Banksia GUI released

[JohnW]

Is it possible to setup a chess position and have two engines play against each other starting from that position? If not could you consider adding it?
I would like to be able to give an old engine knight odds versus a newer engine.

Thank you..

[phhnguyen]

Is it possible to setup a chess position and have two engines play against each other starting from that position? If not could you consider adding it?
I would like to be able to give an old engine knight odds versus a newer engine.

Thank you..

Yes and it’s just a quick setup.

If you have that position, just copy and paste it into BSG. BSG can understand FEN, PGN, UCI positions (such as “position startpos moves e2e4 e7e6”).
If you don’t have that position, you may edit to have (menu -> Edit -> Edit Board, Fig. 1). You may also make moves manually (set the game to human vs human then make moves for both sides).

Once you have a game with a give position you will need to set up engines. Menu -> File -> Game setup to open a dialog as the Fig. 2, select engines for both sides (as well as a timer, options) then press the button "OK".

Now from the toolbar, click on the button "Play" until it changed to green as Fig. 3.

All done, have fun


Fig. 1 Edit a position


Fig. 2 Game set-up dialog


Fig. 3 Play button (the top left one)

[JohnW]

Awesome! Thank you!

[JohnW]

Is it possible to setup a chess position and have two engines play against each other starting from that position? If not could you consider adding it?
I would like to be able to give an old engine knight odds versus a newer engine.

Thank you..

Yes and it’s just a quick setup.

If you have that position, just copy and paste it into BSG. BSG can understand FEN, PGN, UCI positions (such as “position startpos moves e2e4 e7e6”).
If you don’t have that position, you may edit to have (menu -> Edit -> Edit Board, Fig. 1). You may also make moves manually (set the game to human vs human then make moves for both sides).

Once you have a game with a give position you will need to set up engines. Menu -> File -> Game setup to open a dialog as the Fig. 2, select engines for both sides (as well as a timer, options) then press the button "OK".

Now from the toolbar, click on the button "Play" until it changed to green as Fig. 3.

All done, have fun


Fig. 1 Edit a position


Fig. 2 Game set-up dialog


Fig. 3 Play button (the top left one)

Well I followed you directions but it doesn't seem to work. After clicking play, the engine with white never moves. All I see is an arrow for what it's thinking about doing, sometimes it changes etc. But I setup a 10 minute game and it's spent 5 minutes of it without actually moving.

[JohnW]

Disregard, it works. I was being stupid and given it 10 minutes per move so I didn't think it was doing anything

[smcracraft]

0.35 is up here on Catalina 10.15.6 (latest patch).

The books are in and it plays randomly, so that is all great.

My concern though is the Settings/Graphics, for example. See attached photo.

If I could see the labels, I could select from the piece types, piece colors, square colors, and board background.

But it's a mysterious white color.

Please kindly advise.

[phhnguyen]

0.35 is up here on Catalina 10.15.6 (latest patch).

The books are in and it plays randomly, so that is all great.

My concern though is the Settings/Graphics, for example. See attached photo.

If I could see the labels, I could select from the piece types, piece colors, square colors, and board background.

But it's a mysterious white color.

Please kindly advise.

Thanks a lot for the report!

Frankly speaking, I was not aware of that issue even I am using a Catalina iMac since I use only the standard theme (Appearance Light). I see the problem when trying the dark theme. Will find a solution for the next release.

You may change your computer theme to Light appearance as a temporary solution.

[smcracraft]

Changing from Dark Theme to Light Theme revealed the labels in settings.

Thanks.

Hopefully Banksia GUI will support Dark theme a well as it is best not to look at bright screens and do closeup work for many decades.

They contribute to increased intraocular eye pressure which leads to glaucoma.

Hence the darker themes.

Thanks ahead.

[phhnguyen]

Version 0.36 beta released

* Fixed bugs: some small bugs
* Some small improvements/adjustments such as support Dark theme of macOS Catalina
* New features:  

• Support Spanish (translated by Patricio Baeza)

• Auto-download NNUE networks for Stockfish NNUE

Auto-download NNUE networks for Stockfish NNUE is a new-testing feature. The idea is from Vondele of Stockfish dev team. When a user starts installing stockfish NNUE (e.g., by dragging and dropping its execution file into BSG) BSG will check if the default NNUE network exists. If not, it will auto popup a dialog to ask the user to download that file. Just click on the button “Download” and all will be done automatically. The network can be saved into Stockfish main folder or any folder. If another folder is selected, BSG will auto setup the full path for "EvalFile" option.

Later the user can popup that dialog to download again by clicking on the Download button on the option “EvalFile” as below image.

This is the first round of implementation for that feature. Feedbacks/reports are always more than welcome

[F.Huber]

Version 0.36 beta released

* Fixed bugs: some small bugs

... but introduced one new bug: version 0.36 doesn't work anymore!

No error message - it just does absolutely NOTHING when you start it.