Chess interface

Hi!

Is there a chess interface that analyzes a pgn game in a way that it shows evaluation of position through the game (for example +0,5 meaning that white has slight advantage) and offers you one or two better moves (as a variation - preferably with possibility to go through this variation on chessboard and analyse deeper).

I have Arena and while it's otherwise great, I think it only offers a analysis of complete game in a way, that you get txt file with only one (the best) alternative move and continuation for each actual move. There is no evaluation of position move after move and I can see no way to go through all these variations on chessboard (unless I analyze the game in Arena manualy move after move).

I think SCID is better for that.

Aquarium has a function of permanent anaysis...

Aquarium is as bad as a an interface could ever get. Arena doesn't only have full game analysis. Read it's tutorial and you'll find what you're looking for. Aslo chessdb and SCID could be good alternatives.

Can SCID do all that or just some of that (or what exactly can it do?) 

You can choose a game, or multiple games, and get an engine to annotate them for you.

EG, with Houdini @ 5 seconds per move:

I did that, but I can not find what I'm looking for. For example - when I open a pgn game I can not find a way that Arena would show me value of each move in this game. It can analyse a position and recommend the best move (with value), but that's not what I'm looking for...

Does anyone know how to get that in Arena (if it is possible)?

It sounds like it's exactly what you're looking for. What's the difference between "analyse a position and recommend the best move (with value)" and "show me value of each move".

What am I missing?

OK...example: I open a pgn file with my game...and I basically want to know where are my major mistakes and what should I play instead...so problem no.1 is that I can not identify those moves (if Arena has option, that would go through all my moves and evaluate them with numbers, I could see which moves were the worst - is there such option? - with Arena tool that analizes whole game I don't get evaluations of my moves, but of suggested moves)...even if I try to identify my mistakes, I don't know if I'm right, because I don't know how to get Arena evaluate one particular move in my game (if I go to that move and hit analyze button it just calculates the best move and it's value - but not my actual move).

I don't use Arena or SCID, but I know how to do this under WinBoard. Just start WinBoard with an engine. (The standard install comes together with Fruit 2.1, which is likely to be already asymptotically strong for this purpose.) Then select "Analyze game" from the "Mode" menu, and select the PGN file that contains the game you want to analyze. WinBoard will step through the game, analyzing each move for 1 sec, and adding the resulting score/depth from the engine to each move as a comment, and the principal variation of the engine as a PGN variation. (All visible in the "Comment window". If you would rather give the engine more time than 1 sec, you can set the step rate through the "Options -> Load" menu dialog to another value before you load the game.

In the "Evaluation Graph" window (which you might have to open through the "View" menu) you will be able to see the engine score as a function of move number, and poor moves will show up there as score jumps. Clicking the point of the jump will bring you to the corresponding position. Right-clicking the variation in the Comment window will show you what the engine thought to be the best continuation from this position. (Return to the original game with "Revert" in the "Edit" menu.)

At the critical positions you can switch on "Analysis" in the "Mode" menu to set the engine thinking some more on the particular position. If you have switched the engine to Multi-PV mode (through the "Engine -> Engine #1 Settings" menu), you will see principal variations for several moves in the "Engine-Output window". (Again, you might have to open this first, from the "View" menu.) You could step through these variations by right-clicking them, and mooving the mouse vertically with the right button kept down. You can also do moves on the board to see how your own alternatives are punished by the engine, or take them back with the "<" button above the board.

Thank you HGMuller...that sounds just like the thing I'm looking for...I will try WinBoard. Is WinBoard X the same program?

I would also appreciate information about Arena - can that be done in Arena?

Winboard_x is a by now obsolete fork of WinBoard 4.2.7, which has been merged back into the main line since version 4.4.0. The feature I described only exists in WinBoard 4.5.0 (downloadable from WinBoard forum, http://www.open-aurec.com/wbforum/viewtopic.php?f=19&t=51528 ).

I installed Winboard, but I have problems with it. I started it but there is no option "Analyze game". Only "Analysis Mode", but it's not highlighted. Even after loading my pgn game, this option can not be used...

Use Scid. Really... :)

 Oops, sorry, my mistake. I wrote "Analyze Game" where I meant "Analyze File". It is a bit strange that it is greyed out, it shoud not be. Are you sure you started WinBoard with Fruit 2.1 (from the Start -> WinBoard-4.5.0 -> Chess Engines -> Fruit 2.1 menu)? Normally "Analyze Mode" and "Analyze File" would only be greyed out when you start WinBoard as Game Viewer (i.e. select "Just view or edit game files" from the WinBoard startup dialog, if you started through that). You should select "Play against engine or match two engines" (the default choice) if you start tWinBoard through the Startup Dialog. (And then select the engine you want to use in the first combo box. For Analysis the second engine is not used.)

HGMuller: that should solve the problem...I opened it with option "just view or edit games"...I did not know what you ment by "start WinBoard with an engine". Is there a possibility to install another engine?

rooperi: I installed SCID, but I was getting some kind of error messages at the start...and when I examined menus I could not find all the things you were talking about + I didn't really like the graphics, so I uninstalled it.

Update on Arena - I found a way to do evaluation of my moves...kind of contraintuitive, but it's there

To select an engine you can start WinBoard through the Startup Dialog, leave the choice at one-or-two engines, and select the engine(s) from the comboboxes. Or, when you want an engine that is not pre-installed, just type the name and location of the engine. Like

"RYBKA" /fd="RYBKAFOLDER" /fUCI

where RYBKA is the name of the Rybka .exe file, and RYBKAFOLDER the full path name of teh folder where you have this executable. (Could be something like " C:\Program Files\Chessbase\Rybka 3"). The Quotes are important if the names contain spaces, (such as "Program Files"), otherwise they could be omitted. The /fUCI at the end tells WinBoard it is a UCI engine. So you would have to omit that if it was a WinBoard engine such as Crafty.

If you get tired of typing the line of your favorite engine in the combobox, you can use the "Engine -> Install 1st" menu item to add that line to the list of engines for the combobox. Yu then get a popup window where you can do normal text editing, and you could add the line there. (At the end or at the beginning, don't forget to terminate it with a linefeed if it is at the end.) Next time you start WinBoard it will then include that line in the combobox, so you can easily select it.

matejOstir - can you please describe how you got Arena to analyze games finally?  many of us are wondering still

WinBoard binary packages are distributed from WinBoard forum ( http://www.open-aurec.com/wbforum/viewtopic.php?f=19&t=51528 ).