Talk:GNU Go

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Thanks, Evercat. You have enlightened us all.

If you want a quick game of 9x9, I'll start with C-2. --Uncle Ed 14:52, 17 Oct 2003 (UTC)

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Complete duffer would like a "HOW-TO" for installing this sucker on a Windows XP laptop with a graphical interface; Jago looks nice but neither website has any information on how to connect the two together. (I know it's more manly to compile it direct from the source but frankly I don't have the time or the energy and I'd like not to fsck up my machine any more than Bill Gates already did.) Phil 15:03, Nov 25, 2003 (UTC)

Heh. Download a binary from [1]. Unzip it - you should now have gnugo.exe.

Assuming you already have Jago installed, fire it up and select Play Go (GMP) from the Actions menu. Type in the path to gnugo.exe (e.g. C:\gnugo.exe or whatever) and click OK. That should work.

gGo is even easier - once it's installed, you can go to the preferences menu (from the first window of the app) and go to the advanced tab - you can then click Select and use the graphical open dialog to locate gnugo.exe. Then from the front window, click on Play GNU Go. Evercat 21:57, 25 Nov 2003 (UTC)

I used Jago, and it seemed almost as easy as you said. I have to say, however, that if the people who produce this software ever want it to be used by more than a tiny fraction of the planet, they're going to have to put a lot more work into the installation side of things. I've been using computers for decades and I thought the idea was they were supposed to become easier and less arcane (this from a nut who still wants to shoe-horn RedHat Linux into a Dell P-60 because I don't want to throw the beast out). 'Nuff said, now I just have to learn how to play this sucker and I'm away. Still, it beats reading all those books and trying to imagine what it looks like. Phil 12:01, Nov 26, 2003 (UTC)

Hmm, there's not much incentive for the GNU Go people to start making graphical user interfaces themselves; for one thing others already exist and for another, it would be harder to make it cross-platform.

What can happen though is for the people who make the GUIs to distribute GNU Go as part of the package, Sente Software does this with their product for Mac OS X, Goban, which includes GNU Go "out of the box". Evercat 12:52, 26 Nov 2003 (UTC)

Actually that would be better than the current situation. At the moment the various "installation" packages you get are basically ZIP files which you extract into a sub-folder of "Program Files". This is not the way people should be doing stuff nowadays. The idea is to spread the word, not keep it tightly held amongst the "gnostic" community. The idea of GNU was to set the concept free of the big companies who were charging obscene licensing fees, not to produce yet another geek-fest of obscure incantations and pseudo-religious rites... OK, I'm done for now :-) Phil 16:17, Nov 26, 2003 (UTC)

Heh. Sorry, but I used to own a Mac, and I really despise the horrible installation system of Windows. Why can't I just unzip the binary and put it wherever I like, anyway? This is a bit off-topic, though. :-) Evercat 20:07, 26 Nov 2003 (UTC)