XBoard for Mac: Zippy problems

[sje]

XBoard for Mac: Zippy problems

First, it looks like each of the three command files for ICS logins all have the same case sensitivity problem when launched from a case sensitive file system.

Second, after fiddling with the case issues, I got XBoard to launch but couldn't get it properly connected to Symbolic. Specifically, after I got Symbolic matched to an ICC opponent (as Black), Symbolic got started but never got a usermove directive to start calculations.

What I did get to run was this, as a simple shell script:

Code: Select all

/Applications/XBoard.app/Contents/MacOS/XBoard \
        -autoflag \
        -fcp "./Symbolic -c X" \
        -fd $HOME/Arena/Symbolic \
        -hideThinkingFromHuman false \
        -ics \
        -icshost chessclub.com \
        -icslogon $HOME/Arena/Symbolic/icclogon \
        -sgf $HOME/Arena/Symbolic/icc.pgn \
        -size Medium \
        -thinking \
        -xalarm \
        -xanimate \
        -xbuttons \
        -xzab \
        -xzadj \
        -zippyGameEnd "multi seek 5 ; seek 15" \
        -zippyMaxGames 2 \
        -zp

Questions:
1) Is there a better way?
2) Is timestamp/timeseal somehow involved?
3) Is there any recently updated Zippy documentation?

[sje]

Forgot to add: Two extra XBoard instances were launched with that one shell script for a total of three XBoard copies running at the same time. Very strange.

[sje]

XBoard tellall: kibitz or whisper?

Symbolic sends to XBoard:

Code: Select all

tellall [MateIn4/7/0.337/249,049] 24. Qa6 Qb8 25. Nb5 Qc7 26. Rxc7 Kb8 27. Qxa7#

And ICC reports:

Code: Select all

aics% (whispered to 0 observers)

Shouldn't that be kibitzed instead of whispered?

If I'd wanted whisper, then tellothers instead of tellall would have been sent to XBoard.

[JoshPettus]

Forgot to add: Two extra XBoard instances were launched with that one shell script for a total of three XBoard copies running at the same time. Very strange.

Yah I remember something silly like that. I forgot what I did to make it not happen. It was something syntactical, has to do with where the -ics -icshost come in the list of commands.... I really don't know why or what order it should be...

For instance this didn't have that problem when connecting to YaYp POGO to ICS emulator. No idea why.

Code: Select all

xboard -icsUp true -ncp -ics -icshost 127.0.0.1 -icsport 6000

Another option is to add an ics macro in your user conf file under ~~/Library/Preferences/XboardOSX.conf, and add in your lauch command the way fics and ics are in the list. You can then launch xboard with:

xboard -fics whatever

but I admit that's a bit of a pain. Again something to do with the order of the commands...

========
Thanks for letting me know about the scripts with the case sensative thing. I completely forgot, thankfully that's not in the code.
=======
to get timeseal or timestamp working add
-icshelper ~~/../../bin/timeseal or -icshelper ~~/../../bin/timestamp

~~/ has special meaning for the xboard app's data folder inside the app under share.
=======

I wish there were a better way then the .command shell scripts. It would be nicer if we could use xboard's own xop file or at least
"open -a xboard.app --args -ics fics"
But neither will open xboard up in the terminal which causes xboard to crash when loading up an ics with a end of file error. We now have the ICS window so terminal isn't even neccessary anymore, but its a hold over that harm hasn't had a chance to fix yet. Although I have no idea how much xboard depends on it.[/code]

[JoshPettus]

xboard -fics whatever

Err.. that would be
xboard -ics whateverYouCallItInConf

[sje]

Forgot to add: Two extra XBoard instances were launched with that one shell script for a total of three XBoard copies running at the same time. Very strange.

Yah I remember something silly like that. I forgot what I did to make it not happen. It was something syntactical, has to do with where the -ics -icshost come in the list of commands.... I really don't know why or what order it should be...

I am confused. I'd like to work through these issues one at a time.

I do not understand the spurious invocations.

I do not understand the "~~" business.

I do not understand why a command file is necessary.

I do not understand about some of the command line parameters, like icsUp.

----

In there anyone else running XBoard for Mac with a chess program of their own connected? Back four years ago, it seemed like I was the only person trying to do this with Mac OS/X + X Windows. But now that seems like it was a waste because support for X Window applications has been dropped by Apple. If I'm the only one interested in running XBoard on a Mac with a program connected to an ICS, and no one who has the ability to debug has a Mac, then maybe we should not pursue this any longer.

[bob]

Forgot to add: Two extra XBoard instances were launched with that one shell script for a total of three XBoard copies running at the same time. Very strange.

Yah I remember something silly like that. I forgot what I did to make it not happen. It was something syntactical, has to do with where the -ics -icshost come in the list of commands.... I really don't know why or what order it should be...

I am confused. I'd like to work through these issues one at a time.

I do not understand the spurious invocations.

I do not understand the "~~" business.

I do not understand why a command file is necessary.

I do not understand about some of the command line parameters, like icsUp.

----

In there anyone else running XBoard for Mac with a chess program of their own connected? Back four years ago, it seemed like I was the only person trying to do this with Mac OS/X + X Windows. But now that seems like it was a waste because support for X Window applications has been dropped by Apple. If I'm the only one interested in running XBoard on a Mac with a program connected to an ICS, and no one who has the ability to debug has a Mac, then maybe we should not pursue this any longer.

I use quartz + xboard and it works flawlessly. That's the only way Crafty runs on ICC, or on HGMs server, etc. That is how I log in to watch games on ICC or HGM's server. Quartz from macports.

[sje]

I use quartz + xboard and it works flawlessly. That's the only way Crafty runs on ICC, or on HGMs server, etc. That is how I log in to watch games on ICC or HGM's server. Quartz from macports.

How dos that work?

I understand about MacPorts, having used something like it long ago to run non-ported Unix software under Mac OS/X.

What is quartz? The only quartz I know is the imaging subsystem long used by Mac OS/X.

Will using MacPorts really be just like running XBoard under Linux? That would be okay although that would abandon the Mac OS/X specific parts of XBoard 4.8x.

[sje]

It appears that the link to MacPorts xboard is:
https://trac.macports.org/browser/trunk ... d/Portfile
and it's currently unreachable.

The originating reference is at:
https://www.macports.org/ports.php?by=c ... agesize=50

The dependencies are given as:
cairo glib2 gdk-pixbuf2 gettext librsvg pkgconfig xorg-libice xorg-libsm xorg-libX11 xorg-libXaw xorg-libXmu xorg-libXt xpm

Are these automatically loaded/installed with something like apt-get? Do they use the X Window support on OS/X 10.7 (this version is important to me)? How do they work under OS/X 10.10 which doesn't have native X Window support?

[bob]

I use quartz + xboard and it works flawlessly. That's the only way Crafty runs on ICC, or on HGMs server, etc. That is how I log in to watch games on ICC or HGM's server. Quartz from macports.

How dos that work?

I understand about MacPorts, having used something like it long ago to run non-ported Unix software under Mac OS/X.

What is quartz? The only quartz I know is the imaging subsystem long used by Mac OS/X.

Will using MacPorts really be just like running XBoard under Linux? That would be okay although that would abandon the Mac OS/X specific parts of XBoard 4.8x.

Quartz is an add-on you can install via macports. Then it adds in the standard xboard functionality (which ports it watches, etc) so that xboard will run unchanged. Any other x application I have tried has also worked so it is a good work-around since Apple maintains compatibility with absolutely nothing.

The primary thing you lose is that xboard will now look "normal" with its own menu on top of the board, (file, edit, edit) as opposed to using the os x approach of the menu bar on the top of the screen.