PyChess - the greatest chess interface for Linux

[Lanzo]

PyChess is now officially the greatest chess client for Linux to ever acquire existence, and one now might conclude that it has surpassed xboard by all standards. For years, xboard ruled. But as they say, there is always a successor. And PyChess, my dear gentlemen, is that successor.

PyChess is good looking, easy to use, has advanced features, allows you to play games on FICS online, view games from pgn with analysis from an engine of your choice and much much more.

I have been using xboard for many years and recently came across PyChess, and well..I fell in love.

But the truth is that PyChess should have died months ago, but thanks to the strong resistance from the leading developer (Bajusz Tamas), it's still here and receives regular updates almost everyday.

So the bottomline is; if you're on Linux and cherish chess, then PyChess is your dream birthday gift.

Get the latest version of PyChess from; https://github.com/pychess/pychess

[brtzsnr]

I'm glad that the development was picked up again. For a long period there was only a buggy version. I helped do the Romanian translations several years ago.

[zullil]

Your .png seems awfully large (1359 x 735). Could you replace it with a smaller one? Maybe it's only me, but threads that contain large embedded images tend to render badly.

Thanks.

[royb]

I downloaded the latest version of Pychess from Github but when I try to run it (or install it too -- same result), I get this:

Warning: eco.db not find, run pgn2ecodb.sh
Traceback (most recent call last):
File "setup.py", line 81, in <module>
exec(open("pgn2ecodb.py").read())
File "<string>", line 12, in <module>
File "lib/pychess/Savers/pgn.py", line 22, in <module>
from pychess.widgets.ChessClock import formatTime
File "lib/pychess/widgets/ChessClock.py", line 16, in <module>
from . import preferencesDialog
File "lib/pychess/widgets/preferencesDialog.py", line 19, in <module>
from pychess.gfx import Pieces
File "lib/pychess/gfx/Pieces.py", line 6, in <module>
from gi.repository import Rsvg
ImportError: cannot import name Rsvg

Any ideas on how to fix that?

I am running Linux Mint 17.1. Installation of the old version of Pychess via Software Manager is easy enough and works, but that's an old version. I wanted to try out the latest version and ran into the above error when trying to install it (or run it via ./pychess -- same result).

[Lanzo]

I downloaded the latest version of Pychess from Github but when I try to run it (or install it too -- same result), I get this:

Warning: eco.db not find, run pgn2ecodb.sh
Traceback (most recent call last):
File "setup.py", line 81, in <module>
exec(open("pgn2ecodb.py").read())
File "<string>", line 12, in <module>
File "lib/pychess/Savers/pgn.py", line 22, in <module>
from pychess.widgets.ChessClock import formatTime
File "lib/pychess/widgets/ChessClock.py", line 16, in <module>
from . import preferencesDialog
File "lib/pychess/widgets/preferencesDialog.py", line 19, in <module>
from pychess.gfx import Pieces
File "lib/pychess/gfx/Pieces.py", line 6, in <module>
from gi.repository import Rsvg
ImportError: cannot import name Rsvg

Any ideas on how to fix that?

I am running Linux Mint 17.1. Installation of the old version of Pychess via Software Manager is easy enough and works, but that's an old version. I wanted to try out the latest version and ran into the above error when trying to install it (or run it via ./pychess -- same result).

First of all; open the terminal, go to the pychess directory, type in ./pgn2ecodb.sh and wait a few minutes to let it finish. Then when you're done, install gir1.2-rsvg-2.0 with "sudo apt-get install gir1.2-rsvg-2.0"

After everything is done, PyChess will run fine. If you still have some problems, let me know.

[royb]

when I run ./pgnecodb.sh I get this:

roy@linux-vm:~/downloads/pychess-latest/pychess-master$ ./pgn2ecodb.sh
Warning: eco.db not find, run pgn2ecodb.sh
Traceback (most recent call last):
File "pgn2ecodb.py", line 12, in <module>
from pychess.Savers.pgn import load
File "/home/roy/Downloads/pychess-latest/pychess-master/lib/pychess/Savers/pgn.py", line 22, in <module>
from pychess.widgets.ChessClock import formatTime
File "/home/roy/Downloads/pychess-latest/pychess-master/lib/pychess/widgets/ChessClock.py", line 16, in <module>
from . import preferencesDialog
File "/home/roy/Downloads/pychess-latest/pychess-master/lib/pychess/widgets/preferencesDialog.py", line 19, in <module>
from pychess.gfx import Pieces
File "/home/roy/Downloads/pychess-latest/pychess-master/lib/pychess/gfx/Pieces.py", line 6, in <module>
from gi.repository import Rsvg
ImportError: cannot import name Rsvg

Same error it seems.

But I then ran the install of Rsvg and then ran ./pgn2ecodb.sh and that seemed to successfully complete.

Thanks for the help. It's working now.

[gbtami]

I downloaded the latest version of Pychess from Github but when I try to run it (or install it too -- same result), I get this:

Warning: eco.db not find, run pgn2ecodb.sh
Traceback (most recent call last):
File "setup.py", line 81, in <module>
exec(open("pgn2ecodb.py").read())
File "<string>", line 12, in <module>
File "lib/pychess/Savers/pgn.py", line 22, in <module>
from pychess.widgets.ChessClock import formatTime
File "lib/pychess/widgets/ChessClock.py", line 16, in <module>
from . import preferencesDialog
File "lib/pychess/widgets/preferencesDialog.py", line 19, in <module>
from pychess.gfx import Pieces
File "lib/pychess/gfx/Pieces.py", line 6, in <module>
from gi.repository import Rsvg
ImportError: cannot import name Rsvg

Any ideas on how to fix that?

I am running Linux Mint 17.1. Installation of the old version of Pychess via Software Manager is easy enough and works, but that's an old version. I wanted to try out the latest version and ran into the above error when trying to install it (or run it via ./pychess -- same result).

Have you installed dependencies listed in INSTALL?
We migrated pychess to gtk3,pygi and old pychess packege doesnt install new dependencies (of course).

[royb]

Any way to paste an FEN string into Pychess to have it analyzed?

I see it can read an FEN from a file, but it is much more convenient to copy a FEN and paste it (less work and no file clutter to worry about over time with lots of FENs just sitting around in a directory).

Same really for a single PGN file -- I usually paste them in rather than download the PGN especially if it is just a single game I'm interested in analyzing.

[Lanzo]

Any way to paste an FEN string into Pychess to have it analyzed?

I see it can read an FEN from a file, but it is much more convenient to copy a FEN and paste it (less work and no file clutter to worry about over time with lots of FENs just sitting around in a directory).

This is possible and very easy to do. Simply go to "Game", click on "Enter Game Notation" and from there...you can paste a FEN string and PyChess will open a new tab, in which an engine will analyze the position. The same process applies for PGN.

[gbtami]

Any way to paste an FEN string into Pychess to have it analyzed?

I see it can read an FEN from a file, but it is much more convenient to copy a FEN and paste it (less work and no file clutter to worry about over time with lots of FENs just sitting around in a directory).

Same really for a single PGN file -- I usually paste them in rather than download the PGN especially if it is just a single game I'm interested in analyzing.

You can paste a FEN in "Game"->"Enter game notation" into the textbox.