1 2 3 4Chess(GNU) Chess(GNU) 5 6 7NNAAMMEE 8 Chess - GNU Chess 9 10SSYYNNOOPPSSIISS 11 CChheessss [ aarrgg11 aarrgg22 ] 12 13DDEESSCCRRIIPPTTIIOONN 14 _C_h_e_s_s plays a game of chess against the user or it plays 15 against itself. 16 17 _C_h_e_s_s has a simple alpha-numeric board display or it can 18 be compiled for use with the CHESSTOOL program on a SUN 19 workstation. The program gets its opening moves from the 20 file gnuchess.book which should be located in the same 21 directory as gnuchess. To invoke the prgram, type 22 'gnuchess' or type 'chesstool gnuchess' on a SUN worksta- 23 tion where 'CHESSTOOL' is installed. The 'gnuchess' com- 24 mand can be followed by up to 2 command line arguments. 25 If one argument is given it determines the programs search 26 time in seconds. If two arguments are given, they will be 27 used to set tournament time controls with the first argu- 28 ment being the number of moves and the second being the 29 total clock time in minutes. Thus, entering 'chess 60 5' 30 will set the clocks for 5 minutes (300 seconds) for the 31 first 60 moves. If no argument is given the program will 32 prompt the user for level of play. For use with 33 CHESSTOOL, see the documentation on that program. 34 35 Once _C_h_e_s_s is invoked, the program will display the board 36 and prompt the user for a move. To enter a move, use the 37 notation 'e2e4' where the first letter-number pair indi- 38 cates the origination square and the second letter-number 39 pair indicates the destination square. An alternative is 40 to use the notation 'nf3' where the first letter indicates 41 the piece type (p,n,b,r,q,k). To castle, type the origin 42 and destination squares of the king just as you would do 43 for a regular move, or type "o-o" for kingside castling 44 and "o-o-o" for queenside. 45 46CCOOMMMMAANNDDSS 47 In addition to legal moves, the following commands are 48 available as responses. 49 50 _b_e_e_p -- causes the program to beep after each move. 51 52 _b_d -- updates the current board position on the display. 53 54 _b_o_o_k -- turns off use of the opening library. 55 56 _b_o_t_h -- causes the computer to play both sides of a chess 57 game. 58 59 _b_l_a_c_k -- causes the computer to take the black pieces with 60 the move and begin searching. 61 62 63 64 1 65 66 67 68 69 70Chess(GNU) Chess(GNU) 71 72 73 _l_e_v_e_l -- allows the user to set time controls such as 60 74 moves in 5 minutes etc. In tournament mode, the program 75 will vary the time it takes for each move depending on the 76 situation. If easy mode is disabled (using the 'easy' 77 command), the program will often respond with its move 78 immediately, saving time on its clock for use later on. 79 80 _d_e_p_t_h -- allows the user to change the search depth of the 81 program. The maximum depth is 29 ply. Normally the depth 82 is set to 29 and the computer terminates its search based 83 on elapsed time rather than depth. Using the depth com- 84 mand allows setting depth to say 4 ply and setting 85 response time to a large number such as 9999 seconds. The 86 program will then search until all moves have been exam- 87 ined to a depth of 4 ply (with extensions up to 11 addi- 88 tional ply for sequences of checks and captures). 89 90 _e_a_s_y -- toggles easy mode (thinking on opponents time) on 91 and off. The default is easy mode ON. If easy mode is 92 disabled, the user must enter a 'break' or '^C' to get the 93 programs attention before entering each move. 94 95 _e_d_i_t -- allows the user to set up a board position. In 96 this mode, the '#' command will clear the board, the 'c' 97 command will toggle piece color, and the '.' command will 98 exit setup mode. Pieces are entered by typing a letter 99 (p,n,b,r,q,k) for the piece followed by the coordinate. 100 For example "pb3" would place a pawn on square b3. 101 102 _f_o_r_c_e -- allows the user to enter moves for both sides. To 103 get the program to play after a sequence of moves has been 104 entered use the 'white' or 'black' commands. 105 106 _g_e_t -- retrieves a game from disk. The program will 107 prompt the user for a file name. 108 109 _h_e_l_p -- displays a short description of the commands. 110 111 _h_i_n_t -- causes the program to supply the user with its 112 predicted move. 113 114 _l_i_s_t -- writes the game moves and some statistics on 115 search depth, nodes, and time to the file 'chess.lst'. 116 117 _n_e_w -- starts a new game. 118 119 _p_o_s_t -- causes the program to display the principle varia- 120 tion and the score during the search. A score of 100 is 121 equivalent to a 1 pawn advantage for the computer. 122 123 _r_a_n_d_o_m -- causes the program to randomize its move selec- 124 tion slightly. 125 126 _r_e_v_e_r_s_e -- causes the board display to be reversed. That 127 128 129 130 2 131 132 133 134 135 136Chess(GNU) Chess(GNU) 137 138 139 is, the white pieces will now appear at the top of the 140 board. 141 142 _q_u_i_t -- exits the game. 143 144 _s_a_v_e -- saves a game to disk. The program will prompt the 145 user for a file name. 146 147 _s_w_i_t_c_h -- causes the program to switch places with the 148 opponent and begin searching. 149 150 _u_n_d_o -- undoes the last move whether it was the computer's 151 or the human's. You may also type "remove". This is equiv- 152 alent to two "undo's" (e.g. retract one move for each 153 side). 154 155 _w_h_i_t_e -- causes the computer to take the white pieces with 156 the move and begin searching. 157 158BBUUGGSS 159 Pawn promotion to pieces other than a queen is not 160 allowed. En-Passant does not work properly with 161 CHESSTOOOL. The transposition table may not work properly 162 in some positions so the default is to turn this off. 163 164SSEEEE AALLSSOO 165 chesstool(6) 166 167 168 169 170 171 172 173 174 175 176 177 178 179 180 181 182 183 184 185 186 187 188 189 190 191 192 193 194 195 196 3 197 198 199