Puzzle Sheet Generator

A command line program for the creation of chess puzzle PDF-sheets. Create puzzle sheets either from the lichess puzzle database or from FEN strings.

Installation

Download the Lichess puzzles database from https://database.lichess.org/#puzzles and place it unzipped in the data directory.

Then run in terminal in this project's main directory:

pip install .

Usage

CLI still in progress

Idea: Interactive CLI, so we don't have to reload the puzzle db all the time

On start-up the program loads its config and the lichess database, then waits for user commands via interactive cli.

Concepts:

• Store: A set of puzzles. Subset of the lichess puzzle database obtained by filtering via user specified criteria.
• Sheet: A set of up to 12 puzzles, FEN strings or SVGs and some metadata, that can be printed as a PDF file. The puzzles in a sheet can be obtained by sampling from a store, remixing existing sheets and manually entering individual FENs or SVGs.

Configuration

The apps configuration should be placed in the OS standard location (e.g. /home//.config/puzzle_sheet_generator on a Linux system). Possible configurations:

• path to lichess puzzle database
• flag whether to automatically save all created sheets
• board colors

Commands:

• config: Change the programs configuration
• config-default: Restore the default configuration
• list: show all available sheets or stores
  • list sh to show sheets
  • list st to show stores
• show: show a specific sheet or store
  • show <id_or_name>
• delete: delete a sheet or store
  • delete <id_or_name>
• Store specific commands:
  • filter: create a store of puzzles by filtering from the db or an existing store
    • filter <from_store> <new_store_name> with options:
      • -t <theme_1> <additional_theme>*: themes have to spelled as in the lichess puzzle database. If multiple themes are supplied, a puzzle has to match all of them.
      • -r (<mean_rating> | <min_rating> <max_rating>): mean_rating results in min_rating = mean_rating - 100 and max_rating = mean_rating + 100
      • -m (<exact_number_of_moves> | <min_moves> <max_moves>)
      • -o <opening_tag>: currently not working properly
  • sample: create a new sheet or add to a sheet by sampling a given number of puzzles from a store
    • sample <from_store> <into_sheet> [-a <amount of puzzles>]
  • union: unite two puzzle stores to create a mixed set of puzzles
    • union <store_1> <store_2> <name_of_new_store>
• Sheet specific commands:
  • add-to: manually add a new element to a sheet in form of a lichess puzzle (provide puzzle id) or FEN
    • add-to <sheet> <puzzle>
  • copy: Create a new sheet with the same elements
    • copy <sheet> <new_sheet_name>
  • remove: remove an element from a sheet
    • remove <sheet> <puzzle> with <puzzle> being either a lichess puzzle id or the index in the puzzle sheet
  • reorder: reorder elements in a sheet
    • reorder <sheet> <index1> <index2>
  • name: Change the name of a sheet or store
  • header: Specify what will be printed in the header above the puzzles
    • header -l <left-header> -r <right-header>
  • load: load a saved sheet or a directory of saved sheets
  • save: save a sheet, so it can be reused across multiple sessions
• print: create a PDF file from a sheet
  • print <sheet> <path/to/file.pdf> with options:
    • -l (6 | 12) explicitly choose a layout with 6 or 12 puzzles on one page
    • --left-header set the text printed in the left header
    • --right-header set the text printed in the right header

Development Setup

In the repositories main directory set up a new python virtual environment:

python -m venv .venv

and activate it with source .venv/bin/activate (Linux/macOS) or .venv\Scripts\activate (Windows).

Install in development mode via pip:

pip install --editable .