uci

Introduction

uci is a client package for Universal Chess Interface protocol (UCI) compliant engines (such as Stockfish).

Installation

uci requires an engine to be useful. On macOS you can install Stockfish with:

brew install stockfish

All installation methods are listed on Stockfish's Download Page

Supported Commands

Engine's Run method takes commands that implement the Cmd interface. Here is a supported commands:

Example Stockfish v. Stockfish

package main

import (
	"fmt"
	"time"

	"github.com/notnil/chess"
	"github.com/notnil/chess/uci"
)

func main() {
	// set up engine to use stockfish exe
	eng, err := uci.New("stockfish")
	if err != nil {
		panic(err)
	}
	defer eng.Close()
	// initialize uci with new game
	if err := eng.Run(uci.CmdUCI, uci.CmdIsReady, uci.CmdUCINewGame); err != nil {
		panic(err)
	}
	// have stockfish play speed chess against itself (10 msec per move)
	game := chess.NewGame()
	for game.Outcome() == chess.NoOutcome {
		cmdPos := uci.CmdPosition{Position: game.Position()}
		cmdGo := uci.CmdGo{MoveTime: time.Second / 100}
		if err := eng.Run(cmdPos, cmdGo); err != nil {
			panic(err)
		}
		move := eng.SearchResults().BestMove
		if err := game.Move(move); err != nil {
			panic(err)
		}
	}
	fmt.Println(game.String())
	// Output: 
	// 1.c4 c5 2.Nf3 e6 3.Nc3 Nc6 4.d4 cxd4 5.Nxd4 Nf6 6.a3 d5 7.cxd5 exd5 8.Bf4 Bc5 9.Ndb5 O-O 10.Nc7 d4 11.Na4 Be7 12.Nxa8 Bf5 13.g3 Qd5 14.f3 Rxa8 15.Bg2 Rd8 16.b4 Qe6 17.Nc5 Bxc5 18.bxc5 Nd5 19.O-O Nc3 20.Qd2 Nxe2+ 21.Kh1 d3 22.Bd6 Qd7 23.Rab1 h6 24.a4 Re8 25.g4 Bg6 26.a5 Ncd4 27.Qb4 Qe6 28.Qxb7 Nc2 29.Qxa7 Ne3 30.Rb8 Nxf1 31.Qb6 d2 32.Rxe8+ Qxe8 33.Qb3 Ne3 34.h3 Bc2 35.Qxc2 Nxc2 36.Kh2 d1=Q 37.h4 Qg1+ 38.Kh3 Ne1 39.h5 Qxg2+ 40.Kh4 Nxf3#  0-1
}