Editing Xiangqi (section)

===Computers===
The [[Game complexity|game-tree complexity]] of xiangqi is approximately 10<sup>150</sup>; in 2004 it was projected that a human top player would be defeated before 2010.<ref>Yen, Chen, Yang, Hsu, 2004, [http://www.csie.ndhu.edu.tw/~sjyen/Papers/2004CCC.pdf Computer Chinese Chess] {{webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070614111609/http://www.csie.ndhu.edu.tw/~sjyen/Papers/2004CCC.pdf |date=June 14, 2007 }}.</ref> Xiangqi is one of the more popular computer-versus-computer competitions at the [[Computer Olympiad]]s.<ref>Results of the Computer Olympiad competitions are found [[Computer Olympiad#Chinese chess|here]]</ref>

Computer programs for playing xiangqi show the same development trend as has occurred for international chess: they are usually console applications (called engines) which communicate their moves in text form through some standard protocol. For displaying the board graphically, they then rely on a separate [[graphical user interface]] (GUI). Through such standardization, many different engines can be used through the same GUI, which can also be used for automated play of different engines against each other. Popular protocols are UCI ([[Universal Chess Interface]]), UCCI (Universal Chinese Chess Interface), Qianhong (QH) protocol, and [[WinBoard]]/XBoard (WB) protocol (the latter two named after the GUIs that implemented them). There now exist many dozens of xiangqi engines supporting one or more of these protocols, including some commercial engines.{{Citation needed|date=December 2012}}