Chess Insight new app for Mac

[Dariusz]

Since yesterday I test new soft for Mac.

Chess Insight is good piece of Mac database soft. And, it is native for MacOS

Chess Insight is database app with Stockfish engine module for analyze. It appear in Appstore few weeks before.
After few hours with it, I think it is interesting choice for players, coachers, chess clubbers to manage defragmented games (in few databases), explore openings or analyze games with endgame table bases.

Good to see, developer released updates and is very communicate person.
Many earlier apps is for Mac outdated and has old / no intuitive / complicated interfaces.
Chess Insight is simple, lightweight, fast, clean and effective chess app.

I think, developer should implement few functions, e.g. analyze whole game, opportunity to using other chess engines (uci & xboard) search by games by setup pieces (e.g. only pawns), etc. but for now it is very promising )

Below, link to Chess Insight homepage.
http://www.chessinsightpro.com

[stevenaaus]

That's an interesting app. Looks lovely. They say it is easy to use, but from some of their GUI choices in the screenshots... i'm not convinced. How does it go ? $25 is fairly reasonable, but i guess it is lacking features still.

[Dariusz]

For me, the interface is modern with easy access to options.

I think it would be good if the author will placed on your website or eg. Youtube video explanation of selected features Chess Insight.
After my first tests, I think Chess Insight is very promising.

Ofcourse, Chess Insight is not monster like eg. ChessBase, but is much, much cheaper and native Mac application
If Developer implement additional features then Chess Insight will be an interesting alternative for Mac Chess Explorer, ChessX ot ScidvsMac.

[adams161]

I looked it over. I might decide to get it. I like to limit spending and credit card bill cycle ends in a few days and i'm at what i consider my limit so i'll wait. But one thing i'm wondering is about the game databases. For one it seems to not have a native format and i know PGN can be slower. But that aside it doesn't come it appears with a large game database of it's own. You have to supply the PGN it looks like. I'm kind of interested in getting something with an up to date database of games say through 2016 or into 2017 maybe a half million or million game plus or more database. And i don't feel like downloading them week by week from this week in chess etc. Maybe somebody knows an alternative. I"m not a correspondence player and dont need an absolutely comprehensive collection but it be nice to have more up to data games in a database to track how the likes of Carlsen, Caruna and Nakamura are doing and other purposes.

Anyway I might get this anyway next month to look it over and play with. It's not that much at 25 and you're recommendation along with the fairly straight forward explanation on its product page gives me some idea what it does and that it probably does that ok. And i like to support Mac software and hate to do much on Windows anymore not because i hate Windows but just because we want stuff in arms reach and i'm mainly on Mac and don't run any of that parallels or virtuals. Thanks for sharing.

Mike

[stevenaaus]

I thought it must have it's own DB format ? But they are short on the details here.

[juicesharp]

Hi Steven, Chess Insight uses its own embedded DB to simplify and speed up searches over ECO ranges and the others metatags (queries & internal indexes).

Might be one upcoming day there will be an iOS application to sync all data between the devices the user owns.

[Nordlandia]

Chess Insight looks very professional made, overall impression.

[juicesharp]

Hi Mike, auto-sync of games is one of the mid term features that I have on TODO list. Something simple like an automatic TWIC synchronization.
Good to mention, I want to have a seamless integration in order to prevent burdens and bloatwaring of the soft.

[juicesharp]

Thank you for your high opinion, Jon.

The soft was designed and written for personal use in the first place. The functions and design reflect my own needs and preferences. There are good and bad in that. Be honest I just have hated to run an ugly looking soft on my Mac in Parallels. I am ~2040 USCF player a perfectly normal chess-club playing guy. As the result, everything you are doing for yourself - done with patience and love.

[juicesharp]

The new version of Chess Insight 1.43 is available guys.

I am still working on the next major update that should include an "Auto analyze" feature. If you have the ideas related to this area or any good examples like chess.com computer analyze or lecheass.org computer analyze (these are very well known, but might be you dislike anything there) ... you are very welcome to suggest. On this stage, I decided to include the amount of good, bad, casual moves etc ... chart with advantage during the game, PV suggestion for mistakes and blunders ...

This is very early screenshot of the right sidebar in "Auto Analyze" mode
https://www.screencast.com/t/m2auQqW7aw