How to write fen...

Looking on wikipedia you can get a little confused. I made this image to better help illustrate how to write it.

http://i38.photobucket.com/albums/e112/atomicpc/fen.png

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Forsyth-Edwards_Notation Wiki on what it all means.

EDIT: No img or url tags?

brilliant... I always wondered how

very helpful picture

Thank you. Very to figure out something so simple. Bravo.

If you want the lazy man's way, download winboard, check 'Edit' | 'Edit Position', set up the pieces on the board, and then go to 'File' | 'Copy Position to Clipboard' and then you can paste the FEN.

If you want a PGN file check 'Edit' | 'Edit Game', type the moves in for your game and then go to File | 'Copy game to clipboard' and then you can cut & paste the PGN.

Originally posted by bosintang
If you want the lazy man's way, download winboard, check 'Edit' | 'Edit Position', set up the pieces on the board, and then go to 'File' | 'Copy Position to Clipboard' and then you can paste the FEN.

If you want a PGN file check 'Edit' | 'Edit Game', type the moves in for your game and then go to File | 'Copy game to clipboard' and then you can cut & paste the PGN.

Originally posted by cmsMaster
Or, if you're too lazy to get winboard, simply go to new game, click advanced, click play from set piece, and set it up. 🙂

But if you're copying it from a book to put into eboard or babaschess then fen is way faster than clickndraging 22 pieces onto the board checking to see if you have them right...

Originally posted by deeploser
But if you're copying it from a book to put into eboard or babaschess then fen is way faster than clickndraging 22 pieces onto the board checking to see if you have them right...

I wrote about it in my chess enginge blog. It's geared a bit towards programming, but I guess some could find it useful.

http://mediocrechess.blogspot.com/2006/12/guide-fen-notation.html

Fen-notation is hardly for writing positions though. You use a graphical interface to setup a position and then when showing it to others you submit the fen aswell, for easy input in their graphical interface.

It might be easier for you to use a set piece. Once you understand how to read fen then it's pretty easy to use fen to discribe the position.

a clear explanation can be found in the following thread too:

Thread 53742

thanks , FEN was chinese to me so far ...

yea! copy from winboard or the set piece! HOORAY FOR LAZYNESS!

Here's a question for you...How many can set up a position from memory? And I mean a position from say, the middle-game...

Not me! There are some exercises like this on chessmaster 10. I can do the ones where you have to recreate the moves but so far I haven't set up the position exactly like it was. Of course I've only tried that twice.