DGT Smartboard in analysis mode for real-time analysis local play

I encountered this question myself quite a while ago, due to a friend and I thinking it'd make for some hilarious chess "variant" by each of our moves on a DGT smart board to update the evaluation bar as we played. The comedy, of course, derived from the "oh sh*t" moment when you watch your color bar drop to the floor and then the other player has to figure out where you messed up, and vise-versa.

I researched it originally to see if chess.com supported DGT boards on the analysis tab. Obviously, even to this day, it does not. Fritz and other software just felt too bloated and difficult. So, as a software engineer, I set out on the task. I now have a working interface that allows the DGT board from House of Staunton (DGT Smart Chess Board w/ Notation) to interface with the chess.com analysis tab and update in real-time.

My question would be two things:
1. If this has already been done, and probably in a more elegant way than myself, what did people find as a solution?
2. If there's an actual interest in the application I wrote for local play (and for just fun purposes only), should I even bother cleaning up and make the code proper, and toss it up on github for others to enjoy?

I just wrote it for myself and a couple friends, really. But I figure if there's some significant community interest in such a feature for those with smart boards, I'm happy to spend the effort and make the code more "production" quality and less like a weekend hacked together spaghetti project. And just to clarify -- I wrote this for running native on Windows. But I could make a linux port easily enough.

Problem with DGT board is you need a laptop next to it

What would be the "ideal" solution? Basically, what's lacking with smart boards or chess technology in general that everyone would like to see created/built?

For example, you do not need to use a laptop with Chessup or Square-off. Besides, the squares on DGT board do not light up which is a huge problem and basically makes the board useless in this time and age where all other boards for playing online have blinking squares.

I've always asked me why no App has this basic function (live Analysis for the current position)

Chess PGN Master has this feature for a lot of e-boards. I don't remember exactly where I found it. It was a little bit hidden in "change Startposition"?

Make a better version. I would appreciate it.

Hello Jonomous, thank you for your initiative. As a seasoned DGT owner, and tester of many chess Apps linked to DGT boards, including some level of cooperation with the DGT company as well, I think I can toss an idea or two.

Firstly, the most comprehensive, performant and nice looking solution to use DGT boards at home, and connected, optionally, with chess servers online, is Acid Ape Chess. Unfortunately, this Android-only App has two major cons.

The first is that since some time it is not actively updated, the second is that it does connect with Lichess, but not with chess.com.

There are other Apps out there that allow to play on a DGT board without a notebook next to it, but none of them is comparable to Acid Ape Chess.

So, the first suggestion is: if you're in developing, you probably may want to evaluate creating an Android App that allows, among other things, to use the board on chess.com.

In terms of features, there is one that all Apps lack, while it is extremely useful. It is the possibility to have a chess engine analyze a position that you put on the board without playing a game, respecting move turns, etc. in other words, your App should have the engine always on, continuously analysing the position, whatever happens on the board.

As far as I know this feature is available, as of today, only on the Pc app called "bearchess".

Needless to say, I have been an official tester of that App as well.

Hope this helps. Have a great day.

Thank you so much Mr. Agatti. These are the type of "holes in the industry" I've been wanting to hear about. I believe I can accommodate all platforms. Currently, my implementation does indeed use a PC to perform the real-time evaluation. It doesn't consider a "legitimate game", so the engine is always updating as it would within the analysis mode on chess.com. E.g. moves like placing two bishops on the same color square is possible, even though this would never happen in a real game until a pawn is promoted.
So it sounds like it could indeed be beneficial to the community if I expand it to mobile devices such as tablets, phones, along with my existing PC implementation... and to add to that, support additional platforms/websites such as Lichess. All this of course would be created as an open-source project; I have no intention of doing this for profit or locking up the software behind GPL. Given adequate time, I'm certain I can fill the gaps and possibly create something everyone would love using that includes the features from already well-known applications such as Acid Ape Chess and bearchess as you mentioned.
Thank you so much for taking the time to provide this feedback. It seems to be the exact answer I was looking for to point me in a general direction that would benefit the community as a whole.

I don't think I know what you mean by this. For example:

Arena: Load the engines (you can have multiple, and use multi PV too), click "Analysis", activate the board, remove the kings, setup the position, replace the kings, move the pieces.

Fritz: Click "Infinite Analysis", activate the board, remove the kings, setup the position, replace the kings, move the pieces. [There is a bug in Fritz - even if you replace the black king last it still thinks it's white to move].

Shredder: Activate the board, remove the kings, setup the position, replace the kings, set Mode:Analysis, move the pieces.

I'm sure LucasChess does it too.

Thanks and Kudo's to you for the efforts you are intentioned to put in it. If you need a beta tester, you can count on me. Have a great day!

AG

Hi, I think I did not explain myself well. Let me try again.

Imagine the following scenario (if it helps, consider what you do, and how you analyse a game with a human friend, at the chess club, in front of the chessboard):

You and your friends move the pieces, trying different variations, maybe moving two or three times for a color. Then you pick that bishop and move it straight from a square, to another one which is of a different color, saying "if the bishop was here.....then....". Then you add to the board a couple pawns, move them back and forth... and so on.

Now, you simply can't do this with any of the programs you mentioned like Fritz, Arena, etc.

With all the above, you need to follow each time a sort of process, which, more or less, involves the steps of a) entering setup mode b) composing the initial position c) identify who is the side to move d) exit setup e) move the pieces respecting the color's turn. If you want to analyse in the way you would do at the chess club with your friend, either you can't, or you need each time to follow the above lenghty process, to basically "compose" a different position on the board, and have the engine analyse it.

I believe that @Jononomous could build an App which allows a chess player to analyse on a DGT board exactly like you do at the chess club. As I mentioned, as far as I know, at the moment only BearChess is capable of this, thru its "relaxed analysis mode".

Hope this helps, and that I have explained it better now.

What you're describing is a personal project I worked on. The idea was to take a Raspberry Pi and integrate it with a DGT board to play a bot. I also allowed human-human players. I wrapped it all up in a cool chess clock like form factor. I was also planning to email a PGN of the game to each user when the game was complete (if a local user profile was created).

Here's the thread: https://www.chess.com/forum/view/chess-equipment/picochess-next-generation?page=1#last_comment

This is fantastic. Looks like more of us are wanting this feature than I initially thought. I wonder if we should all set up a collaboration. Project <insert cool name here>

@agatti1970 Let me provide primitive screenshots supporting your post regarding "if the position was setup without a game being played" sort of thing:

Hoping either chess.com shuts me down or hires me to 1) do feature development, or 2) anti-cheat. I'm poor. Don't sue me. You'll get nothing, I promise. A cool toaster at best.

@Jononomous, I like it and can't wait to test it.

I love cooperation among forum users, so I hope this entire project will continue and stay alive until delivery.

This looks like a great project as well. I've set a "follow" for myself to the thread you posted. What stage of the project are you in, now?

I felt it was too niche of a project so I stopped working on it. I put some effort into a cross platform desktop chess GUI. I reached out to @jonononmous and offered to collaborate on this.