2.2 Mode Menu

Machine White

Tells the chess engine to play White.

Machine Black

Tells the chess engine to play Black.

Two Machines

Plays a game between two chess engines.

Analysis Mode

XBoard tells the chess engine to start analyzing the current game/position and shows you the analysis as you move pieces around. Note: Some chess engines do not support Analysis mode.

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.

Analyze File

This option lets you load a game from a file (PGN, XBoard format, etc.) and analyze it. When you select this menu item, a pop-up window appears and asks for a file name to load. If the file contains multiple games, another pop up appears that lets you select which game you wish to analyze. After a game is loaded, use the XBoard arrow buttons to step forwards/backwards through the game and watch the analysis. Note: Some chess engines do not support Analysis mode.

ICS Client

This is the normal mode when XBoard is connected to a chess server. If you have moved into Edit Game or Edit Position mode, you can select this option to get out.

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.

Edit Game

Allows you to make moves for both Black and White, and to change moves after backing up with the ‘Backward’ command. The clocks do not run.

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.

Edit Position

Lets you set up an arbitrary board position. Use mouse button 1 to drag pieces to new squares, or to delete a piece by dragging it off the board or dragging an empty square on top of it. 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. You can set the side to play next by clicking on the word White or Black at the top of the screen. Selecting ‘Edit Position’ causes XBoard to discard all remembered moves in the current game.

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.)

Training

Training mode lets you interactively guess the moves of a game for one of the players. You guess the next move of the game by playing the move on the board. If the move played matches the next move of the game, the move is accepted and the opponent's response is auto-played. If the move played is incorrect, an error message is displayed. You can select this mode only while loading a game (that is, after selecting ‘Load Game’ from the File menu). While XBoard is in ‘Training’ mode, the navigation buttons are disabled.

Show Game List

Shows or hides the list of games generated by the last ‘Load Game’ command.

Show Move History

Shows or hides a list of moves of the current game. This list allows you to move the display to any earlier position in the game by clicking on the corresponding move.

Show Engine Output

Shows or hides a window in which the thinking output of any loaded engines is displayed.

Edit Tags

Lets you edit the PGN (portable game notation) tags for the current game. After editing, the tags must still conform to the PGN tag syntax:

          <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).

Edit Comment

Adds or modifies a comment on the current position. Comments are saved by ‘Save Game’ and are displayed by ‘Load Game’, ‘Forward’, and ‘Backward’.

ICS Input Box

If this option is set in ICS mode, XBoard creates an extra window that you can use for typing in ICS commands. The input box is especially useful if you want to type in something long or do some editing on your input, because output from ICS doesn't get mixed in with your typing as it would in the main terminal window.

Pause

Pauses updates to the board, and if you are playing against a chess engine, also pauses your clock. To continue, select ‘Pause’ again, and the display will automatically update to the latest position. The ‘P’ button and keyboard p key are equivalents.

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.