Blowfish, a backgammon match analyser, was introduced to the public domain on Christmas Eve, 2001. The engine was derived from the GNUBG project initiated by Gary Wong. Without his support and the assistance of the GNUBG group, the program would not exist. Version 2 has now been released. Functionality is essentially the same, but with some enhancements. There are now a variety of boards available, thanks to Jacques Thiriat, whose interest and support has been invaluable. The pieces are animated and there is also a rudimentary play ability. The latter has been extended by the development of Snowfish, a dedicated backgammon program that can be invoked from within Blowfish.

Snowfish has been designed as a simple to use, but powerful, backgammon opponent. Its greatest strength is its ability to analyse play and cube decisions on the fly. For further analysis, matches may be saved in *.MAT format for further analysis by Blowfish. While there are features yet to be implemented, the program is fully-functional as it stands. Further development will depend, in part, on feedback and requests from users. A wide variety of boards are available, of varying shapes and sizes. If you are that way inclined, you should easily be able to develop your own. The program is designed to be user-extensible, as is Blowfish. Unfortunately, different designs make the process a little different for each.

This software is released into the public domain. Enjoy!

Mike Rudman