How do I determine who plays white and who plays black? As far as I can
tell, all I can do is flip the board and force the computer to move, or
take back the computer's move and make my own, depending on the situation.
But when I do this, the game still reports that the engine is playing on
the other side.

CeeBee wrote:

How do I determine who plays white and who plays black? As far as I can
tell, all I can do is flip the board and force the computer to move, or
take back the computer's move and make my own, depending on the situation.
But when I do this, the game still reports that the engine is playing on
the other side.

If you start a game and make a move with the white pieces, Fritz will
respond with black. If you want to play black, flip the board, hit the space
key and Fritz will move. Now respond with black and Fritz will continue to
play white.

Right. And if Fritz is playing white and I want to play white, I have to
flip the board, take back Fritz's move, and make my own.

BTW, if I hit the space key, doesn't it give a weaker move than usual? (I
get this impression from the fact that it usually doesn't take very long to
make a move when I hit the space key.)

I don't know what "the game reports that the engine is playing white" means;
maybe you mean that you'll always see the calculation and evaluation of
Fritz in the engine pane (right below). With standard settings, Fritz will
always calculate, even with you to move. This thinking in the oppponent's
time is called "pondering".

Sorry for the vagueness. I meant that in the annotations pane, it still
reports that Fritz is playing on the side Fritz started on, even if I
changed sides using either of the above techniques.

Just wondering if there's a simpler method than flipping and hitting space
or taking back Fritz's move, depending on the context -- one which updates
the display of who's white and who's black in the annotations pane.

Maybe the OP is referring to the fact that the position evaluation is
always positive when white's winning, negative when black's winning.

As far as I know this is non-negotiable. I do seem to remember someone
saying that it wasn't always that way though.


tjb wrote in rec.games.chess.computer:


How do I determine who plays white and who plays black? As far as I can
tell, all I can do is flip the board and force the computer to move, or
take back the computer's move and make my own, depending on the situation.
But when I do this, the game still reports that the engine is playing on
the other side.

David Vancina skrev:
Maybe the OP is referring to the fact that the position evaluation is
always positive when white's winning, negative when black's winning.

As far as I know this is non-negotiable. I do seem to remember someone
saying that it wasn't always that way though.

True. Some GUI's though may offer this in their setup, but I don't which.

Some programs still shows the evaluation from it's own point of view,
like Genius.
For years now, most programs have shown evaluations from White's point
of view, a "-"sign indicates that Black is better in the oppinon of the
engine, and no sign means "+"; White has the upper hand.

BTW: When playing a program, it's normally better not to watch the
engine evaluations Watch the game!


tjb wrote in rec.games.chess.computer:


How do I determine who plays white and who plays black? As far as I can
tell, all I can do is flip the board and force the computer to move, or
take back the computer's move and make my own, depending on the
situation.
But when I do this, the game still reports that the engine is playing on
the other side.

CeeBee wrote:

Right. And if Fritz is playing white and I want to play white, I have
to flip the board, take back Fritz's move, and make my own.

No. You don't have to take back any move by Fritz. Hit CTRL-N and you'll
get a "clean" new board. Now hit space; this is the "move now" command for
Fritz. You have to use it only this one time. Fritz will move a white
piece. You can respond now with black. Fritz will automatically answer
after that move with white. No need to press keys. Just wait for its
answer, depending on time controls.

I meant that if I want to play white but Fritz started as white (it happens
every so often but I can't reproduce it right now) I have to take back
Fritz's white move and make my own white move. Thereafter the game goes as
planned, but the annotations pane still reports that Fritz is white.
Hitting Ctrl-N doesn't help in this situation, by the way; it just starts
Fritz off as white again.

tjb skrev:
CeeBee wrote:

Right. And if Fritz is playing white and I want to play white, I have
to flip the board, take back Fritz's move, and make my own.
No. You don't have to take back any move by Fritz. Hit CTRL-N and you'll
get a "clean" new board. Now hit space; this is the "move now" command for
Fritz. You have to use it only this one time. Fritz will move a white
piece. You can respond now with black. Fritz will automatically answer
after that move with white. No need to press keys. Just wait for its
answer, depending on time controls.

I meant that if I want to play white but Fritz started as white (it happens
every so often but I can't reproduce it right now) I have to take back
Fritz's white move and make my own white move. Thereafter the game goes as
planned, but the annotations pane still reports that Fritz is white.
Hitting Ctrl-N doesn't help in this situation, by the way; it just starts
Fritz off as white again.

In options - game, there's a checkbox called "flip board on new game"
used by people who likes practice with both colors.
If that one is checked, then it's logical that the board flips...