Myracle GUI

[Wilhelm]

Hello Martin,
I have one more wish: would it be possible to add a hash and thread setting option to the "Run EPD Suite" window? It's a bit long-winded to always close the EPD window, go to tools-settings-engines-options, set the new hash and threads and then go back to EPD window. Would things make more easyer. Thank you!

PS: no Logos?
I knew, not realy important, but realy nice
Ok now it's out, I'm a big Logo Fan

William

[mar]

Hello Martin,
I have one more wish: would it be possible to add a hash and thread setting option to the "Run EPD Suite" window? It's a bit long-winded to always close the EPD window, go to tools-settings-engines-options, set the new hash and threads and then go back to EPD window. Would things make more easyer. Thank you!

PS: no Logos?
I knew, not realy important, but realy nice
Ok now it's out, I'm a big Logo Fan

William

Hello Wilhelm,

I have many wishes one of them is that people stop asking about useless logos, that today are just AI slop anyway,
generated by people who completely lack any artistic skill or taste whatsoever

I'd have to:
- implement bmp and jpeg in my framework, because it can only load png (or integrate third-party image loader like stb_image)
- load them asynchronously on demand and potentially downsample (imagine some genius put a 4k logo that you need to downsample to something much smaller - while also being srgb correct of course to preserve the perceived brightness)
- align them when rendering - they would consume precious space
- add a way to select logo image in engine options

so you ask for a lot of work for something very marginal that 9 of 10 people don't even care about

ergo: no logos
yes, it's a "tragedy" and those who don't like it can stick with Arena or WinBoard or Banksia or whichever GUI that supports logos

now imagine I'd implement logos, what next? people will ask for national flags or even national anthems, no way this is happening
sorry if this sounds harsh but I'm not going to implement every nonsense people ask for - after all it's me who invests
large amounts of spare time

as for hash/thread for epd suites: doable but bear in mind the GUI is primarily designed for eng-eng tournaments

epd suites were added recently for completeness and I wasted more time on that already than I wanted
can't you simply clone an engine and set it up to use whichever hash and threads to be used for analysis - you can do this only once
but since I have to prepare a new build anyway, I'll see what I can do

I'm not building a GUI to handle everything and to satisfy everyone
if you want to work with databases - SCID is an excellent choice
do you want to learn and have fun - try LucasChess
and so on, there is plenty of great alternatives out there for a specific use

[Wilhelm]

Sorry Martin, I don't want to get you angry. No more wishes from me! I'll stick with Banksia.

William

[chessica]

Sorry Martin, I don't want to get you angry. No more wishes from me! I'll stick with Banksia.

William

Oh, absolutely not. Never. I got so annoyed with Banksia, especially because the software embedded itself everywhere. I feel a program like that should be developed to be portable. Arena works without installation, too. It’s such a Windows quirk—this need to install everything. I just finished removing the last traces of Banksia. No thanks; I don't need that kind of junk.

[PHILOCHESS]

build 66 is up:
- fix: opening pool non-determinism after tour load
- fix: engine load timeout was lower than it should be due to a bug (5sec instead of 10), now 20sec default,
the same goes for isready after uci newgame. can be set in general settings ranging from 10s up to 60s
- fix: epd parsing bm with comma-separated multiple moves (should fix missing positions in ERET epd)
- epd log now saved automatically in log subfolder once finished
- optional button navigation bar below board (toggled from menu: view/navigation bar)

thanks to everyone who reported the problems, I appreciate your help

Thanks a lot for build 66.

The new fixes are very welcome, especially the engine load timeout and tournament loading fixes. They may look like small details, but they make a real difference when running engine tournaments.

I also appreciate that Myracle keeps improving without losing what makes it attractive: it is practical, lightweight, direct, and very comfortable for engine testing.

Thanks again for the work and for taking user feedback into account.

[chessica]

build 66 is up:
- fix: opening pool non-determinism after tour load
- fix: engine load timeout was lower than it should be due to a bug (5sec instead of 10), now 20sec default,
the same goes for isready after uci newgame. can be set in general settings ranging from 10s up to 60s
- fix: epd parsing bm with comma-separated multiple moves (should fix missing positions in ERET epd)
- epd log now saved automatically in log subfolder once finished
- optional button navigation bar below board (toggled from menu: view/navigation bar)

thanks to everyone who reported the problems, I appreciate your help

Thanks a lot for build 66.

The new fixes are very welcome, especially the engine load timeout and tournament loading fixes. They may look like small details, but they make a real difference when running engine tournaments.

I also appreciate that Myracle keeps improving without losing what makes it attractive: it is practical, lightweight, direct, and very comfortable for engine testing.

Thanks again for the work and for taking user feedback into account.

+1

[Mark 1]

Hi Martin..

Yes, MessChess is truly an excellent program.
In Myracle, I have so far integrated the following engines: Super Constellation, Elite Avantgarde, Mach III, Mephisto Amsterdam, Mephisto Lyon, Mephisto MM II, Mephisto MM IV, Mephisto MM 5, and Tasc King 2.20.

Everything has been running very stably so far, and it’s easy to launch several duels in parallel. The engines can handle EPD files, which adds some nice variety to the matches.

Only Boris currently produces an error message. However, under Arena he works fine with EPD.

I know that you generally prefer to avoid manual game evaluations, but in the MessChess tournament mode it’s sometimes unavoidable. Without a manual evaluation, a duel may not finish properly — although this only happens rarely.

But if it doesn’t work, then it doesn’t work. No problem.

Many chess greetings
Mark 1

[vencenda]

build 66 is up:
- fix: opening pool non-determinism after tour load
- fix: engine load timeout was lower than it should be due to a bug (5sec instead of 10), now 20sec default,
the same goes for isready after uci newgame. can be set in general settings ranging from 10s up to 60s
- fix: epd parsing bm with comma-separated multiple moves (should fix missing positions in ERET epd)
- epd log now saved automatically in log subfolder once finished
- optional button navigation bar below board (toggled from menu: view/navigation bar)

thanks to everyone who reported the problems, I appreciate your help

Amazing update! Thanks for the quick fixes and for the navigation bar. At this point, I dare say that your GUI is close to perfect, at least for my own needs and taste. Btw, I completed a new 1000-game tournament without any initialization failures and with all openings repeating correctly.

[mar]

build 67 is up:
- fix: in human-eng games board is input-locked until black engine finishes loading
- fix: when analysis engine(s) are loaded and stopped, they still keep using memory in the scheduler until unloaded
- added "disable own book" override for uci engines in new tour dialog
- run epd suite has optional hash and threads override (also both hash/threads values are now saved in the log too)

[chessica]

Hi Martin,

I’ve noticed that if I run an EPD test twice on the same day, the previous log file gets overwritten.