text:
What resources are there for connecting engines to play automatically on remote servers?
What resources are there, e.g. tutorials, for connecting engines to play automatically on remote servers such as ICC?  There are certain opening variations that I want to have a strong engine test and refine on a significant basis.  Modifying an engines book is another matter, though material on that would be nice.
But the material I find, either on engines and interfaces themselves, or on automating engines to play on ICC, is either piecemeal, or far from comprehensive.  This link is the best I can do, and as you can see, it in turn refers you to other material.  But I'm concerned about how up to date this is.

WinBoard is the way to go, also check out...
http://www.gnu.org/software/xboard/engine-intf.html
http://www.open-aurec.com/wbforum/
The WinBoard forum is probably the best place to ask this question or the answer can be found there.

http://www.chessclub.com/help/xboard

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text:
Free chess match database
I'm working on a rating/ranking algorithm and I'm finally at a point where I can test some hypothesis but in order to do so I need real data. To be honest almost any board game could be used for this but I thought that chess is the board game with the highest possibility of having such a database.
I was thinking of posting it on other stackexchange pages but in the end I thought going to the root would be most efficient.
What the database should fulfill:

At least 50 players
At least 1000 matches
Downloadable (maybe not required if I can parse it from the website chronological)

Since I only play chess on rare occasions I'm not really too familiar with all the websites out there so I hope someone can help me.

What is a chess "match?" All I know is that most of the major ones have more than 2 games and people alternate colors.

It seems that this kind of test would need some kind of correlation data.  Do you need the match players to have a known and solid rating?

Million Base 2.5 (available from a link here) and ICOfY Base are two free options that more than meet your given criteria, each providing millions of games in PGN format to draw from as you please. In particular, ICOfY Base includes well over 4 million games.

Lichess has an open database of over 4 billion game PGNs: https://database.lichess.org/
Nicolas Noel also has a Lichess Elite database that only keeps games of 2500+ vs 2300+ players: https://database.nikonoel.fr/

I would also like to suggest Chessbase, which is my personal favorite. It has 8 million games. It does require premium to see the move PGN though. You can replay the moves, similar to our move replayer, for free. It can be downloaded here.

Well if the games can't be downloaded for free, it would be hard to test any algorithm on them

The PGN costs money the rest is free. It can be downloaded for free @qwr

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text:
How many FIDE-rated games must be played to obtain a *non* provisional rating?
I have a provisional FIDE rating of 1980 based on my score of 1 (two draws) out of 4 at a FIDE-rated tournament earlier this year; see: http://ratings.fide.com/card.phtml?event=2059100 where provisional rating is Rp.  I am playing in another FIDE-rated tournament next weekend and I seem to recall it may take as few as 9 games against FIDE-rated opponents to obtain an official (non provisional) rating, though I'm having a hard time authenticating this.
This is important to me as it's a 5-round tournament coming up and I want to know whether taking a bye may mean I have to play in yet another FIDE-rated tournament after this one to reach the plateau of 9, if that is indeed the correct figure.

I want to add two details. First, FIDE does not have provisional ratings. The "Rp" you see on that page is your performance rating for that tournament. It is based on the rating of your opponents and your score in the tournament.
Second, only games against FIDE rated players count. You've probably figure that out as only 3 of your games were rated while you were thinking of playing 4 or 5.

5 games against rated opponents played in a rated tournament.

Welcome to Chess SE! This might be the correct answer, but it would be nice to have an official reference confirming this. Could you please provide that?

Reference can be article 7 in https://www.fide.com/fide/handbook.html?id=172&view=article From july 2014 5 games are needed to get a rating.

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text:
Is there ant database that will return the reversed position?
I recently started an online game as White that began as follows.
[FEN "rnbqkbnr/pppppppp/8/8/8/8/PPPPPPPP/RNBQKBNR w KQkq - 0 1"]
1. Nf3 f5  2. d3 Nc6  3. e4 e5

Here I deliberately decided to lose a tempo with 4. d4 and transpose into a Vienna reversed with the Black pieces.  I knew what I was doing and therefore was able to avail myself of various resources (books/databases) on the Vienna game, but this got me to wondering. Are there any databases against which you can enter a position, and it will also look for the reversed position?

Chessbase opening trees (ctg) detect white/black transpositions.  My database has 59 games starting 1.e3, 9 games where black answered 1...e5, but then 28000+ games for 2.e4.

http://chessok.com/?page_id=352
I've been using this for my correspondence games at chess.com, hope this helps you.

Not to my knowledge. Although, a simple solution would be to manually input the moves with sides reversed.


text:
Best book with several annotated games by top GMs with the Dutch
I'm looking for annotated games by top GMs featuring the Dutch defense.  These could be in a book with lots of other non-Dutch games.  Unfortunately Botvinnik's "Botvinnik: One Hundred Selected Games" as I recall doesn't have quite a half dozen and they are all Stonewalls: I'd like some "Classical" variation games too.  How about "Zurich International Chess Tournament, 1953"; Bronstein played the Dutch, didn't he?  Unfortunately with Amazon's "search inside" feature it doesn't look like the games were indexed by opening.  As you can tell I don't mind if the games are old-ish (and this will weed out lots of Leningrad Dutch's I'm not necessarily interested in at this point), though I'm also open to more recent games too.  Thanks in advance.

One of the collections of Larsen's games perhaps?  Again though I can't see the indices of the pertinent books on amazon.  Guess there would be some very recent games by Nakamura but I believe he is playing the Leningrad variation

The World Championship Match between Botvinnik and Bronstein in 1951 contains quite a number of Dutch Defense games. I didn't find many books about the match, but there was one by Botvinnik that may provide a good reference point.

The Killer Dutch by GM Simon Williams includes 24 annotated games, as well as a lot of great advice and new ideas for Dutch players. It focuses mainly on the Classical Dutch, so it sounds ideal for you.

There's also an accompanying DVD that's very decent, available from Simon's own site here or as a digital download from OCL.

Check this link out on chessgames.com: for ECO A91 dutch defense:
http://www.chessgames.com/perl/chessopening?eco=A91

Are the games annotated by GMs, though?


text:
Uploading chessboard to website
I am a beginner programmer with some experience in HTML, PHP, and Java. I would like to upload a chessboard onto my website, and I have used the following links to help me:
http://chess.geniusprophecy.com/chess-viewer.html
http://chesstuff.blogspot.com/2008/11/chess-viewer-deluxe.html
However, I am getting stuck in placing the code (in steps 2. and 3. of the second link) in my source code. For example, what lines should I change and manipulate in
<APPLET archive="Viewer-Deluxe.jar" code="ChessBoard.class"
codebase="/bin" width="631" height="560" mayscript="true">
<PARAM name=PgnGameFile value="/games/Samples.Pgn">
<PARAM name=LightSquares value=F3DCC2>
<PARAM name=DarkSquares value=DDA37B>
<PARAM name=Background value=CCCCCC>
<PARAM name=ImagesFolder value=images>
<PARAM name=PuzzleMode value="off">
Your browser is completely ignoring the <APPLET> tag!
</APPLET>

in order for my code to work?
I've tried modifying the value="" line many many times and I'm frustrated because nothing seems to be working. I've saved my files in the right directory, subdirectory, etc. but I keep getting the error
java.io.FileNotFoundException

Does that "downloading" progress bar say "5 KB of 324 KB"? When it completes I'd expect the applet to run.

Your issue is likely because you're running Windows instead of *nix.
<PARAM name=PgnGameFile value="/games/Samples.Pgn">

/games/Samples.Pgn is a unixy way to specify a path.  If you're on Windows, try the similar:
c:\games\Samples.pgn
Be sure you get the spelling and capitalization exactly right.
Edit #1
According to the feedback below, there's now a malformed URL exception.  So the value needs to be a URL, not a file name.  That's a little different - the unix-like path is correct.
First, try games/Samples.pgn
Note there is no leading /.
Make sure the capitalization is exactly right.  This assumes that there's a folder under your web root called games and that your web server has access to it.  The original URL, /games/Samples.Pgn, would likely require a folder called games to be hanging off the root of the hard drive and most web servers don't have access to that folder.

Thanks Tony, but now I'm getting the error: java.net.MalformedURLException: unknown protocol: c

answer edited...

My question now is how do I download all the games off of one folder (games) instead of having to do so individually? (I'm talking about within the chess viewer applet - it would be easier if you looked at my website.)

I typed in value="Abhishek Mallela/games/Smith.pgn" because I have an Abhishek Mallela folder and a games subfolder and a Smith.pgn game within that subfolder. Now, it is saying "Downloading... PGN File: Abhishek Mallela/games/Smith.pgn". This seems like an error to me, because it hasn't 'downloaded' for a long time

When I put just value="games/Smith.pgn", I get Java.io.FileNotFoundException.

I am so close I can feel it... I just can't seem to finish it off!

games/Smith.pgn fails because there's no games folder in the right place.  Your Abhishek Mallela/games/Smith.pgn URL is exactly correct, however.  It says, "downloading" because it found the file.  I don't use this applet so I can't say why.

Ok, thanks for all your help. I'll figure it out from here.

I'm not too familiar with the Java applets that you're looking at, but I recommend that you use JavaScript for this sort of job. This GitHub repository can be used to display and play through your own games (it supports PGN and FEN).
There are many other libraries out there - it's easy for you to change the design of the board and pieces to suit your site's style. You also might want to ask this question on StackOverflow as you might find some more technical advice there.

Thanks, I asked on stackoverflow but no one has replied. I will definitely look at GitHub repository.

The one I linked you to should be very easy to implement. Once you import the appropriate files, you can simply copy and paste the PGN into your webpage.

Sorry, I'm getting stuck. I downloaded the ZIP on the right hand side of your link, and then copied and pasted the source code of index.html (example page) into my code. But the chessboard is not showing up on my website abhishek.mallela.net. What am I doing wrong?

Wait - you can't just paste the index.html file into your page. Import the appropriate JavaScript libraries (jQuery and jchess) into your own index.html file and use the template that they've provided.


text:
Why is the Sicilian Defense considered hard to play?
I have been told never to play the Sicilian. It is a very complicated opening that even grandmasters aren't ever able to analyze and play well enough. But why, I ask?

A little background info might help out here. Do you have a sense of your own level of playing strength (e.g. a rating)? And who has told you never to play the Sicilian?

Garry Kasparov used to play the Sicilian, but he knew the Steinitz quote: Chess is not for timid souls.

"I have been told never to play the Sicilian" how can this be true when the Sicilian is just the most played response to 1.e4?

Good heavens.  Play it!
The Sicilian is not a defense for the lazy or defensive player - the Black side will need to be booked up, tactically sharp, and more than anything will need to understand why it works, and how to make it work.
Regarding that GMs can't play it, that's nonsense.  It's a deadly tool in their arsenal.
This opening's hypermodern ideas eschew some well-established 'rules' including immediate control of the center.  It encourages an asymmetric game that reduces the chance for a draw.  In many variations, black sacrifices the exchange on c3 in order to gain time and break white's center.
In the Sicilian, black frequently loses quickly or wins long.
Here's an example from 2013 of Anand with the black side taking apart 2716-rated Arkadij Naiditsch.  According to 365chess.com, this is an ECO B52, the "Canal-Sokolsky attack". As you can see from this game, the Sicilian may not be the best choice for the timid.

[fen ""]
1. e4 c5 2. Nf3 d6 3. Bb5+ Bd7 4. Bxd7+ Qxd7 5. c4 Nf6 6. Nc3 g6 7. d4 cxd4 8. Nxd4 Bg7 9. O-O Nc6 10. Nde2 Qe6 11. Nd5 Qxe4 12. Nc7+ Kd7 13. Nxa8 Qxc4 14. Nc3 Rxa8 15. Bg5 e6 16. Re1 Nd5 17. Nxd5 Qxd5 18. Qxd5 exd5 19. Rad1 h6 20. Bc1 d4 21. Rd3 Rc8 22. Rb3 b6 23. Kf1 Ne5 24. Ra3 a5 25. b4 Rc2 26. bxa5 bxa5 27. Rxa5 Nd3 28. Ra7+ Kc6 29. Rxf7 Nxe1 30. Kxe1 Rxc1+ 31. Kd2 Rg1 32. Rxg7 Rxg2 33. Ke1 Rxh2 34. Rxg6 Rh1+ 35. Kd2 h5 36. Rh6 h4 37. a4 h3 38. a5 h2 39. a6 Kc7 40. Rh7+ Kb8 41. Ke2 d3+ 42. Kd2 Ka8 43. Rh5 Ka7 44. Rh6 d5 45. Rh8 Kxa6 46. Rh6+ Kb5 47. Rh8 Kc4 48. Rc8+ Kd4 49. Rh8 Ke4 0-1

Just for fun, here's Tigran Petrosian, the Patron Saint of Positional Players, dismantling Boris Spassky.  This is a B42 Sicilian, Kan variation.  (I like to mention such games because it's easy to get into the habit of thinking of some players as purely positional, or some as purely tactical players.  All GMs are competent in all aspects of the game.)
It's the 1st game of the 1969 world championship.  Again, we see a long game here.  Petrosian would lose the black side of a Sicilian Dragon to Spassky later in the same match, and it would be over in under 30 moves.
[fen ""]
1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 e6 3.d4 cxd4 4.Nxd4 a6 5.Bd3 Nc6 6.Nxc6 bxc6 7.O-O d5 8.Nd2 Nf6 9.Qe2 Be7 10.b3 O-O 11.Bb2 a5 12.f4 g6 13.Rad1 Nd7 14.c4 a4 15.f5 exf5 16.exf5 Bf6 17.Bxf6 Nxf6 18.Qf2 axb3 19.axb3 Ra2 20.fxg6 fxg6 21.h3 Qe7 22.Qd4 c5 23.Qf4 Bb7 24.Rde1 Qg7 25.Qe3 d4 26.Qe6+ Qf7 27.Qe2 Re8 28.Qf2 Rxe1 29.Qxe1 Qe8 30.Qxe8+ Nxe8 31.Be4 Rxd2 32.Bxb7 Nd6 33.Bd5+ Kg7 34.b4 cxb4 35.c5 Nf5 36.c6 Rc2 37.g4 Nd6 38.Rf4 d3 39.Rd4 d2 40.Bb3 Rxc6 41.Rxd2 Ne4 42.Rd7+ Kf6 43.Rxh7 Rc1+ 44.Kg2 Nc5 45.Bf7 b3 46.g5+ Kxg5 47.h4+ Kf6 48.h5 Rc2+ 49.Kf3 b2 50.Ba2 gxh5 51.Rxh5 Rc1 52.Rh6+ Ke5 53.Rb6 Na4 54.Re6+ Kd4 55.Re4+ Kc5 56.Rxa4 Ra1 0-1

There are some high level trainers who suggest avoiding lines like the Rauzer (a line in the Sicilian) or the Gruenfeld for new beginners, suggesting that the ideas behind these openings are just beyond the comprehension of new players, BUT...
Chess learning is known to centre very much around patterns, and these patterns need to become instilled in your subconscious mind.
One very rapid way to learn the basics of an opening is to download a database of high level games from the opening line in question (this is easy to do using 365Chess or other online resources, (TWIC gives good updates, but you will have to sort to opening later), then open the file in a (free) database product like Chessbase Reader (lite) or Jose (Chess for All on your smartphone). Now you simply flip the board to the side you want to play and starting clicking your way (rapidly) through the games (I like to do this for a hero, such as Svidler playing the Gruenfeld).  The point here is not to think too deeply, but just to see the opening evolve again and again rapidly on your screen.  You will see that you DO start to see the main ideas of the line.  (I do pause if there was a neat tactic that I couldn't absorb rapidly, and play that a few times through, so as to build that idea into my mind as well; sometimes these are thematic for the opening, and sometimes they are just increasing one's mental fluidity.)
Once this last thing starts to happen in your mind, then it makes sense to study the opening much more slowly and carefully, learning concrete move orders and what-not.
A beginner who follows this route WILL quickly accelerate their understanding of ANY opening system.  I think even Silman said that (essentially by hand), this is how he came to understand chess more deeply than the average bear.

The Sicilian is a very "sharp" opening that involves major complications for BOTH sides. The result is that the better player will almost always win.
If you play it as a beginner, you will "always" lose, initially. That's why someone told you "never" to play it. There are somewhat easier ways to get draws with other openings.
That is, until you get to become a "good" player. Then you can use this opening to outplay a lot of Whites who will be weaker than you.
Playing the Sicilian (and taking your lumps) is one way to get better, faster.

The Sicilian has many sharp lines and many many variants, more than any other defence to the King's Pawn opening 1.e4. This is, in a nutshell, why it is difficult to master.
Yet the idea that beginners, or players below master level, shouldn't play it is dubious at best. From a purely competitive point of view, if your opponent is about your same strength (s)he will have your very same difficulties playing it from the White side; if your opponent is much stronger than you it is very likely that you're doomed no matter what opening you choose.
In fact, choosing an opening repertoire cannot be based only on the number of lines or ideas to memorize, but also the "feeling" that one about certain positions and certain plans. Even if a beginner is not as sharp and experienced as a master, certainly may find more "natural" and easy to play certain lines and not others. Thus, I believe that is a good idea even for a beginner to try to "experiment" with a good variety of openings (studying grandmaster games and playing them himself) in order to find those for which he has a special feeling.

Whomever told you that should not be advising anyone about anything! The Sicilian is interesting and sharp. Play it, study it, love it and hate it.
And do not listen to those people ever again!

This is a very weird statement. IMHO.
The only thing that I can tell you is that back when I was in the University the school team's coach, who was an IM, insisted in that the "advanced" beginners and low intermediates would learn the Sicilian Dragon since it is a very dynamic opening and there are lots of tactical themes happening all the time so it was good for them.
Some food for thought :)

Sicilian is hard to play for the below points .

Either the Black Player still an Amateur does not understand Counter-Attacking Chess.
Theory is just too long and ultra-sharp lines are difficult to memorize.
Many Variations of Sicilian just coerce with each other and you can not keep yourself to one line . Eg Najdorf can transition to Schevengien/Kan/Taimanov etc .
Black usually has to face K-side Attack very early from White and to defend against it the Play in Center and Q-side may gets extinguished and Black has to defend against powerful Sacs and defend precisely.
Black has to sometimes go on a material deficit as like Exchange Sacrifice in Sicilian Dragon and where R*N on c3 has to be done which many Players below 2000 Elo would like to condemn and focus on Activity .
You need to understand high level chess to understand Sicilian which many Players do not seem to understand.

This is a sharp openning with a long well studied variables in "chess theory", some of them as dragon, pelikan, schveniguen, etc with more than 20 moves known.
So if you are playing with someone with experience in the theory of this opening is better to avoid or going far from the main lines or variables.
The theory says that this is a "two edges sword", because of the fact that white moves in the king side and black on the queen side, is a unbalance openning, given options to both sides to attack, in the most games the winner is who can reach the rival king first.
White will attack on the king side mean while black do in the queen side, in the most aggresive variables, white castle's in queen side with a bayonet attack or moving h4-h5-h6 or sacrificing this pawn in order to open the "h" column for the rook and black using b5-a6 pawns and using C column for the rook, where in most cases is sacrificed in c3 for knight to attack the whites king.

It makes absolutely no sense to avoid it. Play it, learn it, study it, and understand it. You'll want it in your arsenal eventually anyway. It's not going to hurt you.
Maybe you wouldn't want to try it at on OTB tournament for the first year or two. But you can start by studying up on all three of the major families of at least the Open Sicilian, 2...e6, 2...d6, 2...Nc6, and their 11 main variations, over the course of a year or two, and playing dozens or hundreds of harmless online games with them.
When you get good, and your rating is getting fairly impressive, and you feel comfortable with it, you can delve deeper. Imagine if you only started the opening 10 years from now, from scratch? Now imagine if you started now, how much farther ahead you'll be with it in 10 years.
There just isn't much reason not to learn something as early as possible. When you're older, and time is running out, you'll have had more experience with it than otherwise.

I can suggest you from my experience of playing the Sicilian for 8 years now, to avoid it for the first year of your 'starting chess life' and slowly begin to read and assimilate.
I am a practitioner of e4 - c5. I'm finding it still hard to deal with the own weakness of d6. I am fide elo 1140 only. So take up this arsenal sooner.


text:
Rating calculations for Anand-Carlsen world championship
I have some interesting questions that have to do with the rating changes and calculations for the Anand-Carlsen world championship.
First, some preliminary information:
Carlsen's live rating: 2870, Anand's live rating: 2775
If Carlsen wins a game, he gains 3.7 points; draw -1.3 points, loss -6.3 points.
If Anand wins a game, he gains 6.3 points; draw 1.3 points, loss -3.7 points.
The match will be 12 games, with the winner being the first to 6 points. Therefore, the number of standard rated games in the match can vary based on all the ordered possibilities of wins, draws, and losses.
My questions are:
1. What are the possibilities for Carlsen to cross 2900 in live rating?
2. What are the possibilities for Anand to cross 2800 in live rating?
3. What are the upper and lower bounds for Carlsen's rating in the match, given the stipulations?
4. What are the upper and lower bounds for Anand's rating in the match, given the stipulations?
Thanks!

The winner is the first to 6.5 points. Also, note that the answer to question 1 is trivially "none", since the best Carlsen can do is go 7-0, giving him a post-match rating of 2895.9.

The answer for 1 is NEVER, because even if Carlsen has the theoretically best possible tournament with 7-0, his rating would go to 2895.9 only.
The answer for 2 is if:
Anand wins the match 7-0, making his rating 2819.1

OR
Anand wins the match 6.5-5.5 (order of game results does not matter) by:

6 wins, 1 draw in a 7-game match: new rating = 2814.1
5 wins, 3 draws in a 8-game match: new rating = 2810.4
4 wins, 5 draws in a 9-game match: new rating = 2806.7
3 wins, 7 draws in a 10-game match. new rating = 2803.0

The answers for 3 and 4 are:
Carlsen's maximum rating, 2895.9, is attained if he wins 7-0, and thus Anand's minimum rating, 2749.1. Anand's maximum rating, 2819.1, is attained if he wins 7-0, and thus Carlsen's minimum rating 2825.9.

Any result in which Anand gets 7 points will result in his rating exceeding 2800. There are many ways for this to happen besides going 7-0.

What are the many ways for this to happen? I see only 7-0, because THE MATCH ENDS WHEN THE FIRST PLAYER crosses 6 POINTS.

Here is one way: Carlsen wins one game, and then Anand wins the next seven.

Oh ok, I see. And then it could go up to if Carlsen wins five games, and Anand wins seven games.

First, note that the final ratings depend entirely on the score of the match, not on the particular games. For example, if they each win a game, their ratings will change by the same amount as if they draw both games. This may seem like a coincidence but it's just a consequence of the way that FIDE ratings work.
Here is the entire table of possible results. The columns are Anand's match score, Carlsen's match score, Anand's post-match rating, and Carlsen's post-match rating. The results are sorted by post-match rating.
  A   C  A_rat  C_rat
0.0 7.0 2749.1 2895.9
0.5 6.5 2754.1 2890.9
1.0 7.0 2755.4 2889.6
1.5 6.5 2760.4 2884.6
2.0 7.0 2761.7 2883.3
2.5 6.5 2766.7 2878.3
3.0 7.0 2768.0 2877.0
3.5 6.5 2773.0 2872.0
4.0 7.0 2774.3 2870.7
4.5 6.5 2779.3 2865.7
5.0 7.0 2780.6 2864.4
5.5 6.5 2785.6 2859.4
6.0 6.0 2790.6 2854.4
6.5 5.5 2795.6 2849.4
6.5 4.5 2799.3 2845.7
7.0 5.0 2800.6 2844.4
6.5 3.5 2803.0 2842.0
7.0 4.0 2804.3 2840.7
6.5 2.5 2806.7 2838.3
7.0 3.0 2808.0 2837.0
6.5 1.5 2810.4 2834.6
7.0 2.0 2811.7 2833.3
6.5 0.5 2814.1 2830.9
7.0 1.0 2815.4 2829.6
7.0 0.0 2819.1 2825.9

Therefor the answers to your questions are

None.
He needs to win the match with 7 points, or with 6.5 points with Carlsen scoring at most 3.5.
2895.9, 2825.9.
2819.1, 2749.1.


text:
Is the Queen plus pawn versus Queen endgame always a draw?
In a Queen + King versus Queen + King endgame (including zero or more pawns) these is a strong draw tendency due to the fact that a Queen can deliver multiple checks in a row to the opponents open King. My question concerns the Queen+pawn versus Queen endgame. Assuming that the pawn is on its initial square (second rank for white, seventh rank for black), are all these endgames objectively drawn? Second of all, what is the best strategy for the player with the material advantage to aim for a win?

My question concerns the Queen+pawn versus Queen endgame. Assuming that the pawn is on its initial square (second rank for white, seventh rank for black), are all these endgames objectively drawn? Second of all, what is the best strategy for the player with the material advantage to aim for a win?

Emphasis above are mine, and since you have 2 questions I shall answer both separately.

are all these endgames objectively drawn?

No they are absolutely not!

Second of all, what is the best strategy for the player with the material advantage to aim for a win?

Without seeing the exact position I can not answer that-your question is too broad-these endgames require thorough study as everything counts there ( the position of the kings, who moves first and so on ).
I can recommend you Yuri Averbakh-Comprehensive Chess Endings ( Volume 3 ) to learn how to win Q+P+K vs K+Q endgames. There you have described patterns for winning with the bishop/knight/rook/central pawn, queen and king vs king and queen.
I have just suggested the above book because it is written for all levels of play-from novice up to grandmaster-so with that knowledge you can not squander your edge, but if you find something else even better for you!
The key is just to learn how to recognize winning position and to learn how to win it.
All you have to do now, is to use this tablebase to see how can you reach the winning position.
If you have trouble finding exact winning moves you can always go through tablebase moves-just click on the notation.
SUMMARY:
Learn how to win Q+P+K vs K+Q endgames->input the position you are interested in into tablebase->if winnable, play through moves to see how to reach winning position.
I know that this might be too broad of an answer to you, but you ask for help in Queen endgames and these are the toughest to master. Just one imprecise move ( not to mention wrong one ) gives your opponent a draw and squanders your edge!
Hopefully this answer helped you a little.
If you have further question leave a comment and I will reply.
Best regards.

Cool link and nice book recommendation! I have not read that book yet, I will definitely check it out! Concerning the overall strategy for the advantage side, I still think it is  possible to outline a few tips and tricks on what to aim for in a K+Q+pawn versus K+Q endgame. For instance, to cut off the enemy King from your pawn, to avoid Queen exchanges if they lead to drawn pawn endgames, to keep your Queen in the center of the board as an umbrella to cover checks from the enemy Queen. Against a non-expert, a Q+p vs Q endgame can very well be won, in my opinion.

Very nice answer especially the tablebase  link, I was looking for that.

@RauanSagit: If position is winnable, you can win against anybody following the instruction from this book. I haven't had the time to read it yet, but to answer this question I gave a look at the chapter Q+P+K vs K+Q. I have read through all of the examples and everything depends from the position setup. I am sorry to say that, since I upvoted this question and expected an answer to help me-I too am not satisfied with my endgame technique. If you find this book ( hint-it is available for free online ) you will see why giving the general plan is impossible. Best regards.

@dreamcrash: Always glad to help :)

@AlwaysLearningNewStuff When entering a Q+p vs Q endgame, the side with the extra pawn should make sure that it will not fizzle out into a quick draw as soon as this endgame is begun. Next, the placement of the opponent's King will be crucial for the outcome. Yet one possible strategy is to keep the pawn on its initial square and aim for getting a Queen exchange to win the K+p vs K endgame, thanks to the extra tempo(s) gained with the pawn in the future. This can, in my opinion, be a very promising strategy for the attacking side.

@RauanSagit: If you can get to those positions-yes-but you will see in the examples from the book just how hard things are. The worst thing is that these endings are simple and you do not need a master strength to defend-most of the moves are obvious for the weaker side, but most of the moves for the winning side are not. You really have to play "like a Swiss clok" in order to win-that adds so much pressure for the stronger side. Try to find the book and see the examples-you will be astonished ( I know I was ). Best regards.

This ending is a draw unless the pawn is a bishop pawn or a central pawn  and the pawn is in the seventh rank and is supported by its king. If the defending king can get in front of the pawn, the game is a draw; otherwise it is best for the defender to keep his king far away from the pawn. The defender should keep checking until he runs out of check, and then pin the pawn (a good strategy to draw). Based on computer analysis, there is a different thinking :normally the defending king needs to be in front of the pawn. A rook pawn or knight pawn is a theoretical draw if the defending king is in front or near the pawn or if the king is in the corner opposite the pawn's promotion square. A knight pawn has more practical winning chances than a rook pawn. A bishop pawn or central pawn is a win if the defending king is not in front of the pawn. A bishop pawn has better winning chances than a central pawn. The position of the defending king is especially important .
Edmar Mednis gave this breakdown when the defending king is not able to help:

A bishop pawn is the best pawn to have. It is relatively easy to advance and is a win once it reaches the seventh rank.
A central pawn wins if it reaches the seventh rank, but it is difficult to get it there.
if the pawn reaches the sixth rank, the position is usually a draw.
A knight pawn is relatively easy to get to the seventh rank, but the position may be a    theoretical draw.
Positions with rook pawns are theoretical draws, but in practice it may be difficult to draw

John Nunn gives this summary for the defense:
with a central pawn, the defense has two possibilities: get the king in front of the pawn or get the king to corner nearest to the pawn's promotion square
with a bishop pawn, the defender's only chance is to get the king in front of the pawn
with a knight pawn, the defender must get the king in front of the pawn or in the corner furthest from the promotion square
a rook pawn is generally a draw and the defensive guidelines are the same as for a knight pawn.
Naturally, the less advanced the pawn is, the better the defensive chances

I think this answer is a bit too broad. I would like an answer that is focused only on the Q+P vs Q endgame. Cheers.

Instead of copy+pasting parts of the Wikipedia article (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Queen_and_pawn_versus_queen_endgame), why don't you just link it here and add some of your own thoughts?

According to Wikipedia:

According to Reuben Fine and Pal Benko, this ending is a draw unless
  the pawn is a bishop pawn or a central pawn (i.e. king pawn or queen
  pawn) and the pawn is in the seventh rank and is supported by its
  king. If the defending king can get in front of the pawn, the game is
  a draw; otherwise it is best for the defender to keep his king far
  away from the pawn.

If this endgame needs all those conditions to be winning, and you are saying that

"pawn is on its initial square"

I would claim (based on the Reuben Fine and Pal Benko conditions) that this endgame is a draw unless you have a forced way to trade queens and to guarantee that your king gets to control the critical squares. For example:

From my example above you can see that these endgames are not always a draw, but apart from that type of situation, it will be a draw more often than not.

A bit too much copy paste in this answer for my taste. I would like an answer that presents a clear strategy to try to go for a win in the Q+P vs Q endgame.

@RauanSagit Well the problem is that Q+P vs Q with a pawn on the initial position is a draw how can a player go to a win in this type of position? The only copy past it the citation. Unless, you are talking about a strategy to go for a win on a Q+P vs Q endgame where the pawn is not strictly on the initial position. If so I can expand my answer, but the answer will always be based on others ideas since I do not much experience on the subject.


text:
FICS rating vs FIDE Elo
I know that is hard to establish an exact equivalent, but I was wondering what is the factor P in this equation: FICS_BLITZ_ELO * P = FIDE_ELO following personal experience. I mean, if you use to play FICS blitz games and have FIDE ELO, what is your P? I suppose that with a full hand of replies we can get an idea of P value.

my FICS rating is 200 points above FIDE rating

Mathematically speaking, since the same table of expected scores is used, the difference between the two ratings is likely to be a translation rather than a scaling. That is, you should rather ask what is the number P such that FIDE_ELO + P = FICS_BLITZ_ELO.

The SurveyBot in FICS perform statistical analysis on the relation between users' FICS Standard ratings to their reported FIDE ratings. It gives the following:

A list of the estimated FIDE ratings has been
  displayed above. The 234 submitted FIDE ratings fit the best exponential
  curve given by formula FIDE=a*e^(b*FICS), a>0, where a=996.91895981,
  b=0.00035345 and coefficient of determination r^2=0.390.

However, no estimate of accuracy is given, and I'd say 234 users does not sound very much for it to be very reliable. And of course, this does not say much about the correlation between FICS Blitz ratings and FIDE standard ratings.

In this case, I will have to quote from the FICS FAQ (http://www.freechess.org/Help/HelpFiles/fics_faq.html):

39.My rating is over/under inflated.
Don't worry!  Ratings are all relative anyway, not absolute. Compare your
      FICS rating only to other FICS players, not to ratings from other groups.
      Comparing your rating on FICS to a person's rating on another server or
      in a chess federation is not a valid comparison. FICS has a different
      rating system and a different player community than other organizations.
      Therefore your rating here is unlikely to match your rating somewhere
      else.
40.I have a rating on FICS. What would my rating from in-person tournaments be?
Ratings on FICS are not comparable to those gained from
      real life tournaments because they measure play against a different group
      of people under different playing conditions. Some users have higher
      ratings in real life, some have lower ratings.

In your question, you say FICS Elo rating, but the Elo rating system (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elo_rating_system) is a system of its own and FICS might not even be using it for its ratings. FIDE does, for sure! Also, comparing two rating systems is dubious since the opponents you meet, the time controls you use and the initial rating you get and the rating system you use will differ! But comparing the FIDE blitz rating with the FICS rating might be more valid. In this case, my guess would be that the FICS rating will be higher than the FIDE blitz rating. And I base this on absolutely nothing!

Ratings from different pools of players and with different rating methods cannot be compared with any reasonable accuracy.

This depends completely on what is required for the comparison.


text:
What are the key ideas for white in the Keres Attack (Sicilian Scheveningen)?
The Keres Attack (Sicilian Scheveningen) has the following starting position
[FEN ""]
[White "Keres Attack"]
[Black "Sicilian Scheveningen"]
1. e4 c5 2. Nf3 d6 3. d4 cxd4 4. Nxd4 Nf6 5. Nc3 e6 6. g4

What are the key ideas for white in this variation? Where should white place the light and heavy pieces? Should the King always castle queenside? What setup should white aim for?

Unfortunately I am not 1.e4 player but still wish to help. Have yo tried to find some literature on this? I could look up for some resources but I need you to help me a little: Is this attack happening in the Sheveningen line only or in other lines as well ( Najdorf and so on )? I just need to narrow down my search that's all. Hopefully I will be able to help. Best regards and good luck.

@AlwaysLearningNewStuff This variation can also occur via the Sicilian Najdorf. Yes, I have been looking for a good (modern) book for the topic, but I haven't found one yet that is to my liking. I am an 1.e4 player but I haven't used the Keres Attack that often. I might add an answer to this question myself, after doing a bit more research.

this variation leads to a hell of a game. It is a good one to test your ability and your opponent, in my opinion, but you'd better be good at calculating because, strategically, it has no merit at all.

@ThunderGr by strategically, do you mean statically? Strategy can be viewed from many angles. Cheers.

"Strategically" as opposed to "tactically" :). Position evaluation is one of the most heated things in chess ;).

@ThunderGr I prefer the terms "static" and "dynamic". Where the static usually refers to the pawn structure (pawns cannot move backwards). While dynamic refers to the dynamic possibilities of a position. The decision g2-g4 is a static one that is creating dynamic opportunities. Thus, it has static drawbacks (pawn structure, weaker light squares (g2, f3, h3) and dark squares (f4 and h4).

And, we should not forget that it initiates an attack on the king side with the white king in the center and black being able to advance center pawns. In short "unleashes hell" :).

I have edited my answer by adding my conclusion at the very bottom. Unfortunately I wasn't able to find anything else on the Keres attack. Best regards.

OK, this one was tough to crack!
I almost gave up, but I believe I have found enough resources to help you grasp the concept of play.

What are the key ideas for white in this variation?

I think that you will find the answer you seek in this article. The second part is found here and contains relevant moves only-no additional explanations are added.
Still, it tells you enough to grasp the basics.

Should the King always castle queenside?

Yes, otherwise what is the point of g4-it will only weaken the king right ?

Where should white place the light and heavy pieces?

According to the first part of the above article, bishop goes to g5, the other one's placement depends from the concrete lines, the way I see it. Rooks go to d1 and g1/h3-the latter depending on the circumstances.

What setup should white aim for?

The second part of the above article has a good theoretical coverage in my opinion, but ultimately the decision is yours since I am not an 1.e4 player and my theory knowledge is too rusty.
As member Fischer suggested, you can use this link to see some master games with commentary and try to learn something from them. Here is the link with some instructive games, in my opinion, that might help you-note the reference to this game in the comments.
NOTE: Not all the games are about Keres attack but please observe that this is a blog, not a theoretical book.
Another reason for including these links: Being FIDE master yourself, and those guys being IMs, you should have easier time understanding their moves and you should improve faster from those games.
This article mentions several key games for illustrating themes and ideas in Keres attack. To see them you need to register, but with some cleverness we can bypass this:
We know that the games mentioned were played in year 2007 or before, and know the names of the players and the ECO code of the opening. With these information it was not hard for me to find referenced games:
Sokolov-Nisipeanu ( notice that this blog mentions e5 as serious novelty for Black as well-see the commentary bellow the diagram! )
Searching through the same database I found only one game between Macieja and Kasimdzhanov where they played Keres attack so here is the link.
And here is the last game.
These illustrate key ideas for black and ways the White copes with them-positioning of the rooks and minor pieces. For the original commentary of those  you shall have to get by yourself.
A good thing would be to compare the moves with the current theory, and to use strong engine to analyze the critical middle-game positions in order to reveal the mistakes players made. This should give you better insight about minor piece/rook positioning.
EDIT:
There are no "typical plans" or "typical piece setup" in the Keres attack-only raw calculation and creativity.
You must be able to adapt to the every change in the position-which is logical-since these are open/semi-open games and that is the quality they require from a player.
Only closed/semi-closed systems can give you "typical plans/piece setup" which is logical when you think about it, since the closed nature of the position allows you to maneuver.
In open games things change rapidly, so to ask "typical plans" is pointless, especially in such a dynamic and sharp line like this. I would focus my attention on tactical sharpness.
The way I see it, you can use g4 to force Black into making a concession on the king side and to grab more space. Then you should use your better piece coordination and space advantage to increase your initiative. Playing through the games I see this idea for White over and over.
This is the way I would approach this problem.
END OF EDIT
Unfortunately this is all I can offer at the moment, hopefully it will be enough.
Good luck and best regards!

Thanks for the research! This is a good starting point. I will dig in and learn. Cheers.

@RauanSagit: Thank you, and good luck! If you need further help leave a comment and I will try to help. Best regards.

I have not played this opening ever, and I am not qualified to answer it, I have not found many creditable sources for my answer, but I did manage to find a few.
I'm not a fan of copy pasting, so here's what I found

How Fearsome is the Keres Attack? By IM Mark Ginsburg
Sicilian Keres Attack: How to crush the Sicilian defence with the
Keres attack
Kasparov vs Karpov, playing this opening and FM FM Eric Schille analyzing it
The Sicilian Scheveningen: Move by Move (Ebook)
Sicilian Scheveningen by GM Magesh and GM Arun

From Ez-net.com, I quote:

The Scheveningen Variation is a classically motivated defense. Black creates a backward pawn center with his duo at d6 and e6, leaving no weakness on the important central squares d5 and e5. Black intends to simply develop his pieces and then proceed with queenside counterplay. The Scheveningen has been a favorite of Kasparov's, although he often arrives at the position through transposition, playing 5…a6 and 6…e6.
  Other top players use the defense frequently and it is well respected, but it doesn't have the devoted following of the Najdorf or Dragon Variations, perhaps because it is too straightforward and logical. White has several ways to combat the Scheveningen Variation, almost all of them leading to dynamic positions.
The Scheveningen Variation, named for a town in Holland, combines …e6 with …d6, instead of the …Nc6…d6 combination of the Classical. The pawn at e6 can serve as a target for White’s tactical operations. Sacrifices of a knight or bishop on that square are almost routine. The most exciting lines start with 6.Bc4 and are known as the Sozin Variation. Opposite wing castling can lead to very double-edged games.
The Scheveningen features the "small center" for Black, with the pawns at d6 and e6 keeping the enemy pieces at bay. For the most part, Black pawns will remain behind the front lines, mostly on the third rank. White will not have very many weaknesses to work against, and precision is required by both sides. For this reason the top player in the world are frequently seen on both sides of the opening.
The much-feared Keres Attack is the greatest disincentive by white to Black's move order. The Keres Attack is the sharpest response to the Scheveningen, favored by attacking players. However it is by no means clear that White has a guaranteed advantage, but the results overwhelmingly favor White. So even Kasparov, who loved to defend the Scheveningen, often arrived via a Najdorf route to avoid the Keres Attack.
Scheveningen Variation, Keres Attack (with ...h7-h6)(Favors White)
1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 d6 3.d4 cxd4 4.Nxd4 Nf6 5.Nc3 e6 6.g4 White immediately starts his Kingside attack in motion. The threat to play g4-g5 and kick the f6-Knight into oblivion is one that theorists have long debated. Sould Black allow White to carry out his threat, or play ....h7-h6, creating a weakness? This queston produces two distinct variations. Keres Attack (without ....h7-h6) and Keres Attack (with ....h7-h6) the one we will now look at. Scheveningen players by and large prefer to slow down White's expansion by playing
6...h6 7.g5 hxg5 8.Bxg5 At this point is extreamely difficult to evaluate this position. Black's h8-Rook has been "developed" with having moved, a certain plus for Black. The trade of a Black h-pawn for a White g-pawn means that neither player is going to castle on the Kingside. Probably both Kings will move Queenside. White's menacing g5-Bishop must be carefully observed as the tactics of f2-f4 and e4-e5 will hang over Black's position. A usual continuation would be;
8...Nc6 9.f4 Be7 10.Qd2 a6 11.0-0-0 Qc7 12.h4 Bd7 This leads to another one of those bottomless Sicilian positions that defy conventional understanding. Theorists have a slight preference for White in this position.
Scheveningen Variation, Keres Attack (without ...h7-h6) (Favors White)
Black can allow White to carry out his threat, as follows
1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 d6 3.d4 cxd4 4.Nxd4 Nf6 5.Nc3 e6 6.g4 Nc6 7.g5 Nd7 8.Be3 a6 9.h4 Qc7 10.f4 b5
White has extended his Kingside in order to launch an attack, while Black is busily preparing ...Bc8-b7 and ...Nd7-c5 with a counterattack against the e4-pawn. This position is uncommonly sharp. White has a slight advantage.
Scheveningen Variation, Fischer Attack (Equal Position)
The Fischer Attack is a straight-forward concept that begins
1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 d6 3.d4 cxd4 4.Nxd4 Nf6 5.Nc3 e6 6.Bc4 White tries to clamp down on the d5-square, with an eye toward attacking the e6-pawn with f2-f4-f5. Black has a variety of defenses based upon ...Nb8-c6=a5 or ...Nb8-s7-c5 in conjunction with ...a7-a6 and ...b7-b5-b4 going for the e4-pawn. A solid choice is:
6...Be7 7.Bb3 0-0 8.Be3 White prepares to castle Queenside.
8...Na6 Black decides to bring his Knight to the c5-square to eliminate the b3-Bishop. One of the tactics that Black has to be aware of is; [8...Nbd7 9.Bxe6!? fxe6 10.Nxe6 Qa5 11.Nxf8 Bxf8 White sacrifices two pieces for a Rook.]
9.Qe2 Nc5 10.f3
This is a common position from the Fischer Attack. White will aim for g2-g4-g5 and a big Kingside pawn storm. Black will play ...a7-a6 and ...b7-b5 for an attack on the Queenside. This position is dynamically ballanced.
Scheveningen Variation, Maroczy Variation (Equal Position)
In the Maroczy Variation, White takes a more restrained approach to the center. He, she, it aims to complete his kingside development, delaying an attack for awhile.
1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 d6 3.d4 cxd4 4.Nxd4 Nf6 5.Nc3 e6 6.Be2 Be7 7.0-0 Nc6 8.Kh1 White tucks his King away to the h1-square. He is committed to playing f2-f4, and wants to avoid tactics based on the g1-a7 diagonal
8...0-0 9.f4 a6 Black guards the b5-square and prepares the c7-square for his Queen.
10.Be3 Qc7
In their 1995 PCA Championship Match, Viswanathan Anand and Garry Kasparov played this position a number of times. The position is dynamically balanced.
Scheveningen Variation, Tal Variation (Equal Position)
1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 d6 3.d4 cxd4 4.Nxd4 Nf6 5.Nc3 e6
The Tal variation has a completely different plan by White. Mikhail Tal (1936-1992), World Champion, 1960 to 61, was a master of the attack, and introduced the scheme of a quick Queenside castling;
6.f4 White wants to create immediate central threats with e4-e5. Black has to keep a wary, cautious, careful, eye to guarding against this possibility of danger to this possibility.
6...Nc6 7.Be3 Be7 8.Qf3
This position shows Tal's idea. What he wants to do is quickly castle Queenside and reintroduce the threat of e4-e5 after White's Rook is sitting on the d1-square. In many lines, when the players castle on opposite wing, Whit's Queen is ready to support the charge of the g-pawn. The position is dynamically balanced.
There are other plans. White can continue with simple development or go for broke on the kingside with the dangerous Keres Attack, which begins 2…d6; 3d4 cxd4; 4.Nxd4 Nf6; 5.Nc3 g6; 6.g4. Often Black plays this Sicilian defensively, trying to create impregnable barriers. A Hedgehog Position is often the result.

Could you summarize the 3 most important points / plans for white according to these sources? Thanks for the links, by the way! Yet I think that an answer should be complete on its own, so to speak. Cheers.

@RauanSagit will edit my answer when I get home, I'm on mobile now Sir :)

@RauanSagit I edited my answer, better now? :)

I think that the quoted text should be removed and replaced with a few "key ideas" for white. I don't really like the structure and presentation of the quoted text. Also, it is a bit huge, especially if proper diagrams are included. The source link should definitely be included, since it is relevant. Yet, the answer itself should be short and to the point. Of course, this is my opinion and others might think otherwise. Cheers.

@RauanSagit will do so tomorrow, I  promise :)


text:
When is a queen stronger than two rooks?
Two rooks are stronger than one queen. Let's assume that the material is equal, except that one player has a pair of rooks while the other player has a queen. In what situations is the queen stronger than the pair of rooks?

Thank you for your upvote+acceptance of my answer. If you find more useful information about this topic please notify me. I have bookmarked this question, and will update my answer if I find anything new but I doubt. Engine demonstrated clearly the findings listed in my answer. Sorry for not being able to give you 100% concrete answer :( Best regards.

Let's assume that the material is equal, except that one player has a pair of Rooks while the other player has a Queen. In what situations is the Queen stronger than the pair of Rooks?

Since everything else is symmetrical, she can be stronger only if two rooks are not well coordinated and there is a presence of pawns on both wings. This gives you a chance to quickly snatch a few pawns and set them in motion, which should tie at least one rook.
If you fail to utilize this, then rooks will get coordinated-one will defend while the other will attack-and will slowly but surely regroup to attack the king, after which they can exchange themselves for a queen and a pawn resulting in a won endgame. Something like this:
[fen "8/Q4pk1/p3r1pp/1p6/1P6/P5PP/3r1PK1/8 w - - 0 1"]

1.Qb7 Ree2 2.Qb6 Rxf2+-+

This is just an example, of course, but that is how I would play it. It all depends of the position but I doubt you can stop rooks from regrouping like in the above diagram.
Hopefully we shall see other interesting answers as well, looking forward to it.
EDITED IN RESPONSE TO OPs COMMENT:

The material is equal, but the position doesn't have to be symmetrical.

It doesn't matter, the endgame should be won for the side with the rooks anyway.
The only "saving grace" for the side with the queen is asymmetric distribution of the pawns, plus they should be far ahead so when side with rooks enter pawn ending, side with the queen can still create a passed pawn. I guess it all depends from the efficiency of rooks regrouping. I am pretty sure they will be able to tie the queen down eventually, after which the transposition into a won endgame will occur.
To answer this question it would be important to find the exact evaluation of the following position:
[fen "r2r4/1p3pk1/p3p1pp/8/2P5/1P2Q1PP/P4PK1/8 w - - 0 1"]

This is the most realistic case I can come up with. If we can prove that Black can win with the regrouping of his rooks as above, then it is safe to assume Black wins in equal positions with 2 rooks vs queen. I will analyze this myself, or even post this as a question.
UPDATE:
No mater how I alter the pawn structure, White holds the game by sacrificing  king-side pawns to open my king.
Then he uses queens mobility to attack my queen-side pawns and to harass my king.
My rooks can not regroup into winning lineup because of the threat of double attack ( check on the king + attack on the rook/pawn ) or simply because side with the queen has perpetual check.
The only way for queen to win is to strip opponents king naked and use double attacks to win material. Even with such a pathetic setup for rooks as above they can still hold the game.
To conclude:
To win with the queen, you will need weaknesses in opponents pawn structure and you will have to blow up opposing kings cover.
Hopefully  you will be able to exploit pawn weaknesses and bad rook coordination with a double attack to win material.
Using queens mobility and giving "smart" checks is the key here. Keeping as many lines closed can help you-avoid pawn exchanges to restrict rooks mobility and to have greater chances of snatching a pawn with double attack.
Best regards.

The material is equal, but the position doesn't have to be symmetrical.

@RauanSagit: I have edited my answer.

I think that symmetric positions with two or more open files are usually in favor for the side with the pair of Rooks. While asymmetric and highly dynamic positions with a poorly coordinated pair of Rooks are in favor for the side with the Queen. By the way, thanks for the edit! Cheers!

@RauanSagit: I will set Houdini/Fritz to maximum strength and try to win with Black from the edited position. That should give us valuable insight. Best regards.

I suspect that the second position is balanced. The black rooks are well coordinated yet only a single file is open, which means that getting both rooks to the second rank will be more difficult. While white's Queen can hope to get counter-play on the enemy King.

@RauanSagit: I think that this was my final edit. There is no way to win vs 2 rooks unless there are some huge weaknesses to be exploited-rooks just defend too well. In any reasonable position the best you can hope for is to open his king and score a profitable double attack. Best regards.

As a general rule, two Rooks tend to be stronger than a Queen. Typical endgames like 2R+5P vs Q+5P are much better for the rooks who will coordinate to attack the opponent's weakest pawn.
However, some factors can favor the queen:

Open kings : the queen is very strong in direct mating attacks. It can checkmate with minimal support, fork king and unprotected pieces along different lines, or simply secure a perpetual check when needed. If the kings are weak and the game is wild, the high mobility of the queen can thus prove more useful than the rooks. (of course, it is even better if only your opponent's king is weak...)
Knights : as a general rule, the more minor pieces are on the board, the better for the side with the queen: minor pieces reduce the space available for the rook (e.g., by controling entry squares on the open files), make it more probable to build an attack against the opponent king (see point 1), and can protect weak points to diminish the numerical advantage of the rooks. Knights in particular coordinate better with the queen than with the rooks, so a material balance like (QN vs RRN) or (QNN vs RRNB) might not be disavantageous at all.
General strategic pluses : beside the Q vs RR factor, all other strategical rules remain important as in any chess game: weak pawns, passers, coordination, activity (especially open files), tactical threats or a few tempi will change the evaluation of a position with this material balance as often as with any other.

This should be the correct answer.

Another important factor IMO: time. In rapid games, or under time pressure, the queen is usually easier to maneuver and more dangerous.

@leonbloy : sure, but I preferred to concentrate on objective factors, that applies to the position notwithstanding the time control.

The side with the Queen will be stronger when the player with the two Rooks has a lot of weak pawns and/or squares. Yet, the balance in a Queen versus two Rooks situation depends a lot on the position. Thus, a rule of thumb is to prefer the Queen when it has a lot of weak squares and pawns to attack.

The queen is stronger early on in the game, as a rule, on a very crowded board. Queen strength doesn't vary much as the game progresses, but rooks become significantly more useful as pawns start coming off the board and lines start opening up. So if both sides still have their entire armies except for a queen for one, both rooks for the other, the queen will probably be better because it's more agile, while the rooks tend to get blocked by things.

The point is well made that Rooks gain in value as the game proceeds and lines are opened. An interesting question to look at with an engine might be this. How should a game go that starts withouut the White Rooks and the Black Queen?  @AlwaysLearningNewStuff?

If there are a lot of pawns left on the board.. a slight edge exists to the Queen. If there is an extra minor piece for both sides(Knight would be a perfect complement for queen) it can win. If rooks can get coordinated, it is tough for Queen.

The points made above regarding regarding the theoretical advantage of the two rooks are valid, but as someone who recently lost with the two rooks, I have a couple of balancing comments/warnings:

If the side with the queen manages to advance pawns and cramp the opposing king, then that favours the queen. You generally start to get tactical threats (mating attacks, forks...) based on the limited mobility of the king.

In practice, I think it's generally harder to play with the two rooks. It's very easy to miss tactical shots with a queen on the board, particularly if your king is exposed or cramped at the edge of the board. Also, positions of this type often occur in zeitnot, when it's easy to slip up.

Of course, much depends on the specifics of the position and the value of general comments in this case is quite limited.


text:
What to do after losing a game?

What to do after losing a game?

I think that this question is on everyones' minds after a loss. I am guessing that everyone has their own way of coping with a loss. The best way to cope with a loss can turn out to vary from person to person. Yet, I think that it should be possible to find some sort of "best practice" procedure to draw wisdom from a loss and cope with it in a productive manner. Most chess players I know, including myself, feel terrible after a loss. One of the first negative thoughts that arises is

What is the point? I trained and competed so much and I still lost!

Today, I know that there are (at least) three ways of losing a game.

Become completely outplayed with virtually no counterplay.
Blunder (e.g. during time trouble).
Enter a position with chances for both sides, do your best and still lose.

It is clear that whatever level of skill you have, you can still lose. So what to do afterwards? Is there a best practice?

This seems relevant: http://www.chessquotes.com/topic-losing

Throw your pieces at him.

Cry, that's what I do

Chess is played, most times for "fun". It doesn't matter to win or lose. Just put up a fight and enjoy :)

Meditate under a tree for 15 minutes. Help you observe those negative emotions with equanimity.

The best practice would be to thoroughly analyze the game and also your thought process before, during and after the game. Besides, if after sincere hard efforts you still lose, it's important to have an attitude like this -

“I haven't failed, I've found 10,000 ways that don't work” - Thomas
  Edison

In chess, that would mean -

I haven't failed, I have discovered that this
  strategy/opening/tactic/etc. doesn't work.

In my personal experience, you often learn more from the games you lose than from the games you win. So use that to your advantage. Analyze the game thoroughly (of course with the help of an engine) and see where you went wrong. Also, identify faulty patterns of thinking during the game. For example -

"this position was objectively equal, but during the game I thought I
  was worse and so I got demotivated and played badly".

Gary Kasparov suggested the following after winning (but I suppose it applies all the more after losing) -

"Even the game we won always contained mistakes; inaccuracies. It's
  inevitable. I can hardly find one brilliant game with no mistakes."
"If we won, it is most likely because our opponent made the last
  mistake. But, he made the last mistake and he is definitely analyzing
  the game; he'll find what we did wrong in the previous stage of the
  game. So what is important is to find it first."

I found some other interesting quotes on this page. Some of the more interesting quotes are -

Losing can persuade you to change what doesn't need to be changed, and
  winning can convince you everything is fine even if you are on the
  brink of disaster.  -  Garry Kasparov
Don't be afraid of losing, be afraid of playing a game and not
  learning something. - Dan Heisman
I prefer to lose a really good game than to win a bad one.  -  David
  Levy
Setbacks and losses are both inevitable and essential if you're going
  to improve and become a good, even great, competitor. The art is in
  avoiding catastrophic losses in the key battles.  -  Garry Kasparov
You may learn much more from a game you lose than from a game you win.
  You will have to lose hundreds of games before becoming a good player.
  -  Jose Capablanca
Most players ... do not like losing, and consider defeat as something
  shameful. This is a wrong attitude. Those who wish to perfect
  themselves must regard their losses as lessons and learn from them
  what sorts of things to avoid in the future.  -  Jose Capablanca

I'd like to share this on my Facebook status.. thanks..

I like Dan Heisman's quote. I think it defines very well the necessary kind of actitude in order to minimize the harmful psychological effects of loosing a game.

Don't forget to be a good sport. Smile, shake hands with the winner, and congratulate them on a good game. Then later, when you've calmed down, when you're in a more focused frame of mind, analyze your game. (Keep a notebook of the moves).
1) Look for obvious blunders - hanging pieces, bad trades
2) Look for tactical mistakes - forks, pins, etc.
3) Look for strategic mistakes - pieces becoming cramped, weak pawn structure.
4) Decide if one section of the game gave you more trouble than others. (Opening, middle,
endgame)
5) Create your practice plan. Review topics that gave you trouble. Do some practice puzzles. Play against yourself. Play against a computer.
More tips:

Practice focusing on only the board, shut everything else out. Getting angry, sad, or even happy during a game can make you lose focus.
Don't pay attention to your opponent. Just play against the board. Don't rely on him to make mistakes, or move in a certain way. Assume that every move he makes will be the best one he can, and you do the same. If you know what his best move is, and he makes a different one, that's a clue that you have an opportunity to gain an advantage.
Ultimately, a lot of openings in chess will result in black losing, if both players play perfectly. It might not be your fault, just that black starts off one tempo behind. Play both sides, often.

I'd be interested to know which openings result in black losing. My understanding is that it's just a little bit harder for black to equalize in some openings, but does this mean that black is lost?

@Ralph How big of an edge do the white pieces offer against the black pieces? That would be an excellent question indeed that deserves its own discussion.

"a lot of openings in chess will result in black losing" isn't an accurate statement. Black can indeed get a slightly worse position after the opening (where black has failed to equalize). Yet, this is not the same as being "objectively lost". As long as there is room for play, there is room for all three possible results (in practical play between two human opponents).

I like this answer, it's very practical. I do not consider white to start a game with tempo though. Having tempo means the opponent is on the back foot, and the opponent's choice of next move is limited to countering your previous move. This is simply not true of any opening move white can make. I mean, having tempo is only an advantage if you can maintain it.

Well, yes, that's the point - if white can't maintain the tempo advantage then they've made a mistake somewhere. Albeit probably quite a small one.

Almost certainly Chess is objectively a draw. That is, with perfect play, at some point White will either have no advantage or one that is not enough to win (K+RP vs K). But he will have made no mistake. Any advantage that White may seem to have in a well-played opening is usually just a matter of it being easier to find good moves

@Philip Roe You can't claim almost certainly as we don't have the computational power to even dream of running through all sets of games. Sure our engines give an evaluation close to 0.00, but they're only calculating 20-30 moves ahead.

@Inertial Ignorance I fail to understand this comment. I said almost.

@Philip Roe I know, but what's your justification for almost certainly?

Embrace improving at chess. Make it your primary goal. Get set in your mind that winning is secondary.
Take action on the new goal. Analyze all your games. Analyze with your opponent whenever possible. Try to play longer games you can record, and leave blitz for online play (where the computer records your games)
Take some time before you resign to get your mind straight, so you can be a good sport.
If rating is important to you, recognize that rating is a trailing indicator. Rating will rise as you get better. Rating goes up with wins and down with losses, but it will not reliably increase without becoming a stronger player.

World champion Jose Raul Capablanca once said, "From few of my won games have I learned as much as most of my losses."
So look upon a lost game as learning experience. They're usually easier to remember than your wins. To this day, I remember how someone beat me forty years ago with a $450 hotel on Baltic avenue because I had mortgaged everything getting both the green and the maroon monopolies. (All right, that's a different game, but you get the point.) Because the lost games are easy to remember, it's also easy to identify, and hopefully correct your mistakes. (The hardest mistakes to identify are those that should have cost you the game, but didn't.)
In Capablanca's case, most of his lost games came from making the wrong decision at a critical turning point. He even saw the fork in the road ahead of time, but lost his caution when it was time to pull the trigger. Ultimately, his opponent's threats were larger than they seemed at the time, and he lost by misjudging them. When he went back, he worked through how the better choice could have allowed him to draw, or even win the game. That made him good at making the "better choice" in the future.

Actually I think Capablance mostly lost, because his opponents played absolutely brilliant chess that day. Just go over his losses (there aren't that many), it is really a collection of quite extraordinary games.

@BlindKungFuMaster: In "Chess Fundamentals," he discussed a loss to Lasker in which he said, "I would like nothing more than to have this position again." He lost to Marshall in 1909 in which he showed an alternate line in which "Black gets an excellent game." He lost to Chajes in which he "sought complications but this is by not a losing move by any means." In his loss to Janowski, he said, "Unfortunately, Black did not carry out his original plan." (The same was true of his loss to Lasker. His loss to Rubenstein was "a sad [endgame] exhibition for two masters."

I don't really understand your comment. I said Capablanca lost a lot of beautiful games. Now you try to show that he was a rather sore loser? Where is the connection?

@BlindKungFuMaster: He pointed out his own mistakes in his lost (and won) games. There were some games (e.g. against Mieses), that he won, that he felt he should have lost.  And for just about every game he lost, he pointed out a winning (or drawing) line for himself "after the fact."He was among the first chess writers to do this.

Analyze and find out why you'd lost the game. It might probably be the cause of a simple blunder or just a small mistake. In each case, find out exactly what went wrong, whether it's time pressure or other factors.

What you should do particularly when you have just lost to a stronger player is ask them if they will go over the game with you. This normally means going to a separate room if you are playing a tournament but I have had strong players silently play over a few variations showing me where I went wrong without attracting the ire of the arbiters. The "silent" part, though, is vital and if you actually want to discus the game you will have to go to the analysis room or get thrown out.
Losing to much stronger players and having them analyze with you afterwards is absolutely invaluable. I have learned a lot this way. You should take every chance you get to do this.

I humbly believe the best way to learn chess is to learn from lost games. Analyse all your games, especially those that were not successful. - You will learn a lot from own mistakes, and you will most likely remember that "breaking point" when you enounter it again, and think "no, I will not fall for that again".

I do not necessarily endorse this opinion, but I once heard an IM say, that for amateurs, excessively analysing lost games can be counterproductive. Amateurs make so many mistakes even in won games, that they will learn just as much from analysing won or drawn games. The difference is that this will be much more enjoyable. And wallowing in misery is probably not the ideal mindset to learn and improve.
My take on this is, that you should definitely analyse lost games, if the way you lost, or the opening or type of position you lost in, is typical for you. Otherwise it might often be better to just let it go. If you made a bad blunder, beating yourself up about it, will not make you a better player. On the contrary, it might just wreck the necessary confidence to play well.

With regard to Blindkungfumaster’s comment, I agree that over analyzing losses as a novice might be counterproductive. Sometimes the reasons for losing the game are so obvious that analysis is unnecessary. Such as leaving pieces hanging, which I do!

But sometimes you think you know the reason, and you don't. I had a recent win where my opponent wasn't losing quite as soon as I thought he was; he could have saved the game. There's no way to know without analyzing it in some way!


text:
How well does Elo rating estimate a player's strength?
Proposal: strength is the real and rating is the model that estimates it.
Question: How well does Elo rating estimate a player's strength?
Bonus question: What happens if you take the player's rating curve into account?

It shouldn't be that hard to measure this (take a large database of games, filter out those that have missing ratings or are only a single move, put them into bins depending on rating difference, and then check if the average score inside each bin is close to what Elo predicts) but I can't find any good link right now. My gut feeling is that the estimation is very good indeed.

While I've always found ELO to be a fair representation of rating (and a great statistical tool), at an individual level there are many other considerations that it (obviously) doesn't take into account.  I've experienced cases where 3 people of similar overall rating had different styles, such that they could generally beat each other in a circular fashion: A < B, B < C and C < A.  I'd say that this kind of thing is the exception though, not the rule.

How do we define "strength" exactly? "The thing that Elo tries to model" is not an unambiguous definition

The Elo rating is a statistical prediction of your results against players with known rating when they play each other in the long term. Some examples:

Two players with the same rating will score the same amount of victories when playing together.

Two players with a 200 Elo difference, means the stronger player will win 3 out of 4 games (and lose the other).

Two players with a 400 Elo difference, means the stronger player will win 10 out of 11 times (and the weakest winning the other one).

And so on, a difference beyond 700 is not accurately measurable (basically the system predicts 100% score of the stronger player).

Now, in practice, many other factors come into play (ie. the stronger player being bored or overconfident, playing a system in which the weakest players has in-depth knowledge, being in shape, etc.)
For more details, see
https://thechessworld.com/articles/general-information/deeper-look-at-elo-chess-rating-system/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elo_rating

It's not clear to me whether you are asking a philosophical or a quantitative question.
My answer to the philosophical question is that the Elo rating is predictive; that is, it is designed to make accurate predictions about the outcomes of chess games. To that extent, it measures strength by estimating the likelihood that a player will win against another player. It does this by using the player's past results, and it does the best it can given that information.
The answer to the quantitative question is that the "expected value" of a game between two players is correlated with the difference in their Elo ratings. For example if player A's Elo rating is 200 higher than that of player B, then player A would be expected to go about 76-24 over the course of a 100-game match.
Note: The question has changed since I answered it, so my answer makes less sense now. The title of the question used to be Does the chess rating represent a player's strength?, and the question was "I notice that somehow, we chess players associate the chess rating with strength. But is it a measure of strength? To what extent?" Please take this answer as a response to that question, not the one it has been changed to.

I think of strength as the "real" that is predicted by a "model" (in this case, the rating).

The question is, how good is its estimation? There are other systems (like Glicko) that claim to be better.

@RemcoGerlich That wasn't the question at the time :) See my edit.

Yeah, sorry, at first I didn't notice that this was an edited question.

@dfan Yep. I edited the question because I thought it would be more interesting this way. After all, FIDE Elo rating is the official rating of chess players. It is custom to make assumptions about a player's strength based on their Elo rating. Yet, how accurate is this estimation method?

In general, if your edited question isn't just clarifying but is different enough from the old question that answers to the old one no longer answer the new one, it's better to just create a new question, to avoid issues like this.

@dfan Yes indeed. I will do that next time. Cheers.

"Normally" (pun intended) the Elo rating does indicate a player's average strength (you tagged this post with Elo, so I am considering Elo rating).
Elo rating assumes that a player's performance conforms to what is called the Normal Distribution. Thus, if your rating is 2700, then that's your mean or average level of performance. However, that does not give an indication of how far varied your performance can be in relation to your mean rating.
For instance, if your standard deviation is low, then it means that your performance is very consistent around 2700 (for example, you beat most guys below 2600, hardly ever beat 2800+, and usually draw with players between that range). If your standard deviation is high, then it means that sometimes, you beat even Magnus Carlsen (2881 as of today), but at times you find yourself losing to a low rated Grandmaster or even an International Master.

It does no such thing. Rather it is much closer to a primitive form of logistic regression, except the computations can be carried out by hand.

Not quite.  The normal distribution goes from negative infinity to plus infinity.  The proper distribution would be a beta type with finite values for upper and lower actual ratings.

The Elo rating system doesn't estimate a player's strength as well as other systems. I've read a while ago about a contest between rating systems, I'll describe it by quoting the article: competitors train their rating systems using a training dataset of over 65,000 recent results for 8,631 top players. Participants then use their method to predict the outcome of a further 7,809 games.
The conclusion:
The Elo benchmark was outperformed within 24 hours
On a sidenote, I can't see the charts anymore, if anyone finds them, you're welcome to contribute them. From what I remember there were no less than 60 rating systems which outperformed Elo.

8631 top players will in no way represent what the vast bulk of more ordinary players would actually do.

The weakness of the Elo rating system is that it depends on scoring, that is the assignment of win=1, loss=0, and draw=1/2. Scoring causes some information about chess game outcomes to be lost. It would be more accurate to measure chess playing strength in two dimensions. Please see: http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2477868

The real weakness is that there are not enough games among a much wider range of opponents to swamp out the locality differences.  Some cities have much stronger players than others yet their ratings tend to be the same as they play each other in their city and rarely play others from the other city.

An Elo rating most emphatically is NOT a measure of a player's strength, nor was it intended to be. A player might, for all kinds of reasons, have a lower Elo rating than someone that is in reality weaker. For example a player that plays mostly in team competitions might accept a draw in a winning position, or risk losing by playing for a win in a drawn position, with bad effects on their rating.
Another example: One player in  SWISS tournaments might play objectively to get the "correct" number of points that their play deserves. Another might take great risks on the grounds that 3.5 or 4 out of 6 finishes nowhere whereas 5 or more is usually in the money, and worth the risk of losing from an easily drawn position. The first player would probably earn a higher rating, but the second would win more tournaments! (and might actually be stronger).
The maths behind Elo ratings guarantees that rating points are gained more slowly than is warranted by current form and also ensures that a few bad results do not reduce a rating by a huge amount. In effect games played years earlier when a player was much weaker (or stronger) affect the rate at which the rating can change.  This aspect of controlling the rate of change is further fudged by choice of k-factor.
A further problem is that Elo ratings only apply properly to players that are contemporary.  They do not give meaningful comparisons of strength for players active in different eras. Of course that has not stopped people from making such comparisons and concluding (for example) that Lasker and ZUuckertort would hold their own against today's GM's that former world-champion Petrosian was no stronger than any modern-day top-50 super-GM, or that Fischer was significantly weaker than Kasparov and Carlsen. Those conclusions may or may not be true, but it is just wrong to use Elo ratings (retrospectively calculated as necessary) to arrive at them.
What Elo ratings are designed for is to allow the probability of encounters between players to be estimated. They do that quite well for players that have stable ratings that have not changed much over a few years. They do a poor job when one or both of the players is either improving or declining.
They have been adopted as a proxy for chess strength, but are far from perfect. The right way to assess strength is to study a players games and make a judgement, but to do that you have to be very strong yourself, and it is hard work.
As in so many other areas of life and human endeavour it is much easier to pretend that a simple number based on results tells us what we'd like to know ... even when it doesn't.

One interpretation of the question is "What is the standard error of Elo?" That is, if Elo is a statistic that measures some true latent ability, what is the standard deviation of that statistic? If, for example, you've just played 50 tournament games, and your Elo is calculated as 1700, is it really 1700, or might it actually be 1710? Or 1750? Might it be 1600?
I have analyzed this question in a blog post, the gist of which is as follows: Suppose two players play each other repeatedly. The difference in true abilities is "Delta A", where we assume the probability of a win by the first player is the Elo logistic function in Delta A. Then, after many games between them, the difference in their computed Elos will be Delta r which equals Delta a plus some error, epsilon. That error term, epsilon, approximately follows an autoregressive process, and is asymptotically unbiased. The standard error depends on the "k factor" used in updating Elo, and on the probability of a tie (which is typically higher for better players, when equally matched). Here is a plot of the empirical (dots) and theoretical standard error versus the k factor, for different probabilities of a tie:

The upshot is that differences in Elo will have standard error around 20 or more.
As others have noted, the Elo rating has some deficiencies. However, it is fairly simple to describe and compute, which was necessary at the time of its introduction.


text:
How do you checkmate with a rook?
How do you checkmate with a Rook and King versus King? Is there a good and fast method? Can you explain it in a good way? Thanks!

Are you learning chess from the beginning again? :)

FIDE Masters ain't what they used to be!

I know you're a FIDE Master :), so I suppose you're more interested in this question from a teaching perspective.
The simplest way to understand a checkmate with King and Rook vs King is the idea of the rectangle of the opposing king. Consider this position-

Here, the Black King is restricted by the White Rook in this giant rectangular area of the chessboard. For simplicity, I am not considering the area restricted by the White King, which would be like this -

A simple way (I'll deal with optimizations later) to checkmate is to ensure that this rectangle gets smaller and smaller, so that the Black King is pushed to a corner of the board (more visual representation below with diagrams).
    [FEN "8/8/8/8/4k3/8/8/K6R w - - 0 1"]

     1. Re1+ Kd4 2. Kb1 Kd3 3. Kc1 Kd4 4. Re2 Kd3 5. Kd1 Kd4 6. Kd2 Kc4 7. Re3 Kd4
     8. Ke2 Kc4 9. Rd3 Kc5 10. Ke3 Kc4 11. Ke4 Kc5 12. Rd4 Kc6 13. Rd5 Kb6 14. Kd4
     Kc6 15. Kc4 Kb6 16. Rc5 Kb7 17. Kb5 Ka7 18. Rc6 Kb7 19. Kc5 Ka7 20. Rb6 Ka8 21.
     Kc6 Ka7 22. Kc7 Ka8 23. Ra6#

1. Re1+ Kd4

2. Kb1 Kd3 3. Kc1 Kd4 4. Re2 Kd3 5. Kd1

5...Kd4 6. Kd2 Kc4 7. Re3 Kd4

8. Ke2 Kc4 9. Rd3

9...Kc5 10. Ke3 Kc4 11. Ke4 Kc5 12. Rd4

12...Kc6 13. Rd5

13...Kb6 14. Kd4 Kc6 15. Kc4 Kb6 16. Rc5

16...Kb7 17. Kb5 Ka7 18. Rc6

18...Kb7 19. Kc5 Ka7 20. Rb6

Ka8 21.Kc6 Ka7 22. Kc7 Ka8 23. Ra6# 1-0

Of course, with this method, the one mistake that White must avoid is stalemate -

Rb7?? stalemate!

Optimizations and Tricks.
More experienced players can get to smaller rectangles quicker by looking further ahead.
One trick is to trap the king in a smaller rectangle if it comes too close to the rook. For this, White also has to use the king more actively.
   [FEN "8/8/8/8/4k3/8/8/K6R w - - 0 1"]

   1. Re1+ Kd4 2. Kb2 Kd3 3. Kb3! Kd2 4. Re4! Kd3 5. Rc4

Another trick is to give a rook check when the kings are in opposition.
   [FEN "8/8/8/2k5/8/2K5/8/4R3 w - - 0 6"]

   1. Re5+!? (1. Rd1!) Kd6 2.Kd4

This trick is not necessarily optimal. In the above example, White can actually mate faster with the move 1. Rd1!
   [FEN "8/8/8/2k5/8/2K5/8/4R3 w - - 0 6"]

   1. Rd1! Kb5 2. Rd5+! Kc6 3. Kc4

The above optimization is also made possible by the rook-waiting-move trick. If, in the above position, instead of going to c6, the Black king tries to escape via a4, then the following checkmate is possible.
 [FEN "8/8/8/1k6/8/2K5/8/3R4 w - - 0 7"]

 1. Rd5+ Ka4 2. Rc5! Ka3 3. Ra5#

One more idea is to use king-opposition (in combination with the rook) to push the enemy king behind.
 [FEN "8/8/8/2k5/8/8/2K5/4R3 w - - 0 4"]

 1. Kc3! (1...Kd5 2. Re3!) Kc6 2. Kc4! Kd6 3. Re4

Combining these different ideas, here are two of the most optimal mates possible from the starting position -
   [FEN "8/8/8/8/4k3/8/8/K6R w - - 0 1"]

   1. Re1+ (1. Kb2 Kf4 2. Kc3 Ke5 3. Re1+ Kf6 4. Kd4 Kf5 5. Re4 Kf6 6. Re5 Kg6 7.
   Ke4 Kf6 8. Kf4 Kg6 9. Re6+ Kg7 10. Kg5 Kf7 11. Re5 Kg7 12. Rf5 Kh7 13. Kf6! Kg8
   14. Rh5 Kf8 15. Rh8#) 1... Kd4 2. Kb2 Kd3 3. Kb3! Kd4 4. Kb4 $3 Kd3 5. Kc5! Kd2
   6. Re4 Kd3 7. Re5 Kc3 8. Rd5 Kb3 9. Rd3+ Kc2 10. Kc4 Kb2 11. Rd2+ Kc1 12. Kc3
   Kb1 13. Kb3 Kc1 14. Rd3 Kb1 15. Rd1# *

I actually didn't know the 'rectangle' method until now. I always used the 'king in opposition' method.

The "rectangle" method is much better on a large (square) board, where the length of the mating procedure is at most some multiple of the board size, whereas the length of the "king in opposition" approach grows as the square of the board size.

This is the best method to teach. It easy to remember and reproduce. I made a video on this - https://youtu.be/13doGCKqhFY

I would teach the slow but safe and easy way first: The rook divides the board in two halves. Then the attacking king tries to get in opposition to the enemy king (sometimes the rook has to swap sides or needs to make a waiting move for this to happen). Then the rook gives a check, hence pushing the king one field closer to the edge of the board. The mate follows exactly the same pattern.

This is how I learned it, but is it really simpler than the rectangle method?

I think it is. You have just two very simple rules: 1) Get the king in opposition and give a check, 2) If the rook is attacked, swing it over. No stalemates, no uncertainty regarding which piece to move. And the rectangle method is not totally different, you can see it as 2D extension of the 1D opposition method.

I would suggest --  Play this out with an opponent. That's the best way to get the feel of it. Otherwise just google and you will see lots of explanation -- with some nice graphics.
www.chess.com  and chesstempo.com even have some practice board where you can learn.
One link that covers good theory and explains slowly is
http://www.chesscorner.com/tutorial/basic/r_k_mate/r_k_mate.htm

Rule of thumb for checkmate with Rook against lone king:

Use the Rook to restrict the opponent's King.
Support the Rook with the King.
Confine the King to a box and make the box smaller  if possible.
If it is not possible to make the box smaller, move the King (a
waiting move to force back the opponent's King.).
Last but not least which leads to victory is
Force your opponent king to corner (Rank - 1st or 8th or File - a or h ).

Wes already gave a good answer from the teaching perspective for the OP. This answer is complementary to his answer. I am concentrating on the optimization and tricks still keeping beginners in mind (may not be useful to OP). If you haven't seen the basic technique read that form Wes's answer first, then read these tricks and finally go back to optimisation and tricks section of his answer.
The most basic tool in making it faster is flexibility
(eg: not sticking one method always whether it is king-in-opposition method or box-in-method)
Also, just to recall, our purpose is to confine the king to an edge, not to a corner. And we are not preoccupied with which edge it must be.
Though obvious, these fact helps to make it shorter.
Trick 1) When you use king-in-opposition, there is no need to go all the way to the end of the side.
So, instead of the following, you can make the check earlier if the king is confined enough (see the variation).
[FEN "8/8/8/4k3/R7/2K5/8/8 w - - 0 1"]

1.Kd3 Kf5 2.Ke3 Kg5 3.Kf3
( 3.Ra5+ Kf6
    ( 3...Kg4 4.Rb5 Kg3 5.Rg5+)
4.Ke4 Kg6 5.Ra6+ Kg5 6.Rb6 Kg4 7.Rg6+ )

5...Kh5 6.Kg3 Kg5 7.Ra5+ *
Trick 2) King can be inside the rectangle instead of outside
[FEN "8/8/1k6/8/2R5/1K6/8/8 w - - 0 3"]

3.Kb4 Kb7
( 3...Ka6 4.Rc6+ Kb7 5.Kb5 )
4.Kb5 Ka7 5.Rc7+
( 5.Kc6 Kb8 6.Ra4 )
*