I am a absolute beginner, maybe around 20-25 kyu, and I am looking for two things: 1. a computer program for my playing strength and 2. people to play with.
On the KGS server, for example, I find quite a few games in progress, the bots between 20 and 30 kyu play pretty daft, and I don't find people of my playing strength there at all. I would be interested in games with 30 min - 1 hour time for consideration. Go games with 3 - 10 min are of no use to me as a beginner, I only practice my mistakes, as I still lack any intuition.
1. can anyone recommend me a program for beginners that also works on the 19x19 board?
2. where can I find weaker human players in larger numbers, so that one does not have to wait long?
Thanks!!!

Hi jumapari,
I would auggest you the old good saying: lose fast your first 100 games.

The dimension of the board is not so important at your level, so GoQuest can be the right APP and have both people and bots playing at your level.

A good server for 19x19 games is OGS https://online-go.com.
I cannot grant people at your level, but presently it is more crowded than KGS.

Enjoy!

_________________
When you play Weiqi you are joining millions of people across four thousand years of time.
Jonathan Hop - So You Want to Play Go?

Wise words, many thanks for your help! Good health and best wishes from Germany.

Concerning go programs, you can consider playing handicap games against 10-15 kyu bots.

Some time ago I used Champion Go. However it is better to play mostly against humans, otherwise you will get used to the computer's way of playing and you won't know how to react to unusual moves.

Just a general remark to time settings: Below 10 minutes is too fast as main time, I concur. But around 15 minutes for one side and some 20 or 30 seconds byo-yomi is actually plentiful for your level.

The thing is, at 20-kyu (or at 1-dan) - most likely - you will not find most good moves anyway and that's totally okay. At 20-kyu, you should (imo) get a grip on basic capturing tactics (net, ladder and that funky stuff happening when you atari a stone on the second line to the edge of the board) and also develop a feeling for the whole board, ie not starting the fight in the upper right and then slowly crawling over to the rest of the board.

If at any point in the game, you don't know where to play then that's your limitation. More time will likely be used to come up with wrong reasons for the wrong move. That's what the brain does with the unkown, no learning there. That will come later in the review (stronger players will be helpful).

And that's actually my main point: Faster games, more reviews, more learning, faster progress.

On the other hand: It's a hobby, enjoyment comes first, so anything goes ; )

If you want and I'm on KGS, we can play a teaching game (with 15 min :p)

_________________
My "guide" to become stronger in Go

How about the MFOG free trial version? I believe that is supposed to be about 18 kyu. Does it play daft? Do not be put off by 18 kyu being stronger than you are, you should want stronger than yourself when learning form an AI opponent and you can always take a few handicap stones. If I remember correctly, that also includes the "easy" set of problems. I don't know what other parts of MFOG 12 are in the free demo version.

Hello.
1-
I used GnuGo a lot and it helped me to become (a bit) better.
This free software can be downloaded from http://www.gnu.org/software/gnugo/download.html.
I know it is criticized, I know it is outdated, but I just mention it here as a suggestion.
2-
OGS, Pandanet-IGS and KGS are most used by beginners, I think by beginners.

Good point.

But that does not mean that 30 minute games would be better. They would offer you more chances to practice incorrect thinking.

May I suggest, then, playing on boards that are easier to understand. I.e., small boards.

May I also suggest playing the Capture Game, where the first player to capture a stone wins. Play the no pass version, so somebody always wins.

I had a beginner friend who was always frustrated playing against me, because he did not understand what was happening. It turned out that we could play the Capture Game on a 7x7 board and he enjoyed it and learned something.

Welcome to the world of go!

_________________
The Adkins Principle:
At some point, doesn't thinking have to go on?
— Winona Adkins

Visualize whirled peas.

Everything with love. Stay safe.

Godroid from Andreas Grothe is the first APP I started beating consistently.
The opportunity to take back the moves and study the basic situations have been important for me as a newbie).

The APP supports 9x9, 13x13 and 19x19.

_________________
When you play Weiqi you are joining millions of people across four thousand years of time.
Jonathan Hop - So You Want to Play Go?

I think that take back go is a great idea for learning.

_________________
The Adkins Principle:
At some point, doesn't thinking have to go on?
— Winona Adkins

Visualize whirled peas.

Everything with love. Stay safe.

In general it is better to play slow games, so that you are actually considering multiple candidates, reading out their branches, evaluate them and choose the best candidate. Reviewing such slow paced games then will reveal whether you need to improve your candidate picking, your reading or your evaluation.

As a beginner however, your intuition and evaluation skills need major development (your reading may be good or bad, depending on your experience with other games like chess). So going through many play-review iterations in a short time frame may actually be better than trying to figure out what's happening in that one game, without a toolset at your disposal to do so.

There are two ways to reduce the time spent per game: shorter time settings, or smaller boards.

Fox Go server is pretty populous today, I don't know about the beginner level. KGS seems back in business. I hardly find opponents on OGS.
All of them have autogame functions, Fox & OGS have bots of different levels.

You do not necessarily need a bigger selection of beginning and weak players. You need people of all strengths with whom you can interact: ask questions, play out variations, try new things, and take back bad moves. You also need patient and engaged teachers.

It will be easier after The Madness and you can find humans to play go with at a club or coffee house.

I understand your frustration. Go is not like any other game and beginners are usually fixated on killing and winning. Neither of those are really very important in the beginning.

My experience teaching newbies suggests you need to learn a selection of good and efficient shapes and how your stones relate to each other. Then you begin to understand why some shapes are better than others in certain situations. That requires what I call a "visual library", a database of forms and sequences of stones that work and those that do not. You only get that visual resource after you have several hundreds of games behind you. Can't be helped.

_________________
David Bogie, Boise ID
I play go, I ride a recumbent, of course I use Macintosh.

Thanks for your great answers full of practical experience. Thank you also especially for offering me a training session, which I will definitely come back to. I enrolled in the Internet Go School because I think the mix of lessons and practical exercises is great, and I know from chess that it's pretty optimal.
I have now played 3 games against the program "Many Faces of Go" at level 18 Kyu with about 2 hours time to think about it, and today I won for the first time. In retrospect I "chase" the whole thing through AI Sensei and am amazed at all the mistakes I would have hardly noticed myself. Of course this can't replace the exchange between people, but it is a quite good compromise.
If there are still 97 games missing, then at least I have fulfilled the wisdom of the 100 games that you first have to lose
Thanks!

Is the MFOG free trial version (it's weakest level) playing more sensibly than other weak AIs you have tried?

I do NOT know which of the MFOG features are included in the free trial version. Have you explored it?
1) Does it let you set "randomize" when playing? << a touch weaker but will not always play the same move in the same position >>
2) Does it give you access to the easy set of problems? << sort of like "flashcards; you get to see again more frequently those you get wrong and new ones replace ones you are always getting right >>
3) Can you ask it "why?" about its moves -- what go principles were behind the move it chose.
4) How about the joseki trainer?

The problem I see for you is that soon you will get too strong to learn from its 18 kyu level and for a single user, not cheap to buy. I put it that way because Fotland's price is for a "site license" (all the computers and users in your family, you DON'T pay again to add it to another computer)