Welcome to Scidb

Scidb ("Scidb is a Chess Information Data Base") is a chess database application for Linux/Unix and Windows. Scidb is inspired by Scid ("Shane's Chess Information Database"), but it is a completely new development.

The principal features of this chess database application:

  • Support of various chess variants:
  • Support of Chess 960  and Shuffle Chess 
  • Support of various database and file formats:
    Scidb: .sci, .scv
    Scid: .si3, .si4
    ChessBase: .cbh, .cbf (read-only)
    PGN: .pgn, .pgn.gz, .zip
  • 28 different SVG/TrueType chess piece sets
  • User-configurable chess board themes (based on SVG)
  • CQL based search functions (in development)
  • PDF export (in preparation)
    • News

    The third public preview version is released (see Download). This version contains many, many bug-fixes, and also many novelties. Some time will pass until the first stable version, but it's not far anymore. The most important missing goals are:

  • Flexible window layout (unfortunately very complicated)
  • Searching and filtering functionality: search of games, position search, etc. The search functionality will be based on CQL (Chess Query Language; see CQL Manual).
  • Multiple selections in game list
  • Support of Bughouse games
  • Support of variants (Crazyhouse, Antichess, Three-Check) in opening tree
  • Input of games with keyboard
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    With the implementation of this items the first full version will be released - possibly with the next version.

    Of course the Windows version is pending. This requires:

  • A (quite complex) library to emulate the missing functions fopencookie(), and open_memstream() under Windows.
  • Porting all system specific functionalities, so far completely implemented only under Unix - currently the porting is done partially under Windows.
  • Intensive testing because the GUI has a different behavior under Windows.
    • What's new in third version?

    The most important novelties are:

  • Support of different chess variants: Crazyhouse, Antichess (Suicide, Giveaway, Losers), and Three-Check. In current version the support is still a bit experimentally, but with full functionality.
  • Analysis window with support of external chess engines. Due to the lack of the still missing window layout a standalone window will be opened for analysis.
  • Dialog for setup of external chess engines. Two chess engines are already pre-installed:
    • Stockfish (supports Chess 960, and Three-Check)
    • Sjeng (supports Crazyhouse, Antichess, and later Bughouse)
  • Automatic update of supplements via the Internet, currently these are the player photo files.
  • Integration of format independent database archives. Among other things this facilitates an easier shipping of databases via Internet.
  • Drag&Drop between databases.
  • Mouse wheel support for all list windows and the chess board.
  • Serious performance problem when opening ChessBase databases is solved.
  • Merge of games, optionally takes into account move transitions.
  • Game editor now features various settings.
  • There exists a player dictionary (with sorting and filtering functionality) and an engine dictionary.

    • More novelties:

  • Move input: pressing middle mouse button (or spacebar) alternates the move suggestion
  • New database tab: list of sites
  • Full-screen mode tweaked
  • Command line tool cdb2sci added for conversion of databases to Scidb format (.sci)
  • HTML widget reworked: saving resources in a highly significant way
  • Swedish localization integrated (thanks to Lars Ekman)
  • Spanish translation reactivated (thanks to Juan Carlos Vásquez)
  • Spanish help pages added (thanks to Carlos Fernando González)
  • HTML file export of tournament table
  • New piece sets: "Free Staunton", and "Virtual"
  • New board themes: "Blue Theme", "Staunton", and "Virtual"
  • Automatic detection of character set when encoding games (only for si3/si4/cbh)
  • Game browser: full-screen mode integrated, and also maximize/minimize board
  • File selection dialog improved; Drag&Drop among other things
  • Game-Save/Replace dialog improved
  • Player notecards implemented
  • Database window: docking/undocking of list tabs integrated
  • Move input with mouse overworked (if move suggestion is disabled)
  • Menu bar removed: instead a simple main menu exists; this is state-of-the-art, and the layout will be improved
  • Compacting database (.sci only) integrated; required for the physical removal of games marked for deletion
  • Tournament table: optional display of win/draw/loss
  • Algebraic (normal, short, and long), English, Correspondence, and Telegraphic move notations available
  • Now it is possible to import databases without to open beforehand
  • Severe problem with Tcl version 8.6 solved
  • More help pages
  • Some icons newly designed
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