Fritz8

Does anyone know how to use Fritz 8 for openings?

Your question is vague.

Since I posted, I got the Training Mode to work.  Fritz 8 does not provide any additional moves for King's Gambit when I click on "detailed."  It only displays the first moves (1. e4 e5 2. f4) From the initial moves provided by Fritz, I got into a game with Fritz and asked the coach to suggest moves.

The other method I could use is to work with a third-party reference and play the game with those moves. Later, when my skill with Fritz improves, I can record the moves and then play them in a game.

Does this sound correct to you?

What

I've really never spent any time learning openings, so I guess I'm not the best person to give advice here. But I'll make a couple of comments anyway.

I guess one approach would be to find some other opening training software that has more capability than the Fritz Opening Trainer (FOT). Maybe something like an old version of Chess Position Trainer, if you're worried about compatibility with Windows XP. (There are ways of obtaining these older freeware versions.) The downside of that is that it's another complicated piece of software that you'd have to learn.

Another approach would be to modify the FOT database. While I haven't actually done it, you can add variations to the FOT. The FOT is actually just a regular Chessbase-format database of openings. (On my PC, the database is located in the " C:\Program Files (x86)\ChessBase\Training" folder. There are 11 files with the name "Openings.xxx", where xxx are various file extensions like .cbh, .cba, .ini, etc.) You'd have to be proficient at working with Chessbase databases, and you'd definitely want to back up the original Fritz training database folder so that you could reload the original folder if you screwed something up.

And I guess there's always a third approach of getting a good book of general openings and just reading that.

Thanks for the reply.

I stayed with the King's Gambit because it had only three pawn moves.  This gave me a way to learn how Fritz operates.  I did eventually use other openings, where Fritz provided more moves to learn.

After over one year getting familiar with Fritz, I am not about to switch to another, and more complex, software package.    Fritz 8 software has fewer "bells and whistles" than newer products and is easier to understand at my level.  I am almost at the stage when I can record training positions and use them for practice.  For now, it looks like I am progressing in the correct manner.  

Yeah, I didn't really think you'd want to tackle another software program, but I just mentioned it as a possible option. If you're happy with Fritz's training mode, that's great.

Thanks for the info.  Eventually, I'll get to know at least some simple functions of Fritz.