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ICSDRONENG(6) ICSDRONENG(6)
NAME
icsdrone - Interface between an xboard chess engine and an ICS
SYNOPSIS
icsdrone [options]
DESCRIPTION
icsdrone acts as an interface between an ICS (Internet Chess Server)
and a chess engine supporting the XBoard/WinBoard protocol. Unlike
XBoard/WinBoard it does not use a graphical interface so it is suitable
for use on embedded systems.
UCI engines may be used through the polyglot adapter.
icsdrone started its life a fork of icsdrone by Henrik Gram. It was
originally developed for FICS (the Free Internet Chess Server) but
currently ICC (the Internet Chess Club) works as well.
icsdrone has the following new features.
- Feedback on commands.
- Builtin polyglot book support.
- Feedback on the current evaluation and principal variation
(through "whisper" or "kibitz" or the "proxyFeedback" option).
- "Daemon mode" (run in background).
- PGN logging.
- Auto reconnection in case of network problems.
- Support for resigning on behalf of the engine.
- Support for handling of draw offers.
- Support for autojoining tourneys.
- Builtin support for using timeseal.
- Optional "shortlog". E.g. for consulting via a webbrowser.
- Interactive console with readline support and colors.
- An ICS proxy.
When instructed via the "proxy" option, icsdrone act as a proxy for the
ICS it is connected to. This is similar to using xboard with zippy but
now the "GUI" (xboard/winboard) can be closed without terminating the
engine.
MANAGING ICSDRONE
The managing options for icsdrone are schematically described in the
following drawing
console xboard
A A
| |
| (owner)
| |
V V
xboard<--(proxy)-->icsdrone<--(C)-->ics
A
|
|
|
V
engine
OPTIONS
All options take an argument. In the case of boolean options this is
on/off.
-icsHost (default: "freechess.org")
Hostname of the ICS server.
-icsPort (default: 23)
Port of the ICS server.
-timeseal
Path to timeseal binary.
-handle (default: "guest")
Login handle.
-password (default: "xxx")
ICS password
-loginScript
Script with login data and commands.
-owner
Specifies a ICS handle of a user which can send tell commands to
icsdrone.
-autoReconnect (default: "on")
Autoreconnect to ICS on network failures.
-console (default: "on")
Start up with console enabled. The console looks somewhat nicer
when readline support is compiled in.
-daemonize (default: "off")
Go into background. This implies console off.
-feedback (default: "on")
Send info about the eval and principal variation.
-feedbackOnlyFinal (default: "on")
Give feedback info only before move.
-feedbackCommand (default: "whisper")
The command to use to send feedback to observers. Use "kibitz" if
you want your opponent to also see the feedback.
-proxyFeedback (default: "on")
Make icsdrone give PV feedback directly to the proxy (i.e. without
relying on kibitz/whisper).
-ownerQuiet (default: "off")
Send no tells to the owner about starting and finishing games.
-engineQuiet (default: "off")
Do no pass on most engine commands to the ICS. Some engines are
just too noisy.
-program (default: "gnuchess")
Command to start the engine. If the engine is an UCI engine then
this should be an appropriate polyglot command.
-nice
Run the engine at lower priority.
-searchDepth (default: 0)
Specifies the maximum search depth for the engine. 0 means
unlimited.
-secPerMove (default: 0)
Specifies the maximum time to search for the engine. 0 means
unlimited.
-easyMode (default: "on")
Specifies if the engine thinks on the opponents time or not.
-resign (default: "on")
Specifies if icsdrone will resign on behalf of the engine.
-acceptDraw (default: "on")
Specifies if icsdrone will accept draw offers on behalf of the
engine.
-scoreForWhite (default: "off")
Specifies if the engine reports the score of white (like Crafty).
If the engine is Crafty then icsdrone will turn this on
automatically. This is important to handle resigns and draw offers
correctly.
-dontReuseEngine (default: "on")
If true then icsdrone will restart the engine after each game.
-book
Path to an opening book in polyglot format.
-logFile (default: "<handle>.log")
Path to the logfile. If the name ends in .gz and zlib support is
compiled in then the logfile will be compressed.
-logAppend (default: "off")
Specifies if we should append to the logfile.
-logging (default: "on")
Specifies if logging is enabled. Note that logfiles are very large
so on an embedded system you probably want to disable this.
-pgnFile (default: "<handle>.pgn")
Log games to this file.
Optionally redirect the game through a shell command by beginning
the file name with a '|'-character (pipe). For example: -pgnFile
"|process-game.py Data/games.db"
-pgnLogging (default: "on")
Specifies if logging of games is enabled.
-shortLogFile (default: "<handle>.txt")
Log start/end of games as well as received tells to this file.
-shortLogging (default: "on")
Specifies if short logging is enabled.
-sendLogin
Commands to send at login. Multiple commands can be separated by
\n.
-sendGameStart (default: "say this is <enginename>")
Commands to send at start of game. Multiple commands can be
separated by \n.
-sendGameEnd
Commands to send at end of game. Multiple commands can be separated
by \n.
-sendTimeout (default: "resume")
Commands to send when idle. Multiple commands can be separated by
\n.
-limitRematches (default: 0)
After this number of rematches wait 60 seconds before accepting. 0
means disable.
-hardLimit (default: 0)
After this number of rematches automatically decline the next match
offer from the same opponent. 0 means disable.
-issueRematch (default: "off")
Send "rematch" at end of the game.
-acceptOnly
Accept only challenges from this user.
-noplay
Comma separated list of players to auto decline offers from (case
sensitive). Note this is not the same as the ICS "noplay" list.
-autoJoin (default: "on")
Autojoin tourneys. Currently this does not work on ICC.
-tourneyFilter (default: "ct.chess")
Boolean expression (using C syntax) which acts as a filter for
joining tourneys (currently FICS specific). The following variables
may be used (most have the same meaning as in the FICS formula
variable)
ct.tm (string)
ct.time (numeric)
ct.inc (numeric)
ct.etime (numeric)
ct.rounds (numeric)
ct.lightning (boolean)
ct.blitz (boolean)
ct.standard (boolean)
ct.chess (boolean)
ct.atomic (boolean)
ct.suicide (boolean)
ct.losers (boolean)
ct.crazyhouse (boolean)
ct.wild (boolean)
ct.variant (string)
ct.rated (boolean)
Symbols that are understood are
=(assignment) == < > <= >= || &&
+ - * / "" != **(exponentiation) "" ()
+ acts as concatenation on strings
Predefined functions
len (length of string)
str (convert to string)
int (take integer part)
float (convert to float)
bool (convert to bool)
eval (evaluate string expression)
memory (gives amount of free memory in interpreter)
abs (absolute value)
ord (asci value of 1 char string)
chr (convert asci to 1 char string)
lower (convert string to lower case)
upper (convert string to upper case)
find (find location of substring)
time (gives current time in seconds since the epoch)
Arithmetic is using real numbers. Known types are float, bool and
string.
-engineKnowsSAN (default: "true")
The engine understands GUI moves in SAN format. This is less
drastic than sending "feature san=1" which actually forces the GUI
to send moves in SAN format.
-proxy (default: "off")
Proxy the ICS.
-proxyPort (default: 5000)
The port to listen on.
-proxyHost (default: "127.0.0.1")
The interface to listen on. This must be the numeric ip address of
the interface. The default ensures that only connections from
localhost are possible. To allow connections from anywhere use
"0.0.0.0". This is only recommended if you are behind a firewall
as icsdrone is not designed for security. Note that even if you
are only listening locally there are still a number of options to
connect remotely such as the xboard "gateway" option or ssh
tunneling.
-proxyLogin (default: "off")
If this is true, icsdrone will display a login prompt on the proxy.
User/password are derived from the -handle and -password arguments
and from the strings entered at the icsdrone login prompt.
-bailoutStrategy (default: 1)
This options tells icsdrone what to do in case something that
should not happen does happen. Cases that are currently recognized
are
The ICS sends a move that is illegal according to the engine.
The engine sends a move that is illegal according to the ICS.
The engine crashes.
If the -bailoutStrategy variable is set to 1 then icsdrone will
resign on behalf of the engine. If it is set to 2 (or more) then
icsdrone will quit. If it is set to 0 then icsdrone will do...
nothing. Use this at your own risk as icsdrone will now likely hang
or behave strangely.
-variants (default is server specific)
This is a string of comma separated variant specifiers. The
default for a generic ics is
"lightning,blitz,standard,wild/1=wildcastle,wild/2, \
wild/3,wild/4,wild/5"
This means that almost all ics variants translate to the chess
variant "normal" except "wild/1" which translates to "wildcastle".
-colorTell
-colorAlert
-colorDefault
Some colors for use in the console when icsdrone is compiled with
readline support.
CONSOLE, PROXY AND TELL COMMANDS, SCRIPTS
While icsdrone is running you can send commands to it via the console
or via the proxy and if you are the owner also via "tell". In addition
commands can be put in scripts which can be loaded or specified as a
login script (with the command line option "-loginScript").
If you use a login script the first two lines should be the username
and password.
The following commands are interpreted by icsdrone.
help Give some rudimentary help
set Set an option (see below)
softquit Quit at the end of this game
hardquit Quit now
restart Quit and reconnect if autoReconnect is enabled. Otherwise quit.
options List the settable options
coptions List all options including those not settable at runtime.
daemonize Go into background
load Execute a script (for security reasons the name should end with .icsdrone)
Other commands (e.g. "draw", "seek", "match") will be forwarded to the
ICS. Unless they are prefixed by * in which case they will be sent to
the engine.
With the "set" command you can change some command line options at
runtime. This applies to the following options.
easymode
searchdepth
secpermove
sendgameend
sendgamestart
sendtimeout
sendlogin
limitrematches
issuerematch
hardlimit
acceptonly
feedback
feedbackonlyfinal
feedbackcommand
proxyfeedback
ownerquiet
pgnlogging
shortlogging
noplay
autojoin
autoreconnect
resign
acceptdraw
scoreforwhite
colortell
coloralert
colordefault
In contrast to command line options, these options are not case
sensitive.
ADITIONAL REMARKS
It is important to always issue manual seeks. E.g. seek 1 0 m. In that
way icsdrone can perform checks before accepting an opponent (like
verifying the noplay option). This is especially important when playing
as a guest on FICS since in that case FICS does not know you are a
computer and will auto match seeks (annoying the hell out of people who
do not expect to get a computer opponent). icsdrone defends against
this but this will only work if you issue manual seeks.
EXAMPLES
An example command line
icsdrone -owner RoboOwner -program "polyglot engine.ini" -loginScript engine.script -timeseal ./timeseal.Linux -book performance.bin -daemonize on -proxy on
Here is an example login script
RoboUser
xxxx
set sendgameend say thanks\nseek 2 12 m
seek 2 12 m
A command line to make crafty play blitz without further intervention
icsdrone -handle RoboUser -password xxx -program crafty -sendLogin "seek 2 12 m" -sendGameEnd "seek 2 12 m" -proxy on
an equivalent version
icsdrone -handle RoboUser -password xxx -program crafty -sendLogin "seek 2 12 m\n set sendgameend seek 2 12 m" -proxy on
EXIT STATUS
icsdrone returns 1 ("restart") if the autoReconnect option is off and a
network error occurs after a succesful login or a restart command is
executed. In all other cases a value > 1 is returned.
AUTHORS
Henrik Gram <henrik.gram@gmail.com>
Michel Van den Bergh <michel.vandenbergh@uhasselt.be>
SEE ALSO
polyglot(6)
2015-08-22 ICSDRONENG(6)