Review - Chess Informant : Encyclopaedia of Chess Openings - Chess Book Review

The Encyclopedia of Chess Openings (or ECO) is a classification system for the opening moves in chess. It is presented as a five-volume book collection (now also a computer database) describing chess openings. The moves were taken from hundreds of thousands of games between masters, from published analysis in the Chess Informant since 1966, and then compiled by notable chess players. The main editor is Aleksandar MatanoviÄ. Both the ECO and the Chess Informant are published by the Serbian company Å ahovski Informator (Chess Informant). These openings are typically provided in an ECO table that concisely presents the best opening lines.

The books contain only a small amount of text, which is in eight languages. The bulk of the book consists of diagrams of positions and chess moves in International figurine algebraic notation, with special symbols for comments about moves (see Chess annotation symbols).

Instead of the traditional names for the openings, ECO has developed a coding system that has also been adopted by other chess publications. There are five main categories, "A" to "E", each of which is divided into 100 subcategories.

ECO codes generally only cover openings that are commonly seen at the master/grandmaster level of play and which have a significant body of high quality games to draw examples from. Openings such as the Latvian Gambit (1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 f5) and Grob's Attack (1.g4) are not given their own ECO code as in practice, they are almost never seen outside amateur-level play. These openings are all lumped under a single code such as E00 or A00.

ECO code is a registered trademark of Chess Informant.

Openings covered

Volume A: Flank openings

    English Opening
    Benoni Defense
    Dutch Defence
    Reti Opening
    Benko Gambit
    Old Indian Defense
    Bird's Opening
    Irregular openings, etc.

Volume B: Semi-Open Games other than the French Defense

    Sicilian Defence
    Caro-Kann Defence
    Pirc Defence
    Alekhine's Defence
    Modern Defense
    Scandinavian Defense, etc.

Volume C: Open Games and the French Defense

    Ruy Lopez
    French Defence
    Petrov's Defence
    Vienna Game
    Center Game
    King's Gambit
    Philidor Defence
    Italian (Giuoco Piano, Evans Gambit, Hungarian Defense, and Two Knights)
    Scotch Game
    Four Knights Game, etc.
    King's Pawn Opening, etc (covers unusual/rare 1. e4 openings such as the Elephant Gambit and Ponziani Opening).

Volume D: Closed Games and Semi-Closed Games

(including Grunfeld Defence but not other Indian Defenses)

    Queen's Gambit
        Accepted
        Declined (Slav, Orthodox, Tarrasch, Tartakower, Albin Countergambit, etc.)
    Grunfeld Defence
    Queen's Pawn Game, etc.