Playing online with a DGT Electronic Board using the Board API

@BaronVonChickenpants lichess is not "any" chess website its like certainly in the top 3 in the world if not the 1st (in terms of userbase/games played daily)

And I WOULD expect from a company that asks you 600 euro for an electronic chess board to have the decency to actually make it work with the most popular online interfaces for chess.

I really don't understand how companies managed through PR to make the clients so apologetic towards them this is the reason you need to pay 1500 euro for a smartphone (a small screen a battery and a small pcb all worth like 50$ to manufacture when including the scale of production) just because it has a logo on it.

@BaronVonChickenpants lichess is not "any" chess website its like certainly in the top 3 in the world if not the 1st (in terms of userbase/games played daily) And I WOULD expect from a company that asks you 600 euro for an electronic chess board to have the decency to actually make it work with the most popular online interfaces for chess. I really don't understand how companies managed through PR to make the clients so apologetic towards them this is the reason you need to pay 1500 euro for a smartphone (a small screen a battery and a small pcb all worth like 50$ to manufacture when including the scale of production) just because it has a logo on it.

Chivas610

#32

@andrescavallin :
I did one another test this evening, and only problem I experienced was the false warning about "illegal move". After restart, it was ok.
Might not be a too big issue, but I had like 50 sec left on clock so got a bit stressed :D
Would be nice if it's a fixable bug.

@andrescavallin : I did one another test this evening, and only problem I experienced was the false warning about "illegal move". After restart, it was ok. Might not be a too big issue, but I had like 50 sec left on clock so got a bit stressed :D Would be nice if it's a fixable bug.

andrescavallin

#33

Already working on improvements, thanks all for the feedback!!!
Big surprise coming soon, a couple of weeks I think.

Already working on improvements, thanks all for the feedback!!! Big surprise coming soon, a couple of weeks I think.

achava_06

#34

My friend has this board and if the time starts to get to low he plays with the mouse. Make sure you are not too low on time with play. Good work @andrescavallin. Un día en el futuro yo quiero comprar ese tablero de ajedrez :)

BaronVonChickenpants

edited

#35

@drunkenM4ST4 The boards were not originally intended for online play, they were for recording games you played OTB or for streaming tournaments.

It's a legitimate point of view, but this is not the thread for that discussion.

@drunkenM4ST4 The boards were not originally intended for online play, they were for recording games you played OTB or for streaming tournaments. It's a legitimate point of view, but this is not the thread for that discussion.

mcfacciaron

#36

Dear @andrescavallin thank you for your work for us! Tomorrow I will try with my USB DGT board if I am able to set the software

WindowMaker

#37

https://lichess.org/dgt

Also try this and give feedback on the beta if you have a dgt board.

https://lichess.org/dgt Also try this and give feedback on the beta if you have a dgt board.

andrescavallin

#38

Oh yes!! That was the surprise but please wait a couple of days since I need to fix a bug with castling that I will fix today but it may take some days to reach production

BaronVonChickenpants

edited

#39

Can't wait to try it again! Did you fix the underpromotion bug?

andrescavallin

#40

@AV-57 @BaronVonChickenpants @EdForceOne @mcfacciaron @achava_06 @Chivas610 @Bracco @TheChessRuminater @Godking666 @Dcavallin

Hello dear chess lovers, so today I am super happy to announce that DGT Board support is officially integrated into Lichess.org and we are ready for the BETA phase !!!

https://lichess.org/dgt

Thanks to all of you for testing previous versions. I fixed the underpromotion bug and I also tested timing out with different scenarios so those two things should work, but if you experience this problems again or any other problem please report this to me in this same forum post, but the logs that are shown on the console its better that you send them in direct message. I also fixed castling problems.

If you are lazy or super desperate to test, jejeje just go there right now. If you have time, please continue to read to have a better experience and avoid problems.

Current beta status is stable enough to test playing against real opponents, just keep in mind this:

Time controls for casual games: Classical, Correspondence and Rapid only.
Time controls for rated games: Classical, Correspondence and some Rapids including 15+10 and 20+0

If you start a game, let's say, 10+5 then it won't work since APIs are restricted, at the moment you can only use the board with the time controls mentioned above.

Another common problem is that if by mistake you open two browser tabs with
https://lichess.org/dgt/play
Then they will fight over the connection and you will experience problems. This is because the Board API is limited to one connection at a time. Make sure you only have one tab.

The tab can be minimized, hidden or set side to side with the playing page, but it needs to be open during the game. There is no need to refresh or reopen this tab when playing a new game, but it may be helpful to do so after you set the pieces back to the starting position.

If you forget to perform your opponents move and then play your move, this will be considered an illegal move. Also if you perform and illegal move and don't notice this will create problems. So basically if there is no illegal moves everything will go fine, but I think it is inevitable that at some point you will perform some kind of illegal move.

To avoid problems understand that, calculating the move from the position is a complex problem. For example DGT Board send positions change even when you have the piece in the air, so DGT Board may send one, two or even 3 positions for one move. For that reason I trust the LiveChess 2.X program to calculate the move. This program is the one doing that magic. But... if you perform a couple of illegal moves, then the LiveChess program will get confused and will keep on sending the position but will not be able to determined what was the move that was played.

If that ever happens, make sure both DGT Board and Lichess.org have the same position and reload the page. What this will do is to send the current Lichess position to the LiveChess program as the "setup starting position" so now, moves can be detected again.
This means that it is possible to continue correspondence games over several sessions, even if you moved pieces around, as long as the position matches on both program at the time you reload the page, you can continue to play already started games.

I suggest that you setup the board to the initial position before opening the https://lichess.org/dgt/play page. I see that LiveChess is smart enough to know that you are setting up the board to start a new game, but if you face a problem, its better to first setup the pieces, then start a new game.

I hope this helps and feel free to come with bugs and features requests. One thing that I already know I need to do is when you have two started games, you will need to pickup one. Currently the board will be attached automatically to the first game it founds. Since blitz games cannot be played, it is ok if you have let's say a correspondence game going on the board and in the meantime you play other fast games.

Finally thanks to Thibault Duplessis and Niklas Fiekas for the support during this development.

@AV-57 @BaronVonChickenpants @EdForceOne @mcfacciaron @achava_06 @Chivas610 @Bracco @TheChessRuminater @Godking666 @Dcavallin Hello dear chess lovers, so today I am super happy to announce that DGT Board support is officially integrated into Lichess.org and we are ready for the BETA phase !!! https://lichess.org/dgt Thanks to all of you for testing previous versions. I fixed the underpromotion bug and I also tested timing out with different scenarios so those two things should work, but if you experience this problems again or any other problem please report this to me in this same forum post, but the logs that are shown on the console its better that you send them in direct message. I also fixed castling problems. If you are lazy or super desperate to test, jejeje just go there right now. If you have time, please continue to read to have a better experience and avoid problems. Current beta status is stable enough to test playing against real opponents, just keep in mind this: Time controls for casual games: Classical, Correspondence and Rapid only. Time controls for rated games: Classical, Correspondence and some Rapids including 15+10 and 20+0 If you start a game, let's say, 10+5 then it won't work since APIs are restricted, at the moment you can only use the board with the time controls mentioned above. Another common problem is that if by mistake you open two browser tabs with https://lichess.org/dgt/play Then they will fight over the connection and you will experience problems. This is because the Board API is limited to one connection at a time. Make sure you only have one tab. The tab can be minimized, hidden or set side to side with the playing page, but it needs to be open during the game. There is no need to refresh or reopen this tab when playing a new game, but it may be helpful to do so after you set the pieces back to the starting position. If you forget to perform your opponents move and then play your move, this will be considered an illegal move. Also if you perform and illegal move and don't notice this will create problems. So basically if there is no illegal moves everything will go fine, but I think it is inevitable that at some point you will perform some kind of illegal move. To avoid problems understand that, calculating the move from the position is a complex problem. For example DGT Board send positions change even when you have the piece in the air, so DGT Board may send one, two or even 3 positions for one move. For that reason I trust the LiveChess 2.X program to calculate the move. This program is the one doing that magic. But... if you perform a couple of illegal moves, then the LiveChess program will get confused and will keep on sending the position but will not be able to determined what was the move that was played. If that ever happens, make sure both DGT Board and Lichess.org have the same position and reload the page. What this will do is to send the current Lichess position to the LiveChess program as the "setup starting position" so now, moves can be detected again. This means that it is possible to continue correspondence games over several sessions, even if you moved pieces around, as long as the position matches on both program at the time you reload the page, you can continue to play already started games. I suggest that you setup the board to the initial position before opening the https://lichess.org/dgt/play page. I see that LiveChess is smart enough to know that you are setting up the board to start a new game, but if you face a problem, its better to first setup the pieces, then start a new game. I hope this helps and feel free to come with bugs and features requests. One thing that I already know I need to do is when you have two started games, you will need to pickup one. Currently the board will be attached automatically to the first game it founds. Since blitz games cannot be played, it is ok if you have let's say a correspondence game going on the board and in the meantime you play other fast games. Finally thanks to Thibault Duplessis and Niklas Fiekas for the support during this development.

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