgopartialboard}{(1,1)(8,6)}
            \stone{black}{b}{3}
            \stone{black}{d}{3}
            \stone{black}{b}{4}
            \stone{white}{d}{5}
            \stone{white}{g}{2}
            \stone{black}{d}{2}
            \stone{white}{b}{5}
            \stone{white}{c}{4}
            \stone{white}{e}{4}
            \stone{white}{e}{3}
            \stone{white}{e}{2}
            \stone{black}{e}{1}
    \end{psgopartialboard}

For the solution:

    \begin{psgopartialboard}{(1,1)(8,6)}
            \stone{black}{b}{3}
            \stone[\marklb{1}]{black}{a}{2}
            \stone{black}{d}{3}
            \stone{black}{b}{4}
            \stone[\marklb{8}]{white}{f}{1}
            \stone[\marklb{6}]{white}{d}{1}
            \stone{white}{e}{2}
            \stone{white}{g}{2}
            \stone{black}{d}{2}
            \stone{white}{b}{5}
            \stone[\marklb{7}]{black}{b}{2}
            \stone[\marklb{9}]{black}{a}{1}
            \stone{white}{c}{4}
            \stone[\marklb{4}]{white}{c}{2}
            \stone{white}{e}{4}
            \stone[\marklb{5}]{black}{c}{3}
            \stone{white}{e}{3}
            \stone[\marklb{2}]{white}{b}{1}
            \stone{white}{d}{5}
            \stone[\marklb{3}]{black}{a}{4}
            \stone{black}{e}{1}
    \end{psgopartialboard}

Result after running LaTeX

Usage

Run the program from a console window.

The program accepts two optional arguments:

• the common part of file names to write (-[sequential number].tex will be added to it. By default the files will be written in the current directory, with the names YYYY-mm-dd-HH-MM-problem-[sequential number].tex where YYYY-mm-dd-HH-MM is the date and time when the program was started.
• the first sequential number to use; 1 by default.

User guide

THERE IS NO UNDO AT ALL

UI introduction

After you run the program, you will see a window. On top it displays the file name you are working on. On the bottom you see status line, which consists of

• mode indicator (normal, paint, erase or numbers)
• current chosen colour (black or white; initially black)
• message line (here you will see informational messages, warnings and errors)

Above the status line you see the bottom left corner of a go board. The cursor (denoted with square brackets, [ ]) shows the currently selected point.

If the board looks bad it probably means that your font does not have (wide enough) unicode support. Press d to switch to ascii display mode (press it again to go back to unicode mode).

To exit the program press Q (notice the uppercase).

Setting up the main position

Moving around and adding stones in normal mode

The selected point can be moved using arrow keys; the displayed corner of the board will resize dynamically. To add the stone of currently selected colour, press space. To change the currently selected colour, press x or s (s not only changes the currently selected colour, but also changes the colour of the stone at selected point; x does not touch the stoses). To remove the stone, press space on it again.

Paint and erase modes

In paint mode (to turn it on, press p) the stones with selected colour are immediately added to the board when you move the cursor. In erase mode (hotkey is e) the stones are removed from the board when you move the cursor. To go back to normal mode, press n. To cycle through the modes press m (I have no idea why you may want to do that, though).

Solutions

Solution support is very limited. Basically, "solution" is the main position with few (no more than 9) numbered stones added. For one main position you may have multiple solutions.

Solution branches

To add a solution to the main position, press A. The number of solution will be displayed just below the top line of the screen, and the mode will be changed to "numbers".

To add more solution branches, press A again. To cycle between main position and solution branches, use N for the next branch and P for the previous one. To delete the current solution branch, press D.

Adding stones to solutions

You can still move around with the arrows, but the procedure of adding the stones is different. You cannot add non-numbered stones in solution branch; to add a numbered stone press a digit from 1 to 9. The white stones are denoted by yellow digits, and the black one by blue digits.

To remove the numbered stone, press 0. When working on solution branch, you cannot touch normal (non-numbered) stones; however, you can add numbered stone on top of a normal one. When you add a numbered stone, the currently selected colour is automatically changed: if you press 1 and then 2, the added stones will be of different colour.

To change:

• Colour of numbered stone under the cursor: press space
• Currently selected colour: press x
• Currently seceted colour and update the colour of numbered stone under the cursor: press s

Export options

Clipboard

To copy the TeX code for the current solution branch to the Windows clipboard, press c.

Write files

To write the main position and solution positions for all solution branches to files, press w. The files for problems are named sequentially; solution files have added -sol-[solution number].

Misc

To clear the board and start anew, press C (you want to do this after writing files to move to the next problem).

Using LaTeX

See some skeleton LaTeX code in misc/.