Arena 3.5 (EPD/FEN format)

Did anybody notice that there is a problem with EPD files in Arena 3.5? Arena writes incorrect information into an EPD file when you try to use "Add current board position" operation. It usually outputs incorrect castling options and sometimes incorrect move counter too.

 Also, does anyone know how to get rid of the "green engine output" in advance? I use "Game -> Maintenance->Delete all engine output" AFTER the game is finished but is there a way to change settings so that the engine doesn't output those "green lines" AT ALL?

"Did anybody notice that there is a problem with EPD files in Arena 3.5? Arena writes incorrect information into an EPD file when you try to use "Add current board position" operation. It usually outputs incorrect castling options and sometimes incorrect move counter too."

Sorry, I never noticed, probably because I seldom use EPD files. Do you have a sample FEN position that caused you problems that I can try?

"Also, does anyone know how to get rid of the "green engine output" in advance? I use "Game -> Maintenance->Delete all engine output" AFTER the game is finished but is there a way to change settings so that the engine doesn't output those "green lines" AT ALL?"

Yeah, if you don't want them in the PGN, then in "Options --> Appearance --> PGN" just uncheck the boxes in the "Save move information" section.

And if you don't want them to show up on the GUI screen, then in "Options --> Appearance --> Movelist", uncheck the boxes for the first two items, "Show values/times" and "Show comments in the movelist".

You can pretty much use any position on the board and move king/rook to make it "interesting". Make sure you see FEN string in the status bar, below the movelist, in the same box where you usually see the name of the opening. If you don't see FEN in that box, then right click on it and choose "Show current FEN". The FEN string in that box is correct FEN string, to the best of my knowledge, no bugs here, I've checked many times. Then you can "Save position as EPD file" to create an EPD file and then open the very same EPD file and do "EPD->Add current board position". Since it's the same position, Arena should add exactly the same thing to that EPD file. Now open list for that EPD file (EPD->Display list) and you will see two different lines for the same position!!! At least, it is so in many cases. The problem is, Arena uses FEN format for the first position (when you just created the file) and it uses the so-called EPD format for the second position. When it uses FEN format everything seems to match the FEN in the box under movelist. When it uses EPD format it randomly outputs wrong castling options. Castling option are KQkq or any combinations of these letters (KQ- white king/queen side, kq- black king/queen side). FEN and EPD strings have almost the same format except that EPD has some more information like "best move" (bm), "avoid move" etc., but the castling part should be the same. If you try to load that wrong position back as a game you will get wrong position because of the castling.  Interesting, isn't it? But I seemed to find a way around this "bug". I used "Position->Copy FEN to clipboard" and, then in the EPD file list, right clicked and used "Add position from clipboard". This way I avoided using EPD format and used FEN format only. This seemed to work... But I need to test these things for a while.