FAQ (frequently asked questions)
Here is the list of questions that have been answered, click on (or scroll down to) the one that interests you.
Q: What are the system requirements for this software?
Q: How to restore a broken configuration ?
Q: Critical error message - missing file "msvbvm60.dll".
Q: "Run-time error '52': bad file name or number".
Q: Does this software run only on MS Windows ?
Q: After adding opening book files, the interface crashes...
Q: Is this all free and what are the guarantees?
Q: Is it possible to convert ‘crafty.exe’ VB6 source code to VB .NET ?
Q: The program is too slow (performance is poor)...
Q: How to use the 'Analyze' button?
Q: How to use the ‘Engine’ tab (available from the ‘Crafty: Control Panel’)
Q: Does this stuff (GUI) support Winboard/UCI?
Q: How do I
get started?
A: First download the binaries (zip archive),
use some decompression utility to extract the binaries from the archive
(generally this means right clicking on zip file and choosing 'extract'
option). Next start the main program executable file "crafty.exe"
(the one that has two chess pieces drawn on it). If you receive any errors -
read this article further.
Q: What are the system requirements for this software?
A: The following is an estimation of technical parameters for your computer to support this program:
OS: Win9x/ME/2K/XP/Vista,7, Wine
HDD: 10Mb of free disk space
Screen: 800x600, 256 colors (16-bit colors recommended, though the program is usable even on 16 color display)
The following is minimum, but also depending on OS:
RAM: 64 Mb
CPU: ~300Mhz
System libraries: Visual Basic 6 Run-Time
Q: "Run-time
error '339': Component '???.OCX' or one of its dependencies not correctly
registered: a file is missing or invalid".
A: This means that the program is unable to
register and use the required OCX control files - most likely you aren't logged
on Windows as true Administrator. This is particularly frequently met on
Windows Vista. You will have to enable the true Administrator's account and
start the program from it, later it should run from any user.
An article about how to activate the true administrator’s mode on Windows Vista
can be found here
or here.
A simple way to do this is - to open the "Control Panel",
("Administrative Tools") "Computer Management", "Local
Users and Groups", "Users" folder, now to the right you should
see the "Administrator" icon, right click its context menu and choose
"Properties". Remove the check mark from the "Account Is
Disabled" box and click "OK", the next time you will start
Windows you should see the Administrator account logon option. (only experienced Windows users who know what they are
doing should mess with this on their own!)
Q: How to restore a broken configuration ?
A: try “Tools - Options - Defaults – Yes”
You may alternatively reset all configurations by opening Windows Registry Editor (regedit.exe), and deleting the following key "HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\VB and VBA Program Settings\Valters'n'Co\CraftyChess4.0" (i.e. to right click on 'CraftyChess4.0' and choose 'delete' – Windows Registry manipulations should be done only by an experienced Windows user)
In some cases you may also try to delete the files ".\crafty.rc" and ".\data\crafty.dat".
Window positions can be restored via the menu “Windows – Default positions”.
Q: Critical
error message - missing file "msvbvm60.dll".
A: This is almost
definitely due to missing "VB6 Run-time library" on your system.
You can get the installation of this library from the
following link:
http://download.microsoft.com/.../VB6
.0-KB290887-X86.exe
(most Windows versions include this library - this
download is for Wine, Win9x or other rare users)
In some cases the installation of this library may not work, a possible solution is to extract (using some archive decompression agent) the run-time library files into the main directory of the Crafty Chess (msvbvm60.dll and others next to crafty.exe and others). Also in some rare cases (like Windows95) you may need to update Internet Explorer for this library to function!
Q: "Run-time
error '52': bad file name or number".
A: Check to see if the path to crafty.exe
doesn't contain any non-ansi characters - that is some folder name in path to
the folder where you unzipped the binaries is not in English (Cyrillic or
something). The safest course is then to try putting your binaries in some
folder like "c:\craftychess\".
Q: Does
this software run only on MS Windows ?
A: No, there are emulators and compatibility
layers that provide ability for other OS (Macintosh, Linux/Unix etc.) users to
run Windows programs. A very great one is Wine
(However this may require advanced computer skills.)
Q: Program
works fine, but Crafty starts to think from the very first move, is there any
computer opening book?
A: Yes there is! There are three book files
you can get from Dr. Hyatt's ftp site :
ftp://ftp.cis.uab.edu/pub/hyatt/book/
You must place them in the same directory where the
main executable file ("crafty.exe") is.
Q: After
adding opening book files, the interface crashes...
A: You probably added Crafty book files from
wrong version of Crafty. You should only add the suggested book files! (see
previous question)
Q: Is
this all free and what are the guarantees?
A: Yes it is absolutely free! As I state in
the license file - it is here, because I don't mind sharing it. There are
however no guarantees - you must use it at your own risk!
Q: What
are the limitations?
A: The only limitation is that you may not
redistribute it in any modified form. (Unless you receive a written permission
from me)
Q: What
about source code?
A: It is provided as additional download. It
requires "Microsoft Visual Basic 6" and Code Blocks
with "Mingw" compiler for you to be able to
fully modify the program. (and of course - good C and Basic language programming skills...)
Q: Is it possible to convert ‘crafty.exe’ VB6 source code to VB .NET ?
A: I have tried this, and realized, that due to wide API usage and large amounts of incompatible code this is almost impossible – it would probably be easier to rewrite the whole program on VB .NET from scratch…
Q: The program is too slow (performance is poor)...
A: There are a couple of things you can do to improve the program's performance. First of all, if you are using WindowsXP or later Windows version you should have visual styles enabled by default, they will take up more run-time memory and require more CPU time, you can remove them by deleting (or renaming) the 'crafty.exe.manifest' file.
Also you can change two things about piece movement animation - you can remove piece sliding and remove piece movement while they are being held by the user. Both options can be found under 'Tools - Options' menu - 'Movement animation' and 'Animate manual piece moving' correspondingly.
You may also try to disable the sound via 'Tools - sound' menu. (though this may help little)
And you can disable the Crafty engine output text, by opening the 'Crafty Window' ('Windows - Crafty Window' menu) and removing the 'output' checkbox mark.
The very last thing might be to decrease the window/board size via 'Windows - mode' menu.
Q: How to use the 'Analyze' button?
A: When you click the 'Analyze' button, the 'Crafty Window' will automatically open and Crafty analysis mode will be activated. In this mode Crafty just evaluates the current board position and prints its evaluations in the 'Crafty Window'. The most important factor 'score number' should be highlighted automatically, a positive number will mean that white is better by that amount of pawns and a negative number will mean that black is better by that number of pawns. As the search progresses a better and better (more accurate) estimation should be found. If you have opening book enabled in opening it will just print the book moves, in this case remove the 'Book' checkbox, and it will then continue evaluation on its own. Current version will automatically exit the Analysis mode when you close 'Crafty Window', but you can also exit it by pressing the 'Stop' button.
Q: How to use the ‘Engine’ tab (available from the ‘Crafty: Control Panel’)
A: Generally, if you don’t know how to use it – don’t use it! This is for advanced users who want to experiment with the various Crafty chess engine evaluation parameters, that in theory allows you to create custom Crafty personalities with different playing styles.
Any changes you make to these parameters are only applied to the engine when you click the ‘Apply’ button. These changes are for current Crafty chess session only (meaning they won’t affect the program when you start crafty.exe next time), but you can make them permanent by clicking the ‘Save’ button and saving ‘crafty.cpf’ in the main directory of the binaries. Please remember if you do this, since it will change the way Crafty thinks permanently until you either delete the ‘crafty.cpf’ or replace it with one containing different settings. Also this overrides the default skill setting (for every new session). The only exception is that Crafty Chess will always automatically load default personality during the Tournament mode, but will restore your settings when the tournament game is over.
For additional meaning of every parameter read the Crafty documentation and/or search net, read Crafty source code. In case of two value parameter it will always mean that the first parameters affects evaluation parameter for middle game stage, and the second affects if for the endgame stage ([mg] [eg] format). Some additional info can be found if you type ‘pers list’ command in the ‘Crafty Window’. Also take in consideration, that multiple square values, that you edit in a special dialog are always for the white side. The same values for the black side will be the same or will be automatically mirrored!
( In general this is only for experimentation! )
Q: Does this stuff (GUI) support Winboard/UCI?
No (except from Crafty engine Winboard support) it does not! And most likely it won't, since it has not been the main interest of the author, neither he has time for its implementation... ( i.e. you can play only against Crafty on this interface! )