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NAME
xshogi - Xt/Athena user interface for GNU Shogi, version 1.1
SYNOPSIS
xshogi [ options ]
DESCRIPTION
xshogi provides an X11/Xt/Athena Widgets user interface for GNU Shogi.
With xshogi you can play GNU Shogi, set up arbitrary positions, force
variations, or watch xshogi manage a game between two shogi programs.
Furthermore, it can be used as an interface between two players on
different displays. xshogi can also be used as a shogiboard to play
out games. It will read through a game file or allow a player to play
through a variation manually (force mode). This is useful for keeping
track of email postal games or browsing games off the net. xshogi can
also be used as a X client for the Internet Shogi Server (ISS). The
Internet Shogi Server is currently embedded in the Internet Go Server
(IGS). xshogi connects to the ISS and displays all positions sent by
the ISS graphically. So,games from the observation list are
recognized as well as own matches. In case of an own match, pieces
are moved on the graphical display. You can use xshogi in this way
even if you don't have GNU Shogi. After starting xshogi, you can make
moves by pressing mouse button 1 while the cursor is over a square
with your piece on it and dragging the mouse to another square. If
the move is illegal, GNU Shogi will not allow it. xshogi will then
retract the move.
RULES
Shogi is a Japanese board game played by two players. The object of
the game is to capture the opponent's King. Shogi is played on a
nine-by-nine board. The vertical rows are called files, the horizontal
ones ranks or just rows. Each player has twenty pieces: one King, two
Gold Generals, two Silver Generals, two kNights, two Lances, one Rook,
one Bishop and nine Pawns. The player moving up the board and making
the first move is referred to as black and his opponent white,
although in Shogi sets all pieces have the same colour. They are
differentiated only in direction: pieces pointing away from a player
are his. The pieces lie flat on the board and have their Japanese name
written on them.
Moves
King one step in any direction per move
Gold General
one step per move any way except diagnoally backward (as a
king but not diagonally backward)
Silver General
one step per move forwards or diagonally (as a king but not
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sideways or vertically backward)
Knight one step to left or right, and two steps forward (the only
piece which may jump over other pieces)
Rook moves vertically or horizontally any distance
Bishop moves diagonally any distance
Lance moves forward any distance
Pawn one step forward
Promotion
The three rows furthest away from a player are called the promotion
zone. Apart from the King and the Gold, any piece can be promoted to a
more powerful piece when it makes a move completely or partly in the
promotion zone. So, when a piece moves into, out of or fully inside
the promotion zone it may be promoted upon completion of its move.
Promotion is optional, provided that the piece still can make a legal
move in case it is not promoted: if a Pawn or a Lance move to the last
row, or a Knight moves to either of the last two rows, it must be
promoted. In Shogi sets promoting a piece is done by turning this
piece upside down. Its promoted name is written on its other side.
Apart from the King and the Gold General all pieces can promote.
After promotion their moves are as follows:
+ Promoted Silver, promoted kNight, promoted Lance and promoted
Pawn all move as a Gold.
+ The promoted Rook in addition to the moves of the unpromoted
Rook can move one step in the diagonal directions. It either
moves like a Rook or like a King.
+ The promoted Bishop in addition to the moves of the unpromoted
Bishop can move one step horizontally or vertically. It either
moves like a Bishop or like a King.
Capturing and dropping pieces
When one piece moves onto the same square as an opponent's piece, the
opponent's piece is captured. All pieces capture in the same way that
they move. Captured pieces become part of the capturer's force. In a
later move, instead of moving a piece on the board, a player may put a
piece that he has captured from his opponent back onto the board, in
an empty square. This is called dropping a piece. Pieces are always
dropped unpromoted: if a promoted piece is captured, it reverts to its
unpromoted rank. Pieces may be dropped on any empty square on the
board with only three restrictions:
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1) After dropping a piece it must be able to make a legal move.
This applies to Pawns, Knights or Lances. They may not be
dropped onto a square from which they will never be able to
move.
2) Attacking the King by dropping a Pawn on the square in front
of him is not allowed if the King cannot prevent being
captured on the following move. To use the Chess expression:
checkmating the King with a Pawn drop is prohibited.
3) A pawn may only be dropped on a file (vertical row) if there
is no other unpromoted pawn of the same player on that file.
Draws
The game of Shogi has very few draws (roughly 1 percent), mainly
because of the possibility to drop pieces. Draws cannot be offered and
can arise from two situations:
1) A position (including the pieces in hand) occurs 4 times with
the same player to move ("Sennichite"). However, if this is
caused by consecutive checks (direct attacks on the King,
threatening to capture it on the next move) by one side, the
player giving these checks loses the game.
2) Both players have moved their King into the the promotion zone
(or they cannot be prevented to do so) and the Kings cannot be
checkmated. In that case the players may decide to count their
pieces where the King does not count, the Rook and Bishop
count as 5 points, and all other pieces as one point.
Promotion is disregarded. If both players have at least 24
points the game is a draw ("Jishogi"). If a player has less,
he loses the game.
Of course, a player can refuse to count pieces when he still has
mating chances or chances to gain material which would affect the
outcome of the counting. There is no strict rule about what to do if
this is not the case, but nonetheless a player refuses to count up
(e.g. because he does not have enough points for a draw). It has been
generally accepted that in such a case the game ends and the pieces
are counted after one player has managed to get all his pieces
protected in the promotion zone.
OPTIONS
The following command line options also correspond to X resources that
you can set in your .Xdefaults file.
standard Xt options
xshogi accepts standard Xt options like -display, -geometry,
and -iconic.
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-tc or -timeControl minutes[:seconds]
Amount of time for a set of moves determined by
movesPerSession. If this number of moves is played within the
time control period, xshogi resets the time clocks. Default:
5 minutes.
-mps or -movesPerSession moves
Number of moves in a time control period. Default: 40 moves.
-st or -searchTime minutes[:seconds]
Tell GNU Shogi to spend at most the given amount of time
searching for each of its moves. Without this option, GNU
Shogi chooses its search time based on the number of moves and
amount of time remaining until the next time control. Setting
this option also sets -clockMode to False.
-sd or -searchDepth number
Tell GNU Shogi to look ahead at most the given number of moves
when searching for a move to make. Without this option, GNU
Shogi chooses its search depth based on the number of moves
and amount of time remaining until the next time control.
Setting this option also sets -clockMode to False.
-clock or -clockMode (True | False)
Determines whether or not to use the clock. If clockMode is
False, the clock does not run, but the side that is to play
next is still highlighted.
-td or -timeDelay seconds
Time delay between moves during "Load Game". This doesn't
have to be round numbers. Try -td 0.4. Default: 1 second.
-ncp or -noShogiProgram (True | False)
If this option is True, xshogi acts as a passive shogiboard;
it does not try to start a shogi program, not even to check
whether moves made in Force mode are legal. It also sets
-clockMode to False. Default: False.
-iss or -internetShogiServerMode (True | False)
Connect with an Internet Shogi Server to play shogi against
its other users, observe games they are playing, or review
games that have recently finished. Default: False.
To use xshogi in ISS mode, run it in the foreground, and use
the terminal you started it from to type commands and receive
text responses from the shogi server. Useful ISS commands
include who to see who is logged on, games to see what games
are being played, match to challenge another player to a game,
observe to observe an ongoing game, oldmoves to review a
recently completed game, and of course help. Whenever you ask
to observe an ongoing game, review a completed game, or resume
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an adjourned game, xshogi retrieves and parses the list of
past moves from the ISS, so you can review them with the
Forward and Backward buttons or save them with Save Game.
-isshost or -internetShogiServerHost host
The Internet host name or address of the shogi server to
connect to when in ISS mode. Default: "igs.nuri.net".
If your site doesn't have a working Internet name server, try
specifying the host address in numeric form. The address for
igs is currently "203.255.112.3".
-issport or -internetShogiServerPort port-number
The port number to use when connecting to a shogi server in
ISS mode. Default: 6969.
-fcp or -firstShogiProgram program
Name of first shogi program. In matches between two machines,
this program plays white. Default: "gnushogix".
-scp or -secondShogiProgram program
Name of second shogi program, if needed. In matches between
two machines, this program plays black; otherwise it is not
started. Default: "gnushogix".
-fh or -firstHost host
Name of host the first shogi program plays on. Default:
"localhost".
-sh or -secondHost host
Name of host the second shogi program plays on. Default:
"localhost".
-rsh or -remoteShell shell_name
Some systems do not use rsh as the remote shell. This option
allows a user to name the remote shell command. This should
be done in the resource file.
-mm or -matchMode (False | Init | Position | Opening)
Automatically run a game between firstShogiProgram and
secondShogiProgram. If matchMode is set to Init, xshogi will
start the game with the initial shogi position. If matchMode
is set to Position, xshogi will start the game with the
position specified by the loadPositionFile resource. If
matchMode is set to Opening, xshogi will play out the opening
moves specified by the -loadGameFile resource. If the -
saveGameFile resource is set, a move record for the match will
be saved in the specified file. Default: "False".
-lgf or -loadGameFile file
Name of file to read a game record from. Game files are found
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in the directory named by the SHOGIDIR environment variable.
If this variable is not set, the current directory is used
unless the file name starts with a /.
-lpf or -loadPositionFile file
Name of file to read a game position from. Position files are
found in the directory named by the SHOGIDIR environment
variable. If this variable is not set, the current directory
is used unless the file name starts with a /.
-sgf or -saveGameFile file
Name of file to save a game record to. Game files are saved
in the directory named by the SHOGIDIR environment variable.
If this variable is not set, the current directory is used
unless the file name starts with a /.
-spf or -savePositionFile file
Name of file to save a game position to. Position files are
saved in the directory named by the SHOGIDIR environment
variable. If this variable is not set, the current directory
is used unless the file name starts with a /.
-coords or -showCoords (True | False)
If this option is True, xshogi displays algebraic coordinates
along the board's left and bottom edges. The default is
False. The coordFont resource specifies what font to use.
-mono or -monoMode (True | False)
Determines whether xshogi displays its pieces and squares with
two colors or four. You shouldn't have to specify monochrome.
xshogi will determine if this is necessary.
-wpc or -blackPieceColor color
Color specification for black pieces suitable for
XParseColor(3X11). Default: #FFFFCC. These colors look good
on a DEC workstation. If you need different colors, try using
the xcolors application. Source for xcolors can be found in
the X11/R4 contrib directory.
-bpc or -whitePieceColor color
Same for white pieces. Default: #202020.
-lsc or -lightSquareColor color
Same for light squares. Default: #C8C365.
-dsc or -darkSquareColor color
Same for dark squares. Default: #77A26D.
-wps or -westernPieceSet (True | False)
Choose the Western style piece set.
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-npb or -normalPawnBitmap file
-nnb or -normalKnightBitmap file
-nbb or -normalBishopBitmap file
-nrb or -normalRookBitmap file
-nkb or -normalKingBitmap file
Names of the bitmap files for the bitmap piece icons.
-rpb or -reversePawnBitmap file
-rnb or -reverseKnightBitmap file
-rbb or -reverseBishopBitmap file
-rrb or -reverseRookBitmap file
-rkb or -reverseKingBitmap file
Names of the bitmap files for the outline piece icons.
-debug or -debugMode (True | False)
Turns on debugging printout.
RESOURCES
initString
The actual string that is sent to initialize the shogi program
can be set from .Xdefaults. It can't be set from the command
line because of syntax problems. The default value is
"new\nbeep\nrandom\neasy\n". The "new" and "beep" commands
are required. You can remove the "random" command if you like;
including it causes GNU Shogi to randomize its move selection
slightly so that it doesn't play the same moves in every game.
Even without "random", GNU Shogi randomizes its choice of
moves from its opening book. You can also remove "easy" if
you like; including it toggles easy mode off, causing GNU
Shogi to think on your time. That is, if "easy" is included
in the initString, GNU Shogi thinks on your time; if not, it
does not. (Yes, this does seem backwards, doesn't it.) You
can also try adding other commands to the initString; see the
GNU Shogi documentation for details.
blackString and whiteString
These resources control what is sent when the Machine Black
and Machine White buttons are selected. This is mostly for
compatibility with obsolete versions of GNU Shogi. Alternate
bitmaps for piece icons can be specified either by choosing
one of the built-in sets or with the file name resources
described above. There are three built-in sets of piece
bitmaps available, large (the default), medium, or small. It
is easiest to select the set you prefer in the .Xdefaults
file:
XShogi*boardSize: Medium The font used for button labels and
comments can be changed in the .Xdefaults file. You may want
to choose a smaller font if you are using the small pieces:
XShogi*font: helvetica_oblique12 The font used for
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coordinates (when the showCoords option is True) can be set
similarly:
XShogi*coordFont: helvetica_10 If you are using a grayscale
monitor, try setting the colors to:
XShogi*blackPieceColor: gray100
XShogi*whitePieceColor: gray0
XShogi*lightSquareColor: gray60
XShogi*darkSquareColor: gray40
COMMAND BUTTONS AND KEYS
Quit Quits xshogi. Q or q is a keyboard equivalent.
Reset Resets xshogi to the beginning of a shogi game. It also
deselects any game or position files.
Flip View
inverts the view of the shogi board.
Hint displays a move hint from GNU Shogi.
Load Game
plays a game from a record file. If no file is specified a
popup dialog asks for a filename. Game files are found in the
directory named by the SHOGIDIR environment variable. If this
variable is not declared then the current directory is used
unless the file name starts with a /. G or g is a keyboard
equivalent. The game file parser will accept almost any file
that contains moves in algebraic notation. If the first line
begins with `#', it is assumed to be a title and is displayed.
Text enclosed in parentheses or square brackets is assumed to
be commentary and is displayed in a pop-up window. Any other
text in the file is ignored.
Load Position
sets up a position from a position file. If no file is
specified a popup dialog asks for a filename. Position files
are found in the directory named by the SHOGIDIR environment
variable. If this variable is not declared then the current
directory is used unless the file name starts with a /.
Position files must be in the format that the Save Position
command writes.
Save Game
saves a game to a record file. If no file is specified a
popup dialog asks for a filename. If the filename exists, the
user is asked wether the current game record is be appended to
this file or if the file should be replaced. Game files are
saved in the directory named by the SHOGIDIR environment
variable. If this variable is not declared then the current
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directory is used unless the file name starts with a /. Game
files are human-readable, and can also be read back by the
Load Game command. Furthermore, they are accepted as GNU Shogi
text bookfiles.
Save Position
saves a position to a position file. If no file is specified
a popup dialog asks for a filename. Position files are saved
in the directory named by the SHOGIDIR environment variable.
If this variable is not declared then the current directory is
used unless the file name starts with a /. Position files are
human-readable, and can also be read back by the Load Position
command.
Machine White
forces GNU Shogi to play white.
Machine Black
forces GNU Shogi to play black.
Force Moves
forces a series of moves. That is, GNU Shogi stops playing
and xshogi allows you to make moves for both white and black.
Two Machines
plays a game between two computer programs.
Forward moves forward through a series of remembered moves. F or f is
a keyboard equivalent.
Backward
moves backward through a series of remembered moves. As a
side effect, puts xshogi into Force Moves mode. B or b is a
keyboard equivalent.
Pause pauses the clocks or (in Load Game mode) pauses the game being
loaded. Press Pause again to continue. P or p is a keyboard
equivalent.
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 black pieces
(button 2) or white 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 Black or White
indicator at the top of the screen.
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Challenge
allows to make a two display game between two human players.
Enter the display you want to connect to. If you are allowed
to connect, a new board is displayed at the remote display.
Challenge mode can only be stopped by pressing "quit".
Select Level
allows to reset the clocks for both players. Enter the number
of moves and the number of minutes in which the moves should
be done.
Move NOW
force computer to stop thinking and to make the current best
move.
Iconify I, i, C or c iconifies xshogi.
SEE ALSO
gnushogi(6)
LIMITATIONS
If you press the Pause button during GNU Shogi's turn, xshogi will
stop the clocks, but GNU Shogi will still make a move. After a mate
or draw when playing against GNU Shogi, if you back up with the
Backward button, the clocks are reset (because GNU Shogi has exited
and must be restarted). Some xshogi functions may not work with
versions of GNU Shogi earlier than 1.1, patchlevel 02. The game parser
recognizes only algebraic notation.
AUTHORS
Original authors of XBoard: Chris Sears and Dan Sears. Enhancements
for XBoard (Version 2.0): Tim Mann. Conversion to XShogi (Version
1.1): Matthias Mutz.
COPYRIGHT
XShogi borrows its piece bitmaps from CRANES Shogi. Copyright 1991 by
Digital Equipment Corporation, Maynard, Massachusetts. Enhancements
Copyright 1992 Free Software Foundation, Inc. Enhancements Copyright
1993 Matthias Mutz The following terms apply to Digital Equipment
Corporation's copyright interest in XBoard:
All Rights Reserved Permission to use, copy, modify, and
distribute this software and its documentation for any purpose
and without fee is hereby granted, provided that the above
copyright notice appear in all copies and that both that
copyright notice and this permission notice appear in supporting
documentation, and that the name of Digital not be used in
advertising or publicity pertaining to distribution of the
software without specific, written prior permission. DIGITAL
DISCLAIMS ALL WARRANTIES WITH REGARD TO THIS SOFTWARE, INCLUDING
ALL IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS, IN NO
EVENT SHALL DIGITAL BE LIABLE FOR ANY SPECIAL, INDIRECT OR
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CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES OR ANY DAMAGES WHATSOEVER RESULTING FROM
LOSS OF USE, DATA OR PROFITS, WHETHER IN AN ACTION OF CONTRACT,
NEGLIGENCE OR OTHER TORTIOUS ACTION, ARISING OUT OF OR IN
CONNECTION WITH THE USE OR PERFORMANCE OF THIS SOFTWARE.
The following terms apply to the enhanced version of XShogi
distributed by the Free Software Foundation:
This file is part of XSHOGI. XSHOGI is distributed in the hope
that it will be useful, but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY. No author or
distributor accepts responsibility to anyone for the consequences
of using it or for whether it serves any particular purpose or
works at all, unless he says so in writing. Refer to the XSHOGI
General Public License for full details. Everyone is granted
permission to copy, modify and redistribute XSHOGI, but only
under the conditions described in the XSHOGI General Public
License. A copy of this license is supposed to have been given to
you along with XSHOGI so you can know your rights and
responsibilities. It should be in a file named COPYING. Among
other things, the copyright notice and this notice must be
preserved on all copies.
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