From: Colin Paul Adams <colin <at> COLINA <dot> DEMON <dot> CO <dot> UK>
Date: 13 feb 1998
Subject: Variants server: progress report

I have got to the point where I can play Chu Shogi against myself
(useful, eh?) on two machines across my network here at home, with the
single exception that double moves aren't yet supported (but as I have
the code for all that worked out from my efforts in C++ last summer,
that won't take long). So it is very near the time for some real
testing.

I still have some problems with O/S dependencies that puzzle
me. Stephen Lamb has kindly been doing some testing on Windows NT with
me, but we still have unsolved problems. As I start a new job on
Monday (boo! hiss! - that will slow down development drastically), we
may not be able to carry on with the testing. In any case, I have yet
to try anything with MacOS. So I am again appealing for testers. The
requirements are:

You must have, or be able to install, the Java Runtime Environment on
your machine. And you must be able to connect to the internet from
that machine at weekends, or evenings (sometime within 2000 - 2200
GMT). Also, there is very little point in anyone running Unix (or
Unix-like systems) volunteering, as I can do that testing
myself. Volunteers please email me.

Both the server and the client are written in Java, but that is only
because it makes development fast. Any language that can support TCP
sockets will do. So if anyone wants to write a client (or convert an
existing program to act as a client, or port my Java client) for O/Ss
such as MS-DOS (which I believe does not run Java??????), please get
in touch with me, as the protocol is now sufficiently developed to
make it worth while starting.
--
Colin Paul Adams
Preston Lancashire
colin <at> colina <dot> demon <dot> co <dot> uk