XBoard

[cms271828]

Hi,

I'm creating a browser chess gui for use with my own engine (possibly others in future).
I was considering xboard, and say crafty. What format must the moves be in when they are passed from Xboard to crafty (user move), and crafty to Xboard(engines move) .

Is it just like d2d4, or d4e5 (pawn capture)
If black has moved pawn from h7 to h5, and white pawn on g5...
then g5h6 must mean enpassant.

Not sure about castling, is this just O-O, and O-O-O?
And for promotion.. a7b8=N for example?

Thanks for advice

[michiguel]

Hi,

I'm creating a browser chess gui for use with my own engine (possibly others in future).
I was considering xboard, and say crafty. What format must the moves be in when they are passed from Xboard to crafty (user move), and crafty to Xboard(engines move) .

Is it just like d2d4, or d4e5 (pawn capture)
If black has moved pawn from h7 to h5, and white pawn on g5...
then g5h6 must mean enpassant.

Not sure about castling, is this just O-O, and O-O-O?
And for promotion.. a7b8=N for example?

Thanks for advice

http://www.gnu.org/software/xboard/engine-intf.html

Miguel

[cms271828]

Thanks,

I see promotion is just done a7b8n

But what is best for castling, just giving kings move, e1g1, or O-O.

I think we just give the kings move, e1g1, that way any move is..
[TO][FROM] or [TO][FROM][PROMOTION] which is more consistent

Thanks

[Engin]

most engines are using e2e4, d2d4 format and if there is any pawn promotion its add =q, r, b, n , en passant is no different if pawn moved on f5 then e5f6 is enough, to using castling like O-O is reserved for SAN , so better using with e1g1, playing chess960 have a different castling format like king takes rook (e1h1).

some engines can using short format SAN too, like e4 e5 Nf3 Nf6 Nxe5 ...

some engines are using like Nf3-e5 format d2-d4 , but that is not often used in computerchess.

[hgm]

most engines are using e2e4, d2d4 format and if there is any pawn promotion its add =q, r, b, n , en passant is no different if pawn moved on f5 then e5f6 is enough, to using castling like O-O is reserved for SAN , so better using with e1g1, playing chess960 have a different castling format like king takes rook (e1h1).

That is NOT correct WinBoard protocol. In Chess960 XBoard writes and expects castlings as O-O and O-O-O, and I do't think it will understand KxR notation. (Except when legality testing is off, perhaps.) In normal Chess castling is e1g1, not O-O. It writes promotion suffixes as lower case, without = sign. It happens to understand the = sign on input, as that is SAN, and it understands SAN, (but there is no guarantee that other GUIs using WinBoard protocol will; it is not a requirement!). But it will never send it.

[bob]

Thanks,

I see promotion is just done a7b8n

But what is best for castling, just giving kings move, e1g1, or O-O.

I think we just give the kings move, e1g1, that way any move is..
[TO][FROM] or [TO][FROM][PROMOTION] which is more consistent

Thanks

Depends. Crafty is a SAN engine. It can interpret things like b7b8Q, but it will output SAN moves, such as b8=Q.