How to set up chessli

How to set up Chessli¶

In this section we will go through a few setup steps, to get the most out of chessli. If you haven't done yet, please first follow the install instructions to get chessli on your system.

Configuration¶

General config and user config¶

You can type:

chessli --user <your_lichess_username> --show-configs

to show the current configurations.

Here you'll see a general config and a user config pertaining to the currently active user.

Saving keystrokes with a default username¶

The general config can be used to set a default username. This is useful, because if set, you won't need to set your username anymore in each command.

So, for example,

chessli --user DrNykterstein openings ls

becomes a simple

chessli openings ls

Locating chessli's configs¶

In order to set a default username, you'll first need to locate the general config file. The location depends on your operating system and is chosen with the help of appdirs.

Just type

chessli --user <your_lichess_username> --show-paths

to get an idea where the general config is located. On my linux system it's living at /home/pwenker/.config/chessli/config.yml.

Setting a default username¶

To then set the default username, just open the general config and add a line with your lichess username. If your username is DrNykterstein, then write into the config file

user: DrNykterstein

You can check if it worked by typing again

chessli --show-configs

and see if your username appears in the general config.

Temporarily overwriting the default username¶

Note that if you have a default username set, but want to overwrite it temporarily, you can just again state it in the command.

For example, if you have set DrNykterstein as default in your config, but enter

chessli --user pwenker openings ls

this will temporarily overwrite it.

Lichess API Authentification¶

Some parts of the lichess API, for example fetching your puzzle activity, require authentification. For this purpose, you need to get a personal API access token.

You can then put this token into the general config, just like we did with your default username in the previous section. The syntax looks like this:

token: sdjfkdsldf23

(I made sdjfkdsldf23 up, but you get the idea).

:warning: Please keep your token secure! You can think of them as passwords, that you don't want to share with anyone.

Anki Support via `apy`¶

In order to directly "ankify" your mistakes, openings and tactics, you need to set up apy. Currently chessli is compatible with apy version 0.6.0 and anki version 2.1.26. Please refer to apy's install instructions for detailed information.

Note, however, that you don't necessarily need apy. Alternatively, all ankify subcommands contain a --export-only option which creates a csv file that you can manually import into Anki.

:warning: If you use apy, please make sure to backup your Anki database before!

Getting Chessli's Anki Cards Templates¶

You'll find the chessli card templates here on ankiweb as a shared deck. Just follow the instructions there, to set them up. :)

How to set up chessli