Hi Hans

The Teensy USB Development Board that I use and Berger coded for me just emulates a keyboard.

First you have to untick the read only attribute in the Montreux cfg properties (Screenshot 1).

Then you change the Steadykey to zero in the Core Input Option of the Montreux ini file (Screenshot 2).

Now you have to try and work out which square corresponds to the Unamed Key in the Root (Screenshot 3).

First on your keyboard, change all the Named keys (New Game etc) to none.

Then input a1 (Kbd A Kbd 1) into any Unnamed Key then return to machine and press the a1 square on your physical board. What happens then is that although you have programmed the Unnamed Key to the a1 square it probably indicates another square on the PC graphical board.

You now go back into the Root and change the wrong programmed Unnamed Key (a1) to the actual PC board square.

Now you have found your first correct square you continue doing this for all the 64 squares.

Final screenshot of my board working with the Montreux program.

I hope this helps you in understanding how it communicates.

Regards
Bryan

Hello Bryan,
yes, thanks for your explanation!

I've also already experimented with this method long time ago (when I tried to allow entering moves with the PC keyboard instead of the mouse),
but the problem is, that you always have to press 2 keys at the same time on the keyboard (e.g. A and 2 for a mouseclick on a2),
and that's not really comfortable. But for your external board this is indeed a very clever method.

Since your way to find out the correct square for these 'Unnamed Key' entries in the Tab menu is very time-consuming, I've now added the right square names to the board sensors in ALL devices, i.e. now you see "Square A1", "Square A2" etc. instead of 'Unnamed Key' in the Tab menu. Of course you still have to make these assigment manually, but at least you see now the board square in the list and can immediately enter the right keys.
So it will be much easier for you to add more CB-Emu modules to your external board.

Here is this new Update3:
https://www89.zippyshare.com/v/V8LRJfR4/file.html
(apart from these new square labels nothing has changed, so you can just use these new EXEs without having to change anything in your existing configuration).

Now I have one more question:
With your method moves made on your external board are sent to CB-Emu on the PC, but the other direction is not possible, right?
IOW, when the chess module in CB-Emu makes a move, you still have to look at the PC screen to see this move, i.e. the board LEDs on your external board do NOT show this move, right?
Or have you even found any additional trick, so that your external board 'gets' the moves from CB-Emu?

In principle this should be possible, especially now with the new PGN feature in the last versions, because whenever CB-Emu writes a move into 'gamelog.pgn', it could also send this move to any other target (file, console, screen, USB etc.).
So in fact a 'full' communication (only for moves of course) between an external board and CB-Emu should be possible -
only the direction 'CB-Emu to external board' would have to be solved.

Regards,
Franz

Well, going back to the whole 'bill' issue, I am certainly in when it comes to this. If it were in fact possible to connect CB-Emu to a Millennium Exclusive Board or a DGT-board, it would definitely be a HUGE incentive to buy one of those....

But Franz, believe me, I am a very happy man already if CB-Emu should stay as it is!

Greetings,
hyppyp

Hi,

Why not CERTABO chess board?

I believe that right now is the ideal electronic chessboard to develop this project, for its open communication protocol, availability of source code under GPL V3.0 license, ...

Open protocol: This means that the information about positions, names of pieces and commands for the leds are available on the USB port in ASCII format and can be read by any software with serial interface. In other words it means that the board can be controlled by other hardware and software platform as you wish.

Certabo software: We would be pleased to give! Certabo® software source codes for PI and PC are available under GPL V3.0 license, this means that as buyer and user of the Certabo® platform you have the right to receive them together with the binary code if you ask for them and do whatever you want but under the same license terms.

More info: https://www.certabo.com/faq/

Regards,
Gerardo (aka berger)

Hi Franz

Many thanks indeed for your kind update and it will now make my life much easier 😀

Unfortunately I don't contribute whatsoever to the coding of the Teensy USB Development Board as this is kindly provided by my friend Berger, so I am not in a position to comment on the communications of the board.

The interesting comment by Berger about communicating with the Certabo electronic chess boards is that I own one and to be able to use it with your software would be the ultimate chess board for me personally 👍

Many thanks again for the update

Regards from England
Bryan

Hi,

This code is for my SolusChess board, which does not have LEDs in the squares, and which emulates a keyboard in order to send the moves, and therefore its communication is unidirectional. Certabo is a much more suitable platform for this.

Regards,
Gerardo

Well, building such full (bidirectional) communication is nothing for me, this would definitely be a task for any MAME developer -
only they know the MAME system very well, have good hardware knowledge and can write the necessary C code much better than me.

And for this they won't even need my CB-Emu version (or its source code) - since all moves are displayed (by LEDs) and made on the external board,
the original (official) MAME version without my enhancements would be sufficient, because in this case the display of chess pieces on the MAME screen
is not needed at all.

Regards,
Franz