Re: [XBoard-devel] Opening pgn files in xboard

[h.g. muller]

At 17:41 30-12-2011 +0100, Byrial Jensen wrote:

> All subtypes (the subtype is the part after the slash) starting with x- 
> are unofficial and may be made by everyone.

OK, I defined a new type appliction/x-xboard-tourney, next to x-chess-fen 
an x-chess-pgn.
I also made xpm icon files, installed everything as you instructed, and it 
works!

So now the only thing left is to see that these xdg commands are performed 
on make-install.

But does any other programs use FEN-files and are they really needed? I 
mean isn't it better to put a FEN position into a PGN-file where you do 
have metadata to tell which game the position is taken from?

FEN files (and similar EPD files) are quite common in computer chess. 
People use them as start positions for engine tourneys. WinBoard 
(optionally) creates an associated with FEN files when you install it, and 
I think most other Chess GUIs do that as well.

> Yes. The desktop files for mimetype association should also have a 
> "NoDisplay=true" line which means that no menu entry will be made from the 
> desktop file.

OK, I created 3 more desktop files (for PGN, FEN and TRN), and the 
associations work like a charm. I am ust contemplating how to make this 
more user-configurable. Currently I start the PGN handler with tthe command

Exec=xboard -ncp -lgf %f

The "-lpf %f" is of course mandatory, but that the user wants -ncp mode is 
not obvious. It could be that he wants his favorite analysis engine to be 
automatically loaded, e.g.

Exec=xboard -fcp crafty -lgf %f
Exec=xboard -fcp stockfish -fUCI -lgf %f

Perhaps we should make a more-easily configurable command, like

Exec=xboard -ncp -opt ~/.pgnviewrc -lgf %f

So that the user could create a file .pgnviewrc stuffed with options to 
configure XBoard for this partiular application (including 
"-saveSettingsOnExit false" to prevent they leak into the persistent 
settings file). Not sure how this could best be organied. Perhaps there 
should be a directory ~/.xboard where these type of settings files could be 
collected.