chessreader uses the images captured from a webcam placed above a chessboard to follow a live game of chess, played between two humans. The game can be monitored (check for illegal moves, checkmate, etc.) and more importantly recorded.

chessreader should also be able to connect to a chess engine and allow a human to play against the engine on a real chessboard (assuming the human moves the pieces for the engine - can't do everything for you now, can we?)

Using image recognition techniques, our goal is to be able to run on virtually any chessboard, with nothing more than a well-placed webcam, right above the board (e.g. hanging from the head of a desk lamp). Unlike other solutions like DGT e-boards, or chessboarduino, we don't want to place RFIDs or any kind of sensors on your pieces or your chessboard.

chessreader is still in its early development phase - any help will be greatly appreciated! :)

Please take a look at the wiki for an insight on how chessreader works under the hood, and don't hesitate to contact us if you want to.

Chessreader requires Python >= 3.4. See requirements.txt for the list of python libraries required - you can install them in a virtualenv if you feel like it.

Well at the moment there's not much to do with it... Be patient! ;)

chessreader uses the nosetests framework: simply run nosetests from the base directory.

You can also run python chessreader.py --test