Pasting moves or positions from clipboard

 

ChessPartner allows you to take move notation lists from the clipboard. These are handled in sequence and tested for validity. A couple of rules must be obeyed:

 

The moves on the clipboard must be in a text format, not graphical. When a non-text format is present the paste function is disabled.

 

The moves on the clipboard are appended to any existing moves in the current list! So, when you have a list that's from the very beginning of a chess game, you must first select new game before pasting the list

 

The notation format is flexible but requires attention. Any leading move numbers are accepted but not used. Punctuation and spacing characters are also ignored. Both long and short notation are then understood, chess specifics like '+' and '++' are not interpreted.

 

During the paste function each move is verified and only put on the board when found valid. When an invalid move or move notation is detected an error message is popped up and the process halts.

 

Note that sometimes a move notation may have two meanings, the so called ambiguous move. This will open up a window with the available valid moves that apply for the notation. Usually a chess player picks out the correct move. In case you picked the wrong move the chess brain may stop the pasting some moves further down the list . . . ! try choosing one of the other moves when you repeat the paste. Do not forget to reset the current move list first.

 

*By using the long notation format on the clipboard, any ambiguity problem is avoided.

 

It is also possible to paste a position from the clipboard, the position must be in FEN notation format.

 

FEN is "Forsyth-Edwards Notation"; it is a standard for describing chess positions using the ASCII character set.

 

A single FEN record uses one text line of variable length composed of six data fields.

 

FEN specifies the piece placement, the active color, the castling availability, the en passant target square, the halfmove clock, and the fullmove number. These can all fit on a single text line in an easily read format.  The length of a FEN position description varies somewhat according to the position.

 

The first field represents the placement of the pieces on the board.  The board contents are specified starting with the eighth rank and ending with the first rank. For each rank, the squares are specified from file a to file h.  White pieces are identified by uppercase SAN piece letters ("PNBRQK") and black pieces are identified by lowercase SAN piece letters ("pnbrqk").  Empty squares are represented by the digits one through eight; the digit used represents the count of contiguous empty squares along a rank.  A solidus character "/" is used to separate data of adjacent ranks.

 

The second field represents the active color.  A lower case "w" is used if White is to move; a lower case "b" is used if Black is the active player.

 

The third field represents castling availability.  This indicates potential future castling that may or may not be possible at the moment due to blocking pieces or enemy attacks.  If there is no castling availability for either side, the single character symbol "-" is used.  Otherwise, a combination of from one to four characters are present.  If White has kingside castling availability, the uppercase letter "K" appears.  If White has queenside castling availability, the uppercase letter "Q" appears.  If Black has kingside castling availability, the lowercase letter "k" appears.  If Black has queenside castling availability, then the lowercase letter "q" appears.  Those letters which appear will be ordered first uppercase before lowercase and second kingside before queenside.  There is no white space between the letters.

 

The fourth field is the en passant target square.  If there is no en passant target square then the single character symbol "-" appears.  If there is an en passant target square then is represented by a lowercase file character immediately followed by a rank digit.  Obviously, the rank digit will be "3" following a white pawn double advance (Black is the active color) or else be the digit "6" after a black pawn double advance (White being the active color).

 

An en passant target square is given if and only if the last move was a pawn advance of two squares.  Therefore, an en passant target square field may have a square name even if there is no pawn of the opposing side that may immediately execute the en passant capture.

 

The fifth field is a nonnegative integer representing the halfmove clock. This number is the count of halfmoves (or ply) since the last pawn advance or capturing move.  This value is used for the fifty move draw rule.

 

The sixth and last field is a positive integer that gives the fullmove number. This will have the value "1" for the first move of a game for both White and Black.  It is incremented by one immediately after each move by Black.

 

Here's the FEN for the starting position:

 

rnbqkbnr/pppppppp/8/8/8/8/PPPPPPPP/RNBQKBNR w KQkq - 0 1

 

And after the move 1. e4:

 

rnbqkbnr/pppppppp/8/8/4P3/8/PPPP1PPP/RNBQKBNR b KQkq e3 0 1

 

And then after 1. ... c5:

 

rnbqkbnr/pp1ppppp/8/2p5/4P3/8/PPPP1PPP/RNBQKBNR w KQkq c6 0 2

 

New in this version is the ability to directly paste PGN games. In that case the complete game is loaded including the various tags, comments and variations.