Winboard and Chess engines FAQ

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Table of Contents

• [A] Introduction
• [B] Setting up
• [C] Opening books, Endgame Tablebases and Hash Tables
• [D] Engine Specific Problems
• [E] Winboard Engines in Other graphical interfaces
• [F] Misc Software and running Computer Chess Tournaments

Latest update: 03-08-2003

Detailed contents

• [A] Introduction
•  
  • [A.1] What is this Faq about?
  • [A.2] What is Winboard and where else can I download it if Tim Mann's Site is down?
  • [A.3] What is the difference between Winboard and Xboard? What are the various modifications of Winboard available?
  • [A.4] What are Winboard engines? How many Winboard engines are there?
  • [A.5] Where can I download the latest versions of the Winboard engines ?
  • [A.6] How strong are the Winboard engines compared to the commercial ones?Which is the strongest program ?
  • [A.7] The programs are too strong for me , where can I find a weaker one?
  • [A.8] What are Dann Corbit complied versions of Chess Engines?
  • [A.9] Can I run Winboard engines in Chessmaster® Fritz etc? Can Chessmaster® or Fritz etc run in Winboard?
  • [A.10] What about Ferret, Insomniac , Hossa etc? Are they Winboard compatible? Where can I get them?
  • [A.11] What are "clones"? Where can I get them?
  • [A.12] What is this "Winboard edition I /II" ? Where can i get Gandalf,Capture,Patzer and Lambchopx?
  • [A.13] Where can I get Winboard engines that play Suicide Chess,Fischer Random or other variants?
  • [A.14] I'm a programmer, how do I get my Chess program to be Winboard ,Chessbase or UCI etc compatible? Where can i find examples of free source Chess programs?
  
  
• [B] Setting up
• • [B.1] How do I Install Winboard?Should I uninstall the older version when upgrading?
  • [B.2] How do I install more Winboard Engines?
  • [B.3] How do I setup Crafty,Fritz etc to run on FICS,ICC,USCL etc?What about Yahoochess?
  • [B.4] How do I connect 2 copies of Winboard over a LAN or the internet without connecting over a internet server? Can I use it to play chess with a friend over the net?
  • [B.5] Help! Winboard program still refuses to run.
  • [B.6] Where can I get more help?
  • [B.7] I give up. Is there a easier way to do this?
  
  
• [C] Opening books, Endgame Tablebases and Hashtables
• • [C.1] What is a opening book?
  • [C.2] What is the book learning?
  • [C.3] How do I turn the opening book on?
  • [C.4] Is there a way to set uniform opening books for all Chess engines through a GUI book?
  • [C.5] Where can I download more opening books?
  • [C.6] What are endgame Tablebases [egtbs]? What is the difference between Nalimov,and Edward Tablebases?
  • [C.7] How many Tablebases do I need? Can I download only some of them?
  • [C.8] How do I turn the endgame tablebases on?
  • [C.9] Where can I get (buy, generate, download) more endgame tablebases?
  • [C.10] Okay. I followed the instructions but why is the endgame Tablebases still not working?
  • [C.11] There's a bug in the program, Why does Amy, TCB etc refuses to promote the pawn?
  • [C.12] What are Transposition/Hash tables?
  • [C.13] How much memory should I allocate in transposition table?
  
  
• [D] Some Engine Specific problems
• 
  
  
• [D.1] Bringer
  • [D.1.1] General overview
  • [D.1.2] When I run Bringer in Winboard the Bringer Graphical Interface starts as well. How can I remove it?
  • [D.1.3] How can I change the language in Bringer from German to English?
  • [D.1.4] How do I change the Transposition Table memory allocation for Bringer?
  • [D.1.5] What is the best memory allocation for Bringer?
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• [D.3] Chessmaster 8000/9000/10,000 [The King]
  • [D.3.1] General overview
  • [D.3.2] How do I use Winboard engines in Chessmaster?
  • [D.3.3] What are the main differences between Chessmaster 8000 and 9000 in terms of Winboard support?
  • [D.3.4] How do I get Chessmaster [The King] to play in Winboard , Arena etc?
  • [D.3.5] How do I get Chessmaster [The King] to play in Fritz,Junior etc or other Chessbase GUI.
  • [D.3.6] How do I get Chessmaster [The King] to play online at ICC or FICS? What about Yahoo servers?
  • [D.3.7] Why is Chessmaster [The King ] when exported outside Chessmaster not using a opening book? How do I provide an opening book with bookthinker?
  • [D.3.8] How do I match Chessmaster 8000 versus 9000?
  • [D.3.9] How do I use Chessmaster personalities outside Chessmaster? Where can I find more Chessmaster personalities?
  
  
• [D.4] Crafty
• • [D.4.1] General overview
  • [D.4.2] Do I need a crafty.rc file? Where can I get one?
  • [D.4.3] THE UAB site has only the source code of the latest Crafty, where do I get the complied versions for Windows?
  • [D.4.4] How do I compile a opening book? What is book.bin and books.bin?
  • [D.4.5] What is bookc.bin? How do I use it?
  • [D.4.6] why does Crafty play the same opening over and over again against other Chess engines?
  • [D.4.7] How do I weaken Crafty?
  • [D.4.8] When I run the annotateh command, no diagrams are displayed during the analysis.
  
  
• [D.5] Francesa
• • [D.5.1] General overview
  • [D.5.2] What is Mad?
  • [D.5.3] How can I adjust the size of the Hash Table?
  • [D.5.4] Francesa stops moving after the first game?
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• [D.7] Knightcap
• • [D.7.1] General overview
  • [D.7.2] Setting up Knightcap
  
  
• [D.8] Little Goliath
• • [D.8.1] General overview
  • [D 8.2] What is the difference between the Winboard version of Little Goliath 3.0 and the one available at Chessbase in the "Young Talents" CD?
  • [D.8.3] Little Goliath resigns immediately,when it has lost the prior game when using the /mg command.What should I do?
  • [D.8.4] Goliath is not using it's opening book?
• 
  
• [D.9] SOS
•  
  • [D.9.1] General overview
  • [D.9.2] Help! SOS 10/99 or SOS 11/99 refuse to work!
  • [D 9.3] Help! SOS refuses to run when I upgraded to Winboard 4.2.1 and above!
  • [D 9.4] Help! SOS [the Winboard version] refuses to run in Chessbase/CM8000
  • 
    
    
  
  
  
• [E] Winboard Engines in Other graphical interface
• • [E.1] How do I get a Winboard engine to work in Chessbase environment [Fritz, Junior, Nimzo etc]?
  • [E.2] What is the difference between using a native version and using the Winboard adapter?
  • [E.3] Which engines work with Chessbase?
  • [E.4] How do I get a Winboard engine to work in Chessmaster8000®?
  • [E.5] Which engines work with Chessmaster?
  • [E.6] How do I get a Winboard engine to work in the Chess genius,Chess Academy, Chess partner ,Chess Vision etc ?
  • [E.7] How do I get a UCI engine to work in Winboard?How do I get a Winboard engine to work in a UCI graphical interface?
  • [E.8] How do I get Chessmaster [The King] to work in Winboard or Arena?How do I get Chessmaster to run on Chess servers?
  • [E.9] How do I get Chessmaster [The King] to work in Chessbase GUI,Chess Partner 5 or Chess Assistant 6?
  • [E.10] What is Universal Chess interface [UCI]? How is it different from Winboard?
  • [E.11] What are the graphical user interfaces that support UCI?
  • [E.12] What are the Chess engines that support UCI?
  
  
• [F] Misc Questions, running Computer Chess tournaments, Chess formats
•  
  • [F.1] How can I run a match automatically between 2 programs in Winboard?
  • [F.2] How can I run a Nunn match [match from a fixed position] automatically in Winboard?
  • [F.3] How can I run a tournament automatically in Winboard?
  • [F.4] How do I calculate Elos or generate cross tables?How do I tell if the results are significant?
  • [F.5] How do I present/display Chess games on the web?
  • [F.6] How do I set up Winboard engines to handle tournaments with 2 time controls in Winboard? Eg 40 moves in 120 minutes followed by 30 minutes for the rest of the moves?
  • [F.7] How do display the number of nodes per second calculated by the Chess engine?How about displaying other information ?
  • [F.8] Winboard 4.2.X automatically saves all my Crafty games with the name Crafty-18.6, how do I change that?
  • [F.9] How do I run test suites automatically in Winboard?
  • [F.10] When "show thinking" is turned on during the game, the lines get cut off. How can I display the whole line?
  • [F.11] What is PGN,FEN,EPD, CBH,CBF etc and how do I handle them in Winboard?
  
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Articles on Computer Chess/Winboard in general

• 1st Winboard Trivia Quiz - Only for Winboard and Computer Chess Fanatics.
  
  
• A Beginner's guide to running Computer Chess Tournaments - This is my first article explaining why, how and what to do when running a Computer Chess Tournament.(14 Feb 2001)
  
  
• Using Batch files to automate Computer Chess tournaments in Winboard. Contributed by Peter Berger. (6 March 2001)
  
  
• Download FAQ.PDF , FAQ2.PDF , and FAQ3.PDF which consists of this FAQ in PDF format. The current version is updated up to 8 March 2001. A text format of this FAQ is also available.
  
  
• A beginner's guide to building Opening books - This is the second article written by yours truly, covering the steps needed to build a opening book for Winboard Compatible engines.(18 Mar 2001)
  
  
• Table listing compatibility of Winboard engines and Chess Academy 6,Shredder 5 and Chessbase - By Harold Roig (1 April 2001)
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• Guide to endgame tablebases - A new web site by me. Covers some non-Winboard specific area. (1 April 2001)

More articles coming soon.

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