Installing CQL 6

This version of the installation assumes you have the file hhdbvi.pgn. If you do not, you can use any other pgn file in its place. Say the pgn file is named my.pgn. Then when you run cql on the examples, use cql -i my.pgn instead of cql.

Installing CQL on Windows

  1. Unzip the installation file, named something like cql6-build-9-493-windows.zip. This will create a directory named cql6 in the directory from which the zip file was unzipped. Depending on your zip client, the cql6 directory might be a subdirectory of a directory like cql6-build-9-493-windows
  2. You can put cql.exe anywhere you like that is convenient.
  3. You can now run cql.exe.
  4. To run the examples on the sample PGN file that comes with cql:
    • Open PowerShell and cd to the cql6 directory
    • To run an example, try say 
      	.\cql.exe -i sample.pgn examples\staircase-sort.cql
    • This should create a pgn file named staircase-sort-out.pgn .
    • If you have the HHdbVI endgame study database, just put hhdbvi.pgn in the current directory and run cql on an example directly: 
      	.\cql examples\staircase-sort.cql
  5. If you want to install the CQL font, right click on the file with a filename similar to CqlChessMono.ttf in the distribution and click "Install".
(Obviously, you will want to arrange the directories and files wherever is convenient for you. cql.exe can be run from anywhere; it has no dependencies and does not use external files or libraries other than what is passed to it as command line arguments.)

This completes the installation. You can now run CQL.

Installing CQL on Mac

  1. Unzip the installation file, named something like cql6-build-9-493-mac.zip. This will create a directory named cql6 in the directory from which the zip file was unzipped.
  2. You can put cql anywhere you like that is convenient, as long as it is in your PATH.
  3. You can now run cql. Note that modern Mac OS's by default require considerable adjustment to security settings to allow untrusted code to run.
  4. To run the examples on the sample PGN file that comes with cql:
    • Open a shell or Terminal and cd to the cql6 directory
    • To run an example, try 
      	./cql -i sample.pgn examples/staircase-sort.cql
    • This should create a pgn file named staircase-sort-out.pgn .
    • If you have the HHdbVI endgame study database, just put hhdbvi.pgn in the cql6 directory and run cql on an example directly: 
      	./cql examples/staircase-sort.cql

Installing CQL on Linux

For Linux installation, obtain the source from the authors and build that. Be sure to read the instructions for building from Linux, because the Makefile must be manually modified.

The executable will be in the executable cql. The sample CQL files and sample PGN file can be copied from the examples subdirectory of the Mac distribution (or downloaded from the website individually).

Upgrading from previous versions to version 6.2

If you are upgrading from a previous version of CQL 6 to version 6.2:
  • Remove the old executable (cql.exe on windows; or cql on Linux/Mac).
  • delete the old examples/ subdirectory of your installation and replace it with the version of examples/ in this distribution (some examples files have changed).
  • verify that the new version has been installed by executing cql -v. This should indicate that version 6.2 is running.