where should i see the winboard.exe

[evergreen1]

I want to have a shortcut to winboard on my desktop. i searched for winboard.exe but could not find one. in the installation folder in My C drive i could find a "black knight" thought this may be the clue for shortcut. but i got a winboard start up.

is this the so called wb exe?

is there a way to get directly the winboard when i click on something ( like when we click on the arena icon we get the interface.)

[H.G.Muller]

It should be where you asked to install it when running the installer (and then in the WinBoard sub-folder). By default this is C:\WinBoard-4.7.3\WinBoard.

The installer creates items in the Windows start menu to start WinBoard in various modes, but also one to get directly to the WinBoard folder, no matter where you installed it.

Clicking on winboard.exe there would start WinBoard in default mode (i.e. through the Startup Dialog, so that you can specify there exactly what you want). You can also click on any .xop file, which are files that contain lists of options, to start WinBoard with those options. (The installer associates .xop files with XBoard, if you did not untick that.) Or you could drag the .xop file on top of the winboard.exe icon, to achieve the same. That should work for all file types associated with WinBoard: if you drag a PGN file on top of it, it should start in Game Viewer mode for that game file, if you drag a .trn tourney file on top of it, it starts playing for that tourney, etc.

[evergreen1]

You can also click on any .xop file, which are files that contain lists of options,

there are so many xop files. cct , fairy,icc.friut etc.
I clicked on a xop file. windows error message says
windows cannot open this file.
how can i know that what are the options inside the xop file?

[H.G.Muller]

If Windows says it cannot open the file, something most have gone wrong in associating the .xop file type with WinBoard, during the install. It should still work if you drag the .xop file onto the winboard.exe icon.

You can see the contents of the .xop files by right-clicking them, and selecting 'Open with', and then select NotePad, or any ortehr text editors. They are normal text files with WinBoard options. On some windows you can browse for an application to open it with, and there can then also be a checkbox 'always open files of this type with this application'. This you could use to associate them with WinBoard, so that double-clicking them would work again.

The .xop files do more or less what their name suggests. 'fairy' starts up Fairy-Max, 'fruit' starts up Fruit, 'fics' connects you to FICS, 'icc' with ICC, 'cct' was for connecting to the CCT engine tournament as audience.

[evergreen1]

thanks HGM for the response. followed your instructions. NOw i can read the content of a xop file.
when i drag and dropped the fruit xop file over the winboard.exe an error message came it says
polyglot.pipe x_open{}fruit21:the system cannot find the file specified.what does it mean?

[H.G.Muller]

It means it cannot find the .exe file of Fruit. Which is strange, because Fruit is included in the install. Normally it should be in the folder C:\WinBoard-4.7.3\Fruit, as the file fruit_21.exe. Can you check if it is there?

[evergreen1]

in the winboard folder i dont have anything like frurt.outside there is a folder namely fruit in which i have not .exe but the following.
copying .txt readme.txt, logo.bmp, technical_10.txt.

i have exe files in the concerned folders-of fairymax,eleeye,haqid,and pusar2009-09

[H.G.Muller]

There should have been a fruit_21.exe in the C:\WinBoard-4.7.3\Fruit folder, which apparently got lost for unknown reasons. And if it is not there, Polyglot will not be able to find it. I am pretty sure fruit_21.exe is present in the install. So perhaps you should re-run the installer (no need to un-install first, just install over the old install).