I think most people active in the computer chess area would agree that currently
the Winboard/Xboard protocol is perhaps the most important protocol to support.This timeline
is an attempt to chart some of the most significant milestones in the
development of Xboard/Winboard and the rise in popularity of it's accompanying protocol.
I must warn readers that this, is a purely subjective selection of the events that I
think are most significant in the on-going story about
Xboard/Winboard and Chess
engines.Obviously, the scope will be very limited. It does not attempt to
cover the much broader story about Computer Chess, but rather a limited subset of it.
So interesting as events like Kasparov versus Deep blue, the debates at CCC about SDF and
autoplayers, they don't directly affect the Winboard story.
Feel free to disagree with me, I'm more than willing to
hear from you what you think are the most significant events in the development of
and rise in popularity of the Winboard standard.
I'm
very new (perhaps from late 98, early 99) to the field, so it's likely
that I'm ignorant of some of the more significant events (in
particular there's a big gap between 95-97!) . All I can say is that I
have tried my best by checking all publicly available sources. In
particular, the following 3 made up most of my "research".
Google Groups - With more than 20 years of
available usenet posting at rec.game.computer.chess, this was a very valuable resource.
The Wayback machine - This site was a godsend. In particular,
I used it to view sites like Gambitsoft news , Tim Mann's site (http://www.research.compaq.com/SRC/personal/mann/chess.html)
, Frank Quisinsky sites (http://www.in-trier.de/~quisinsky/news.htm)to obtain information that would have
otherwise being lost to the ages.(Note: For legal reasons, I won't link to the exact url showing the site
as it was. You can do it yourself if you are interested)
- After 1997,
many of the most significant debates on Computer Chess were conducted here.(Note
: I will not link to the direct threads unless I get permission from the contributors
of the message.)
I still need help in fleshing out this timeline. In particular, it would help if
those of you who have being around a long time, could help me out by pointing out things
that i have missed, or correct any errors. I'm also hoping to get a listing of the first few
winboard engines (either available to the public, or private).
A list of Xboard/Winboard engines in order of their appearance by
Frank Quisinsky helped a lot. .
13 Feb 2002 - Added mention of the first port to Win32. Removed reference of The crazy Bishop
has third available Xboard/Winboard engine. It's unclear which was third after Crafty.
Added release date of Arasan as Winboard compatiable engine .
Acknowledgements
Thanks to Bob Hyatt, Bruce Moreland, Remi Coulom, Vincent Diepveen for comments and
answering some
of my questions.
Dec 1991
-Tim Mann takes over as chief maintainer of XBoard.First release
was Xboard 1.3.
At the time,Gnuchess is only chess engine to run in Xboard.
- Tim Mann ports Xboard to Win32 , Winboard is the result.At the time
it ran only on the 32 bit Windows NT and was not very popular.
-Tim Mann introduces Zippy, purely as a bot to shout Zippy the pinhead
quotes.
-Zippy with ICS support is introduced. Gnuchess plays on
ICS through Zippy.Though not the first Computer engine to play on ICS, Zippy soon becomes very popular.
-Several people see the potential of porting their chess
engine in place of Gnuchess. Shay Bushinsky the first person to
ask Tim Mann how to connect another Chess engine in place of
Gnuchess. Original email reply,forms the basis of the current
protocol.
-Several other Chess engines become Winboard/Xboard
compatible at about the same time or before Crafty. Notables
include private/commercial engines like Ferret(Bruce Moreland) in Mid to late 95 and
Zarkov. Several other
free Xboard/Winboard compatiable Engines are released.E.g. Arasan 3.2 (Jon Dart) released in
Sept 96. The Crazy Bishop (Remi Coulom) released in Jan 97. SSEchess II (Sam Slutzky) released
May 97.
[ Source: Estimate/guess based on posts on rgcc, private communication
with authors. ]
April 98
-Number of Winboard compatible engines continue to grow, Tim
mann's site lists 18 freely available engines namely, Arasan, Comet, Crafty, The Crazy Bishop,
EXchess, Faile, Fortress, GNU Chess, Gromit, Inmichess, La Dame
Blanche, OliThink, Phalanx, Rival, SSEChess, Tristram, and
ZChess.
[ Source: http://www.research.compaq.com/SRC/personal/mann/chess.html,18 April 98]
Sept 98
-Djordje Vidanovic's website on Computer Chess established, probably the
first ameteur website to run and publish computer versus computer engine results using
xboard/Winboard
[ Source: Rgcc announcement ]
Nov 98
-Remi Coulom releases Winboard adaptor for auto232 player.
[ Source: Rgcc announcement ]
Dec 98
-Fritz 5.32 released with winboard adaptor for
Winboard Chess engines. -Within a month, a debate erupts in RGCC and
CCC about how Winboard engines are weakened in Fritz, because
Fritz sends a "new" command each turn.
-Frank Quisinksy's newsticker begins together with Volker Pittlik's site and
Winboard forum .By Nov 99, there are some 10,000 hits (and this is just the beginning)
and the Winboard Forum is a regular visitor to
the top 100 Parismony forums. Frank Quisinksy starts to host computer
chess tournament results on his site, number of such tournaments
begins to rise.
[ Source:Archived Frank Quisinsky's newsticker ]
Dec 99
-TSCP (Tom Kerrigan's Simple Chess program) version 1.4 becomes Xboard compatible.Designed to be simple to learn,
this program together with Faile (Adrian Regimbald) becomes a important learning
example for those starting out. They are followed
by Gerbil (Bruce Moreland) and Beowulf (Colin Frayn)
[Source:Archived Frank Quisinsky's newsticker , CCC archives ]
2000
-Many more sites devoted to computer chess and Winboard as well as
Chess programming spring up between 1999 and 2000.Many users begin to run their own computer
chess tournaments in Winboard as well as build their own opening books.
Source: NA
Feb 2000
-The number of commercial software that supports the Winboard protocol rises,
Frank Quisinsky partners with Gambitsoft for "Phase X"
site on configuring Winboard engines in Chess academy,Chess
Assistant etc. -First computer chess tournament held at ICC. 22
entries. most of which are Winboard/Xboard compatible. By CCT4 in Feb 2002,
there are more than 46 entries.
[ Source:Archived Frank Quisinsky's newsticker,
CCT 1 ]
-50th available Winboard engine mark exceeded at this point or sometime before.
[ Source:Archived Frank Quisinsky's newsticker ]
Sept 2000
-Gandalf is first commercial Winboard engine to be sold individually by Gambitsoft.
[Nimzo2000 while
being a commercial Winboard engine was sold as a package with Shredder.]
[ Source:Archived Frank Quisinsky's newsticker ]
Nov 2000
- Chess Academy supports Winboard engines.
- Chessmaster 8000 released . Surprisingly it supports Winboard engines.
- UCI protocol published by Stefan Meyer-Kahlen on CCC.
[ Source: Posting by Stefan Meyer-Kahlen at CCC,28 Nov 2000 and various ]
Dec 2000
-Winboard Protocol II introduced in Winboard/Xboard 4.2.0 beta .
The first release was somewhat buggy. Several Chess engines begin to
support Protocol II by Feb 2001, Sjeng (2nd Jan 2001),Crafty,Comet,Yace support
the second
level protocol.
-Yace becomes first freeware engine to support UCI.
[ Source: Archived Frank Quisinsky's Newsticker ]
March 2001
-Changing of guard. Thomas Mayer takes over from Frank Quisinsky the main task
of maintaining the famed Winboard engine details page.Thomas
also takes over the administration of the Winboard forum from Volker Pittlik in Sept
2001.
[ Source: Thomas Mayer's News ]
May 2001
-100th available Winboard engine reached. Depending on how you count it,
the 100th entry is Chezzz.
- "Winboard edition II" by Gambitsoft released, includes both UCI and Winboard
versions of Patzer,Lambchop and Capture. Gandalf is included only as a UCI version.
-Method to run The King (Chessmaster 8000) in Winboard is found.
[ Source:
Winboard forum archived posts ]
July 2001
-Beta testing for "Winboard Edition III" led by Frank Quisinsky for Gambitsoft begins.
Many UCI engines are produced (e.g. Pharaon,Anmon,Nejmet) however within a few months the project is cancelled.
-Chessbase introduces UCI support for Fritz 7. -Arena (Martin Blume) goes into open beta-testing.
Arena is the first free UCI interface. -Chess partner ERT and Gandalf 5.1 introduces UCI support.
-Rebel Century to be released soon in Winboard form.
-Quark , the free Winboard engine by Thomas Mayer stuns everyone by
beating Fritz and Shredder in CCT 4. Leading (together with Junior) in the final round
,it unfortunately loses in a drawish position. Ends third equal on points with Fritz.
- Yet another Change of guard. Thomas Mayer stops maintaining Winboard details page.Eventually, Leo Dijksman takes
over as maintainer of Winboard engine details at WBEC.
[Source: http://wbec-ridderkerk.nl/
]
April 2002
-Odd Gunnar Malin releases his free Wbtouci adaptor to allow Winboard engines to be used as UCI engines
[Source: Wbtouci adaptor help file
]
- Ruffian a free WB/UCI engine is released. For the first time, a free engine
is clearly stronger then Crafty and probably competitive with existing commercial programs.
[Source: Ruffian Homepage
]
