[Kde-games-devel] a new chess interface for KDE

[Paolo Capriotti]

On 2/19/06, Alan Horkan <horkana at maths.tcd.ie> wrote:
>
> Dont suppose it is cross platform?  (I like cross platform software, some
> employers do not give users much choice of OS even though I can install
> applications.)

Right now, Linux is the only operating system I have access to. AFAIK,
KDE libraries have not been ported to Windows or OSX. Anyway, even if
I am considering portability issues, I'm first focusing on a Linux
implementation, and maybe I'll try to port it to Windows later,
ifdeffing KDE specific code (however, that could be hard to do). They
tell me that there are already a great number of good chess interfaces
for Windows, so I think this is not a priority for anyone.

> I'm not a fan of supposedly "funny" gnaming konventions.  To quote the
> Simpsons: "We need a name that sounds funny at first but less funny each
> time you hear it.  B-Sharps!"
>
> However "King Board" might be suitable small variation on your current
> name which also gives some suggestion of chess and retains the leter K.
> You could probably do better though.

Nice quote :)
I'll consider your suggestion.

> Do you have a general roadmap of your own?  How do you plan to
> differentiate from good old xboard?
>
> (I could make suggestions but they'd mostly be summarized by saying
> eye-candy and try looking at the features various popular commericial
> offerings provide.)

On a first iteration, it will be just a 'better xboard': all xboard
featurs + fancier graphics, resizable windows, 'game-aware' piece
animations, multiple boards for observing games, support for shogi and
variants, the ability to see captured pieces and drop them onto the
chessboard on games like crazyhouse.
Additional features might include: multiple premoves and support for
arbitrary nesting of variants when examining games (or PGNs).
Anyway, I like eye-candy, and I would like to know what your ideas are.

Thanks,

Paolo