I am a semi-beginner, but it would be helpful to the group if you don't limit your answers to just "beginner problems". If I'm lucky, this thread will serve as a resource for many. I can do a lot of legwork (probably slowly, but I'm game).

In this thread, I'm only interested in online resources or apps. I have a few problem books, and use them sometimes, but a computer-assisted list of problems is easier to follow, and offers some conveniences over a problem book. Even a cursory search yields a few obvious resources, but none of these are what I'd call excellent. Perhaps we can make them so. I'll give an example of a site that I consider excellent at the end. I assume there are more out there.


1. Sensei's "Go On The Internet" page. This is good (I haven't followed all the links yet), but, inevitably out of date, with broken links and other issues. With enough help in this thread, I can maybe update that page, so that it becomes the go-to resource for everyone.
2. Threads on here, like this one. I've done a bit of searching here, and can do more. Again, there is valuable info, but it needs investigation and collation. I'll try to do more collation of that kind of information over the upcoming weeks.
3. Phone apps. I'm aware that many Go resources have moved to phones and tablets as apps. Again, it's all good, and I'm not opposed to paying for quality in that realm (free is also good ). But having some advice from those who have used those apps, nicely compiled all in one place, would be ideal. If you recommend something, please give us a few words about what is good and bad. Again, I can facilitate creating a list of apps, but will need help from others on the contents. I don't have nearly enough time to try them all.
4. SGF's. If there are places to get problems as SGF's, either paid or for free, let us know.
5. Anything I've missed?


Now, to illustrate what I think is a good example, I recently stumbled on a bunch of life/death problems on the WBaduk (previous, CyberOro) site. For those who haven't heard of it, this is a large (free) Korean go server site for China, Japan, and Korea (along with ROW). Here's how to get to the problems (which are mostly life and death, I think):

1. Go to the WBaduk site and download the app. Java required.
2. Start the app and log in (free account required).
3. You'll see an icon labeled "Problem" on the right-hand side, but you can't get there without logging on to a specific server. To log onto a server, click on the Server link at the top right, double-click on one of the 7 servers and login in again with your account. The list of active games on that server will appear. if you don't feel like getting invited to games, click on "Setting" at the top, go to the Invitation tab, select "Ignore all invitations" and OK out.
4. Now click on the Problem icon on the right, and you'll get to the problems. There is one dropdown for difficulty, and another that lets you choose to see all problems, or only the ones that you haven't already solved. The ability to come back later and pick up right where you stopped is a big convenience.

These problems are nicely implemented and, while they don't have any real explanations, it's easy to get started and blast through a bunch of problems. As mentioned, the site remembers where you left off for next time. It's a major resource for a beginner (and hopefully for more advanced players too). If there were more sites like this one, we'd be very lucky. Here's a list of sections and counts of problems.

1. Beginner (25K - 20K) -- 156 problems
2. Easy (19K - 15K) -- 365 problems
3. Easy (14K - 10K) -- 1161 problems
4. Middle (9K - 6K) -- 398 problems
5. Middle (5K - 2K) -- 264 problems
6. High (1K - 2D) -- 193 problems
7. Expert (3D - 7D) -- 114 problems

As you can see, this is pretty generous, for a free site. Please check it out, if you've never been there.


I won't rattle on all night... please contribute links and app recommendations, and give us a few hints about what's included, and the level of expertise that would be required. I'm hoping we can keep this thread going for quite a while, and turn it into a compendium of resources for online problems, etc.

Thank you all for any assistance you can render. Let's make this a valuable thread.

-- Gohst

On iOS, the Go Books app(formerly SmartGo books) allows access to some truly excellent resources. I think this format shines for problem books, where you get many of the conveniences of computer assisted problems combined with the benefit of properly curated problem sets. The Graded Go Problems for beginners series is particularly excellent.

I think Go Child has some very good problem sets. The interface takes a little getting used to (there are symbols instead of text to tell you if the problem was correct since it was originally designed for pre-readers), but once you get going it is very nice. There are some problems so easy my four year old can do them and others that far exceed my skill.

On the other hand, http://goproblems.com/ is very inconsistent in quality. I have solved a lot of problems there in the past, but I don't think it actually helps me get stronger. The ratings are often matched up very poorly with the problem difficulty, and some of them are very artificial. SmartGo Kifu uses these problems for their problem set, though the ratings seem to have been organized more sanely.