** Version 4.9.1 **
bugfix release for 4.9.0
* Fix crash when logging out from ICS
* Defer book faking input move until ping balance
* Fix setting up btm positions with 'edit'
* Fix bare King adjudication
* Fix check testing in games without King
* Fix disambiguating Pawn moves in Xiangqi
* Fix King leaving Palace in Xiangqi
* Fix compile error Xaw build
** Version 4.9.0 **
(see http://www.gnu.org/software/xboard/whats_new/4.9.0/ )
* New features in this release
* Running EPD test suites
* Getting instant help (XB)
* Editing castling rights in a position
* Use mouse wheel to set up position (XB)
* Allow engine to pop up its settings dialog
* Specifying ultra-fast games (XB)
* Installing board themes from packages (XB)
* Using a single-button mouse
* A special directory for start positions
* Allow terminal-less ICS play (XB)
* Sound warnings in analysis mode
* Changing fonts through the GUI (XB)
* Automatic adapting of fonts to board size (XB)
* New variant support
* New piece types
* Allowing more than 26 piece types
* More flexible piece promotion
* Restricting promotion choice
* New configurable move types
* Inscribing pieces with text
* Setting rules from the command line
* Allow inaccessible squares
* Load Shogi games in .kif format
** Version 4.8.0 **
(see http://www.gnu.org/software/xboard/whats_new/4.8.0/ )
* New features in this release
* Resuming saved unfinished games
* Setting up positions more easily
* Bitbase adjudication
* Showing tablebase hits
* A new ICS window
* Recalling board themes (XBoard)
* Playing moves by clicking them
* Fonts in the XBoard GTK build
* Using the mousewheel (XBoard)
* Displaying a blunder graph
* Slicing up a PGN database
* Auto-install of engines
* New variant support
* ASEAN Chess
* Chu Shogi
* Mighty Lion
* Highlighting squares on engine command
* Let the engine finish a user move
* Non-standard variant names
* Fischer castling in any variant
* Knowing the moves of unknown pieces
* Fixed bugs
* Fix crash on using some Browse buttons in dialogs of the GTK
build.
* Fix buffer overflow in PGN parser, when all lines end in
comments.
* Fix crash on specifying non-existent board texture.
* Prevent crash on double-click in XB Game List Tags dialog.
* Fix the auto-display comment control in the General Options
dialog of WinBoard, which was ignored.
* Fix adjusting clocks by clicking them in Xaw build.
* Fix zooming of Evaluation Graph XB with mousewheel, which was
not working at all.
* Fix sticky-windows feature WB for Windows 8, where it did not
work at all.
* WinBoard's seek graph is now sized to also cover any board rim.
* Key bindings XB for non menu items are no longer ignored.
* Set castling rights correctly after loading of game file from
command line.
* Allow castling and e.p. moves to be edited into opening book
(and prevent their disappearance from it).
* The sorting of engine output was made more robust against
engines that send thinking output on fail lows.
* Fix node-count display, which was clipped to 32 bits.
* Suppress board-size oscillations in GTK build.
* Fixed detection of screen size in GTK. (This is a mixed
blessing, as now it picks the largest possible window size, and
in GTK interactive down-sizing is not possible.)
* Fix mode highlighting after refusal of Two Machines mode because
2nd engine did not support variant.
* Blow up textures that are too small.
* Ignore invalid color specs in stead of treating them as black
(important because Cairo does not understand old xpm color
names).
* Prevent XB and WB from becoming unresponsive during lengthy
tasks such as book building.
* Fix slowdown of WB during loading of huge PGN files due to
Game-List window update.
* Limit width of menu bar for small board sizes in GTK build.
* Improve the code to kill rogue engines in XB.
* Drawing of pieces outside the board (in maximaized windows),
which left lots of debris, is now suppressed.
* Make WB window sizing handle multiple screens.
* 50-move counter is no longer reset on Chess960 castlings.
* Fix legality testing of A-side castling in FRC (which was
allowed with Rook on a- and blocker on b-file).
* Fixed piece ID of Falcon in Falcon Chess, which was written as
'.' and could not be selected on promotion.
* Fix cross-edge e.p. captures in Cylinder Chess (which was not
recognized as e.p.).
* Fix animation of Seirawan Chess castling + gating at Rook
square, which made Rook disappear.
* Fix adjudication of stalemates in variant Giveaway.
* Display of the variant tag in the Game List now works.
* Reset move entry (clearing target-square markers) on 'clear
board' in Edit Position mode.
* The Game List is automatically updated when you alter the tag
selection for the game lines.
* Indicate current variant in New Variant dialog of the GTK build
(by printing it in boldface on the button).
* Known Problems
* GTK: in a tiling window manager the size of the board seems to be
calculated incorrectly. A temporary fix for this is to use a fixed
size by using the "-size <N>" and "-fixedSize true" options
on the command line.
** Version 4.7.3 **
(see http://www.gnu.org/software/xboard/whats_new/4.7.3/ )
bugfix release for 4.7.2
* Fix buffer overflow in parser on long PGN with scores
* Allow castling and e.p. capture moves to survive when editing opening book
* Fix node-count overflow in engine output
* Better sorting of fail-low lines in engine output
* Fix Chess960 a-side castling legality check
* Fix position search in Chess960
* Fix adjudication of Giveaway stalemates
* Adapt WinBoard window positioning to work with multiple screens
* Cure some weirdness in XBoard when dragging pieces outside the board
* Some dialog layout improvements to facilitate internationalization
* Fix crash on using some dialog Browse buttons in GTK version
* Connect manual menu item work in GTK version
* Put code for OS X integration in the GTK version
** Version 4.7.2 **
(see http://www.gnu.org/software/xboard/whats_new/4.7.2/ )
bugfix release for 4.7.1
* Make PGN parser immune to unprotected time stamps
* Fix book creation
* Fix GUI book after setup position
* Allow drops / promotions/ deferrals to be edited into book
* Allow entry of negative numbers in spin control (WB)
* Fix grabbing of selected piece
* Fix initial board sizing WB
* Fix -zippyVariants option
** Version 4.7.1 **
(see http://www.gnu.org/software/xboard/whats_new/4.7.1/ )
bugfix release for 4.7.0
* updated translations
* fixed texinfo 5.0 problems
* Work-around for Xt selection bug
* Add -backupSettingsFile option
* Make skipping of unknown option smarter
* Let popping up of WinBoard chatbox for channel open it
* Fix vertical sizing of GTK board
* Fix buffer overflow in feature parsing
* Accept setup command for non-standard board size
* Fix fatal error on unsupported board size
* Fix GTK box popup
* Let XBoard -autoBox option also affect move type-in
* Fix spurious popup after batch-mode Analyze Game
* Fix saving of analyzed game
* Provide compatibility with Alien Edition setup command
* Fix quoting of book name in tourney file
* Fix disappearence of pieces that were moved illegally
* Fix horrible bug in reading scores from PGN
* Print score of final position in Analyze Game
* Fix GTK SetInsertPos
* Fix scrolling of Chat Box
* Make Chat Box window obey -topLevel option
* Fix Xaw file browser
* Update zippy.README
** Version 4.7.0 **
(see http://www.gnu.org/software/xboard/whats_new/4.7.0/ )
* Code refactoring of XBoard
* The old X11 front-end has been largely rewritten,
so that all windows are now created by a single
generic routine
* XBoard now uses the Cairo library for all drawing
* Pixmaps and bitmaps no longer supported;
XBoard now uses PNG and SVG images instead.
* An alternative (as yet experimental) front-end
using GTK has been added
* Interactive Analysis
* Excluding moves from analysis by playing them
* Excluded-moves header in Engine Output window
* Analyzing with two engines simultaneously
* Annotating an entire muti-game file
* Analysing positions by Monte-Carlo play
* Other New Functionality
* Displaying player logos (XB)
* Player logo on ICS can be based on player handle
* Chat boxes for XBoard
* Narrowing down of position searches
* Copying pieces when editing a position
* Starting WinBoard through drag & drop
* Recalling fully configured engines and ICS
* Creating an opening book from a game file
* Pausing a game
* Automatically observing partner games with dual-board
* Interface Improvements
* Recognizes file type of lone argument by extension
* Default startup settings configurable per mode
* Separate menu items for loading 1st and 2nd engine
* Engines can be selected from listboxes
* Grouping of engines in the installed-engines list
* Stay in Analyze or Game Start mode after engine loading
* 'Continue Later' button in WB tournament dialog
* A new --help option (XB)
* A second board window for observing ICS games (XB)
* Smoother graphics and a resizable board (XB)
* A rejuvenated file browser (XB Xaw)
* Scrolling listboxes with mouse wheel (XB Xaw)
* Tabbing through dialog etry fields (XB Xaw)
* Adapt width of auxilliary windows on board resize (WB)
* External piece bitmaps (WB)
* Border around the board (WB)
* Saving settings as themes (WB)
* Bug fixes
* Grayout of Analysis menu item in zippy mode
* Crash on flagging in -st mode
* Keep track of virginity in variant seirawan FENs
* Immunity to capitalized promo pieces
* Avoid board sizes with unavailabile variant pieces
* Work-around for FICS violation of SAN
* Check validity of tourney participants
* Loop-Chess promotions with legality testing on
* Fix -fSAN option in Analyze File mode
* Scrolling of Engine Output after PV walk (XB)
* Start browsing in currently-selected folder (WB)
* Allow entry of fractional timeIncrement (WB)
* Resolve conflict between -mps and -inc options
* Size of mini-Shogi promotion zone
* Adjudication of stalemate and perpetuals in Shogi
* Rep-draw detection in drop games
* Insufficient-material draws in Knightmate
* Replacing of engine in non-last game position
* Sweep selection of promo-piece in click-click move
* Don't save aborted games in tourney PGN
* Remember ponder, book and other settings in tourney file
* Do not erase PGN tags on engine loading
* Solved feature problems with engine loading in match mode
* Re-send option settings to -xreuse engine
* Allow use of 'shadow' promotion pieces in any variant
* WinBoard did not always start in its installation folder
* Initialization of 'Twice' checkbox in Tournament dialog (WB)
* Clearing of marker dots after mode or settings change
* some smaller bugfixes
** Version 4.6.2 **
(for a more detailed list with screenshots see http://www.gnu.org/software/xboard/whats_new/4.6.2/ )
bugfix relase for 4.6.1
* Suppress clear-board message after pasting FEN
* Fix faking of castling rights after editing position with holdings
* Fix second-engine variant test
** Version 4.6.1 **
(for a more detailed list with screenshots see http://www.gnu.org/software/xboard/whats_new/4.6.1/ )
bugfix release for 4.6.0
* Fix memory corruption bug on second-engine loading (through menu or in tournament),
which could destroy -firstInitString
* Fix bug loading a new engine through the menu (not loading it with the full game,
but just upto the current move)
* Prefix engine command with "./" when a pathname is split up during install, so the engine actually runs (XB)
* Fix fall-back to -ncp mode when engine does not start (cutting short the feature timeout)
* Fix bug in position search for FRC castlings (where a King could 'fall off' the board)
* Add a message to inform the user how to clear the board, in sweep-select edit-position mode
* Fix a bug that could stop the clock when the board window was dragged (XB)
* Fix switching off highlighting during game (so last highlights do not remain for the rest of the game)
* Allow user to enter the name of a non-existing file when browsing for a save file (WB)
* Make sure rarely used engine-related options (such as -firstNPS) are also correctly loaded during session
* Correctly handle parsing of Crazyhouse promotions with legality-testing off
* Fix click-click detour under-promotions, which were not working for non-captures
* Don't strip path from engine command if directory is explicitly given in Load Engine dialog
* Consistently make auxiliary windows top level-shells or not, with new -topLevel option (XB)
* No longer fatal if second engine does not support current variant (just refuse Two Machines mode)
* Scroll XBoard game list to keep selected item in view (XB)
* Suppress spurious error popup when starting observing of bughouse games
* Fix vertical axis ticks in eval graph with drop games
* Put title on same line as menu bar only for -size 72 and larger (with -titleInWindow, XB)
* Properly open and close debug file when switching debug mode through key binding Ctrl-D (XB)
** Version 4.6.0 **
(see http://www.gnu.org/software/xboard/whats_new/4.6.0/ )
* Engine vs. Engine
* Loading and installing engines through the menu
* Running tournaments with more than two partipants
* Stopping a match between two engines
* Replacing a tourney participant
* Playing openings in color-reversed pairs
* Perpetual chasing in Xiangqi
* Interface Improvements
* Auto-Queen, and still under-promote?
* Piece fonts and figurine fonts
* Displaying PVs as SAN
* Small scores in the Eval Graph
* How close is the 50-move draw?
* Sign of the engine scores
* Interactive Analysis
* Playing moves from the PV
* Rapidly changing the number of PVs
* Setting the other side to move in analysis
* Annotating a game with an engine
* Other New Functionality
* Searching a position in a PGN file
* Editing the opening book
* XBoard -> WinBoard Convergence
* Exporting the game list (XB)
* A move type-in box (XB)
* New-style Move History window (XB)
** Version 4.5.3a **
(see http://www.gnu.org/software/xboard/whats_new/4.5.3a/ )
* only changes to Winboard : build non JAW by default, fix compile errors
** Version 4.5.3 **
(see http://www.gnu.org/software/xboard/whats_new/4.5.3/ )
* fixes of major bugs:
* In the file-browse dialog . and .. no longer mask other files if they are non-first in the directory
* Fix XBoard crash on showing an empty Engine Settings dialog, printing a message in stead
* The XBoard Game List can now handle files with more than 1900 games, by paging through them
* The state of the Move-History window is now remembered by XBoard even when the Engine-Output window is up
* Fix crash on switching sounds in WinBoard under Windows Vista
* Fix empty-string option values on XBoard command line (which were ignored)
* Fix spurious vertical scrolling in XBoard Engine-Output window on clicking in it
* Obey an engine's san feature when sending book moves to it
* Fix XBoard crash when 'filtering' made Game List empty
* Suppress clearing of Engine-Output window on automatic updates in analyze mode
* Force Move-History refresh after loading/reverting variation
* Fix closing brace, when joining two comments to same move
* fixes of minor bugs:
* Suppress playing sounds when no -soundProgram is set
* Fix display of last move of last match game
* Update window title after last game of match
* Never one-click move when legality testing is off
* Suppress playing book move when total weigth of all moves is zero
* Restore echo after ^C killed XBoard during ICS password
* Fix default of -remoteUser, which could cause crash when playing remote engines
* Fix recognition of separators between options in -adapterCommand command line
* Fix button sizing in generic popup
* Fix translatability of 'Spartan Chess' menu item WB
* Remove some duplicats from WB language template file
* Fix spurious 'Unfinished' sounds during ICS examining
* Fix bug in handling of partner command in zippy-mode bughouse games
* Create more space in some WB dialogs to accomodate translations
* Improvements benefitting the speaking version for the visually impaired (WB):
* Implement NVDA support in JAWS version
* Fix translation of spoken composite messages
* Fix JAWS reading of Engine-Settings dialog by removing group-boxes
* Add tab stops in WB generic popup
* Reorder controls in Engine-Setings dialog WB, so they are tabbed through in logical order
* fixed compiler warnings/errors and portability:
* Fix use of random function in XBoard shuffle dialog callback
* Fix inconsistent type of the variable 'shuffleOpenings'
* Silence warnings during rpm build
* Fix warnings XBoard file browser
* Fix some warnings and header-file improvement
* misc:
* Add -at and -opt options as alternative for @, as work-around for Windows shortcut bug
* Make occurrence of unknown option in settings file non-fatal
* Stale output no longer lingers in the engine-output window when a new game starts
* Popdown (stale) Comment window on new game
** Version 4.5.2a (Winboard only)**
(see http://www.gnu.org/software/xboard/whats_new/4.5.2/ )
* Fix Engine Settings button options in WinBoard
** Version 4.5.2 **
(see http://www.gnu.org/software/xboard/whats_new/4.5.2/ )
* Main new feature:
* Added many option dialogs and reworked some of the old ones
* bugfixes, packaging and install:
* Fix nps bug
* Fix flipBlack option XBoard with board texture
* Fix two bugs in reading position diagram
* Fix parsing bug of FRC castling
* Fix bugs in FRC castling rights
* Fix display of promotion piece in ICS superchess
* Fix path browsing in WinBoard
* Fix use of game/position file in first match game
* Fix build on Mac OS X
* install bitmaps and sounds during "make install"
* some minor bug fixes
* code cleanup (e.g. 64 bit warnings, removed malloc.h)
** Version 4.5.1 **
(see http://www.gnu.org/software/xboard/whats_new/4.5.1/ )
* bugfixes:
* Revert "Implement -reset option feature in WinBoard"
* Fix deselection of greyed-out variant button (WB)
* Put warning in HTML help
* Fix unmarked translation
* Fix Alfil bug
* Fix variant janus size prefix
* Fix Xiangqi King facing
* Fix showing of user move after adjudication
* Make language choice from menu persistent
* Fix ICS channel 0
* Fix some resource leaks
* fixed packaging issues:
* add DIFFSTAT and SHORTLOG to tar-ball
* added history.c to the tar-ball. Needed for Winboard
* fixed compiler warnings/errors:
* added missing header file for sprintf
* added missing #includes and missing prototypes to filebrowser
* Fix MSVC compilability
* Fix 64-bit Windows compilability
* Fix MSVC snprintf problem
* fixed configure problems:
* fixed configure script to correctly detect Xaw3d library
* updated configure.ac to check for Xaw header files
* misc:
* Fix two typos in option names in texi file
** Version 4.5.0 **
(see http://www.gnu.org/software/xboard/whats_new/4.5.0/ for more details)
General
-------
* User specific settings files
* More logical (and standard) menu structure
* Translation into other languages (WB)
* Walking the PV of an engine
* Exploring variations
* Playing through PGN variations
* Annotating a game with analysis results
* Editing Comments
* Controlling move choice of the GUI book
* Keeping the clock in sync in tournaments
* Starting an engine match from the menu
* Fixed thinking time per move
* Improved multi-PV support
* Where your pieces can move to
* Editing crazyhouse holdings
* Thai Chess (Makruk) and Seirawan Chess
* Non-compliant FEN and SAN input
* Improved Xiangqi adjudications
* Allowing engines to setup a position
Merging XBoard & WinBoard
------------------------------
* Evaluation graph (XB)
* Settings file (XB)
* Filtering the game list (XB)
* Game-List options dialog (XB)
* Recalling the ICS input history (XB)
* Aribtrary board textures (XB)
* Highlight arrow (XB)
ICS-client Enhancements
-----------------------
* Maintaining a healty ICS connection
* Claiming a draw after your move
* ICS seek graph
* One-click moving
* Observing your bughouse partner
* Improved Chat-Box interface (WB)
* Uploading games to an ICS
* Side-by-side boards
** Version 4.4.4 **
* Repair exit-popup deadlock patch
* Fix bug in sending "usermove" when forcing book moves
* Let move parser return ImpossibleMove for off-board moves
* Prevent engine stall on perpetual-chase evasion
* Pop down old tags on loadng new game in WinBoard
* Fix game end during dragging
* Repair animate dragging
* Fix bug in sending cores command to engine
* Fix parsing of SAN shogi promotions
* Fix variant switch on PGN loading
* Allow -flipBlack to work with font-based piece rendering
* Allow font-based piece rendering in board sizes below petite
* Fix WinBoard game-list title
* Fix deadlock in match-result display
* Fix regression in colorization of zippy-matched commands
* Fix zippy handling of draw offers from ICS
* Make some more zippy code obey the --disable-zippy flag
* Remove unnecessary double equals from configure.ac.
* Cut board squares out of texture bitmap more cleverly
** Version 4.4.3 **
* Add variant Makruk
* Implement castling for variant CRC
* Extensive bugfix of -autoKibitz
* Accept <Enter> for changing chat partner
* Change opening array -variant fairy
* Send continuation lines to chat box they belong to
* Use -keepAlive option to determine connection health
* Fix of ancient WinBoard bug: check value of int options
* Fix bug for incommensurate time odds
* Fix piece-to-char table -variant fairy
* Fix TwoKings ICS castling-rights bug
* Fix reading castling rights FEN in knightmate and twokings
* Fix OO-castling in FRC after pasting FEN
* Fix bug in display of logos
* Fix highlighting bug in XBoard
* Match handles with multiple titles for channel Chat Boxes
* Make WinBoard makefiles use parser.c in XBoard directory
* Added missing sounds files to be able to compile on windows
* Added logo files for xboard
* Bugfix stale first-click
* Fix copying of WB Chat Window contents
* Fix XB crash on giving keyboard focus to non-text widget
* Bugfix copying from Chat Box, own lines
* Fix 'mamer bug' in Chat Boxes
* Fix copying of kibitzed lines from WB Engine-Output window
* Do not recognize non-ICS variants from PGN event tag
* Remake programVersion string after receiving engine features
* Set keyboard focus at startup to board window
* Fix window-position upset on failing engine start in WinBoard
* Allow lower-case promochar in moves of type h8=Q
* Small bugfixed for JAWS version
* Small bugfixes
** Version 4.4.2 **
* add Winboard source files into tar-ball
* remove trailing \r in xboard output
* double buffer size to prevent overflow
* fix problem with empty string in -firstNeedsNoncompliantFEN
* updates makefiles to include dependency on config.h
* correctly apply some check boxes from the option menu
* score sign in analysis mode
* fix for bug #28077: xboard needs to link against x11
* fix castling rights when copying FEN to clipboard (again)
* fixed some outstanding pixmaps
* fix the irritating wandering off of the MoveHistory window in XBoard on opening/closing.
* use xtell for talking to handles, but tell for talking into a channel.
* fix bug in bughouse drop menu
* removing some rather verbose debug messages that seem no longer needed.
* fix engine-sync on move-number type-in bug
* fix declaration of engineOutputDialogUp
* fix double start of zippy engine after switch to gothic
* the last move before the time control now gets its time listed in the PGN
* fix casting rights after FEN pasting
* fix crash on engine crash
* fixed build on openbsd
* cleaned up some debug messages and typos
* removed files that should only be in the windboard directory
* added missing library for build on OS X
** Version 4.4.1 **
* added chat windows to keep track of multiple conversations (WinBoard only)
* allow the result comment as a display item in the game list
* added a "Mute All Sounds" item in the WinBoard Options menu
* new -forceIllegalMoves option
* new -keepAlive option (for ICS play)
* ported -autoDisplayComment and -autoDisplayTags to xboard, controling popups
* replaces analysispopup with engineoutputpopup in xboard
* allow copy/paste position and game to use clipboard (xboard)
* updated several bitmaps (xboard)
* Made the beep sounds for JAWS board navigation configurable
through command-line options
* added the result comment to the game-list tags when the game
list is exported to the clipboard
* updated RTF docs
* fixed premove problem
* fixed engine did not start playing when out of GUI book on second
move with white
* fix bug using opening books (file were not closed)
* fixed crash when opening Engine #1 Settings when there were no
text-edit options in the dialog
* fixed loading of games from command lines, fixes cmail bug
* fix joining lines split by ICS and resizing terminal window when using ICS
(new option -keepLineBreaksICS, -wrapContinuationSequence, -useInternalWrap)
* fixed -autoDisplayComment
* fixed wrong default value for engineDebugOutput in xboard
* swapped 'tell' and 'message' parsing order for correct colorization.
* fixed parse bug for pgn files
* fix for edit-position "moves" being sent by XBoard to the engine
* bugfix for protocol extensions: egtbpath -> egtpath
* fix bug in parser
* further bugfixes: #8847, #10990, #27427, #27642,
#27666, #27667, #27668, #27715, #27751, #27760,
#27772, #27799, #27826 and several small ones
* use "make distcheck" to generate tar-balls
* prepared a system to internationalize winboard menus
* improved mouse handler
* rewrote wevalgraph for better frontend/backend separation
* code cleanup
** Version 4.4.0 **
A new release of both XBoard and WinBoard is now available. Version
4.4.0 includes many changes. It is the first major release of
xboard/winboard after a fork of the project after version 4.2.7. It
includes small changes made in the main line and changes made by a
fork of Alessandro Scotti and lots of changes made afterwards by
H.G. Muller (released as versions 4.3.x). This release represents a
unified version of all changes made after the fork. It includes many
new features and bugfixes.
You can get both XBoard and WinBoard from the Savannah
project pages:
https://savannah.gnu.org/projects/xboard/
If you find a bug, please report it in the bug tracker at
https://savannah.gnu.org/projects/xboard/ or by email to bug-xboard
(AT) gnu.org.
** Version 4.3.16 **
New command-line options
/niceEngines=N for adjusting the priority of engine processes so they don't soak up all your system resources
/firstOptions="..." Allows the setting of options that engines define through the feature option="..." commands
/secondOptions="..."
/firstLogo=filename.bmp Displays the mentioned bitmap next to the clock (with H:W =1:2 aspect ratio) (WB only)
/secondLogo=filename.bmp
/autoLogo=false get logo files automatically from engineDirectory\logo.bmp
General enhancements:
* New WB-protocol command: 'feature option="NAME -TYPE VALUE OTHER"', which engines can use to define options
* New WB-protocol command: 'option NAME VALUE' used to set value of engine-defned options.
* implements /delayAfterQuit and /delayBeforeQuit in XBoard, and uses SIGKILL to terminate rogue engine processes
** Version 4.3.15 **
New command-line options
/rewindIndex=N (for the new auto-increment mode of the loadGameIndex or loadPositionIndex in match mode)
/sameColorGames=N (for playing a match where the same player has white all the time)
/egtFormats="..." (for specifying where various end-game tables are installed on the computer)
New menu items
+ Time-odds factors can be set in the time-control dialog
+ Nr of CPUs for SMP engines can be set in the Options -> UCI dialog
+ Own-Book options can be switched from the Options -> UCI dialog
+ The ScoreIsAbs options can be set from the Options -> Engine dialog
+ New-Variant menu adds Superchess
General Enhancements:
* WinBoard engines can now also use the Polyglot opening book (implemented as general GUI book)
* New WB-protocol commands memory, cores and egtpath make interactive setting of these parameters
possible on WB engines
* New Polyglot is available that relays the interactive setting of these parameters to UCI engines
* Match mode suports an auto-increment mode, so that all games or positions from a file can be played
* Draw claims with Kings and an arbitrary number of like Bishops (e.g. KBBKB) are accepted
The source tree in original xboard 4.2.7 format can now be compiled under Cygwin with the aid
of the cygwin.mak file in the ~/winboard/ subdirectory of the source releasy, after you put
the hep-file from an executabl distribution there. Maefiles for other compilers are not updated
since 4.2.7, as I do not have those compilers.
** Version 4.3.14 **
This relaese was not made by the GNU xboard team, but by H.G.Muller.
It mainly contains developments on WinBoard. Nevertheless, an attempt
has been started to back-port the enormous number of improvements that
have been made to WinBoard since the Linux and Windows developments branched
to xboard. This is reflected by the source tree now having the same format
as that of xboard 4.2.7, including all the xboard sources.
An enormous amount of work still has to be done to make the xboard version
fully equivalent to WinBoard, especially on user-interface side. As a modest
beginning, the xboard source files have been patched to allow their compilation
with the newer back-end files from WinBoard. To this end, the number of piece
types in xboard has been increased from 6 to 22, and the WinBoard bitmaps
have been converted to xboard source format (.bm) and are included in the
xboard bitmaps directory. Other quick patches include the coloring of the
board squares (for xiangqi and holdings), and some code in the user-move
handling to suppress all moves into or out of the area between board and
holdings in crazyhouse, and the treatment of king-captures-own-piece
as a possibly valid move (for FRC castling). This should make it possible
to run xboard with the new back-end files without too much inconvenience.
New xboard command-line options have been added to make the added back-end
features available. The include the new variants (as argument of the old
-variant option), -boardWidth, -boardHeight and -holdingsSize. Be sure
to call xboard with "-boardSize middling" or "-boardSize bulky" if you
want to play with fairy pieces, or xboard might crash due to unavailability
of bitmaps. Other added xboard options are:
ADJUDICATION OPTIONS:
-checkMates
-testClaims
-materialDraws
-trivialDraws
-ruleMoves
-repeatsToDraw
-adjudicateLossThreshold
-firstScoreAbsolute
-secondScoreAbsolute
TIME-CONTROL OPTIONS
-firstTimeOdds
-secondTimeOdds
-timeOddsMode
-firstNPS
-secondNPS
GENERAL OPTIONS
-matchPause
-engineDebugOutput
-userName
-pgnExtendedInfo
-pgnEventHeader
-hideThinkingFromHuman
This is all completely untested, but as the options merely switch on well-tested
code in the back-end, there should not be too many problems with them.
Bugs can be reported in the WinBoard forum.
** Version 4.3.14k **
Compared to version 4.3.13 described below, this version features
New command-line options:
/autoKibitz (for relaying the PV info of the engine to the ICS)
/userName="..." (for setting the name of the Human player, also as menu)
/engineDebugOutput=N (controlling the writing of engine output to debug file)
/firstNPS=N (for time management by node count or CPU time)
/secondNPS=N (likewise for the other engine)
New Menu items
+ Enter Username (same as /userName command-line option)
+ Save Diagram (for saving the Chessboard display as bitmap file)
+ Machine Both (not implemented yet, but menu item already provided)
+ New-Variant menu adds CRC, Janus and Berolina (the latter only with legality testing off!)
+ Any variant can be played from a shuffled opening setup
Bugfixes:
* Problems with switching the variant in ICS zippy mode solved
* In ICS observing mode game history is now fully accessible
* Moves are not fed to engine in zippy mode, when observing a game from a variant unknown to the engine
* a problem with loading PGN of FRC games with move disambiguation and initial castling rights was fixed.
* A bug in the clock display that made previous versions of WinBoard crash for tiny displays is fixed
General enhancements:
* variant name displayed in title bar in ICS mode, when not 'normal'
* when receiving a challenge in ICS zippy mode, it is checked if the engine supports the variant (/zippyVariants="..." can still be used to limit the allowed variants, and for protocol-1 engines is still the only thing to go on)
* when loading a game from a PGN file, WB automatically switches to the variant specified in the PGN tags
* when starting from a loaded position (using /loadPositionFile), this position will be used on subsequent 'New Game' commands as well (until we switch variant)
New is also that the source tree is now brought back in the original WinBoard 4.2.7 format, including
xboard source files. Note, however, that the xboard sources are from an older date, and I did not test
if they still compile together with the much newer backend sources. I did add code in xboard.c to recognize
the new command-line options I added since then, and in so far they are back-end options that should be enough
to make them work. This is completely untested, though; I did not even try to compile it. Last time anyone
built a working xboard.exe from this was at a stage where WinBoard did have adjustable board size, allowing
it to play Xiangqi. But no crazyhouse holdings yet.
** Version 4.3.13a **
This version of WinBoard_F fixes several bugs in 4.3.12, and also addse a few new features.
The new features include:
- some more fairy pieces, so that each side now has 22 piece types in stead of 17,
making most fairy pieces available in board size "petite" (next to "bulky" and "middling"),
making the ArchBishop and Chancellor, as well as one wildcard piece (the Lance) available in all
sizes from "petite" to "bulky".
- The FRC support is fully fixed, both in local and ICS mode.
- A mechanism is provided for safe draw claiming in cases where a 3-fold repetition woud occur only
after your own move. In this case a draw will be awarded by WinBoard if the engine sends "offer draw"
before making its move.
- Genuine draw offers are not passed on immediately to the opponent but held up to when the offerer announces
its move.
- Variants FRC, Cylinder and Falcon are added to the "New Variant..." menu.
- Support for playing time-odds games is added. (Options /firstTimeOdds, /secondTimeOdds, /timeOddsMode)
- A mechanism is provided for attaching WinBoard options to the engine command, to create options that
follow the engine (e.g. time odds) in a tournament run under a tournament manager.
Bugfixes include:
- Shatranj in ICS mode (did not work at all before)
- Some draw adjudications (QRKR was mistaken for KRKR, and KBKB with like Bishops is now recognized)
- time info in the PGN is now correct
** Winboard_F.4.3.12 release notes
This WinBoard (beta-)version is derived from Allessandro Scotti's
Winboard_x, and supports the following new options, mainly in the area
of adjudication of engine-engine games, improved Crazyhouse support,
and allowing variants with non-conventional pieces and or board
sizes. (All option are shown here with their default values):
/variant=normal
This (already existing) option has been expanded with
several new variants, involving non-conventional pieces and deviating
board sizes. The board size is automatically adapted to the selected
variant, unless explicitly overruled (see below). The new variants are
(with default board size, files x ranks, in parentheses):
variant name Game board description
knightmate Knightmate (8x8) Variant where the King moves as a Knight, and vice versa
capablanca Capablanca Chess (10x8) Variant featuring Archbishop and Chancellor as new pieces
gothic Gothic Chess (10x8) Same as Capablanca, with a more interesting opening position
courier Courier Chess (12x8) a Medieval form that combines elements of Shatranj and modern Chess
shogi Shogi (9x9) Japanese Chess
xiangqi Xiangqi (9x10) Chinese Chess
fairy Fairy Chess (8x8) Variant were you can use all pieces of other variants together
The variant can be set from the newly added "File -> New Variant..."
sub-menu. Extra board files are indicated by the letters i, j, k, l,
... For boards with more than 9 ranks, the counting starts at zero!
More than 10 ranks is not tested and unlikely to work in the area of
PGN saving / reading. Non-FIDE pieces will be referred to in FENs and
PGN by letters that depend on the variant, and might collide with
piece designators in other variants. E.g. in Xiangqi 'C' is a Cannon,
in Capablanca Chess it is a Chancellor. Pieces that do not belong in a
variant cannot be addressed in FEN and PGN either, for as long as that
variant is selected, unless the letter assignment is overruled with
the aid of the /pieceToCharTable option. The variant is not saved in
the winboard.ini file; on start-up we always get variant "normal"
unless we use the command-line option, or have added the option to the
winboard.ini file manually (in which case it will disappear when this
file is overwritten by WinBoard saving its options). WinBoard_F knows
the movement of all pieces occurring in Capablanca Chess (of which
FIDE Chess is a subset), Shatranj, Courier, Xiangqi and 9x9 Shogi, so
that these games can be played with legality testing enabled.
/pieceToCharTable="PNBRQFWEMOUHACGSKpnbrqfwemouhacgsk"
Each piece that WinBoard knows (in its legality test) has a letter
associated with it, by which it will be referred to in FEN or PGN. The
default assignment can be overruled with this option. The value has to
be a string of even length, with at least 12 characters. The first
half of the string designates the white pieces, the second half the
black. The last letter for each color will be assigned to the
King. (This is the piece that moves as an orthodox King; note that
Nightmate and Xiangqi have a different royal piece.) All letters
before it will be assigned to the other pieces in the order:
P Pawn (move often depends on variant)
N Knight (move subtly different in Xiangqi (where it is written as H) or Shogi)
B Bishop
R Rook
Q Queen (Lance L in Shogi)
F Ferz/General (The Shatranj 'Queen' and Xiangqi 'Adviser', used for Silver General S in Shogi.)
W Wazir/GrandVizer (Gold General G in Shogi, in Xiangqi it is royal and denoted by K)
E Alfil/Elephant (Moves subtly different in Xiangqi vs Shatranj/Courier)
M Commoner/Man
O Cannon/Pao
U Unicorn (representation of Royal Knight in Knightmate, used as promoted Pawn in Shogi)
H Nightrider (Promoted Knight in Shogi and CrazyHouse)
A Archbishop/Cardinal (Promoted Bishop in Shogi and CrazyHouse)
C Chancellor/Marshall (Promoted Rook in Shogi and CrazyHouse)
G Grasshopper (Promoted Queen in Crazyhouse, promoted Lance in Shogi)
S (Promoted Silver in Shogi)
K King
Pieces that are not mentioned (because the argument has less than 34
characters) will remain disabled. Mentioned pieces can be disabled by
assigning them a '.' (period). They are then not recognized in FEN or
PGN input. Non-FIDE pieces that are not assigned a letter will also
not appear on the promotion menu. It is not advisable to disable a
piece that is present in the opening position of the selected variant,
though.
Promoted pieces that need to be distinguished from original pieces of
the same type (because of demotion on capture and transfer to the
holdings) will be indicated by the letter for the unpromoted piece
with a '+' in front of it (Shogi), or by the letter of the promoted
piece with a '~' after it (Crazyhouse, Bughouse, in general everything
with holdings that is not Shogi). To achieve this, they should be
assigned the characters '+' or '~', respectively.
All the new pieces have a native bitmap representation in the board
sizes 'bulky' and 'middling'. For all window sizes that do not support
such fairy bitmaps, promoted NBRQ are represented as a 2-sizes-smaller
normal piece symbol, so that Crazyhouse can be played at any
size. People disliking the fairy representations might even prefer
this.
There is an enhanced 'Edit Position' menu popup (right-clicking on the
squares after selecting this mode in the main menu), featuring some
common non-FIDE pieces, and 'promote' and 'demote' options to make
those not directly in the menu. The promotion popup shows ArchBishop
and Chancellor in Capablanca and Gothic, (or in fact in any game where
this piece is not disabled or a promoted version of a normal piece),
and leaves only the options YES / NO in Shogi. In Xiangqi there are no
promotions.
/fontPieceToCharTable="PNBRQFWEMOUHACGSKpnbrqfwemouhacgsk"
This option is similar to /pieceToCharTable, but sets the font
character that is used to display the piece on the screen (when
font-based rendering is in use), rather than in the FEN or PGN. The
default setting should work with George Tsavdaris' WinboardF font,
which uses the 'intuitive' mapping of font characters to symbols. With
font-based rendering the fairy pieces can be used at any board size.
Note that UHACGS are also used to represent the promoted versions of
PNBRQF, in games like Crazyhouse and Shogi, where the promotion has to
be undone on capture. In such games you are likely to prefer a
different representation of those pieces then when they represent true
fairy pieces.
/flipBlack=FALSE
Traditional Shogi bitmaps are only included for size "moderate". For
other sizes you must depend on font-based rendering.
/detectMate=TRUE
/testClaim=TRUE
/materialDraws=TRUE
/trivialDraws=FALSE
/ruleMoves=51
/repeatsToDraw=6
The option /materialDraws=TRUE causes games with insufficient mating
material to be adjudicated immediately as draws, in case the engines
would not claim these draws. This applies to KK, KNK and KBK. The
option /trivialDraws adjudicates KNNK, KBKB, KNKN, KBKN, KRKR and KQKQ
to draws after 3 moves (to allow for a quick tactical win). Note that
in KQKQ this might not be sound, but that problem would disappear once
bitbase probing is implemented.
Clocks
The flag-fell condition is now indicated as '(!)' behind the displayed
time, to eliminate the necessity for overwriting the message in the
title bar (which might contain indispensible information in match
mode).
Other improvements / changes
Castling rights and e.p. rights are now fully maintained, and
considered in legality testing. They are imported from and written to
FEN, as is the 50-move counter. (When reading an incomplete FEN they
are still guessed, though.) The time (in sec, or min:sec) is now
always stored together with the PV information to the PGN, if storing
the latter was requested (through ticking "extended PGN info" in
"Options -> General..."). The saved time is the WinBoard clock time
(as opposed to the time reported by the engine).
** Winboard_F.4.3.8 release notes
This Winboard supports the following new options (shown here with their default values):
/variant=normal
This (already existing) option has been expanded with several new
variants, involving non-conventional pieces and deviating board
sizes. The board size is automatically adapted to the selected
variant, unless explicitly overruled (see below). The new variants are
(with default board size, files x ranks, in parentheses):
variant name Game board description
knightmate Knightmate (8x8) Variant where the King moves as a Knight, and vice versa
capablanca Capablanca Chess (10x8) Variant featuring Archbishop and Chancellor as new pieces
gothic Gothic Chess (10x8) Same as Capablanca, with a more interesting opening position
courier Courier Chess (12x8) a Medieval form that combines elements of Shatranj and modern Chess
shogi Shogi (9x9) Japanese Chess
xiangqi Xiangqi (9x10) Chinese Chess
fairy Fairy Chess (8x8) Variant were you can use all pieces of other variants together
The variant can be set from the newly added "File -> New Variant..." sub-menu.
Extra board files are indicated by the letters i, j, k, l, ... For
boards with more than 9 ranks, the counting starts at zero! Non-FIDE
pieces will be referred to in FENs and PGN by letters that depend on
the variant, and might collide with piece designators in other
variants. E.g. in Xiangqi 'C' is a Cannon, in Capablanca Chess it is a
Chancellor. Pieces that do not belong in a variant cannot be addressed
in FEN and PGN either as long as that variant is selected, unless the
letter assignment is overruled by the /pieceToCharTable option. The
variant is not saved in the winboard.ini file; on start-up we always
get variant "normal" unless we use the command-line opton, or have
added the option to the winboard.ini file manually (in which case it
will disappear when this file is overwritten). WinBoard_F knows the
movement of all pieces occurring in Capablanca Chess (of which FIDE
Chess is a subset), Shatranj, Courier, Xiangqi and 9x9 Shogi, so that
these games can be played with legality testing enabled.
/pieceToCharTable="PNBRQFWEMOUHACGSKpnbrqfwemouhacgsk"
Each piece that WinBoard knows (in its legality test) has a letter
associated with it, by which it will be referred to in FEN or PGN. The
default assignment can be overruled with this option. The value has to
be a string of even length, with at least 12 characters. The first
half of the string designates the white pieces, the second half the
black. The last letter for each color will be assigned to the
King. (This is the piece that moves as an orthodox King; note that
Nightmate and Xiangqi have a different royal piece.) All letters
before it will be assigned to the other pieces in the order:
P Pawn (move often depends on variant)
N Knight (move subtly different in Xiangqi (where it is written as H) or Shogi)
B Bishop
R Rook
Q Queen (Lance L in Shogi)
F Ferz/General (Silver General S in Shogi)
W Wazir/GrandVizer (Gold General G in Shogi, in Xiangqi it is royal and denoted by K)
E Alfil/Elephant (Moves subtly different in Xiangqi vs Shatranj/Courier)
M Commoner/Man
O Cannon/Pao
U Unicorn (representation of Royal Knight in Knightmate, used as promoted Pawn in Shogi)
H Nightrider (Promoted Knight in Shogi and CrazyHouse)
A Archbishop/Cardinal (Promoted Bishop in Shogi and CrazyHouse)
C Chancellor/Marshall (Promoted Rook in Shogi and CrazyHouse)
G Grasshopper (Promoted Queen in Crazyhouse, promoted Lance in Shogi)
S (Promoted Silver in Shogi)
K King
Pieces that are not mentioned (because the argument has less than 34
characters) will remain disabled. Mentioned pieces can be disabled by
assigning them a '.' (period). They are then not recognized in FEN or
PGN input. It is not advisable to disable a piece that is present in
the opening position of the selected variant, though.
Promoted pieces that need to be distinguished from original pieces of
the same type (because of demotion on capture and transfer to the
holdings) will be indicated by the letter for the unpromoted piece
with a '+' in front of it (Shogi), or by the letter of the promoted
piece with a '~' after it (Crazyhouse, Bughouse, in general everything
with holdings that is not Shogi).
All the new pieces have a native biytmap representation in the board
sizes 'bulky' and 'middling'. For all window sizes that do not support
such fairy bitmaps, promoted NBRQ are represented as a 2-sizes-smaller
normal piece symbol, so that Crazyhouse can be played at any
size. People disliking the fairy representations might even prefer
that.
There is an enhanced 'Edit Position' menu popup (right-clicking on the
squares after selecting this mode in the main menu), featuring some
common non-FIDE pieces, and 'promote' and 'demote' options to make
those not directly in the menu. The promotion popup shows ArchBishop
and Chancellor in Capablanca and Gothic, (or in fact in any game where
this piece is not disabled), and leaves only the options YES / NO in
Shogi. In Xiangqi there are no promotions.
/alphaRank=FALSE
This option does not seem to work for reading PGN files. Saving works
fine. For now, using it is not recommended. In the future it might be
redefined as only affecting engine-engine communication, .
/flipBlack=FALSE
Setting this option will cause upside-down display of the native piece
bitmaps used to represent the pieces of the side that plays black, as
would be needed for a traditional representation of Shogi pieces. It
can be set from the "Options -> Board..." sub-menu, and it is saved in
the winboard.ini file. For now, traditional Shogi bitmaps are not
included, though.
Other improvements / changes
Castling rights and e.p. rights are now fully maintained, and
considered in legality testing. They are imported from and written to
FEN, as is the 50-move counter. The time (in sec, or min:sec) is now
always stored together with the PV information to the PGN, if storing
the latter was requested (through ticking 'extended PGN info' in
"Options -> General..."). The saved time is the Winboard clock time
(as opposed to the time reported by the engine).
** Winboard_F.4.3.7 release notes
This Winboard supports the following new options (shown here with
their default values):
/variant=normal
This (already existing) option has been expanded with several new
variants, involving non-conventional pieces and deviating board
sizes. The board size is automatically adapted to the selected
variant, unless explicitly overruled (see below). The new variants are
(with default board size, files x ranks, in parentheses):
variant name Game board description
knightmate Knightmate (8x8) Variant where the King moves as a Knight, and vice versa
capablanca Capablanca Chess (10x8) Variant featuring Archbishop and Chancellor as new pieces
gothic Gothic Chess (10x8) Same as Capablanca, with a more interesting opening position
courier Courier Chess (12x8) a Medieval form that combines elements of Shatranj and modern Chess
shogi Shogi (9x9) Japanese Chess
xiangqi Xiangqi (9x10) Chinese Chess
fairy Fairy Chess (8x8) Variant were you can use all pieces of other variants together
The variant can be set from the newly added "File -> New Variant..." sub-menu.
Extra board files are indicated by the letters i, j, k, l, ... For
boards with more than 9 ranks, the counting starts at zero! Non-FIDE
pieces will be referred to in FENs and PGN by letters that depend on
the variant, and might collide with piece designators in other
variants. E.g. in Xiangqi 'C' is a Cannon, in Capablanca Chess it is a
Chancellor. Pieces that do not belong in a variant cannot be addressed
in FEN and PGN either as long as that variant is selected, unless the
letter assignment is overruled by the /pieceToCharTable option. The
variant is not saved in the winboard.ini file; on start-up we always
get variant "normal" unless we use the command-line opton, or have
added the option to the winboard.ini file manually (in which case it
will disappear when this file is overwritten). WinBoard_F knows the
movement of all pieces occurring in Capablanca Chess (of which FIDE
Chess is a subset), Shatranj, Courier, Xiangqi and 9x9 Shogi, so that
these games can be played with legality testing enabled.
/pieceToCharTable="PNBRQFWEMOUHACGSKpnbrqfwemouhacgsk"
Each piece that WinBoard knows (in its legality test) has a letter
associated with it, by which it will be referred to in FEN or PGN. The
default assignment can be overruled with this option. The value has to
be a string of even length, with at least 12 characters. The first
half of the string designates the white pieces, the second half the
black. The last letter for each color will be assigned to the
King. (This is the piece that moves as an orthodox King; note that
Nightmate and Xiangqi have a different royal piece.) All letters
before it will be assigned to the other pieces in the order:
P Pawn (move often depends on variant)
N Knight (move subtly different in Xiangqi (where it is written as H) or Shogi)
B Bishop
R Rook
Q Queen (Lance L in Shogi)
F Ferz/General (Silver General S in Shogi)
W Wazir/GrandVizer (Gold General G in Shogi, in Xiangqi it is royal and denoted by K)
E Alfil/Elephant (Moves subtly different in Xiangqi vs Shatranj/Courier)
M Commoner/Man
O Cannon/Pao
U Unicorn (representation of Royal Knight in Knightmate, used as promoted Pawn in Shogi)
H Nightrider (Promoted Knight in Shogi and CrazyHouse)
A Archbishop/Cardinal (Promoted Bishop in Shogi and CrazyHouse)
C Chancellor/Marshall (Promoted Rook in Shogi and CrazyHouse)
G Grasshopper (Promoted Queen in Crazyhouse, promoted Lance in Shogi)
S (Promoted Silver in Shogi)
K King
Pieces that are not mentioned (because the argument has less than 34
characters) will remain disabled. Mentioned pieces can be disabled by
assigning them a '.' (period). They are then not recognized in FEN or
PGN input. It is not advisable to disable a piece that is present in
the opening position of the selected variant, though.
Promoted pieces that need to be distinguished from original pieces of
the same type (because of demotion on capture and transfer to the
holdings) will be indicated by the letter for the unpromoted piece
with a '+' in front of it (Shogi), or by the letter of the promoted
piece with a '~' after it (Crazyhouse, Bughouse, in general everything
with holdings that is not Shogi).
All the new pieces have a native biytmap representation in the board
sizes 'bulky' and 'middling'. For all window sizes that do not support
such fairy bitmaps, promoted NBRQ are represented as a 2-sizes-smaller
normal piece symbol, so that Crazyhouse can be played at any
size. People disliking the fairy representations might even prefer
that.
There is an enhanced 'Edit Position' menu popup (right-clicking on the
squares after selecting this mode in the main menu), featuring some
common non-FIDE pieces, and 'promote' and 'demote' options to make
those not directly in the menu. The promotion popup shows ArchBishop
and Chancellor in Capablanca and Gothic, (or in fact in any game where
this piece is not disabled), and leaves only the options YES / NO in
Shogi. In Xiangqi there are no promotions.
/fontPieceToCharTable="PNBRQFWEMOUHACGSKpnbrqfwemouhacgsk"
This option is similar to /pieceToCharTable, but sets the font
character that is used to display the piece on the screen (when
font-based rendering is in use), rather than in the FEN or PGN. The
default setting should work with the WinboardF font, which uses the
'intuitive' mapping of font characters to symbols. Note that UHACGS
are also used to represent the promoted versions of PNBRQF, in games
like Crazyhouse and Shogi, where the promotion has to be undone on
capture.
/boardWidth=-1 /boardHeight=-1
Set a number of files and ranks of the playing board to a value that
will override the defaults for the variant that is selected. A value
of -1 means the variant default board size will be used for the
corresponding parameter (and is itself the default value of these
options). These parameters can be set in the "Files -> New Variant..."
sub-menu, where they are reset to the default -1 is you OK the chosen
variant without typing something to overrule it. These parameters are
saved in the winboard.ini file. (But unless you saved while a variant
with board-size override was selected, they will always be saved as
-1.)
A variant with a non-standard board size will be communicated to the
engine(s) with the board size prefixed to the variant name,
e.g. "variant 12x8_capablanca". In protocol 2 the engine must first
enable this feature by sending "boardsizeFxR" amongst the accepted
variants, where F is the maximum number of files, and R the maximum
number of ranks, as decimal numbers.
/holdingsSize=-1
Set the size of the holdings for dropable pieces to a value that will
override the default for the variant that is selected. A value of -1
means the variant default holdings size will be used for that
parameter (and is itself the default value of this options). This
parameter can be set in the Files -> New Variant... sub-menu, where it
is reset to the default -1 is you OK the chosen variant without typing
something to overrule it. This parameters is saved in the winboard.ini
file. To disable holdings, set their size to 0. They will then not be
displayed. For non-zero holding size N, the holdings are displayed
left and right of the board, and piece drops can be effected by
dragging pieces from the holdings to the drop square. In bughouse, the
holdings will be filled by the ICS. In all other variants, captured
pieces will go into the holdings (after reversing their color). Only
the first N pieces of the /pieceToCharTable argument will go into the
holdings. All other pieces will be converted to Pawns. (In Shogi,
however they will be demoted in the regular way before determining if
they fit.) Pieces that are disabled (per default and per
/pieceToCharTable option) might not be counted when determining what
are the first N pieces. Non-standard holdingsize will be communicated
to the engine by prefixing it (together with the board size, even if
this is standard) to the variant name, e.g. "variant 7x7+5_shogi". In
protocol 2 the engine should enable this feature by sending
"holdingsH" amongst the variant names, where H is the maximum
acceptable holdings size as a decimal number.
/alphaRank=FALSE
When this parameter is true, a-h are converted to 1-9, and vice versa,
in all move output and input (to PGN files or SAN move display as well
as in communication with the engine). This might be useful for Shogi,
where conventionally one uses letters to designate ranks, and digits
to designate files. Engines that want to use this option must make
sure pieces are never represented by lower case! This option can be
set from the Files -> New Variant... menu, where it defaults to FALSE
unless you explicitly set it. It is not saved in the winboard.ini
file. Note that the PGN format in Shogi also leaves out the trailing
'+' as check indicator: In Shogi such a trailing '+' means promotion,
while a trailing '=' means defer promotion. Prefix '+' signs are used
on moves with promoted pieces, disambiguation is done western SAN
style.
/allWhite=FALSE
Causes the outline of the 'white' pieces to be superimposed onto the
'black' piece symbols as well (as a black outline) when native bitmaps
are used (as opposed to font-based rendering). This is useful if we
choose a very light color to represent the 'black' pieces. It might be
particularly useful in Shogi, where the conventional representation of
the 'black' pieces is as upside-down white pieces, so that both colors
would be white. This option is saved in the winboard.ini file, and can
be set in the "Options -> Board..." sub-menu.
/flipBlack=FALSE
This option is reserved for future use. It will cause upside-down
display of the 'black' native piece bitmaps, as would be needed for
Shogi. For now it can be set from the "Options -> Board..." sub-menu,
and it is saved in the winboard.ini file, but it is ignored.
/detectMate=TRUE
/testClaim=TRUE
/materialDraws=TRUE
/trivialDraws=FALSE
/ruleMoves=51
/repeatsToDraw=6
These are all options that only affect engine-engine play, and can be
set from the "Options -> Engine..." sub-menu. They are all related to
adjudication of games by the GUI. Legality checking must be switched
on for them to work. If /detectMate is TRUE, the GUI recognizes
checkmate and stalemate (but not in games with holdings!), and ends
the game accordingly before the engines can claim. This is convenient
for play with engines that fail to claim, and just exit. With
/testClaim set, all result and illegal-move claims by engines that
claim more than their own loss are scrutinized for validity, and false
claims result in forfeit of the game. Useful with buggy engines. The
option /materialDraws=TRUE causes games with insufficient mating
material to be adjudicated immediately as draws, in case the engines
would not claim them. The option /trivialDraws adjudicates KNNK,
KBKB, KNKN, KBKN, KRKR and KQKQ to draws after 3 moves (to allow for a
quick tactical win. Note that in KQKQ this might not be sound, but
that problem would disappear once bitbase probing is added). The
/ruleMoves determine after how many reversible moves the game is
adjudicated as a draw. Setting this to 0 turns this option off. Draw
claims by the engine are still accepted (by /testClaim) after 50
reversible moves, even if /ruleMoves species a larger number. Note
that it is perfectly legal according to FIDE rules to play on after 50
reversible moves, but in tournaments having two engines that want to
play on forever is a nuisance in endings like KBNKR, where one of the
engines thinks it is ahead and can avoids repeats virtually forever.
The option /repeatsToDraw makes the GUI adjudicate a game as draw
after the same position has occurred the specified number of times. If
it is set to a value > 3, engines can still claim the draw after
3-fold repeat. All these options are saved in the winboard.ini file.
Clocks
There is an "Options -> flip Clocks" command, that swaps the position
of white and black clocks (convenient in over-the-board matches, where
the screen is next to the board, and you want your own time to be
displayed on your side of the screen). The clocks can be adjusted in
"edit game" mode: right-clicking them adds one minute, left-clicking
subtracts one minute. (Also for OTB matches, to keep them synchronized
with the official match clock.) The flag-fell condition is now
indicated as (!) behind the time.
Other improvements
Castling rights and e.p. rights are now fully maintained, and
considered in legality testing. They are imported from and written to
FEN, as is the 50-move counter.
** Winboard_F 4.3.2
These are the release notes of Winboard_F 4.3.2, which is released
under the GPL. This version was derived from Allessandro Scotti's
Winboard_x 4.2.7 source files. It only includes the files that were
changed:
config.h
common.h
parser.h
moves.h
resource.h
winboard.c
backend.c
moves.c
parser.l
winboard.rc
and some bitmaps for piece symbols
I made modifications in the following areas:
1) Adjudication and claim verification
2) Fairy pieces and board sizes other than 8x8
3) Miscellaneous
Miscellaneous
/matchPause=10000
is an option to set the length of the pause between two games of a
match. The value is in msec, default value is 10000 (I will present
all newly implemented options with their default value as example). Be
aware that some engines might not be stopped yet if you make the pause
too small, but might still be puking output, which then will interfere
with the next game. But the fixed value of 10 sec of the old Winboard
seemed like overdoing it.
Time info in PGN
When you ask for the PV-info to be stored in the PGN (a Winboard_x
option), it now also stores the time spent on the move with it.
Flag fell
In engine-engine games the messge "white/black/both" flag(s) fell" no
longer appears in the window caption, but as an exclamation point
behind the clock time. (To prevent the annoying overwriting of the
normal header line).
Adjudications and Claim verification.
These functions are only present in engine-engine games, and only if
legality-testing is switched on. (The latter will be typically
switched off in games with bizarre rules, which the GUI doesn't know,
and in that case the GUI can never have an opinion on the outcome of a
game.)
Illegal-move forfeit
As soon as one of the engines plays an illegal move, it forfeits the
game. This feature was already present, but it should be 100% reliable
now, as it also takes e.p. and castling rights into account, rather
than erring on the safe side.
Illegal-move claim
From the above, it follows that any illegal-move claims by an engine
must be false, and will result in forfeiting the game. (In Winboard_x
this message is ignored, causing the game or match to hang.)
Checkmate adjudication
As soon as one of the engines does a move that results in checkmate,
the GUI declares the game won, without waiting for the engine to claim
it.
Insufficient mating material
As soon as the material on the board has shrunk to KK, KNK or KBK, the
game is declared draw.
/adjudicateLossThreshold=0
This option was already present in Winboard_x, (to declare a game lost
for which both engines agree for 3 moves that the score is below the
given threshold), but a non-zero value is now also used to enable the
following adjudications. If you only want the latter, just make the
threshold impossibly low (-40000 will usually do the trick).
Trivial draws
If we are 3 moves into a KQKQ, KRKR, KBKB KBKN or KNKN end-game, the
game is adjudicated as draw.
/repeatsToDraw=6
When the specified number of repeats occurs, the game is adjudicated
draw. Should keep track of e.p. and castling rights. This does not
require legality-testing to be switched on. The engines retain the
legal right to claim after a 3-fold repetition, though. If you set
this parameter to 3 or less, they will never get the chance. Better
not set it to 1 or less.
/ruleMoves=51
After the given number of full moves without capture or Pawn move, the
game is adjudicated draw. Even without legality testing. The engines
retain the legal right to claim after 50 moves.
/testClaims=FALSE
When enabled, this option verifies all result claims made by the
engines, and overrules the claim if it is false (forfeiting the game
for the claimer). An engine can still safely claim a win for its
opponent on a nonsense reason, though; this is taken to be the
equivalent of 'resign'. Draw claims (made before a draw adjudication)
are checked against the 50-move, 3-fold-repetition or
insufficient-material rules. Win claims are always considered false,
as the GUI adjudicates checkmates (and stalemates) before any engine
can claim them.
Fairy-Chess support
/boardWidth=8
Sets the number of files on the board. The additional files are named
i, j, k, l... in PGN, and should be indicated this way in
communicating moves to and from the engine. Currently works upto
12. No guarantees on how the rest of the display (clocks, etc.) looks
if you make this number < 8.
/boardHeight=8
Sets the number of ranks. Extra ranks are numbered 9, 10, 11... in
PGN. This is so far largely untested, and unlikely to work for
double-digit ranks. Displaying boards with upto 12 ranks seems to
work, though, but double-digit ranks might cause all kind of unforseen
problems in PGN file and move parser, or in communication with the
engine. To avoid such problems as much as possible, in boards with
more than 9 ranks the counting of ranks will start at zero rather than
one!
/fontPieceToCharTable="......."
This paramater, controlling the mapping of font symbols to piece
types, was already present in Winboard_x. The default is dependent on
the font selected with the /renderPiecesWithFont option. It can now
accept upto 32 pieces, but the length should always be even. The first
half designates the white pieces, the second half the black, both in
the order PNBRACHFEWDOGMQK. (The letters mentioned here are the
letters by which the pieces will be indicated in PGN and FEN notation,
what you have to give as argument depends on the font you use. A black
king might be 'l', for instance). If you give fewer then 32 pieces,
this will go at the expense of what is just before Queen. So the last
two symbols you give for each color are always Queen and King, the
others are assigned in the order Pawn, Knight, ... Pieces that do not
get a symbol assigned will remain invisible.
fairy-FEN support
The letters ACDEFGHMOW are accepted in FENs in addition to the regular
PNBRQK,(and of course the lower case versions for black), and are
passed to the engine in a setboard or edit menu. Double-digit skips
are acceptable in FENs. 'x' is interpreted as a skip of 10. Castling
rights should no longer be ignored. (Doesn't work for FRC yet,
though.) The 50-move-plies field should also be meaningful now.
Legality testing for Fairy pieces
There is a build in notion of what some of the new pieces can do, according to
A = Archbishop (aka Cardinal) = N+B
C = Chancellor (aka Marshall) = N+R
F = Ferz (aka General), moves 1 step diagonal
W = Wazir (aka Grand Vizer), moves 1 step orthogonal
E = Elephant (aka Alfil), jumps 2 steps diagonal
D = Dabbabah (aka War Machine), jumps 2 steps orthogonal
M = Man (aka Commoner), moves as King, but is not a royal piece
O = Cannon, moves along Rook lines, but cannot capture unless it jumps over
exactly one piece (friend or foe), and captures the first piece
it encounters thereafter. It can only jump if it captures something.
The piece jumped over (the 'platform') is not affected.
The other pieces have not yet any moves implemented:
H = Nightrider
G = Grasshopper
In games that use the mentioned pieces as described (Shatranj,
Courier, Capablanca Chess) you can leave legality testing on. If you
use them to represent pieces that move differently, you should switch
legality testing off.
Pawn moves
Pawn motion is made dependent on the variant played: in Shatranj and
Courier the double move is forbidden. In those games promotions are
always to Ferz. In Capablanca Chess the ArchBishop and Chancellor also
appear as choices in the promotion popup box.
/variant="normal"
Several new variants names are added (replacing "variant31" upto
"variant36"). They affect the initial position. (Board size has to be
set separately.) They are: courier (a Medieval predecessor of modern
Chess, played on a 12x8 board) capablanca (on a 10x8 board, featuring
Archbishop and Chancellor) gothic (as Capablanca, but with a more
exciting initial setup) xiangqi (Chinese Chess) shogi (Japanese Chess,
no support yet) fairy (This variant plays on 8x8 with HEW in stead of
NBR on the Queen side, so that all back-rank pieces are (potentially)
different) Make sure the selected board size matches the variant; this
is not automatic
Xiangqi and Shogi support (or lack thereof)
Xiangqi is only partially supported. The board display is
western-style (the pieces play on squares, rather than grid
intersections). The legality testing uses the Shatranj Knight and
Elephant, that cannot be blocked, and thus allows some moves that
should be illegal in Xiangqi. The Palace region is indicated on the
board, but there is no testing if the King or Mandarins (implemented
as ordinary Ferzes) leave the Palace. SAN might be non-standard, as it
uses O to indicate Cannon. Most of this will be fixed in a future
version. Shogi is not yet supported at all, first the shaky
implementation of Crazyhouse will have to be beefed up.
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