Letter #13 -  2002

Sub:    PGN Files
Date:   4/07/02  2:33:26 PM MDT
From:  VinceCarter
To:      service@chess-poster.com

Excuse me, I have a big question.

I have the notation of a game I played.

For example, it's like 1. e4 e5  2. d4 d5

How do I make this a PGN file?
 

Dear viewer,

A PGN file (Portable Game Notation) is nothing more than an ASCII text file which can be made with any text editor such as Notepad, WordPad, MS Word, etc.

All you have to do is to type text on any text editor following an easy text format as shown below:

[Event "USA Ch. final"]
[Site "?"]
[Date "1997.09.10"]
[Round "4"]
[White "Christiansen, L."]
[Black "Benjamin, J."]
[Result "0-1"]
[ECO "B08"]
[WhiteElo "2550"]
[BlackElo "2580"]
[PlyCount "100"]

1. d4 d6 2. e4 Nf6 3. Nc3 g6 4. Nf3 Bg7 5. Bf4 O-O 6. Qd2 Bg4 7. O-O-O c6 8. Bh6 Qa5 9. Kb1 Nbd7 10. Be2 e5 11. Bxg7 Kxg7 12. h3 Bxf3 13. Bxf3 b5 14. g4 Nb6 15. h4 Nc4 16. Qc1 Rab8 17. dxe5 dxe5 18. h5 Ng8 19. hxg6 hxg6 20. Be2 Rfd8 21. Bxc4 bxc4 22. Rxd8 Qxd8 23. f4 Qd4 24. Ka1 exf4 25. Qxf4 Re8 26. a3 Qe5 27. Qe3 Re7 28. g5 a5 29. Ka2 Re6 30. Rh4 Re8 31. Rh1 Ne7 32. Rf1 Nf5 33. Qf2 Nd6 34. Qf6+ Qxf6 35. Rxf6 Nxe4 36. Nxe4 Rxe4 37. Rxc6 Re5 38. Rxc4 Rxg5 39. b4 axb4 40. axb4 f5 41. b5 f4 42. Rc7+ Kf6 43. b6 Ra5+ 44. Kb3 Rb5+ 45. Kc4 Rxb6 46. Kd4 Kf5 47. Kd3 Re6 48. Rf7+ Kg4 49. c4 f3 50. c5 Kg3 0-1

Some parameters at the beginning of this example (inside brackets) are optional and can be excluded from the PGN file.

As a practice, make yourself a PGN file: highligh with your mouse the above PGN text, from the "[Event..." first line of text to the last "0-1" letters.

Next, copy it to your clipboard memory by right clicking the selected text and choosing "copy" from the submenu prompt (CTRL + the letter C also copies it).

Now, open any of your favorite text editor (Notepad, WordPad, etc.) and paste the memory content onto a blank page (CTRL + V pastes it).

All you have to do next is to save the file as text (default) and give it the name you wish. Last, manually rename the .txt extension of your file to .pgn.

The result is a PGN file which can now be read by any PGN viewer.

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