Introduction¶

python-chess is a pure Python chess library with move generation, movevalidation and support for common formats. This is the Scholar’s mate inpython-chess:

Installing¶

Download and install the latest release:

ModuleNotFoundError:Nomodulenamed'chess' after upgrading from oldpython-chess versions? pipinstall--force-reinstallchess(due to #680)

Game pigeon, another game slowly gaining the attention of kids and parents.For most parents, they have always been conscious of what games their children play online. In this post, I will be broad on game pigeon and also show you how to download to your iPhone. Debating creationists on the topic of evolution is rather like trying to play chess with a pigeon — it knocks the pieces over, craps on the board, and flies back to its flock to claim victory.

Features¶

• Supports Python 3.7+. Includes mypy typings.

• IPython/Jupyter Notebook integration.SVG rendering docs.

• Chess variants: Standard, Chess960, Suicide, Giveaway, Atomic,King of the Hill, Racing Kings, Horde, Three-check, Crazyhouse.Variant docs.

• Make and unmake moves.

• Show a simple ASCII board.

• Detects checkmates, stalemates and draws by insufficient material.

• Detects repetitions. Has a half-move clock.

  With the new rules from July 2014, a game ends as a draw (even without aclaim) once a fivefold repetition occurs or if there are 75 moves withouta pawn push or capture. Other ways of ending a game take precedence.

• Detects checks and attacks.

• Parses and creates SAN representation of moves.

• Parses and creates FENs, extended FENs and Shredder FENs.

• Parses and creates EPDs.

• Detects absolute pins and their directions.

• Reads Polyglot opening books.Docs.

• Reads and writes PGNs. Supports headers, comments, NAGs and a tree ofvariations.Docs.

• Probe Gaviota endgame tablebases (DTM, WDL).Docs.

• Probe Syzygy endgame tablebases (DTZ, WDL).Docs.

• Communicate with UCI/XBoard engines. Based on asyncio.Docs.

Selected projects¶

If you like, share interesting things you are using python-chess for, for example:

• a stand-alone chess computer based on DGT board – http://www.picochess.org/

• a bridge between Lichess API and chess engines – https://github.com/careless25/lichess-bot

• a command-line PGN annotator – https://github.com/rpdelaney/python-chess-annotator

• an HTTP microservice to render board images – https://github.com/niklasf/web-boardimage

• a JIT compiled chess engine – https://github.com/SamRagusa/Batch-First

• teaching Cognitive Science – https://jupyter.brynmawr.edu

• an Alexa skill to play blindfold chess – https://github.com/laynr/blindfold-chess

• a chessboard widget for PySide2 – https://github.com/H-a-y-k/hichesslib

• Django Rest Framework API for multiplayer chess – https://github.com/WorkShoft/capablanca-api

Acknowledgements¶

Thanks to the Stockfish authors and thanks to Sam Tannous for publishing hisapproach to avoid rotated bitboards with direct lookup (PDF)alongside his GPL2+ engine Shatranj.Some move generation ideas are taken from these sources.

Thanks to Ronald de Man for hisSyzygy endgame tablebases.The probing code in python-chess is very directly ported from his C probing code.

Game Pigeon How To Quit Chess Against

Thanks to Kristian Glass fortransferring the namespace chess on PyPI.

License¶

python-chess is licensed under the GPL 3 (or any later version at your option).Check out LICENSE.txt for the full text.

Contents¶

• Core
• PGN parsing and writing
• Gaviota endgame tablebase probing
• UCI/XBoard engine communication
• Variants

Indices and tables¶

There’s a saying about trying to use reason and logic to argue with a stupid person:

“Never play chess with a pigeon.

The pigeon just knocks all the pieces over.

Then shits all over the board.

Then struts around like it won.”

You could say that’s what Hillary Clinton tried to do.

She tried to play chess with a pigeon.

Probably, never before has a candidate for President of the USA been so qualified as Hillary Clinton.

Probably, never before has a candidate been so unqualified as Donald Trump.

Hillary tried to beat him at her game: the politician’s game.

She was more intelligent, more articulate, more prepared.

She knew every detail of how government works.

Donald Trump knew next to nothing, and he didn’t care.

The more she tried to beat him at chess, the more he knocked all the pieces over.

After the three debates, I saw Hillary’s untruthfulness score rated at 23% (that’s mistakes and/or lies).

23% is pretty good, Bernie Sanders was rated at 24%.

So Hillary was more honest than most politicians.

Donald Trump’s score was rated at 67%.

More than double the number of mistakes and/or lies.

But he didn’t care.

At every debate, he knocked all the pieces over, shat all over the board and strutted around like he’d won.

And unbelievably he did win.

Because he wasn’t playing chess.

Hillary thought she would win by playing chess better than a pigeon.

But ordinary people were sick of the chess game.

It seemed to them like double-speak that ignored the real facts of their lives.

Game Pigeon How To Quit Chess Pieces

They complained that they had lost their jobs and their homes, and now they had to live in a trailer-park on food stamps.

The politicians would hold up graphs showing that unemployment was lower than it had ever been.

As if the graph was the reality and them not having a job was irrelevant.

The politicians didn’t seem to care whether or not they had a job.

The politicians cared about winning the argument.

And they won the argument with graphs and statistics and ‘expert’ reasoning.

And ordinary people felt inarticulate and stupid next to the complicated chess game: the clever words and abstract figures.

Then Donald Trump came along and he didn’t try to play chess.

He just knocked all the pieces over, shat all over the board, and strutted around like he won.

And, whether it was the truth or not, ordinary people finally had someone who spoke in a language they could understand.

For the politicians, winning the chess game had become the end in itself.

And for the people, the first thing they wanted was to get rid of the chess game.

That’s a good lesson for communications professionals with university degrees.

The logic that worked in college, often doesn’t work in the real world.