Your trusted source for computer chess information!

Welcome to the Computer-Chess Wiki

If you like Computer Chess, then you will love our site! It is the best place to discover hard-to-find information about how to download, set up, and run chess engines – both free and commercial – in various chess GUIs such as: Winboard, Arena, Chessbase, etc. We urge you to join us by hitting the 'Login' button at the top right of this page. (Find more information here.) There's no fees and there's no tiresome ads here at the wiki or by email. Membership has privileges: only members can create new wiki pages or edit existing ones. If enough members want additional features, then we will add them: message boards, polls, calendars, chat – if you want it, you will get it!

How To Navigate the Computer-Chess Wiki

People sometimes get lost in wikis. There are 6 ways to navigate around this one.

  1. Table Of Contents - A box at the upper right helps you navigate the current page
  2. Navigation - A box at the upper left lists popular choices
  3. Search - This is a box on the left side. Type in what you're looking for
    • click Go to land at a wiki page of this name. (It may not exist!)
    • click Search to look through a Google-like list of matches within this site
  4. Chessboard - Click on the chessboard to go back to the home page (this page)
  5. Back - Click your browser's 'Back' button to take you to the previous page
  6. Links - These are found on the wiki pages. They can take you to other parts of the wiki or to an outside site

Main Sections of this Site

The History of this Site

Here is Aaron Tay's original website. It was accurate when written, but now, several years later, this is no longer true. For instance:

  • Winboard and Arena features have expanded
  • New free chess software is not mentioned
  • New computer chess web sites have popped up and are not mentioned
  • Old computer chess web sites have disappeared
  • There are many bad and dead links

The Future of this Site

The information on this website was mostly supplied by Aaron Tay's Winboard and Chess Engines FAQ. This FAQ was originally limited to Winboard only, but over the years it has embraced other GUIs [Arena], other protocols [UCI], non-Winboard engines, and even some shareware and commercial chess software as well. It is our intention to take the rigidly organized FAQ and to group it under better headings, such as these:

  • Chess GUIs
    • Arena
    • Winboard
    • Commercial and Shareware Chess GUIs
  • Chess Utility Software
    • Conversion and Filtering Software
    • Opening Book and Database
    • Tournament Software
  • Endgame

There's a long, long way to go and we can't get there without your help!

What You Can Do

Join us by hitting the 'Login' button at the top right of this page. Information is being added to this site on a daily basis (in editable wiki form). Some information is up to date, some is not. But you can help make it both current and accurate. Almost every file on this site can be edited by you, the computer-chess enthusiast. If you notice a mistake, don't hesitate to correct it. It doesn't matter if you don't understand wiki format or if English is not your native language. As long as you make your correction then someone else can come along after you and make it look 'pretty'. If you are a computer chess expert and want to write a new article, then put it up on our site! We are hoping that, working together, we can create an oasis of computer chess knowledge! Please look at the Wiki Help Page for more information, especially if you are an engine author wanting free hosting or if you want to put up your own tournament pages.

What We Offer

  • Free personal chess pages - We will host your personal chess pages here! :)
  • Free engine hosting - We will host your chess engine here! :)
  • Free tournament hosting - We will host your chess tournament site here! :)
  • Email accounts - You can be joe@computer-chess.org. Get yours today before all the good names are taken!
  • Subversion repositories - If you are a programmer a Subversion repository is indispensable. You can have a complete version history of all your coding efforts. If you mess up your code, just revert back to a previous version; look at diffs between previous commits; create a new, experimental branch, and, if it is successful, merge it into your main trunk. The repository can be made public or private.
  • Web storage - Backup your data to our web server – affordably.
Notes:
  1. The free hosting for personal pages, engines and tournaments will be checked:
    • you can not use huge amounts of storage
    • you can not place any ads or non-chess material on your pages
    • this offer is not limited in any other way!
  2. For email and Subversion repositories: Active members will get reduced prices; very active members will get them for free! (except for web storage)
  3. If you want to donate some money to help out our computer chess efforts, that would be great!
  4. If at any time there is a surplus of money it will be used to further the interests of computer chess!

Copyright 2008, by Ron Murawski


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