| |
Main
Date: 31 Oct 2006 02:59:28
From: Dave (from the UK)
Subject: scid vs arena
|
Has anyone here compared 'scid'
http://scid.sourceforge.net/
with 'arena'
http://www.playwitharena.com/
How are they different?
How similar are they?
Whilst both a free, arena is closed source, which it a minus as far as I
am concerned. Also it only runs on Windows, which is an even bigger minus.
But how the functionality of arena compare with scid? Someone has told a
friend that arena is the best.
Given I'm not a great user of M$ Windoze software, I've no intention of
expanding much effort to test out arena for myself, but if anyone has,
I'd be interested what you think of it.
--
Dave (from the UK)
Please note my email address changes periodically to avoid spam.
It is always of the form: [email protected]
Hitting reply will work for a few months only - later set it manually.
http://witm.sourceforge.net/ (Web based Mathematica front end)
|
|
| |
Date: 31 Oct 2006 03:30:40
From: Tony M
Subject: Re: scid vs arena
|
On Tue, 31 Oct 2006 02:59:28 +0000, "Dave (from the UK)"
<[email protected] > wrote:
>Has anyone here compared 'scid'
>
>http://scid.sourceforge.net/
>
>with 'arena'
>
>http://www.playwitharena.com/
>
>How are they different?
>
>How similar are they?
>
>Whilst both a free, arena is closed source, which it a minus as far as I
>am concerned. Also it only runs on Windows, which is an even bigger minus.
>
Apparently, new versions of Arena are coming out soon for Windows and
Linux. The current Arena beta expires on November 14th, so it should
be around that time. The new versions will remain free. The Windows
version is written in Delphi; I suspect the Linux version will be a
Kylix product. I doubt that Arena will be open source, though.
>But how the functionality of arena compare with scid? Someone has told a
>friend that arena is the best.
>
The two programs don't really serve the same purpose. Arena is for
playing against engines, playing on ICS style servers, and organizing
engine tournaments. Arena has a very slick interface, and I found it
to be quite simple to use, although I have seen other posters express
their confusion over Arena. You can think of Arena as being a souped
up version of XBoard/WinBoard.
Scid is more of a database program, akin to Chessbase. To me, the
interface in Scid was a little hard to get used to, but it has a whole
bunch of interesting features. I particularly like the MCO-style
opening reports that Scid generates. Scid has an analysis module, but
it can only handle winboard/xboard engines, so an adapter like
Polyglot (http://wbec-ridderkerk.nl/html/details/PolyGlot.html) is
required if you wish to use UCI engines in Scid.
Have you ever heard of a product called Jose? It's quite a nice
program, sort of a combination of what Arena and Scid have to offer,
and is open source and runs under Windows, Linux and MacOS.
http://jose-chess.sourceforge.net/ is the Jose home page.
>Given I'm not a great user of M$ Windoze software, I've no intention of
>expanding much effort to test out arena for myself, but if anyone has,
>I'd be interested what you think of it.
Tony
|
| | |
Date: 31 Oct 2006 04:42:53
From: Dave (from the UK)
Subject: Re: scid vs arena
|
Tony M wrote:
> On Tue, 31 Oct 2006 02:59:28 +0000, "Dave (from the UK)"
> <[email protected]> wrote:
>
>
>>Has anyone here compared 'scid'
>>
>>http://scid.sourceforge.net/
>>
>>with 'arena'
>>
>>http://www.playwitharena.com/
>>
>>How are they different?
>>
>>How similar are they?
>>
>>Whilst both a free, arena is closed source, which it a minus as far as I
>>am concerned. Also it only runs on Windows, which is an even bigger minus.
>>
>
>
> Apparently, new versions of Arena are coming out soon for Windows and
> Linux. The current Arena beta expires on November 14th, so it should
> be around that time. The new versions will remain free. The Windows
> version is written in Delphi; I suspect the Linux version will be a
> Kylix product. I doubt that Arena will be open source, though.
Thank you for that information.
>>But how the functionality of arena compare with scid? Someone has told a
>>friend that arena is the best.
>>
>
>
> The two programs don't really serve the same purpose.
That's useful to know. I think my friend needs a database - he will not
use the program(s) to either play online or play engine tournaments.
> Arena is for
> playing against engines, playing on ICS style servers, and organizing
> engine tournaments. Arena has a very slick interface,
He felt the interface was a lot better than scid.
> and I found it
> to be quite simple to use, although I have seen other posters express
> their confusion over Arena. You can think of Arena as being a souped
> up version of XBoard/WinBoard.
OK - a very different animal to scid.
> Scid is more of a database program, akin to Chessbase. To me, the
> interface in Scid was a little hard to get used to,
Yes, I can agree with that. Well worth the effort though.
> but it has a whole
> bunch of interesting features.
Yes.
> I particularly like the MCO-style
> opening reports that Scid generates.
I've not looked at that myself, but will investigate.
> Scid has an analysis module, but
> it can only handle winboard/xboard engines, so an adapter like
> Polyglot (http://wbec-ridderkerk.nl/html/details/PolyGlot.html) is
> required if you wish to use UCI engines in Scid.
I am using Polygrot to use the Toga engine. It's somewhat stronger than
crafty, which I used to use. That said, I tend to have two engines
running at the same time, which can be interesting. One will often find
something different to the other. Since the machine has 4 CPUs, it does
not slow down running two engines at the same time.
> Have you ever heard of a product called Jose?
Yes, I had heard of it. I've not looked at in any detail, but the Jose
website says it runs on Windows with an Intel/AMD CPU, Linux with
Intel/AMD cpu or MAC OSX with a PowerPC processor.
Unfortunately, I want to run it under Sun's Solaris, using a Sun
UltraSPARC processor.
I downloaded the source code, but there is not even a readme there, so
I've no idea how one is supposed to use it. Scid in contrast is easy to
build on Solaris.
I just downloaded Jose and put it on my Windows box. I have not
investigated it much, so can't really comment. It looks OK I guess.
> It's quite a nice
> program, sort of a combination of what Arena and Scid have to offer,
> and is open source and runs under Windows, Linux and MacOS.
> http://jose-chess.sourceforge.net/ is the Jose home page.
See comment above about me wanting for Solaris.
>>Given I'm not a great user of M$ Windoze software, I've no intention of
>>expanding much effort to test out arena for myself, but if anyone has,
>>I'd be interested what you think of it.
>
>
> Tony
Thank you for your comments Tony.
--
Dave (from the UK)
Please note my email address changes periodically to avoid spam.
It is always of the form: [email protected]
Hitting reply will work for a few months only - later set it manually.
http://witm.sourceforge.net/ (Web based Mathematica front end)
|
|
