PostgreSQL Chess Extension

This repository contains a PostgreSQL extension developed as a course project for INFOH417 Database System Architecture (2023/24) at Université Libre de Bruxelles (ULB). This extension facilitates the storage and retrieval of chess games within PostgreSQL, supporting chess-specific data types, functions, and indices to enable efficient querying of chess game data.

Overview

Chess games are recorded using various notation standards. This extension utilizes:

• Standard Algebraic Notation (SAN) for move sequences (commonly used in Portable Game Notation or PGN)
• Forsyth–Edwards Notation (FEN) for representing board positions at specific moves

For details on these notation standards, see:

• Standard Algebraic Notation (SAN)
• Forsyth–Edwards Notation (FEN)

Features

The extension introduces two custom data types and several functions tailored to chess data:

Custom Data Types

• chessboard: Represents a specific board state in a chess game.
• chessgame: Represents a sequence of moves for an entire chess game.

Functions

getBoard(chessgame, integer) -> chessboard

• Returns the board state at a specified half-move count (a full move includes one turn by each player).
• Setting the integer parameter to 0 returns the initial board state.

getFirstMoves(chessgame, integer) -> chessgame

• Truncates and returns the first N half-moves of a given game.

hasOpening(chessgame, chessgame) -> bool

• Checks if a chess game begins with a specific sequence of moves (e.g., opening moves).
• The second parameter should be a partial game sequence, containing only the opening moves to check for.

hasBoard(chessgame, chessboard, integer) -> bool

• Verifies if a specific board state appears within the first N half-moves of a game.

Indices

The extension also provides specialized indices to optimize common queries:

• hasOpening_idx: A B-tree index on the chessgame type, supporting efficient lookup for games with specific opening sequences.
• hasBoard_idx: A GIN index that uses getAllStates(chessgame) to index individual board states across moves, supporting fast lookup for specific board configurations.

Installation

Prerequisites

• PostgreSQL on a Linux-based environment (e.g., Ubuntu, WSL).

Steps

1. Clone this repository and navigate to the project directory.
2. Run:

   make && make install