Scid

It appears this (very good) and free database program, abandoned some time ago, has been updated.

I'm not going to download it myself - I already have Chess Assistant - but others may find it useful:

http://prolinux.free.fr/scid/

http://chessdb.sourceforge.net/

there is another spin off of it.

The prolinux site in the original post refutes the chessdb version of scid. Interesting reading...

Originally posted by baconfats
The prolinux site in the original post refutes the chessdb version of scid. Interesting reading...

Your right... very interesting... I use chessDB and it works great. I am curious to see what this new SCID developer comes up with.

Originally posted by baconfats
The prolinux site in the original post refutes the chessdb version of scid. Interesting reading...

Very interesting reading. Does anybody in the forum have additional evidence in support or refuting the claims on that site regarding the supposed non-improvement of ChessDb over the original SCID?

You can read all the sorry details of the debate in the scid-users mailing list, but the bottom line is that two people wanted to continue the code, they couldn't work together, they both think they are doing what is "right" and thus two forked projects (though one denies it is a fork at all).

As far as I can tell, having been trying both, ChessDB has focused on online play and automation of pgn imports (including from The Week in Chess) while the scid (the other one) has focused on making many more improvements to the db capabilities, tactical training, etc...

zazen: Thanks for the info. Experience has taught me that it's generally easier to figure out the truth based upon the observations of a neutral third party rather than trying to figure it out from the stories of the two parties involved.

Originally posted by AlboMalapropFoozer
[b]zazen: Thanks for the info. Experience has taught me that it's generally easier to figure out the truth based upon the observations of a neutral third party rather than trying to figure it out from the stories of the two parties involved.[/b]

Yeah, but it's immeasurably more fun to read the vitriol of the two parties involved....

Originally posted by AlboMalapropFoozer
Very interesting reading. Does anybody in the forum have additional evidence in support or refuting the claims on that site regarding the supposed non-improvement of ChessDb over the original SCID?

The main problem I have with ChessDB is that it won't build on my machine, which renders the whole thing rather useless.

Originally posted by AlboMalapropFoozer
Very interesting reading. Does anybody in the forum have additional evidence in support or refuting the claims on that site regarding the supposed non-improvement of ChessDb over the original SCID?

Yeah, I just looked at the ChessDB source and the accusation that Dave Kirby plastered his name all over it is either outdated, or just plain not true. I looked at every file and without exception they contained something like this:

//////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////
//
// FILE: chessdblet.cpp
// ChessDBlet, a WinBoard chess engine
//
// Part of: ChessDB (Shane's Chess Information Database)
// Version: 3.4
//
// Notice: Copyright (c) 2002 Shane Hudson. All rights reserved.
//
// Author: Shane Hudson (sgh@users.sourceforge.net)
//
//////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////

now if some enterprising person would just take both and mash them back together to get an all encompassing 3rd fork..

Originally posted by skryking
now if some enterprising person would just take both and mash them back together to get an all encompassing 3rd fork..

that's what I want! until then I'll down load on chessDB and go through the games on scid.

Originally posted by DeepThought
The main problem I have with ChessDB is that it won't build on my machine, which renders the whole thing rather useless.

I'm confused over your use of the word "build". Do you mean that 1) on your machine, the program does not have full functionality e.g. it will not build a database? or 2) on your machine, the program cannot be installed e.g. your OS is Linux and the program needs to be recompiled and won't? or 3) something else? Just curious as to what and why the problem is.

There is one very important feature which scid (prolinux version) has and chessdb lacks - UCI engine support. In old scid and chessdb one must use polyglot. This is not only matter of convenience, UCI support means setting UCI engiine params, multi-0variation analysis etc.

Originally posted by Mekk
There is one very important feature which scid (prolinux version) has and chessdb lacks - UCI engine support. In old scid and chessdb one must use polyglot. This is not only matter of convenience, UCI support means setting UCI engiine params, multi-0variation analysis etc.

Actually, the newer version of SCID on the prolinux site does support UCI engines. See the following part of the new feature list: http://prolinux.free.fr/scid/scid_newfeatures.html#seriousgame

Before upgrading to the new SCID, I could only use Fruit (a UCI engine) with polyglot. But now with the new SCID, I use Fruit directly and it works great.