Winning starts with what you know
The new version 18 offers completely new possibilities for chess training and analysis: playing style analysis, search for strategic themes, access to 6 billion Lichess games, player preparation by matching Lichess games, download Chess.com games with built-in API, built-in cloud engine and much more.
Following on from my article on Backups, one of the more recent innovations made by the good people of ChessBase, is to utilise the "Cloud" for computer chess. Why is this important? In brief, it allows you to access your chess databases and analysis from any internet-connected device in the world.
What is "The Cloud"?
It can sound complicated, but put simply, "The Cloud" essentially refers to any data that is stored and accessed via the internet, rather than the hard drive of your actual computer. It enables users to access the same files and applications from almost any device, because the computing and storage takes place on a server connected to the internet, instead of locally on the user's device. This is why a user can log into their Instagram account on a new phone after their old phone breaks and still find their old account in place, with all their photos, videos, and conversation history. It works the same way with cloud email providers like Gmail or Microsoft 365, and with cloud storage providers like Dropbox or Google Drive.
One of my favourite cloud features of ChessBase is their Engine Cloud. It is possible to access chess engines that are running on other computers and use them for your own analysis, or you can supply your own engines to be used by other users. We will look at this feature more closely in a future article.
Today we are going to look at the ChessBase Cloud Database function. Which works in tandem with their MyGames Cloud app on their website. With MyGames Cloud you always have your games with you, and you can rest assured that they are safely backed up. The app provides you with the tools to manage your games however you choose: you can create or delete databases, copy games to other databases, save, edit, and annotate your games, and access the strong integrated chess engine for your own analysis. What’s more, all your games from playchess.com are automatically saved to a dedicated database. You can also open and manage your opening repertoire on the move. And the livebook is available there too.
Accessing the ChessBase Cloud
To access the ChessBase Cloud, you first need to log onto ChessBase 15. We have looked at how to do that in an earlier article. But it's worth covering again.
ChessBase 15 will ask you if you would like to login when you open the program:
Or you can do it by going to the Home tab and clicking "Login" on the ChessBase Account section of the ribbon.
Once you are logged in, you can access the cloud database screen by clicking the "Cloud Databases" button on the ribbon, or the icon in the Folder window.
That brings up your Cloud databases in the Database Window.
Note, you will only have a "playchess.com" database once you have played some games on the playchess.com server while logged in under the same username.
These databases behave much the same as normal databases. You can copy games to these databases the same way you do with your normal databases.
For instance, if I want to copy all the games from one of my databases into the "My Games" cloud database, I just go back to "My Databases" (press the button next to the "Cloud Databases" on the ribbon, or click the "My Databases" folder in the folder window.
Right-click on the database you would like to copy (it can be any database you like, but obviously, a database of your games, or your repertoire, makes sense.)
Go to "Edit" and click on "Copy"
Then, go back to your Cloud Databases, right click on your target database, go to "Edit" and click on "Paste"
It will bring up a confirmation window.
If you are happy, you can click ok, and it will copy the games to the cloud database.
Accessing Cloud Databases from any internet connected device
The magic happens when you have an internet connected PC/Mobile/Tablet and your ChessBase login details. You can access those games again anywhere in the world. You don’t even need to have any ChessBase software installed on the device you’re using!
Simply open your web browser of choice, and head to the ChessBase website and click the login button.
Enter your ChessBase account Username and Password and click submit.
Now, you should see that the login button has changed to your ChessBase username.
Click on your username, and it will take you to your ChessBase user data page.
At the top of the page, click "Web Apps" then click "My Games"
This takes you to the My Games page, where you can see information about using the ChessBase Cloud.
Click on "My Games Cloud" on the right.
And that will take you to the ChessBase MyGamesCloud.
Here there’s access to the Live Database, for up to the minute games. You can access a cloud engine for analysis, and much much more.
Click on the "Databases" button at the top, then "Open Database" to see a list of your Cloud Databases.
Here I will click on the "My Games" database that I copied all my games to, and that will open up a list of all my games, just as though I was on my computer at home.
I could write a second article just on the MyGamesCloud section itself, but for now, I advise you to play around with the functions and elements of this amazing and powerful resource. It is a veritable goldmine of information and features. All accessible from a simple web browser.
Stay awesome, and have fun.
