How do you use .bin books?

[JohnW]

Can someone explain how to use *.bin opening books? Chess interfaces like Fritz only accepts *.ctg, Arena only seems to accepts *.abk opening books etc.

[Guenther]

Can someone explain how to use *.bin opening books? Chess interfaces like Fritz only accepts *.ctg, Arena only seems to accepts *.abk opening books etc.

I guess you mean Polyglot *.bin books? (bin is just short for binary, which could be all kind of various book formats)

If there is no GUI option (Cute and Winboard have such an option) you need to select it via the uci option from the selected program, if it supports it.
You could also use Polyglot as a pure book adapter too.
A Google search will reveal several examples how to do this.

examples:
http://support.stockfishchess.org/discu ... ening-book
http://www.chess2u.com/t9471-how-to-use ... -arena-3-5


Guenther

[JohnW]

Ah ok, thanks. Too bad there wasn't a standard that all interfaces used.

[hgm]

Most interface developers do not like it that other interfaces could use their books. The ctg format is proprietry to ChessBase. The format has only be partly hacked. he Arena .abk format also has never been made public.