ChessX Reviews

Congratulations to the developers of this amazing program. Linux is extremely lacking in programs in this segment, and I am not referring to chess engines, in this part Linux is equally well served compared to Windows. But in terms of a graphical interface to study and play online, today, in my opinion, the two programs that are worth it are chessx and Scid. I have both installed on Arch Linux and Debian Sid. A pity that chessx is practically abandoned in Debian, the version in the repositories is still 1.4, a very old version and with some known bugs, bug 286 still persists in the version available in debian using the plasma KDE environment, I have a little experience, researching I found the solution, but imagine people who don't understand anything, who just want to install and use, most install and give up using it on the same day, because bug 286 makes the program totally unusable, not being able to open and import files is in no condition to use. Another known problem is the upstream availableVoices bug, in the compilation of version 1.6.0, which even makes compilation impossible in Debian, the most incredible thing is that there are patches for these bugs, but they are not included in the installation for Debian, in Arch Linux it is error-free automated installation possible. Imagine the common user facing a bug like this in version 1.6.0, 90% give up using it. Finally, I would like to ask a question, I like to play on FICS, but on this server, unfortunately, there are more robots online than human beings, when I send a challenge, I would like to know if chessx filters so that only human beings can accept it him, or am I running the risk of playing against robots? Important to clarify, that I am not referring to the cheaters' robots, I am referring to the robots maintained by the server itself. There are dozens of chess programs to study and play online on linux, I think I've tested almost all of them, as I've already mentioned, the only ones that are really worth it are chessx and Scid. Common mistakes in the development of chess programs for linux: People focus too much on the look, a lot of fluff, most are totally useless, just decorating the menu. You forget the main thing, the absolute majority of users of these programs want to play online, and for that they need a light and fast interface, pieces that move quickly, fundamental to have pre-movement working 100%. Scid has the pre move option, but for me it didn't work in FICS, in chessx it worked wonderfully. The developers of these programs have to understand, perhaps 80% of users will play games of 3 minutes or less without increments, and to play these modalities the program's interface accounts for 50% of the final result, pre movement working 100%, light interface parts fast with a good look, this is fundamental. I would guess that 90% of games played on all online chess sites are in these fast modes, this is because honest users want to avoid cheaters. Sorry for the length of the text, and once again, congratulations on this excellent program.

falconnuget wrote in 2021 that the move sound was obnoxious, and it still is, with no way to turn it off except muting the system sound someone else pointed out that only the creators of chessx know how to use 'save', and that is still true today. if i wanted to save games, i would not be using this program. same goes for loading a saved game. good luck with that the only thing that i do with this app is to use the "setup position" button. then, "play engine". but even this is frustrating as many times the computer feels like it needs to take control of both pieces. i suspect this is my fault because i'm using the 'back' / 'undo' option when this happens, and i didn't go back far enough, but stopped the 'undo' on the wrong color there really aren't too many good options for free chess engines. if you only want to analyze games without saving or loading, and don't mind obnoxious move sounds, this is an excellent option. i also like the 'analyze' option

Best open source chess software by far!

This app is almost perfect - thank you. One thing - where are the clocks displayed during a game?

I switched to the dark mode and I can't return to the normal mode cause this absolutely sucks and I don't know what to do. Help me someone!

Bonjour, je vous remercie pour ce logiciel, Pouvez vous me dire comment faire pour changer la langue ? Merci

Almost perfect, unfortunately transform Russian text in symbols.

I've been looking everywhere for a MacOS PGN viewer that I can use offline, and ChessX is fantastic! I love the engine integration and the useful tab features to see the notation and game files. My one suggestion is to update the move sound effect because I really like hearing the chess pieces move, but the current sound is obnoxious (I turned the sound off, but I want to turn it back on!)

Would be nice to have these otherwise this tool isn't of much use to me: 1) the game is shown in a very small size (could not find option to view in bigger size) 2) ideally i would like to drop pgn files into a windows folder and the pgn viewer should be able to show me all these pgns in its listing. could not find way to do this in ChessX. In it you need to manually add each file to ChessX. And even after you add then in the listing window I would like to see file name but it shows that after full file path - so effectively file name gets hidden. Note: both the above are present in Chessbase's Chessbase Reader tool (which is also free)

Like most reviewers I really love the look of this program and would give it the full 5 stars but for one issue. I can't get it to run on Windows 8.1. after installation and launch, all I get is a clipboard. I am surprised nobody else has reported this issue. I have even tried uninstalling/reinstalling it and also using the 32 bit version. Nothing works. If anyone can suggest in layman's terms how this can be resolved, I'd be very grateful. Update: I found the solution on Chess.com so it's now up and running. A simple matter of right clicking on the icon in the system tray and maximizing the window. It's also covered on this site under ticket #249. Maybe still only 4 stars as it's not perfect but it looks great!

I specially emphasize Training mode that's helpful when you try to analyze a lot of chess sessions.

Excelente software, easy to use, plenty of functions. It can manage big databases. Only a little confusing the item of mailing lists and communications.

Edit : 02 Mar 2019 Apologies for editing/adding here as I am unable to add a new review. First could somebody please ask James Coons to provide a Windows version if possible with the latest features. Secondly just wanted to say that the latest version 1.4.9 (1.5.0) is a huge leap with the added features - for one thing the ability to read ctg/abk files is a godsend. Third and I've requested this before - any chance please of adding a chess clock somewhere - menu bar or an added tab. Finally - many many thanks !!

Chessx is perhaps the most promising open-source chess database program out there and certainly the best-looking! The only thing that keeps me from using it full-time is that it only handles PGN format which isn't very efficient for large database... Do you guys have any plans to support scid database format?

Perfect, simple but very powerfull chess database tool.

Very good chess database & pgn viewer. It even has an endgame table-base so it makes it extremely useful for analysis. Everything in this is absolutely perfect... it's truly the best(free) pgn database/viewer.

Very lean an beautiful chess database. Database, game view, opening tree, engine analysis all there!!

A good tool for chess players

This is a very good interface, runs excellent with chess engines.... However, for the mac retina display, the gui is "pixely" - it looks like the gui was designed with a set resolution without using DPI or something, i.e. the pieces and buttons don't look "smooth". Another concern about the design is that I am having a little trouble figuring out how to save my pgn files after I have written in comments on games etc. Otherwise, I would recommend this to anyone using a mac.

Great strategy game. Good Tool! Runs smoothly. This is a wonderful project.

Application does what it says on the box...would be good to add some functionality around playing on-line etc due to the interface being so attractive and usable.

Very useful project!

It compiled, it ran... I am happy... I am just gathering a database with games and a chess engine... Chessx looks very promising