Annotation of 43BSDReno/games/chess/DOCUMENTATION/MAN-PAGE, revision 1.1.1.1

1.1       root        1: .TH Chess GNU
                      2: .SH NAME
                      3: Chess \- GNU Chess
                      4: .SH SYNOPSIS
                      5: .B Chess
                      6: [
                      7: .B arg1 arg2
                      8: ]
                      9: .SH DESCRIPTION
                     10: .I Chess
                     11: plays a game of chess against the user or it plays against itself.
                     12: .PP
                     13: .I Chess
                     14: has a simple alpha-numeric board display or it can be compiled for
                     15: use with the CHESSTOOL program on a SUN workstation.
                     16: The program gets its opening moves from the file gnuchess.book which
                     17: should be located in the same directory as gnuchess.
                     18: To invoke the prgram, type 'gnuchess' or type 'chesstool gnuchess'
                     19: on a SUN workstation where 'CHESSTOOL' is installed.
                     20: The 'gnuchess' command can be followed by up to 2 command line arguments.
                     21: If one argument is given it determines the programs search time in
                     22: seconds.  If two arguments are given, they will be used to set tournament
                     23: time controls with the first argument being the number of moves and the second
                     24: being the total clock time in minutes.  Thus, entering 'chess 60 5' will set
                     25: the clocks for 5 minutes (300 seconds) for the first 60 moves.
                     26: If no argument is given the program will prompt the user for level of
                     27: play.
                     28: For use with CHESSTOOL, see the documentation on that program.
                     29: .PP
                     30: Once
                     31: .I Chess
                     32: is invoked, the program will display the board and prompt the user
                     33: for a move. To enter a move, use the notation 'e2e4' where the first
                     34: letter-number pair indicates the origination square
                     35: and the second letter-number pair indicates the destination square.
                     36: An alternative is to use the notation 'nf3' where
                     37: the first letter indicates the piece type (p,n,b,r,q,k).
                     38: To castle, type the origin and destination squares
                     39: of the king just as you would do for a regular move, or type
                     40: "o-o" for kingside castling and "o-o-o" for queenside.
                     41: .SH COMMANDS
                     42: .PP
                     43: In addition to legal moves, the following commands are available as responses.
                     44: .PP
                     45: .I beep
                     46: -- causes the program to beep after each move.
                     47: .PP
                     48: .I bd
                     49: -- updates the current board position on the display.
                     50: .PP
                     51: .I book
                     52: -- turns off use of the opening library.
                     53: .PP
                     54: .I both
                     55: -- causes the computer to play both sides of a chess game.
                     56: .PP
                     57: .I black
                     58: -- causes the computer to take the black pieces with the move
                     59: and begin searching.
                     60: .PP
                     61: .I level
                     62: -- allows the user to set time controls such as
                     63: 60 moves in 5 minutes etc.  In tournament mode, the program will
                     64: vary the time it takes for each
                     65: move depending on the situation.  If easy mode is disabled (using
                     66: the 'easy' command), the program
                     67: will often respond with its move immediately, saving time on
                     68: its clock for use later on.
                     69: .PP
                     70: .I depth
                     71: -- allows the user to change the
                     72: search depth of the program.  The maximum depth is 29 ply.
                     73: Normally the depth is set to 29 and the computer terminates
                     74: its search based on elapsed time rather than depth.
                     75: Using the depth command allows setting depth to say
                     76: 4 ply and setting response time to a large number such as
                     77: 9999 seconds. The program will then search until all moves
                     78: have been examined to a depth of 4 ply (with extensions up
                     79: to 11 additional ply for sequences of checks and captures). 
                     80: .PP
                     81: .I easy
                     82: -- toggles easy mode (thinking on opponents time)
                     83: on and off. The default is easy mode ON.  If easy mode is disabled,
                     84: the user must enter a 'break' or '^C' to get the programs
                     85: attention before entering each move.
                     86: .PP
                     87: .I edit
                     88: -- allows the user to set up a board position.
                     89: In this mode, the '#' command will clear the board, the 'c'
                     90: command will toggle piece color, and the '.' command will exit
                     91: setup mode.  Pieces are entered by typing a letter (p,n,b,r,q,k) for
                     92: the piece followed by the coordinate.  For example "pb3" would
                     93: place a pawn on square b3.
                     94: .PP
                     95: .I force
                     96: -- allows the user to enter moves for both
                     97: sides. To get the program to play after a sequence of moves
                     98: has been entered use the 'white' or 'black' commands.
                     99: .PP
                    100: .I get
                    101: -- retrieves a game from disk.  The program will
                    102: prompt the user for a file name.
                    103: .PP
                    104: .I help
                    105: -- displays a short description of the commands.
                    106: .PP
                    107: .I hint
                    108: -- causes the program to supply the user with
                    109: its predicted move.
                    110: .PP
                    111: .I list
                    112: -- writes the game moves and some statistics
                    113: on search depth, nodes, and time to the file 'chess.lst'.
                    114: .PP
                    115: .I new
                    116: -- starts a new game.
                    117: .PP
                    118: .I post
                    119: -- causes the program to display the principle
                    120: variation and the score during the search.  A score of
                    121: 100 is equivalent to a 1 pawn advantage for the computer.
                    122: .PP
                    123: .I random
                    124: -- causes the program to randomize its move
                    125: selection slightly.
                    126: .PP
                    127: .I reverse
                    128: -- causes the board display to be reversed.  That
                    129: is, the white pieces will now appear at the top of the board.
                    130: .PP
                    131: .I quit
                    132: -- exits the game.
                    133: .PP
                    134: .I save
                    135: -- saves a game to disk.  The program will prompt
                    136: the user for a file name.
                    137: .PP
                    138: .I switch
                    139: -- causes the program to switch places with
                    140: the opponent and begin searching.
                    141: .PP
                    142: .I undo
                    143: -- undoes the last move whether it was the computer's
                    144: or the human's. You may also type "remove". This is equivalent
                    145: to two "undo's" (e.g. retract one move for each side).
                    146: .PP
                    147: .I white
                    148: -- causes the computer to take the white pieces
                    149: with the move and begin searching.
                    150: .SH BUGS
                    151: .PP
                    152: Pawn promotion to pieces other than a queen is not allowed.
                    153: En-Passant does not work properly with CHESSTOOOL.
                    154: The transposition table may not work properly in some
                    155: positions so the default is to turn this off. 
                    156: .fi
                    157: .SH SEE ALSO
                    158: .nf
                    159: chesstool(6)
                    160: .fi
                    161: 

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