pyWeiQi

Here's a little GO sgf player I knocked up using Python3.1.  Download it from the attachments section below.

Once downloaded, unzip & then start via the pyWeiQi.py file (if you have Python 3.1 installed, a double click should do it).

By all means have a look at the code if you're interested in how it works.

I created it about 6 years ago because I wanted to play sgf files on a Sharp Zarus PDA & couldn't find a player.

I also fancied trying out Python, so this was my learning project. 

My Zarus version used QT for the windowing / GUI.  

However, when I stumbled across the code again the other day, I decided I wanted the player to work using only the standard python install, so I've re-coded it to use tkinter (and the latest version of Python - ie. 3.1).

So just what is GO?

GO is the greatest strategy game ever devised by man.  

What's that?  Who mentioned Chess?

Yes, Chess is a great game but GO far exceeds Chess in my opinion.  

Don't believe me! 

Well, a Chess computer program can play and beat the strongest Chess professionals in the world - GO programs still aren't capable of beating a strong amateur GO player, and Professional GO players are light years ahead of amateurs in playing strength!

I call my player pyWeiQi because there's already a GO playing client out there called pyGO, and anyway GO was invented by the Chinese, so I thought it'd be nice to use it's Chinese name. The names by which GO is known around the world are: GO in Japan & the West, Wei Qi in China and Baduk in Korea.

pyWeiQi is a very simple player, with a crude sgf parser which strips only the game data from the sgf file, ie. variations are left out.  

Anyway, it seems to work how I intended when tested with random files from the limited number of game files which I have.

To use pyWeiQi you simply open an sgf file then hit the > button to play forwards through the game & < to go backwards.  

You can also attempt to guess the play by clicking on the board - if you hit the correct point the stone appears, if not you'll get feedback as to how far out you were.

I intend to add play functionality to pyWeiQi at some point, so that it can be used to play & save a game, as well as play through sgf files. But we'll see.