Nona

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Nona, Frans Morsch' first chess program written in 6502 assembly to ran on an Apple IIe. Nona had it's debut at the DOCCC 1983 with a respectful fourth place and 5 out of 8, losing from the established PK83, Chess 0.5X and Gambiet 83. Frans emphasized his commercial ambitions with a second place at the DOCCC 1984 behind Chess 0.5X, and specially after winning the amateur tournament at the WMCCC 1985 in Amsterdam, and short later the DOCCC 1985, where Nona became Dutch champion for the first time. At the WCCC 1986 in Cologne, Nona gained 3/5 after losing the first two rounds from Schach 2.7 and BCP.

=Mondial= In 1985, while already affiliated with Hegener & Glaser, and Nona commercialized as Mephisto Mondial, Frans ported Nona to Ed Schröder's faster interface code for the Mephisto hardware , and Ed, not competing with Rebel this year, was even mentioned as Nona's co-author for that 1985 tournament , and further acknowledged Frans did a better job than he did at that times. According to Jan Louwman, Nona aka Mondial had a selective layer of three plies performing a kind of Shannon Type B Strategy.

=Quest= Nona and Ed Schröder's Rebel were now the dominating aspirants for the Dutch title in the upcoming events, Nona won again in 1986, Rebel the DOCCC 1987 with runner-up Nona. In 1988, Nona won already under its new name Quest, at that year still a 6502 program, until Frans changed to Intel 8086 for the IBM PC. The 6502 version of Quest was further commercialized as 8 bit Sphinx by Newcrest Technology.

=Photos & Games=

HCC Days
Frans Morsch with Nona aka Mephisto Mondial, HCC days in Utrecht

DOCCC 1985
DOCCC 1985, Nona vs. Chess 0.5X [Event "DOCCC 1985"] [Site "Leiden NED"] [Date "1985.10.??"] [Round "?"] [White "Nona"] [Black "Chess 0.5X"] [Result "1-0"]

1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 e6 3.Nc3 Bb4 4.Qc2 d5 5.a3 Bxc3+ 6.Qxc3 Nc6 7.Bg5 dxc4 8.e3 O-O 9.Bxc4 Bd7 10.Nf3 h6 11.Bh4 g5 12.Bg3 Ne4 13.Qd3 Nxg3 14.hxg3 Kg7 15.O-O-O Ne7 16.Ne5 Ba4 17.b3 Bc6 18.Nxc6 Nxc6 19.Kb2 Qf6 20.Qe2 Rfd8 21.Ka2 a6 22.Rc1 Qe7 23.Rhd1 Na5 24.Bd3 e5 25.Qd2 Nc6 26.Be4 exd4 27.Bxc6 bxc6 28.exd4 Qf6 29.Rc3 Re8 30.Re3 Qd6 31.Qe1 Rxe3 32.Qxe3 Rb8 33.g4 Qd5 34.f3 a5 35.Qe5+ Kg6 36.Qxd5 cxd5 37.Rc1 Re8 38.Rxc7 Re2+ 39.Kb1 Rxg2 40.Rc5 Rf2 41.Rxa5 Rxf3 42.Kc2 Rf4 43.Kd3 Rxg4 44.Rxd5 f5 45.Rd6+ Kh5 46.a4 f4 47.a5 Rg3+ 48.Kc4 f3 49.Rf6 g4 50.a6 Rg2 51.b4 Rc2+ 52.Kb3 Rc7 53.b5 Rd7 54.b6 Kg5 55.b7 Kxf6 56.b8=Q f2 57.Qf4+ Ke7 58.Qxf2 Rd6 59.Qe2+ Re6 60.Qxe6+ Kxe6 61.a7 Kf5 62.a8=Q 1-0

WCCC 1986
WCCC 1986, Mark Taylor, Kevin O’Connell and David Levy, Cyrus 68K - Nona [Event "5th World Computer Chess Championship"] [Site "Cologne, Germany"] [Date "1986.06.15"] [Round "5"] [White "Nona"] [Black "Cyrus 68K"] [Result "1-0"]

1.d4 e6 2.e4 d5 3.Nc3 Bb4 4.e5 Ne7 5.Bd2 Nf5 6.Nf3 Be7 7.Bd3 Nc6 8.Be3 Nxe3 9.fxe3 Nb4 10.Be2 c5 11.O-O Nc6 12.Na4 c4 13.Nc3 Kf8 14.e4 Ke8 15.Rf2 h6 16.exd5 exd5 17.Qd2 Bf5 18.Nd1 Nb4 19.Ne3 Be4 20.b3 cxb3 21.axb3 h5 22.Ng5 Bxg5 23.Qxb4 Qe7 24.Bb5+ Kf8 25.Qxe7+ Kxe7 26.Re1 Ke6 27.c4 Raf8 28.cxd5+ Bxd5 29.Nxd5 Kxd5 30.e6 Be7 31.Rxf7 Rxf7 32.exf7 Bb4 33.Rd1 Rf8 34.Be2 h4 35.Bc4+ Kd6 36.Rf1 Bc3 37.Rf4 Rh8 38.f8=Q+ 1-0 Vlastimil Hort, Frans Morsch, Hans van der Zijden Hans-Joachim Kraas far right in Bobby vs Sun Phoenix

DOCCC 1986
DOCCC 1986, Winner Frans Morsch with Nona and Jaap van Oosterwijk Bruyn

DOCCC 1986, Nona - Rebel [Event "DOCCC 1985"] [Site "Leiden NED"] [Date "1986.10.??"] [Round "?"] [White "Nona"] [Black "Rebel"] [Result "1-0"]

1.d4 c6 2.e4 d5 3.exd5 cxd5 4.Bd3 Nc6 5.c3 Nf6 6.Bf4 g6 7.Nf3 Bg7 8.O-O O-O 9.Nbd2 Bg4 10.Re1 Qb6 11.Qb3 Qxb3 12.axb3 Nh5 13.Bg5 f6 14.Be3 e5 15.dxe5 fxe5 16.Bc5 Rfe8 17.Bb5 a6 18.Bxc6 bxc6 19.h3 Bd7 20.Bd6 e4 21.Nd4 Bh6 22.Nf1 Nf4 23.Reb1 Nd3 24.b4 Bg7 25.Ne3 Bxd4 26.cxd4 Re6 27.Bc5 Rf6 28.Rf1 Nxb2 29.b5 a5 30.Bb4 a4 31.b6 Re6 32.b7 Rb8 33.Rfb1 Nc4 34.Nxc4 dxc4 35.Bd2 Rf6 36.Rxa4 Bf5 37.Ra8 Rff8 38.Rxb8 Rxb8 39.Rb6 e3 40.Bxe3 c3 41.f3 c2 42.Kf2 h6 43.Bxh6 Bd3 44.Bf4 Kf7 45.Ke1 g5 46.Bxg5 Kg6 47.h4 Bb5 48.d5 c1=Q+ 49.Bxc1 Kf5 50.Kf2 Ke5 51.g3 Kxd5 52.Bf4 1-0

1987
DOCCC 1987: Rebel - Nona [Event "DOCCC 1987"] [Site "Leiden NED"] [Date "1987.10.??"] [Round "?"] [White "Rebel"] [Black "Nona"] [Result "1-0"]

1.d4 e6 2.c4 Nf6 3.Nc3 d5 4.Bg5 Be7 5.e3 O-O 6.Nf3 Nbd7 7.Bd3 c5 8.O-O dxc4 9.Bxc4 cxd4 10.exd4 Nb6 11.Bb3 Nfd5 12.Bxe7 Qxe7 13.Re1 Nxc3 14.bxc3 Bd7 15.c4 Rad8 16.Qc2 Qf6 17.Ne5 Bc6 18.Rad1 Qh4 19.Nxc6 bxc6 20.g3 Qe7 21.d5 cxd5 22.cxd5 e5 23.f4 Nd7 24.Qc7 Rc8 25.Qxa7 Qd6 26.fxe5 Nxe5 27.Re3 Rfd8 28.Rde1 Ra8 29.Qd4 f6 30.Rc3 Ra6 31.Rf1 Nf7 32.Rfc1 Ne5 33.Kh1 Raa8 34.Rc7 Nf7 35.Qg4 Rf8 36.Qe6 Rae8 37.Qxd6 Nxd6 38.Rd7 Nb5 39.Rc5 Re1+ 40.Kg2 Nd4 41.Rcc7 Re2+ 42.Kh3 Nf5 43.g4 Re3+ 44.Kg2 Nh4+ 45.Kf2 Rf3+ 46.Kg1 1-0

=See also=
 * Mephisto Mondial
 * Mythology
 * Nona, the Chess-Playing Lego Robot
 * Quest

=Publications=
 * Jaap van Oosterwijk Bruyn (1985). The Dutch Computer-Chess Championship 1985 - Nona Prima Donna. ICCA Journal, Vol. 8, No. 4
 * Jan Louwman (1985). Mephisto Mondial, volledige uitvoering en goedkoop. Computerschaak, pagina 2 (Dutch)
 * Gerhard Piel (1985). Interview mit Manfred Hegener. (pdf) Erwerbsquelle: 10-1985, Zeitschrift Schachcomputer (Herausgeber Florian Piel), Edition 20, S. 6-8, Gerhard Piel: Neue Programme von neuen Programmierern. (German) hosted by Hein Veldhuis
 * Jaap van Oosterwijk Bruyn (1986). Nona retains her Title. ICCA Journal, Vol. 9, No. 3

=Forum Posts=
 * Re: assembly--not really that fast by Ed Schröder, CCC, January 15, 2002
 * Re: Just another conspiracy theory by Eelco de Groot, CCC, February 19, 2010
 * Question for Ed Schröder about Nona by Gerd Isenberg, CCC, April 03, 2012

=External Links=
 * Nona's ICGA Tournaments
 * Dedicated chess computers - Home of the Dutch Rebel by Ed Schröder
 * Nona (disambiguation) from Wikipedia
 * Nona (mythology) from Wikipedia
 * Nona Gaprindashvili from Wikipedia
 * Nona Gaprindashvili – the legendary fifth world champion from ChessBase news, May 03, 2006

=References=

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