Banksia GUI released

[Eduard]

I think Pham made an error from the beginning: instead of developing Banksia GUI the way he thought it would make sense, he listened to endless and so often futile requests. Banksia is unusable for anything except -- just like the string of requests -- endless eng-eng tournaments. One cannot load a slightly more annotated pgn (annotations are not visible), and any operation has become over-complicated.

IMHO, he should stop listening to any of us and focus on what he thinks is worthy, or to the needs of his target group -- if it is a larger slice of users, chess players/amateurs, he is obviously on the wrong path. The same happened with Arena.

You are wrong! I'm sure that Pham appreciates our feedbacks, every betatester and supporter is absolutely focused on a specific area. It's a really complex GUI with millions on features and he quickly fixes all glitches (now the tournaments management IS PERFECT) and adds new incredible functions with every new build.
He's always kind and hears our suggestions. The graphic is superlative and absolutely customizable. I have asked the same to Arena author Martin Blume by email, thanking him for Arena, but asking to fix some big bugs and he haven't even answered me a single word. It's closed source, written in Delphi and so no one can correct or improve it anymore

...And now I do another PayPal donation to Pham!

Millions of functions, but the basics are missing. By the way, I've already sent a donation for Banksia. I support several projects.

[Cornfed]

I think Pham made an error from the beginning: instead of developing Banksia GUI the way he thought it would make sense, he listened to endless and so often futile requests. Banksia is unusable for anything except -- just like the string of requests -- endless eng-eng tournaments. One cannot load a slightly more annotated pgn (annotations are not visible), and any operation has become over-complicated.

IMHO, he should stop listening to any of us and focus on what he thinks is worthy, or to the needs of his target group -- if it is a larger slice of users, chess players/amateurs, he is obviously on the wrong path. The same happened with Arena.

You are wrong! I'm sure that Pham appreciates our feedbacks, every betatester and supporter is absolutely focused on a specific area. It's a really complex GUI with millions on features and he quickly fixes all glitches (now the tournaments management IS PERFECT) and adds new incredible functions with every new build.
He's always kind and hears our suggestions. The graphic is superlative and absolutely customizable. I have asked the same to Arena author Martin Blume by email, thanking him for Arena, but asking to fix some big bugs and he haven't even answered me a single word. It's closed source, written in Delphi and so no one can correct or improve it anymore

...And now I do another PayPal donation to Pham!

Pham 'appreciating' feedback I am sure is true....and he's very responsive....but what matejst's and Eduard post can be true as well. Think about it.
It's really the reason I still only use the quick/easy/intuitive Fritz GUI. Banksia is a 'hot mess' in comparison....at least for my needs.

[shaoxinyu]

@Eduard

You may just use Chessbase. Chessbase is the best in annotating games and managing databases. I don't think we should expect a single developer to do something better than Chessbase: it is not a big issue to add new functions, but the optimization (e.g. loading a pgn containing thousands of games) and stability (no crash, and can load a pgn where some games are broken) are not easy tasks.

btw: the thinking arrow is useful for me: I don't want to use the pv board and I am not good enough to think the line in my brain.

@Cornfed @matejst

I agree it depends on the author to make decisions. For me, I would like to have a GUI for engine testing (maybe not well-optimized like cutechess) but containing more options for users. For learning and managing databases I would just use Chessbase.

[Eduard]

@Eduard

You may just use Chessbase. Chessbase is the best in annotating games and managing databases. I don't think we should expect a single developer to do something better than Chessbase: it is not a big issue to add new functions, but the optimization (e.g. loading a pgn containing thousands of games) and stability (no crash, and can load a pgn where some games are broken) are not easy tasks.

btw: the thinking arrow is useful for me: I don't want to use the pv board and I am not good enough to think the line in my brain.

@Cornfed @matejst

I agree it depends on the author to make decisions. For me, I would like to have a GUI for engine testing (maybe not well-optimized like cutechess) but containing more options for users. For learning and managing databases I would just use Chessbase.

If you can't even copy a simple analysis, that's very disappointing, sorry. Also the impossibility to change fonts. I will not use 0.51, I will probably delete this GUI. Have fun with the many new arrows.

[shaoxinyu]

@Eduard

You may just use Chessbase. Chessbase is the best in annotating games and managing databases. I don't think we should expect a single developer to do something better than Chessbase: it is not a big issue to add new functions, but the optimization (e.g. loading a pgn containing thousands of games) and stability (no crash, and can load a pgn where some games are broken) are not easy tasks.

btw: the thinking arrow is useful for me: I don't want to use the pv board and I am not good enough to think the line in my brain.

@Cornfed @matejst

I agree it depends on the author to make decisions. For me, I would like to have a GUI for engine testing (maybe not well-optimized like cutechess) but containing more options for users. For learning and managing databases I would just use Chessbase.

If you can't even copy a simple analysis, that's very disappointing, sorry. Also the impossibility to change fonts. I will not use 0.51, I will probably delete this GUI. Have fun with the many new arrows.

The engine info contains every information you need and I don't know what the ChessBase analysis can give you more.

It's your freedom to do anything but I don't think it polite to say something here. I am always fine with any idea you suggest but it seems you only concern your demands.

[AlexChess]

@Eduard

You may just use Chessbase. Chessbase is the best in annotating games and managing databases. I don't think we should expect a single developer to do something better than Chessbase: it is not a big issue to add new functions, but the optimization (e.g. loading a pgn containing thousands of games) and stability (no crash, and can load a pgn where some games are broken) are not easy tasks.

btw: the thinking arrow is useful for me: I don't want to use the pv board and I am not good enough to think the line in my brain.

@Cornfed @matejst

I agree it depends on the author to make decisions. For me, I would like to have a GUI for engine testing (maybe not well-optimized like cutechess) but containing more options for users. For learning and managing databases I would just use Chessbase.

+1

[Cornfed]

@Cornfed @matejst

I agree it depends on the author to make decisions. For me, I would like to have a GUI for engine testing (maybe not well-optimized like cutechess) but containing more options for users. For learning and managing databases I would just use Chessbase.

Hey, don't get me wrong, Banksia has all kinds of cute bells and whistles. That's fine. ALL I was saying was that for something like a simple engine match - like I did last weekend - it's just easier for me to to take a pgn file (Silver Suite was what I used) and run a match using Fritz (you can't do this with Chessbase of course so I don't know why you even say that). Being able to open the file sometimes within Chessbase for further research is a bonus of course.

[carldaman]

@Eduard

You may just use Chessbase. Chessbase is the best in annotating games and managing databases. I don't think we should expect a single developer to do something better than Chessbase: it is not a big issue to add new functions, but the optimization (e.g. loading a pgn containing thousands of games) and stability (no crash, and can load a pgn where some games are broken) are not easy tasks.

btw: the thinking arrow is useful for me: I don't want to use the pv board and I am not good enough to think the line in my brain.

@Cornfed @matejst

I agree it depends on the author to make decisions. For me, I would like to have a GUI for engine testing (maybe not well-optimized like cutechess) but containing more options for users. For learning and managing databases I would just use Chessbase.

If you can't even copy a simple analysis, that's very disappointing, sorry. Also the impossibility to change fonts. I will not use 0.51, I will probably delete this GUI. Have fun with the many new arrows.

The engine info contains every information you need and I don't know what the ChessBase analysis can give you more.

It's your freedom to do anything but I don't think it polite to say something here. I am always fine with any idea you suggest but it seems you only concern your demands.

Those concerns can be shared by many other users. That's actually the most useful kind of feedback.

[AlexChess]

@Eduard

You may just use Chessbase. Chessbase is the best in annotating games and managing databases. I don't think we should expect a single developer to do something better than Chessbase: it is not a big issue to add new functions, but the optimization (e.g. loading a pgn containing thousands of games) and stability (no crash, and can load a pgn where some games are broken) are not easy tasks.

btw: the thinking arrow is useful for me: I don't want to use the pv board and I am not good enough to think the line in my brain.

@Cornfed @matejst

I agree it depends on the author to make decisions. For me, I would like to have a GUI for engine testing (maybe not well-optimized like cutechess) but containing more options for users. For learning and managing databases I would just use Chessbase.

If you can't even copy a simple analysis, that's very disappointing, sorry. Also the impossibility to change fonts. I will not use 0.51, I will probably delete this GUI. Have fun with the many new arrows.

The engine info contains every information you need and I don't know what the ChessBase analysis can give you more.

It's your freedom to do anything but I don't think it polite to say something here. I am always fine with any idea you suggest but it seems you only concern your demands.

Those concerns can be shared by many other users. That's actually the most useful kind of feedback.

Thinking arrows are really useful. I can follow engines plans watching dedicated monitor occasionally, while I'm working.

[Uri Blass]

Some ideas:
1)I would like to know in advance what is going to happen in a match to avoid mistakes.

For example I played stockfish depth 10 against Dragon depth 14 from a pgn with swap sides
only to discover after the match started that black won most games because it seemed that black got depth 14 in all games and it was in one game stockfish and in one game dragon.

Another mistake is that I wanted to play the same opening with white and black but did not get it correctly and the engines swap sides but started from opening 1 and in the second game opening 2 and in the third game opening 3.

Another mistake is when I want one program to play white all games and do not get the correct one to play white all games

Seeing a picture of how the match is going to be seen before starting the match so if I have some mistake I can correct it can be productive

2)I would like to have an option for fixed setting for every engine so I can use the same setting with the engine for all games without changing things.

I may decide that I would like to have Stockfish14_depth_13_single_core as one of the players and in every game it is going to use depth 13 even if I do not tell the GUI that I want to use depth 13. The engine is going to be called Stockfish14_depth13_single_core and if I try to have it in some tournament it must use depth 13 and single core.

I may also like to have the option to have something like Stockfish14_nodes_1000000 single core as one of the players in every game
or Stockfish14_40_moves_to_40_seconds_4_cores as one of the players.

The idea is that the setting is going to be fixed after the engine start to play the first tournament and if I try to change them or change one of the parameters of the engine I get a warning that the setting are fixed and that it is better if I simply duplicate the engine in a different setting and different name.

It is not instead of normal Stockfish14 that can be used in tournaments if I decide about setting that is not fixed but additional option.