Can you tell if a player is using a db / chess program?

So you can use the opening explorer on this site but not the games database?

Can you just play games where the starting position is the end of the opening book?

Yes, I'm a "patzer". When I breath the thin air of your lofty rating, maybe I can follow grandmaster games to 25 moves

Learning openings is dangerous as it leads to playing by rote. The brain turns off and the memory takes over. Even the computer ceases to think and replies automatically. This is not chess its copy-cating the past. Chess starts when you begine to think about your moves.

Boosting ratings by fake accounts and thrown games or by computer analysis of positions seems self-defeating to me and that is why my hunch is that it is not common except at very high rating levels (2200+). 

Wouldn't the perpetrator just end up playing opponents above his league and soon he would never be able to win a game at his level without cheating?  Then he would have to keep his rating low enough so as not to raise suspicion, but it would still be too high for him to play a game with any chance of winning honestly.  So he would be stuck making engine moves, but still throwing every second game so as to keep his rating low enough to avoid exposure.  This would get boring very quickly for anyone.

I cannot picture anyone staying interested enough at making engine moves to be a frequent online chess player.  He would get bored at 2200, and push for a higher rating so as to challenge the top dogs, and then he would get busted and start again.

Perhaps I'm a little nieve, having just discovered chess.com. However, it seems to me that to use a chess engine of some kind somewhat defeats the enjoyment of the game. Is not the point to get some kind of self satisfaction out of your own achievement? How do you get that if you use an engine of some kind?

It is a shame if people do use an assistant of some kind on the site, as anyone can play a computer at any time. The thrill has to be in tackling a human opponent who is able to react unexpectedly at times.

It is interesting to note your tactics observations around the 1500 mark. OK, so I'm not 1500, however, my tactics are considerably lower than my normal score (at the moment). I know I'm not using an assistant of any kind, but my chess is so erratic that the time element of the tactics always gets me.

I like the site though, and hope to be able to re-kindle my enjoyment of the game.

@swmike - the time element gets me, too!  People (such as myself) often have several hundred rating points of difference between their "Online" and "Live" ratings. 

This can help identify a weakness.  For me, my ratings difference shows my weakness at "playing by feel" - it shows I have to painstakingly calculate out a variation in my head if I want to play a decent game.

The solution is obviously to play more chess! Haha!

Hmmm? Not really. According to admin somewhere, AFAIK, use of engine is more common in higher level, and that is understandable. Not because you use engine so your rating is higher but because at higher level engine can be useful to exercise analyzing moves. You do have advantage to study positions using engine. And it is not boring at all.

You can gain a deep knowledge of your opening by playing online using engine. You will benefit from it when you play OTB. Sad, isn't it?

@yusuf... I see your point, and it is sad.  Someone (who is already reasonably high level) might use the engine consistently for a few moves per game and we would never know... and he would not get bored and might do it for a long time, especially if he had no sense of honour.

What the hell are you talking about? How did I fail to notice anything about you, when I didn't even notice you existed? You're pretty kooky.

@ IMDeviate & GlennBK:

The good advice I often receive as an adult beginner is to just learn solid opening principles (control the center, develop, gain tempi, etc.), and only when those principles are solid (say in a year or so), I should go on to learn the theory of specific openings that suit my playstyle.

IMDeviate, you are right in that we stand on the shoulders of giants and should learn from them.

Once I played a 14 years old girl from the best chess club around. Her trainer asked me to open up with 1.e4. And we went the Sicilian Dragon route. We follow "book moves" up until the famous rook sacrifice (exchange with the Knight) at c3. I don't remember what move number is that but I think it is quite deep. Can you imagine a little girl knows such variation? She lost it after I followed Kasparov playing style to leave my King alone only protected by a Knight.

On another game I achieved similar Dragon position but with different route and she was very confused. Juniors can remember very long variation (even better than adults most of the time) but when faced with modern opening (b3/b6/etc), even junior world champion cannot handle it well.

A nice theory but opening lines are often being abandoned by masters and some are being rehabilitated. What was believed to be unsound in 1980 has now been found to be sound and vise versa.

There is no substitute for thought at every stage, especially for players like myself who are average. If I think for myself then I'm on firm ground only someone who thinks more clearly will out wit me and that as it should be.

I dont use a database, what would be the point of that? chess is meant to be fun and involve thinking, and if i used a computer to play chess it would take all of the fun out of it.

To bluetrane: I am not sure of the rule, but for me personally, I don't need to consult opening books, these I studied well in my first 10 years of my 36 years of playing the game. Middlegame books interesting but I have always been a strong middlegame player. My main weakness, endgame...in six years, I might have solved my problem. So if I consult any book these days, it would be an endgame book, something I should have done right from the start, but found it so boring I would throw the book to the otherside of the room. Using a book on site, I don't...your given perhaps 15-30 mins to evaluate a position, inwhich case your wasting time if you don't have any idea of how to tackle the position. Once the answer to the position is given and you didn't get it right...then it is the position you have to learn.

Well i just joined and i hadnt even thought about this, i guess it wouldnt matter to me, since practice is practice, if they wanna cheat, thats them :/

There are a lot of players that know lines of the Najdorf Sicilian (also the KID) 20+ moves deep.  Its not hard to believe that once in a while two of them play each other.

http://chessdb.sourceforge.net/    http://www.chessbase.com/download/download2.asp

chess is all about fun and thinkng finding your wakest point. the first time i played was in 1994 at sec school but then stopped about 6 years ago until december 2011.i prefer to learn my mistakes through playing it's fun  

Haing read down to a few friendly arguments, I find I am an odd breed.

Used to be a memorizing fool for too long, but enjoyed the game enough to set down to actually LEARN WHY moves are made.

Seat of my pants playing is a losing idea because I have discovered that the opponent is going to try to win.

I haven't figured out why...but, to make my opponent happy, I, too, shall play to win.

I use an accelerated dragon.

I like it, I'm comfortable with it.

If a d4 comes my way, I try to finangle it INTO the sicilian, and succeed a few times.

Do I play brilliantly?

HA!

I have lost my queen in so many games I can't even stop laughing at myself! I blunder and plod about...

But I learn, too.

I have a fair amount of fight in me, and now, it's me.

But...computers?

Dang! I watched kingscrusher get stepped on in a five minute game by something someone determined was a program. He laughed it off (I like that guy!) but the nagging cloud will be there for me.

So, (getting back to differences in ratings) as a guest player at chessworldnet I only got two rated games to start with, and accidently did a nine move win first game, and held good second game and came out with a 2149 rating.

As I mentioned before, I lose Q, I do blunder with pizzazz!

MAYBE, if i sit and concentrate on a game, I can muster 1500? I am nonviolent, but the closest analogy I can think of is, my knife isn't sharp, but, if I get in the right places, it's gonna hurt.

But, as a lower player, I have seen some amazing things. A Knight dance out from its original post, come all the way around the board and then snatch up a Bishop that had no active play on the board.

THAT wasn't a computer.

THAT was a show off, and man alive, that player is good.

BUT

...how can I spot a computer having its way with me?

Or...can I?

It's quite easy to at least match and defend pieces early on in the game...unless you make some error...but early on...all these different openings sure they can lead to your doom...but early on I kind of feel that move for move it's possible to attack and defend with more or less equal level to your opponent...as you say, after the opening period is when things can start to get hairy...