Welcome to Open Systems Chess

Open Systems Chess is our way of describing Technical Chess Software that is not bound by proprietary datasets. In our estimation, all chess games should be available for the viewing and study of anyone at anytime. So slowly, but surely, we are building generations of shareware that allows unlimited viewing and analysis of chess games using PGN (Portable Game Notation) datasets.

ChessN Pro v2.3.0

Download ChessN Pro v2.4.0

• More Games: As the popularity of PGN archives of chess games increases, the size of the files also increases. We've been asked to manage files which have been in excess of 90 MBytes. Those are large files, and quite frankly, ought to be in a database for maximum usefulness. Never the less, ChessN Pro 2.3.0 can read and manipulate large PGN archives. Make sure that you have adequate hardware to support the activity, it is machine intensive even in the popular database programs.
• Full Editing:Version 2.3.0 provides expanded editing capabilities. All PGN fields are fully accessible now and the ease of data entry is considerably improved. No more dialog box editing for fields, just point and click through entire games.
• Tabbed Access:To improve the visibility of the tremendous information that can be embedded in a PGN description of a chess game. ChessN Pro 2.3.0 has moved to side by side tabbed pages. You can browse through the games in a file, while directly seeing and editing the contents. You can focus on a single game and bring up a detail page which focuses on a single move while browsing through the main line. Jump to a variation by simply selecting the line of interest. All the time never leaving the larger game view. Much improved.
• Detailed ViewingThere are levels of detail available in a well documented chess analysis in PGN notation. At the finest grain, ChessN Pro 2.3.0 provides a full page of detailed information about a single move, Comments, multiple NAG aggregation, RAV editing and annotation. All in a single place, while never losing focus on the larger issues being presented by the main line of the game.
• EPD/FEN SupportFEN is a nearly universal format for describing a single position in a chess game. It does not however help with multiple move transport and description. ChessN Pro now partially supports EPD (Enhanced Position Description) as described by the standard. It is a common language for communicating with chess engines of all types. Look for more complete support for creating and receiving EPD strings in future releases.
• Improved Drag/DropThere has been considerable interest in improving the ability of ChessN Pro to aggregate smaller PGN files. We're listening. ChessN Pro 2.3.0 supports a very complex level of drag and drop to allow a user to select PGN game files in other file managers and allowing them to be dragged and saved in a single archive. If a program supports Windows drag/drop, it can talk to ChessN Pro 2.3.0.
• How much does it cost?ChessN Pro 2.3.0 sells for $20.00 US.
• Computational Requirements Windows 98 or Windows ME and screen resolution of 1024x768

ChessN Pro

ChessN Pro is a chess game editor. It adds a new level of flexibility to technical chess analysis.

Viewing archived chess games. ChessN Pro is an excellent game viewer for chess games which have been saved in Portable Game Notation (PGN) form. We think of PGN as the basis of Open Systems Chess. It's an internationally recognized standard way of archiving chess games that doesn't belong to a single company who can control and arbitrarily change the format to create proprietary barriers to the sharing of information.

Creating archived chess games. ChessN Pro allows you to enter your own games or the games of your local club. It is an excellent resource for keeping track of correspondence chess games. Since all of the games entered are saved in PGN (Portable Game Notation) format, they are easy to share since nearly all the popular computer chess games can at least read the files (of course, many still try to create barriers to sharing games by forcing their users to use their unique, proprietary format).

Aiding in the analysis of chess games. ChessN Pro fully supports Recursive Annotation Variations (RAV). RAV's are used to document other moves that could be made instead of the one currently selected. Writing RAVs in PGN notation is difficult at best and the resulting text form is not user-friendly. ChessN Pro suports both the creation and the orderly review of these variations on a chess move. Given that every move in a game could need to be analyzed, ChessN Pro is indispensable for capturing your thoughts and inclinations for adding to the vast body of chess knowledge.

Capturing a board position for computer analysis. ChessN Pro supports FEN notation. Most computer chess games can accept FEN positions for further computational analysis. ChessN Pro is a good support tool for completely mastering the full strength of the current generation of chess engines. With release of version 2.3.0, ChessN Pro also provides limited support for EPD notation.

Creating chess documentation for publication. ChessN Pro is great at extracting a single game from a large (up to 131000 games) PGN archive. It is also good at capturing the board position (in graphics form) for pasting into a word processor for documenting chess games for yourself or for publishing on the World Wide Web.

Frequently Asked Questions

What is PGN? PGN stands for Portable Game Notation. This is a open, internationally recognized standard developed several years ago to aid in sharing archived chess games. We believe that PGN forms the basis of Open Systems Chess in that no one can make you by a computer chess program just to get access to that special collection of games. PGN game archives have exploded on the Web and ChessN Pro is a recommended way of accessing this huge chess knowledge base.

Does it support EPD? Yes, ChessN Pro supports EPD copy and paste. In fact, it will generate multiple move EPD strings from RAV segments. EPD is quite useful when working with analysis engines and is a derivative of FEN which is part of the PGN starndard (ChessN Pro supports FEN).

Can I move the pieces? Yes, you can move the pieces. Not only can you view the PGN games but you can make your own. ChessN Pro is both game viewer and editor.

Can I play against ChessN Pro? No, ChessN Pro does not support any chess engines. We will include an analysis engine in the next major release.

I really like the RAV notation. Can I paste it to another program? Yes. Select a RAV column and copy. When you paste it will be in EPD format.

How many games can I have in a file? 131072. That's a lot. There are chess programs out there that boast of nearly infinite file size and they use proprietary database engines to support the functionality. We've elected to focus on PGN files not database management. What's the tradeoff. The bigger the files the longer it takes to process them. So if you routinely want to deal with large PGN files, we recommend a fast processor Intel P3/P4 (>800MHz) and 128K of RAM. Remember, ChessNPro is not a database manager; it's a PGN editor.

How do I buy the program? The easiest way is to go to the ChessN website at and punch the Buy button. This will vector you to our e-commerce partner and put you a credit card away from owning your own copy of ChessN Pro.

Do you have a freeware version? We call the freeware version, ChessN Pro Demo. It has all of the functionality of ChessNPro with the following exceptions:

• Save games is disabled.
• Copy games to the clipboard is disabled.
• Game loading limit is set to 500.
• We'll continue to add to the FAQ as time goes on and ChessN Pro users ask us more questions.

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