Auto232

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Zauberlehrling ¹

Auto232,
an autoplayer protocol based on the serial communication RS-232 standard. It was initially developed by Chrilly Donninger in the mid 90s to communicate with the Chess 232 Board. A MS-DOS TSR driver, available for various chess programs, was able to "hook" into their printer output to parse their moves played, and to redirect input and commands into the keyboard buffer to start new games and enter moves.

With two PCs, or two COM ports even with one computer ¹, connected by a modified null-modem cable, it was now possible to play matches between two programs automaticly, a huge relief for testers and engine rating list organizations like SSDF. The Auto232 product with cable and software was purchased by CSS-Shop and Gambit-Soft.

Windows

A free Windows Auto232 driver written by Stefan Meyer-Kahlen ² allowed automatic play also between Windows programs. Auto232 was further incorporated inside various GUIs and engines, but implementations were at times buggy and the protocol not that reliable specially concerning game termination ³. With the advent and wider distribution of the standardized computer chess protocols such as the Chess Engine Communication Protocol aka WinBoard / XBoard and the Universal Chess Interface, Auto232 became obsolete and outdated.

See also

• Chess 232 Board
• Chess Engine Communication Protocol

WinBoard

XBoard

• UCI

Publications

• Chrilly Donninger (1996). Zauberlehrling - Das Auto232-Protokoll im Detail. CSS 1/96, pdf (German) ⁴

Forum Posts

1997 ...

• Technische Spezifikation des 232-Protokolls (German) by Harald Faber, rgcc, January 08, 1997
• Windows driver for CHESS 232 board an Autoplayer 232 by Bert Seifriz, CCC, November 09, 1997

1998

• AUTO232 question by Amir Ban, CCC, March 01, 1998
• Smartboard, Auto232 by Stuart Cracraft, CCC, February 14, 1998
• Kill this auto232-players by Peter Herttrich, CCC, April 29, 1998
• Survey proposal: Importance of Auto232 compatibility by Moritz Berger, CCC, September 09, 1998
• Autoplayer for Win32 (again) by Stefan Meyer-Kahlen, CCC, September 12, 1998
• Auto232 by Chris Whittington, rgcc, September 12, 1998
• Autoplayers and Bean-Counters by Chris Whittington, rgcc, October 18, 1998

1999

• AUTO232 and memory protection by Ed Schröder, CCC, February 03, 1999
• Re: Auto232 questions, here is the manual in English! by Harald Faber, CCC, April 07, 1999
• Re: What Is Auto232? by Harald Faber, CCC, April 23, 1999
• Re: my own auto232 player by Vincent Diepeveen, CCC, December 07, 1999

2000 ...

• Re: Auto232 with one machine? by Stefan Meyer-Kahlen, CCC, January 29, 2000
• end of auto232? by Harald Faber, CCC, March 03, 2000
• Definition of the Extended Autoplayer 232 Protocol by Stefan Meyer-Kahlen, CCC, May 16, 2000
• Auto232, and one computer by Peter Skinner, CCC, August 18, 2000
• Auto232 - Anyone with a good source of info on how to use it? by Steve Maughan, CCC, November 17, 2000
• Auto232 using a network by Fabio Barrettone, CCC, July 17, 2001
• how to run auto232 with 1 pc by Mustafa, CCC, May 28, 2002
• auto232 by Christophe Drieu, CCC, October 23, 2002
• Auto232 1.0 revisited by Michael P. Nance Sr., CCC, September 27, 2003
• auto232 without null modem cable by Vasik Rajlich, CCC, April 18, 2004

2005 ...

• Chess programs using Auto232 by Olivier Deville, CCC, September 06, 2005
• Auto232 with only USB ports (solution?) by James T. Walker, CCC, January 04, 2006
• How do I connect using auto232 to ICC using Fritz GUI? by LJC, CCC, June 14, 2009

2010 ...

• Eberhard Boerger's Auto232 adaptor/Remi Coulom's Auto232 by Sedat Canbaz, CCC, March 06, 2014
• Auto232 Driver for DOS (and Windows?) by Theo Heinze, CCC, July 11, 2015

External Links

• Auto232 player - Auto232 and Winboard by Aaron Tay, hosted by Ron Murawski
• Schachclub Leinzell - Autoplayer 232 by Peter Schreiner, May 2000 (German)

References