To set up a position to analyze, you do the following:
1. Select Edit Position from the Mode Menu
2. Set up the position. Use the middle and right buttons to bring up the white and black piece menus.
3. When you are finished, click on either the Black or White clock to tell XBoard which side moves first.
4. Select Analysis Mode from the Mode Menu to start the analysis.
The analysis function can also be used when observing games on an ICS
with an engine loaded (zippy mode); the engine then will analyse
the positions as they occur in the observed game.
To use xboard in ICS mode, run it in the foreground with the -ics option, and use the terminal you started it from to type commands and receive text responses from the chess server. See Chess Servers below for more information.
XBoard activates some special position/game editing features when you
use the examine or bsetup commands on ICS and you have
‘ICS Client’ selected on the Mode menu. First, you can issue the
ICS position-editing commands with the mouse. Move pieces by dragging
with mouse button 1. To drop a new piece on a square, press mouse
button 2 or 3 over the square. This brings up a menu of white pieces
(button 2) or black pieces (button 3). Additional menu choices let
you empty the square or clear the board. Click on the White or Black
clock to set the side to play. You cannot set the side to play or
drag pieces to arbitrary squares while examining on ICC, but you can
do so in bsetup mode on FICS. In addition, the menu commands
‘Forward’, ‘Backward’, ‘Pause’, and ‘Stop Examining’
have special functions in this mode; see below.
In chess engine mode, the chess engine continues to check moves for legality but does not participate in the game. You can bring the chess engine into the game by selecting ‘Machine White’, ‘Machine Black’, or ‘Two Machines’.
In ICS mode, the moves are not sent to the ICS: ‘Edit Game’ takes
XBoard out of ICS Client mode and lets you edit games locally.
If you want to edit games on ICS in a way that other ICS users
can see, use the ICS examine command or start an ICS match
against yourself.
In ICS mode, changes made to the position by ‘Edit Position’ are
not sent to the ICS: ‘Edit Position’ takes XBoard out of
‘ICS Client’ mode and lets you edit positions locally. If you want to
edit positions on ICS in a way that other ICS users can see, use
the ICS examine command, or start an ICS match against yourself.
(See also the ICS Client topic above.)
<tag-section> ::= <tag-pair> <tag-section>
<empty>
<tag-pair> ::= [ <tag-name> <tag-value> ]
<tag-name> ::= <identifier>
<tag-value> ::= <string>
See the PGN Standard for full details. Here is an example:
[Event "Portoroz Interzonal"]
[Site "Portoroz, Yugoslavia"]
[Date "1958.08.16"]
[Round "8"]
[White "Robert J. Fischer"]
[Black "Bent Larsen"]
[Result "1-0"]
Any characters that do not match this syntax are silently ignored. Note that
the PGN standard requires all games to have at least the seven tags shown
above. Any that you omit will be filled in by XBoard
with ‘?’ (unknown value), or ‘-’ (inapplicable value).
If you select Pause when you are playing against a chess engine and it is not your move, the chess engine's clock will continue to run and it will eventually make a move, at which point both clocks will stop. Since board updates are paused, however, you will not see the move until you exit from Pause mode (or select Forward). This behavior is meant to simulate adjournment with a sealed move.
If you select Pause while you are observing or examining a game on a chess server, you can step backward and forward in the current history of the examined game without affecting the other observers and examiners, and without having your display jump forward to the latest position each time a move is made. Select Pause again to reconnect yourself to the current state of the game on ICS.
If you select ‘Pause’ while you are loading a game, the game stops loading. You can load more moves manually by selecting ‘Forward’, or resume automatic loading by selecting ‘Pause’ again.