Banksia GUI released

[Damir]

One small request, is it possible for Banksia to learn from PGN, or does it already does? and if so, how it can be seen?

[phhnguyen]

Try to do it again and simpler. In a simpler way.

Can you suggest how BSG should work in a simpler way? (how to display information and play). Thanks

So that you can present such games online to other people in the world.

We were discussing about local network playing, not online (not by the Internet) in which only computers/users in a local network can see and play vs each other but not other people. I have been working on other functions to play online.

[phhnguyen]

One small request, is it possible for Banksia to learn from PGN, or does it already does? and if so, how it can be seen?

No, BSG doesn't learn anything from PGN. That is the engines' job.

What BSG can do with PGN files:
- View/edit: Just drag and drop them into BSG
- Build databases and/or opening books (both BSG's format and Polyglot). Menu -> Tools

[swami]

Thanks so much for offering this GUI. It' fantastic, and has huge potential.

Would like to see the following options:
Ability to save the current status of the tournament into a file, automatically after each game. I had created a tournament of 6 rounds, and after 5 rounds and a powercut, the tournament wasn't saved automatically and when I tried to load the file, it wasn't resuming the last played game. I had to restart the event all over again.
In Knock out mode, viewing the results is bit confusing.

[phhnguyen]

Thanks so much for offering this GUI. It' fantastic, and has huge potential.

Would like to see the following options:
Ability to save the current status of the tournament into a file, automatically after each game. I had created a tournament of 6 rounds, and after 5 rounds and a powercut, the tournament wasn't saved automatically and when I tried to load the file, it wasn't resuming the last played game. I had to restart the event all over again.

Thanks for the feedback!

I have been trying to speed up the whole BSG system as well as to reduce the bad effects for playing engines by saving tournament info (banksiatour.json, engine logs...) not immediately but after a given period. At the moment the period is about 30s. If your computer and/or BSG is shut down immediately you may lose about 30s of computing. If you close BSG even in the middle of a tournament, the data is still saved fully (without losing anything).

In the next releases, users can configure that delay period or completely turn it off.

In Knock out mode, viewing the results is bit confusing.

Can you tell me more about this detail? What confuses? Thanks

[phhnguyen]

Can you suggest how BSG should work in a simpler way? (how to display information and play). Thanks

At the beginning thank you for your reply.
Of course, yes, I will describe it in your reply to me. You do one window and everything has to be there:

after clicking on menu -> Connect -> Network players - a window opens with the options that I described below.

1. You do two windows "chess engine name". They must be installed in the program. For example:
Jane = Komodo 13.3 x64
Felicity = Houdini 6.03 x64
A small note here - it can not have any chess engine of the inscription at the beginning rm:: - it does not look like nicely
2. Another window - Tournament - choose the tournament to be played from the list - those that are available in the program.
3. Another window - Round - number of rounds in a tournament or match.
4. Another window - Use of the book by the engines - Of course in different formats - the book must be on the program.
5. Another window - Time - you set the playing time for both engines. Those that are available in the program.
6. Another window - Start - a match between two engines begins.

Everything should be in one window. On both computer monitors should see the match and the inscription:
Komodo 13.3 x64 - Houdini 6.03 x64.There is no inscription on the front of the engine rm::.

If you chose the "Swiss" tournament then:
Jane = we must have more engines
Felicity = we must have more engines

This is how it should look like.

Thanks a lot for sharing your thoughts and design.

Sure I will remove the prefix "rm" from the next release.

I am a bit confused here since you said you don't want to have more than one window (for network play), but what you introduced here is clearly multi-windows

BTW, the scenarios may be more complicated than your post here since BSG has already more functions for local network play:
- not only tournaments it can play normal games. E.g., people and/or engines sitting on several computers, play vs each other (they can play game by game without creating a tournament)
- other people (on other computers) can monitor and/or watch any playing games on that network
- they can chat via the network (for convenience)

[phhnguyen]

I'll write in a moment what I meant by one window in the program. I mean, in this one window, put tiny windows like these, give them a name, for example. I thought about such windows.

Ah, I got it. Tech terms they are boxes (dropdown box, combo box...) or controllers. Thanks for clarifying.

For creating a tournament BSG has a complicated popup dialog - a window (menu -> File -> New Tournament). I got difficulty to improve it, make it be simpler since users want to control so many aspects of the tournament. Thus we have dilemmas here: 1) it looks complicated but if we are hard to cut down its functions 2) It is not a good idea to create another similar dialog just for another player type (network players) since users have to learn to use more thing.

[AdminX]

Is there a location where remote network games are saved? I ask because when a game is over the notation panel goes blank, so there is no way for me to save the game if it is not automatic saved somewhere.

Thanks

[phhnguyen]

Is there a location where remote network games are saved? I ask because when a game is over the notation panel goes blank, so there is no way for me to save the game if it is not automatic saved somewhere.

Thanks

If they are tournament games, they will be saved into the game log as usual. If they are normal games, you may untick to checkbox "auto close" thus they are still shown after their games are over and you can save them manually.

Note that when you create a tournament on a computer, it is considered as the "active" one and its games will be saved as tournament games as I have mentioned above. However, other computers which are involved in that tournament are considered as the passive ones and their games are treated as "normal" games in those computers (won't be saved automatically).

[Damir]

I am trying and run Tour in Banksia GUI. Unfortunately I am having problems locating where the games are. Also when trying and tick the PGN and mark it as PGN Tour, it is unticked again after tour is finished… and I have to tick it again as PGN every time..