Chess.com v0.1 released!

It's raw, it's a little bit ugly, but it's here and thoroughly lovable.

v0.1 Chess.com for Windows Mobile.

What's in:

• CAB file based installs (installs to your games folder in the start menu)
• Online standard games
• All in game actions and a fully functional analysis screen
• Proven to work on Samsung Omnia II and HTC HD2 handsets running Windows Mobile 6.x @ 480*800 resolution.

What's not (in current order of priorities):

• A pretty splash screen - if it looks like nothing is happening when you first start the app, then just wait. It's connecting to chess.com and having a little chat.
• Chess.com background for the splash screen will also be used for the Home screen and Games List screen. In fact, most of the early screens (login, home, game lists) are pretty clunky and need work.
• offline caching. This actually is written, and works - but a little too raw for my liking so removed from this release. Will be aiming to replicate the iPhone prettyness in the next release.
• password obfuscation - yes, I store your password in the program directory of your device in *gasp* free text. "Logout" to clear it.

other things on the TODO list in no particular order:

• Chess 960 (currently supported except castling - so I've disabled it for now)
• in game chat
• move animation and drag and drop of pieces
• handset based new user registration
• handset based challenging, seeks, acceptances, new games etc
• tactics training
• play against computer
• videos - may need a diamond upgrade for this (is that a hint? )
• in game notes - not currently supported by the API (another hint??) - a regular wish-list item from my iPhone chess.com user friends.
• other phone types with resolutions apart from 480*800 - by request!
• crisper graphics for buttons, icons
• button feedback - visual and tactile.
• Settings, settings and settings. Board colours, piece graphics, coordinates.
• much much more

All feedback greatly appreciated: Bugs, priority suggestions, features.

Cheers,
Clinton.

Hello!!

Thanks for the CAB. I was able to grab my phone (in bed...lol) checked my mail, extract .zip and install. I played a moved in one of my games in less than two minutes after install. I will wait on the requesting of things after a couple releases,  but I will comment on what you already have on the TODO list. But first... one thing I noticed right away was after going into the analysis board, I was not able to "quit" and go right back to the actual game... i am sure everything will have a back button eventually.

Things that are of prime importance (in my opinion). By this, I mean features that would give chess.com a great windows mobile app for super smart phone chess market (like my HTC HD2...I am a little biased!!). 

Online chess....not the live games. I think the edge network and some others are WAYY to laggy for that feature. But the slow play is a must.

Access to a very strong offline computer program. There are a lot of great free engines out there and most are relatively small enough for install on a phone. I would also think it would be nice to just have the board installed and the ability to let the users install their own choice of engines. May be a bit much. And as if that were not enough. Possibly the ability to store and create our own database with variation support.

Just a thought in the middle here... I do have an ipod touch with the chess.com app on it and enjoy it very much. But I think that the ipod/iphone app would be a great starting point and that this app could be a great improvement over it. With that in mind...

LEARN TAB>>>>This is where I feel that this app could reach out to a LOT of chess and non-chess users and even influence the purchase of certain phones based on the implementation of this aspect of the site. The video lessons are HUGE and we should have the ability to search within the video database. Chess mentor, tactics, opening explorer and computer workout should be standard I think. I have a LOT more to say about this but will wait for future releases.

Beyond this I think the average user will be interested in speed and visual aspects much more than a power user. 

Just some of my morning thoughts...

If I can help with the GUI in any way, let me know. I may be able to assist.

Thanks, Kyle

hey Kyle,

thanks for trying out so quickly.

FYI the analysis screen has a button on the top left of the screen labelled "Online" - touching that takes you back to your game (currently a little sluggish as it reloads from chess.com - will fix that to reload from cache).

Does the iPhone app provide an alternate way of returning from Analysis?

Computer chess is a priority - I was just going to ship with crafty, but Erik has pointed me to an engine called "fruit". This is a UCI compatible engine, so the potential of plugging other engines in seems quite feasible.

Variation support? I don't know what that is. One idea I've been kicking around is to save variations from the analysis screen for current games - not sure if that's in the spirit of the site though, so was going to bounce it with Erik. Can you explain your idea some more?

Tactics are covered in the API, and will be supported. The rest, aren't currently supported by the API (as far as I'm aware). That said, I've had some success with screen scraping (inefficient as it is) and have considered a game-exporer lite idea.

re speed and visual aspects. What are your first impressions? As mentioned in the release notes, I've already nailed down caching and expect that can be used to speed up a few parts of the app (ie, returning from Analysis as touched on above). Visually, agree it needs work. I think many of the icons are fuzzy mainly because I'm resizing from the iPhone icons on the fly.

I'm holding off committing too much time to the GUI until I get a feel for the types of resolution combinations it'll need to support. Thanks for the offer of assistance.. when it's time to smarten up the GUI I'll drop out a call - that said, maybe Erik's team might prefer to do that being as rightfully protective of the chess.com brand as they are.

Cheers,
Clinton

Hello All!

By variation support, I mean the ability to enter a line say 1 e4 c5 2 Nf3 d6 and then go back to ...c5 and enter another 2nd move for white as a variation (nested I think is the term). Kind of a way to enter in multiple lines, so that say if you are saving a game and would like to refer to areas you could have gone in a different direction, you could save the analysis and refer to it later. I think this is usually standard in most chess apps. I argued with dev's from the Glaurung app to try to get them to incorporate that into the iphone app, but it seems that it was too much of a task.

I do see the "Online" in the top right corner. you are correct that is the same as the iphone. Maybe you could change it to "Back" as that would be more appropriate. At least I think so.

First impressions of the visuals are fine for this release. But yes you can tell it needs a little sharpening. To be honest, I would happy the way it is as long as the functionality is there. But there are a lot of people who would say otherwise.

It looks like you have the Samsung Omnia and that the screen fits well. It does on the HTC HD2 as well, but there is a bar along the bottom of the screen where the GUI does not stretch to. I do not envy you on the development for the GUI for so many different phones. And I do understand if the Chess.com teams takes that part over.

Thanks for your work!!

Kyle

I'd love to try this beta. How do I get the cab?

Hi Suzann,

I'd love for you to try it! What phone do you have?

Clinton

Hey

where is the download link?

my phone is htc tytn II (kaiser)

I have an AT&T Tilt2 with custom ROM Windows Mobile 6.5. Can I get the cab?

dohukgamer,

unfortunately, the app doesn't currently support the tytn ii - I'll contact you directly when it does (should be a few weeks)

Suzann,

I'm currently emailing the CAB out to people with compatible phones. The Tilt2 is supported, so drop me your email address and I'll send it to you.

Hi Kyle,

any chance of a screenshot (or even a photo of your phone) showing me the "bar along the bottom of the screen"?

I figure the HD2 must be presenting a shorter startbar at the top of the screen giving more realestate for apps.

how about blackberry storm 2?

hey Rich,

no - this app will only support smart phones that run the windows mobile OS. Try the blackberry beta-testing group:

http://www.chess.com/groups/view/chesscom-blackberry-beta-group

cheers,

Clinton

i have a htc touch hd running on windows mobile 6.5.

i would like to beta test your software. Note i sent a post on another chess.com forum about the subject.

Sven

hey sven,

send me your email address and I'll send you the CAB.

cheers,
Clinton.

any idea when a new version may be out?

thanks

Hello

May I have *CAB for HTC Touch 2 please

Thanks a lot in advance.