Revolutionary! – Go Books Review

To put it simply: if you play Go, you want this app. Because if you play Go, you probably have a library of Go books, most of which just sit gathering dust. The problem with Go books is that they feature diagrams with large numbers of moves on each diagram. If the number of moves is more than about 5 (which is very common), then playing over the moves in your head is very difficult, and setting up a board and stones is worse because you would usually have to set up dozens of stones in just the right places. Go Books is a book-reading app for Go Books. In addition to letting you read Go books, this app makes the diagrams active, so you can play them through one stone at a time while reading the book. I can’t emphasize enough how much of a difference this makes; now I can go through my Go books and actually understand what is being played out on a move-by-move basis. It’s better on the iPad but works perfectly well on the iPhone too (would that there was a native Mac version — a man can dream…). In addition, there are tons of great Go books available, from older classics (some out of print!) to books that have just been published. The author of this app, Anders Kierulf, is also the author of the excellent SmartGo program (called SmartGo Kifu on the iPhone/iPad, and yes, you want that one too). Both programs are of impeccable quality; I can’t remember ever finding a bug in either one. and both are under active development. Even though SmartGo is great, it is Go Books (this app) which I think will have a really transformative effect on the Go community. I can’t recommend this highly enough to Go fans.
Review by chessgodzilla on Go Books.