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Subject: Re: xboard or UCI? Pro's and Con's?

Author: Russell Reagan

Date: 08:06:32 03/13/04

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On March 13, 2004 at 07:33:24, Joshua Shriver wrote:

>Which is the better protocol to use for a chess engine?
>It seems this might be a bias question since each may have it's pro's/con's, but
>what are they? What do you all recommend.
>
>Sincerely,
>Joshua Shriver

In addition to Peter's good assessment of the pros and cons, I think one main
difference is that the Winboard protocol is more geared toward giving the
programmer more control, while UCI is geared toward giving the user more
control.

As a programmer, I used to dislike UCI. After installing and configuring lots of
Winboard and UCI engines myself, I really appreciated how easy UCI made it to
install and configure engines. Even so, I still prefer Winboard a little,
because it views the chess engine as a chess playing entity that is in control
of its actions (ponder whatever move it wants, do book learning, offer draws,
resign, etc.). UCI is also a little easier to implement, since it is a simpler
protocol with fewer commands.

If you're going to be distributing a chess engine, it would probably be best to
support both (eventually).



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