Shane's Chess Information Database - SCID

Developer(s)	Shane Hudson
Stable release	4.6.1 / July 2014
Operating system	Windows, Linux, OS X, Solaris, FreeBSD, NetBSD and probably other UNIX-like variants
Type	Chess database
License	GPL

Shane's Chess Information Database (Scid) is a popular free UNIX, Windows, Linux, and Mac application for viewing and maintaining huge databases of chess games. It has features comparable to popular commercial chess software, but is less polished. Scid is written in Tcl/Tk and C++.

Scid has undergone several stages of development. Firstly by Shane Hudson, and then Pascal Georges. The fork Scid vs. PC is a notable alternative.

Features

Scid is a powerful Chess Toolkit with many features. It can interface with XBoard engines (such as Crafty and GNU Chess), and UCI engines (e.g. Fruit, Rybka and Stockfish). Using Scid, one may play games against human opponents (on the Free Internet Chess Server), or computer opponents. Database features include a Move Tree with statistics, Player Information and Photos, and General Searches for specific endings (e.g. pawn vs. rook or rook vs. queen), positions or players.

Scid's speed is due to its storing chess games in its own compact database format (si4), but it also supports the popular portable game notation.

History

There are multiple projects related to Scid, all using the si4 database format. ChessDB was the first Scid fork, but had little longevity or technical novelty. Scid vs. PC has been in development for five years to 2014, and has an overhauled interface. Its major new feature is a Computer Tournament mode and also includes rewritten Gamelist, FICS and Analysis widgets. It maintains 100% database compatibility with Scid. Scid on the go is a browser for Scid database files for Android.

Two wholly rewritten projects: ChessX (written in C and libQT), and the new, ambitious Scidb (also written in TCL/C++), are under active development.