v2.4.1

This is a bugfix release.
Thanks to lichess user Instit for reporting the problems and testing the app.

Fixes:

• Not enough space being reserved below the board when having both coordinates and engine turned on (so it wasn't possible to read the eval)
• Very minor change: Make the "best move" in analysis blank when it's mate (it used to show the previous move)

Known Issue:

• The Adobe PDF Reader has problems to open the generated PDFs, but any other PDF viewer (including browsers) work perfectly fine. If you absolutely need to use the Adobe app (why though? There's plenty of good options) you can right click in the Alpha.ttf font and install it. Adobe Acrobat will still show a warning when opening the PDF, but it will display the file. If possible, this will have a proper fix on our side in the future.

v2.4.0

As always, if you don't already have the puzzle database, download it from here and unpack it to the "puzzles" directory of the app.

What's new:

• Drag & drop support 🥳
• Option to export part of the search to PDF
• Option to save the puzzle as a jpg
• Filter by opening variation (like in lichess, but without the most unusual variations)
• It should use less CPU time
• File search dialog to make it easy to select the engine file
• Button to quickly hide the tabs (and leave just the board visible)
• In the engine evaluation the piece notation is now translated like the rest of the interface
• Add a few more piece themes and one board theme
• Fix a few issues with the chess notation (regarding disambiguation and promotion)
• Remember if the window was maximized and set it accordingly in the next run
• Fix the hint highlight not being reset when navigating to other puzzles
• Adjust the distance to mate label in the engine output (in the previous version it could show zero and negative values)

There were many changes, including very important ones under the hood, so let me know if you encounter any issue, but it should be fine.

Thanks to the contributors:

• @yuval59 for fixing a misspelling in the Readme #17
• Lichess user Instit for the updates on the French translation and many bug reports

v2.3.0

As always, download the lichess puzzle database from here and unpack it to the "puzzles" directory of the app.

I'm rushing this release a bit because of the last point in the list below, the lichess db changed it's opening field and this required a change in this app as well. If you experience any issue, please let me know.

Thanks to lichess user Instit for contributing the French translation! Translations to other languages are welcomed.

What's new:

• The interface is now translated to Portuguese, Spanish and French
• Added the option to show board coordinates
• Added the option to favorite/unfavorite puzzles and search these favorites
• Added a previous puzzle button
• Fixed compatibility with the current lichess db (they changed how the opening info is stored and so the previous offline-chess-puzzles executable wasn't working properly for this kind of search anymore)

v2.2.0

As usual, you need to download the lichess puzzle database from here and unpack it to the "puzzles" directory of the app.

What's new:

• Engine support on analysis
• Flip board (to practice seeing what's being threatened against you) #9
• The last search settings are remembered when you open the app again #8
• No more need to set the board size manually, just resize the window and it will adjust as expected (the size is also remembered the next time you open the app)
• Improved color themes
• No need to restart the app after changing settings.
• Fix the FEN on the puzzle tab, it was from the position before the opponent's move was made (I wonder if anyone had noticed this)
• Added a "copy to clipboard" button on the FEN and links.

Other Changes:

• There's no more 2 executables, the one that uses opengl has all the features we need and better compatibility, so we're only using it (Thanks for the development in the iced gui library). The next version will probably use the software renderer they are working on, which should improve compatibility further.
• In some systems people needed to manually install the vcruntime140 dll before, this should be fixed now. #3
• A few minor tweaks on the enable/disable behaviour of the buttons below the board, to make it more consistent

The Linux binaries were tested on Arch Linux and Linux Mint 21.

v2.1.0

As before, I didn't include the puzzle database in the release files, please download it from the lichess site: https://database.lichess.org/lichess_db_puzzle.csv.bz2, extract the ".csv" file and put it in the "puzzles" directory.

The opengl version inside the zip files is what I had previously called windows 7 version, it's for systems that don't have Vulkan or DirectX 12, the pieces look worse because we have to use a regular font to display them (instead of images), but other than that, the functionality is the same.

The number of puzzles classified by opening is still not very big, you can take a look at the lichess page to have an idea of how many are there. In this app the filter is just by opening family, not subvariations.

The Linux binaries I'm providing here were tested in Linux Mint 20.1 and Arch Linux. I don't know if they will work in other systems but the compilation is pretty straightforward in case you have to compile it yourself.

Changes:

• Fixed compatibility with the current lichess db (with the old version, some puzzles would be ignored due to the introduction of a couple opening fields in the database)
• Added a filter by opening (including the side to play)
• Added an option to not automatically load the next puzzle
• Added a button to redo the puzzle
• Added a takeback button in the analysis mode

Minor changes:

• Now it's visually clear which is the piece selected for promotion
• The puzzle link is shown and is selectable (previously we were just displaying the puzzle ID)
• Added the Gothic A1 font for the pieces in the opengl version, alongside the GNU Freefont that we had used before

Known issues:

• In old Windows versions (7/8), you may have to install the vcruntime140 dll (in this case there will be an error message complaining about it's absence), this dll can be obtained from Microsoft's website.

v2.0.0

Important:

I won't be including the puzzle database in the release files anymore, please download it from the lichess site: https://database.lichess.org/lichess_db_puzzle.csv.bz2, extract the ".csv" file and put it in the "puzzles" directory.

This way requires you a bit of manual work but on the other hand it makes sure the file is updated and you won't need to download again if you already have it.

Changes:

• Horizontal layout with tabs
• Puzzle information is displayed (game link, fen, rating, themes, etc.)
• Sound for moves (can be turned off)
• Basic analysis mode (let you freely move the pieces)
• Hint (highlight the piece that should be moved)
• Different piece and board themes
• Includes also 32-bit versions for Windows

Windows:

The "windows7" and "windows10" in the name in kind of an approximation:

• The version for windows 7 should also work in 8 / 8.1 and is for systems that don't have Vulkan or DirectX 12. The pieces look considerably worse and you can't change them but other than that the functionality is the same.
• The Windows 10 version should be preferred if it works in your system, since it looks way better.

Linux:

The binary file I'm providing here was compiled in Linux Mint and tested there and in Arch Linux. I don't know if it will work in other systems but the compilation is pretty straightforward in case you have to compile it yourself.

v1.1.0

General changes/fixes:

• Highlight last move (very useful to see if en passant is allowed).
• Added a config file (settings.json) to change board size, puzzle db location, piece theme (name the images the same way as the merida ones and set the directory name in the config file) and search results limit. This will (hopefully) be made easier in the future but at least a temporary way to change these things was needed right now.
• Doesn't crash anymore when all the search results are solved.

Minor changes:

• Removed a theme option ("of-player") that didn't make sense for this app.
• Include the side to move in the "Wrong move" message (for the cases when you click too fast by mistake and miss it).
• Don't start the selection if the click isn't on a piece from the side to move.

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Windows:

• Doesn't open a command prompt window anymore.
• Added another .exe (named "offline-chess-puzzles-win7.exe") for windows versions older than Windows 10. The piece theme can't be changed and is quite ugly (it uses a font and not images) but other than that, the functionality is the same.

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Linux:

• First binary release. The AppImage file is self-contained as it's supposed to be but if you want/need you can put a settings.json file (like the one in the repository) in the same directory to change things. It was tested on Arch Linux and Linux Mint 20.1.

v1.0.0 (Windows release)

This is the first release, there's a lot of things that could be improved but it's already fully functional (the zip also includes the lichess puzzle db, so no need to manually download it yourself).

I'm doing this Windows release first both because in Linux we're more used to compiling things ourselves and also because I still need to check how exactly I should distribute Linux binaries.