The Game menu

New game

Start playing a new game using the settings from the Zebra Settings menu.

New practice session

Start a practice session. In this mode, you play and take back moves on the board and Zebra assesses and displays the merits of all possible moves at any stage. The moves and scores are displayed in a scroll-bar to the right of the board. By double-clicking on a move in this list, the move you select is made. (Single-clicking results in the principal variation field in the Status bar corresponding to the move chosen.)

The depth to which the moves are search is specified in the Zebra Settings menu. It is possible to restrict WZebra to only give scores for the moves that lead to positions in the opening book using the Function submenu of the Zebra Settings menu.

Replay game

Enter a mode where you can browse back and forth through the current game (which may or may not be complete). Stepping through the game is done using the five blue arrows on the toolbar below the menu bar. If the game has been analyzed using Analyze game or Retrograde analyze game below, then the scores for the move actually played and the move WZebra prefers are displayed.

It is possible to explore variations of the game during replay: If you make a move on the board that was not actually played during the game, the resulting variation is explored in practice mode. When you take back the moves in the variation, you can continue replaying the game.

Analyze game

Let WZebra analyze all the moves of the current game searching to the depth specified in the Zebra Settings menu. After the analysis is completed, the analyses of all positions can be browsed by choosing Replay game from this menu. It is also possible to produce a text file with the full analysis by choosing Export game (text) from the File menu.

Retrograde analyze game

Like Analyze game but the analysis is done from the end of the game and back to the beginning. If the game ended with the board being filled, the analysis begins with the position with 1 empty, then the position with 2 empties is analyzed etc. This is especially useful when the search depth is set to Solving (Win/Loss) or Solving (exact) in the Search submenu in the Zebra Settings menu: Just start a retrograde analysis and abort it by clicking on the Stop icon and you can browse the results for the positions WZebra has solved so far. It is also possible to resume an interrupted endgame retrograde analysis if it is started from a position which was solved before.

Self-play game

Initiate a game where WZebra plays against itself using the settings from the Zebra Settings menu.

Proceed as game

Start playing a game from this position.

Proceed as practice session

Start a practice session from this position.

Setup board

A special position editor is invoked:

Here you can create an arbitrary board position by adding or removing discs of either color, or choose a predefined position from a list of common opening sequences.

Notice that the four center discs may not be cleared. The main reason for this is that Zebra has no knowledge about the patterns occurring in such positions, another reason is that every board position must contain at least 4 discs.

The keys 'B', 'W' can be used as shortcuts for adding black and white discs respectively. The space bar can be used as shortcut for erasing a disc. Common for these keys is that the square affected is the one to the right of the last square modified if possible, otherwise the first square on the next line: B1 after A1, C1 after B1, A2 after H1 etc. Using these shortcuts it is possible to create a position by pressing 64 keys, one for each square on the board.