chessnut

Updated 15-05-2023

chessnut is a web interface for playing against chess engines. It is interacting with superb binbo beneath the surface. chessnut was previously written in Angular, and used lichess-org/chessground-examples as a board. But after a little investigation, I decided to switch over other libraries. chessnut doesn't use Angular anymore but lit and chess-board web component.

This was a learning tool. Mainly, to practice erlang programming language. It turns out that the idea has more fun in it than predicted.

TODOS:

1. A better web interface. Partly done
2. There are many things to implement out of binbo, the possibilities are many. Tournaments between engines, a game analyzer.
3. Custom pgn and fen as input.
3. chessground doesn't know anything about en passant rule and pawn promotion. I haven't add anything to handle them. Therefore, those cases, when occur, render the game unplayable.
4. Changing board styling.
5. Get more erlang into play, like saving games in a memory somewhere.

Installation

Build the UI

cd priv/ui
npm install 
npm run dev

Run the backend

export CHESS_ENGINE="/path/to/chess/engine"  # set the path of chess engine
rebar3 get-deps
rebar3 shell    

Go to:

http://localhost:5173/

Make moves. And enjoy binbo.