That pretty much applies to all game development on Linux, not just chess. However, I would argue that chess on Linux is keeping up fairly well. For FICS, I use Jin; and for computer chess I use Shredder on Linux. Both, IMHO, run just fine. The SCID chess database is supposedly very good, although I'm not a strong enough player to be thinking about storing games.
Chess on Linux...
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Sep 21, 2015
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#3
Actually chess is about the only reason I'm still running a dual boot machine: I'd like to take the last step and kick out windows for good, but I have got used to all the really good stuff:
- Chessbase Megabase
- Chess Position Trainer
- CT-Art
As these programs are unwineable, I would like to know if you guys know of a handy alternative.
My thoughts:
Playing isn't a problem at all:
BabasChess does just great in wine, raptorchess is a viable alternative and I think the Shredder interface also connects to FICS, not to menton this site.
SCID vs. PC is indeed a mighty tool, but where to get a worthy database to fill it with? The good thing about chessbase is not so much the huge load of material but the 70.000+ games commented by strong GMs. I haven't found an equivalent of that so far, and I think it's obvious something like that can't be for free. I wouldn't mind paying for it, but it should run in Linux!
So my best bet so far is:
- Get a large database into SCID
- update it manually, possibly from TWIC
- If you need high level commented games maybe log into chesspublishing.com and use their sources online or import the respective pgns.
Tactics can be honed at various servers while I don't quite know where to get a tool like CPT - if you use that one you'll quickly appreciate its value.
Engines are the least problem of all: If you want to buy one, you can also buy Shredder for linux, but stockfish (possibly the strongest engine available at all) is in almost every distro's repos, while Glaurung is also pretty strong, not to forget good old Crafty.
What are your thoughts on this?
I decided to search Chess.com for "linux" on a whim, and managed to scrounge up two groups. Of the two, this one appears to be the most active, but the activity level seems to be new people bumping old threads, and a whole lot of stuff that's been sitting around for months or years.
I got to thinking about that, and I realized that kind of mirrors the whole state of chess on Linux. When I got back into chess after taking a few years off, I went digging around to see what was new.
Is there anything new?
No, not really. Chess on Linux seems to be frozen in time. Even the commercial apps that are available on this platform seem to release their Linux version with an older version of everything than their main Windows/OS-X flagship.
Fortunately, sites like Chess.com make most of this irrelevant anyway. The Linux chess tools are pretty miserable, so don't use them, and hang out here instead.