History

In may 1997, I wrote a chess program called "Échecs" (french for "chess"). It was a chess program written for Turbo Pascal for Windows 3, running in a sort of terminal window. I was using Windows 95 at that time.

The program then evolved as I ported it to different programming languages, programming environments and operating systems. As I cannot find all versions now, the best guess I can make for the date is often "unchanged since ...".

Program	Date	Features
Turbo Pascal versions
Échecs	May 1997, unchanged since november 1997	in french, reads input as short algebraic chess notation, nice graphical board (screenshot)
Borland Delphi 3 versions
Échecs	unchanged since december 1997	In french. Turbo Pascal code is ported to Delphi.
Schach 1.0	unchanged since may 1998	First version in german.
Schach 2.0	unchanged since may 1998	graphic clock, save to and read games to files
Borland C++Builder 3 versions
Schach 3.0	unchanged since may 1998	Parts of the delphi program are rewritten as C++.
Schach 3.1	unchanged since august 1998	had an MDI interface
the first BabyChess version	unchanged since april 1999	Has a new concept of *.cpp and *.h files.
The current BabyChess program
0	march 10th 2000	The first version available over the internet. Windows version in german only.
1	11th	english and french versions
2	19th	read from and write to files
3	23rd	Shell version, PRE, GNU Make used for building
4	april 1st	Console Version, DJGPP package
5	6th	BabyChess Windows: Auto Response
6	14th	BabyChess Console
7	may 7th	classes BabyChess, Real_Time_BabyChess, DOS combo, new C++ names
8	24th	PRE is replaced by MACRO. Figur class rewritten. The web site is reviewed. Automatic reply and infinite thinking added to the Real_Time_BabyChess class. BabyChess Windows saves settings in the home directory. The old versions are available as source and executables.
9	june 4th	BabyChess Windows uses the class Real_Time_BabyChess, thus has the same functionality as the Console. BabyChess Windows has an info line. The engine now does iterative deepening at every depth.
10		There's a chess engine for use with XBoard called bbch. King security added. Web Chess Vote added. pre is not used anymore, use of GNU m4 instead. Added a configure script. Added a sign for promotion. Writing in the standard algebraic notation. BabyChess can read and write PGN files, at least those with a single game. Read only logic added.

Old News

Since version number 10, the history of BabyChess is a list of old news. Recent news are put on the main page.

• July 24th 2000: BabyChess is refenrenced at amateurschach.in-trier.de. This way the BabyChess web-site got as many hits in a few days than in a few months! As this site is about WinBoard engines, a release of the WinBoard engine is to come soon, about the first of August. Many thanks to this web-site!
• July 31st: The Windows Release is out! Version 10.2! Get it on the donwload page.
• August 27th: Here are the highlights of the next BabyChess version:
  
  • A new graphical interface, with own windows, menues, etc...
  • Multiple chess boards in one session
  • The engine running in a separate process. Because DOS does not support multiple processes, there will be no DOS version anymore.
  • Themes to fully configure the GUI.
  • Here's a screenshot of a prototype of the new BabyChess program: w-gui.gif
• October 13th: Upon a request by a chess master from www.grandmaster.com, it is planned to make a source release of only the Web Chess Vote. It will be extended to handle multiple games, and direct move input, in order to let good chess player play a game of chess against the Rest of the World. The release will be version 10.3, and will not contain sources of the other programs.
• October 15th: The source release of the Web Chess Vote is out. Get it on the download page now.
• December 8th: The BabyChess documentation is now available in HTML .
• December 22nd: Version 2 of the Chess Engine Communication Protocol is released. The next version of the BabyChess Engine will merely be compatible with this new protocol. The new protocol is supported by XBoard/WinBoard version 4.2. It is currently not supported by Fritz and ChessMaster. Both implement the old version. The new BabyChess engine will use threads. It will play white (a bug in version 10.2 made it impossible), implement the "move now" command. The multi-threading part is done, but not the new protocol. I will first have to install XBoard or WinBoard 4.2.0beta.
• January 10th 2001: Version 11 of the XBoard engine bbch works on Linux. Get the source code on the download page.
• April 27th: Redesigned the web page. Every page in now a CGI program. Dropped the counters from SiteMeter and Top Chess Site.
• April 27th: Version 11.1 of the WinBoard engine is out! Get it now!
• June 14th: The interactive BabyChess GUI was compiled successfully on the X Window System. The next release should be available soon. Have a look at a screenshot.
• July 9th: BabyChess 12 is out! The new version includes the BabyChess GUI and the XBoard engine. Read the README, download here.
• July 13th: Cygwin Programmer needed
  Now that the BabyChess GUI version 12 is released for Linux, it would be nice to also have it compiled for Windows. I have decided to stop working on the Windows port. I invite programmers familiar with Cygwin to do the port. Anyone interested is invited to work on it. Send me the patches and the archive when it works.
• August 2nd: WinBoard Engine Best Release Poll
  Sergio Martinez and Arturo Ochoa have started a poll, where they are looking for the best WinBoard Engine. If BabyChess is your favorite chess engine, go vote for it!
• August 8th: New Screenshot Online
  Have a look at the latest screenshot. It shows menus, radio buttons and board in different sizes. More screenshots can be found on the graphics page.
• August 20th: Proportional fonts, Block alignment
  Check out this brand new screenshot that has all these cool features of the GUI.
• October 17th: BabyChess Fractals
  Work has been started to develop a BabyChess Fractal Generator program. The program is at this time able to draw a Mandelbrot type of fractal. Have a look at a sample screenshot.
• November 12th: BabyChess Project Changes Name to Baby
  The name of this project used to be "BabyChess", but since a fractal program was added, the project's name is now "Baby". "BabyChess" still refers to the chess program of Baby. As a side effect, the Baby web site is now located at http://user.cs.tu-berlin.de/~kunegis/baby/. The old name with bch instead of baby is still valid, however. Please upgrade links to the Baby web site.
• November 13th: BabyFractal Released
  Version 12.1 of BabyFractal, the fractal generating program of the Baby project, is now available for the first time. BabyFractal displays the Mandelbrot set fractal, and allows the user to zoom into the structure. Images can be saved as PNG (Portable Network Graphics). BabyFractal can be obtained on the installation page as a source release. More on BabyFractal
• December 13th: LibXBoard
  I am planning to write a library called LibXBoard. The goal is to integrate the backend of XBoard into a library that can be used by graphical chess programs such as BabyChess.
• December 18th: Anti-Aliased Fonts
  Baby now supports anti-aliased fonts. Check out the new screenshot.
• December 19th: Version 12.2 Released
  Version 12.2 of BabyChess and BabyFractal are available. Source releases are on the installation page.
• January 24th 2002: Solving the Game of Chess
  You can now read all I have to say about the date the Game of Chess will be solved.
• January 30th: Two new Chess Documents
  The next version of BabyChess will provide a chess evaluator instead of a chess engine. An engine for compatibility with XBoard will still be available. The other document describes the evaluation of chess positions.
   
• February 7th: New Mailing List
  The Baby project now has its own mailing list. Messages can be sent to <baby-devel at mail.freesoftware.fsf.org>. To subscribe to the mailing list, visit the mailing list info page.
   
• May 22nd: New Screenshot
  The version in this screenshot is the development version of the upcoming BabyChess 12.3.
   
• May 23rd: Screenshot of ICS Client
  This is a screenshot of the BabyChess ICS client of the 12.3 version of BabyChess.
   
• May 23rd: BabyChess 12.3 Released
  BabyChess version 12.3 is now available on the BabyChess page. RPMs for i386 are also available for the first time.
   
• August 14th: Screenshot of version 12.3
  A new screenshot of version 12.3, running on Solaris, displayed on Windows using an X server.
   
• August 20th: GTK
  I'm currently porting the UI to GTK. No screenshot available yet.
   
• November 30th: Version 13.pre.37
  Version 13.pre.37 is available on the development page. It's a development version that uses GTK+ 1.2. Version 13 of BabyChess will be released in a few weeks.
   

BabyChess / History

Updated Mon Mar 21 13:40:46 2005