Banksia GUI released

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phhnguyen
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Full name: Nguyen Hong Pham

Version 0.50 released

Post by phhnguyen »

Version 0.50 released


Fixed bugs:
* Analysis may crash after working
* Lichess bots are still buggy: sometimes the completed games are not released; stoped when they think their opponents lost by time; chat templates may not be saved
* There is a bit of delay (max to 0.5s) when making each move from an opening book

Some minor bug fixes, some small improvements/adjustments

New features:
* Display original names and authors of engines in Strings/Stats panel and as tooltips on Engine info panel (Fig. 1)
* All panels’ top bars could be hidden. That could save some space, look more clean and tidy, avoid moving panels accidentally (but they are still resizable)
* Image viewers: could show movies, live-camera
* New dialog box to check and recover tournaments backup files (Fig. 2)
* Lichess bots: challenging dialog box becomes easier to use with more information about Win/Draw/Loss, it can monitor and limit the number of challenges per 24h (Fig. 3)
* The dialog box of Playing games is changed into a panel (Fig. 4)
* ECA back to work with some bug fixes and improvements


Notes:
  • Showing names of engines and their authors in panels of Strings/Stats and Engine info is just a small improvement, usually, we don’t list such small improvements here. However, this time we list it as a new feature, just want to show our respects to the authors/developers of engines. Engines play very important roles in chess systems but so far it’s not easy to find their authors when playing. We prefer that information won’t take much precious space nor annoy users too much but still easily access and frequently be displayed. All engines, books, databases… in the download panel also come with authors names already (from previous versions)
  • Image viewers are pushed to limit by implementing abilities to show movies and cameras. Just remind again this feature is mainly for decoration as well as vs… being bored ;)
  • For BSG the user's data is very precious. In the last versions, BSG applied multi ways to make tournament data be safer, from new/clever ways to write down, to create multiple backup files (by days and by times). In this release, BSG helps to verify and recover from those backup files in a visual and easy way
  • Be aware Lichess has many limitations about chats, challenges, requests… Recently Lichess’s authors confirmed that bots (from an IP address) can challenge max to 200 times within 24h. Thus the new feature of limitation in the Challenge box can help your bots adopt the new rules
  • We realized even the dialog box “Playing games” is one of the very useful features but rare to use. The main reason in previous versions it is displayed in a large pop-up dialog box that takes more space, covers some information and makes BSG looks messy. Thus in this release, we compact it a bit, convert it into a panel that could be docked with other panels. It still requires a large space when displaying multi games but that is arrangeable, especially for users with modern large screens

Image
Fig. 1 Original names and authors of engines are listed in String/stats panel as well as tooltips on Engine Info panel

Image
Fig. 2. Dialog box to view, check and reload a tournament from backup files

Image
Fig. 3. Lichess challenge box can track the Win/Draw/Loss (WDL) and manage to challenge to adapt to the limit of 24h

Image
Fig. 4. A “busy” screen. The panel “Playing games” shows all active games
https://banksiagui.com
The most features chess GUI, based on opensource Banksia - the chess tournament manager
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Wilhelm
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Re: Banksia GUI released

Post by Wilhelm »

phhnguyen wrote: Sat Sep 04, 2021 12:05 pm
Wilhelm wrote: Fri Sep 03, 2021 5:13 pm
GPU-mode is no option because a Gauntlet will run for days instead of a few hours.
So I will start DJ11 manualy, this takes only a minute to rise the concurrency. This has worked in the last gauntlet.
Maybe you find a way to prohibit BSG to start all concurrency at the same time.

Thank you, regards
Adding that feature is not hard for me. However, it may be... hard for users since they may have to see, learn, understand many new things.

I have just read that someone gave up after trying for a while to create a new tournament with BSG - the work should be done in a few seconds! Perhaps I will create a new tutor video and/or find a way to simplify the interface.
I think you did a great job and setting up a tournament is not harder as in any other GUI. May be a tutorial video for beginners or technical not so perfect users could be helpfull.
What I would like to see is a material overview in the bottom of the notification. When running 24 games you can better see whats going on.
So far, many thanks.

regards
Ryzen 5900x, 64GB Ram, RTX3080, 2x 2TB SSD, 1x 1TB SSD, 1x 2TB HDD, all custom watercooled, Win10 and Win7 Multiboot, Win98/Windows Millennium/WinXP virtual machines for 16bit
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Mark 1
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Re: Banksia GUI released

Post by Mark 1 »

Many thanks !!!!
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AdminX
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Re: Banksia GUI released

Post by AdminX »

Thanks! Still loving this GUI, especially the fact that I can perform engine vs engine matches locally over network using different computers.

Image
Click image for larger view.

On a side note I could not install (GPU Version) ClassicAra 0.9.5, but it did detect MultiAra 0.9.5, so I had to copy the Json for MultiAra and edit it so I could get ClassicAra to work.
"Good decisions come from experience, and experience comes from bad decisions."
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Cornfed
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Re: Banksia GUI released

Post by Cornfed »

Sorry for the silly question, but it is discussed a lot in this thread.

What is a 'bot'? Are you saying you can hook up your computer to lichess with an engine open and allow others to simply play against your engine?
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AdminX
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Re: Banksia GUI released

Post by AdminX »

Cornfed wrote: Sat Sep 04, 2021 8:01 pm Sorry for the silly question, but it is discussed a lot in this thread.

What is a 'bot'? Are you saying you can hook up your computer to lichess with an engine open and allow others to simply play against your engine?
Yes! :D
"Good decisions come from experience, and experience comes from bad decisions."
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Eduard
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Re: Banksia GUI released

Post by Eduard »

Cornfed wrote: Sat Sep 04, 2021 8:01 pm Sorry for the silly question, but it is discussed a lot in this thread.

What is a 'bot'? Are you saying you can hook up your computer to lichess with an engine open and allow others to simply play against your engine?
On my Homepage, you can read about:

https://solista-chess.jimdosite.com/lichess/

Sorry, only in German, you have to translate it.
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AlexChess
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Re: Banksia GUI released

Post by AlexChess »

Thank you Pham!

All seems OK on Windows 11 ARM64. It has imported all my 1431 games already played and I'm continuing my SuperBlitz updating some engines. I have reconfigured only some changed GUI panels ( no more Engine Infos dance :D )

Best regards, Alex
Chess engines and dedicated chess computers fan since 1981 :D macOS Sequoia 16GB-512GB, Windows 11 & Ubuntu ARM64.
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shaoxinyu
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Re: Banksia GUI released

Post by shaoxinyu »

It seems the backup files for tournaments are not working on Windows 10. GUI will be crashed when I use it.

In fact, if the GUI is crashed/quitted during a tournament, I couldn't open the GUI anymore. I have to delete the banksiaplaying.json to open the GUI.
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phhnguyen
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Re: Banksia GUI released

Post by phhnguyen »

AdminX wrote: Sat Sep 04, 2021 6:32 pm Thanks! Still loving this GUI, especially the fact that I can perform engine vs engine matches locally over network using different computers.

Image
Click image for larger view.

On a side note I could not install (GPU Version) ClassicAra 0.9.5, but it did detect MultiAra 0.9.5, so I had to copy the Json for MultiAra and edit it so I could get ClassicAra to work.
I have checked the issue. Interesting. BSG detected and installed successfully the engine ClassicAra. If you open the file banksiaengine.json you can see that engine is in that file.

However, the user can't use it to play chess, because it tells BSG it knew to play... chess ;)

The problem is in this line from ClassicAra:

Code: Select all

option name UCI_Variant type combo default chess var chess var chess
However, typically BSG detects an engine as a chess engine if it says nothing about variants at all or uses words "standard", "normal" BUT not "chess".

On the other hand, MultiAra used the word "standard" thus it is fine for BSG:

Code: Select all

option name UCI_Variant type combo default chess var chess var standard var fischerandom var chess960 var crazyhouse var kingofthehill var atomic var antichess var horde var racingkings var 3check var threecheck
Since there is no standard about names of variants, I am not sure if I should change BSG to adapt it or we should ask the author to use common ways, such as use the word "standard" or just stop sending about variants when the engine supports only chess.

BTW, he should make ClassicAra and MultiAra be consistent about variants.
https://banksiagui.com
The most features chess GUI, based on opensource Banksia - the chess tournament manager