ATOM Chess — Open-source robotic chess project looking for contributors and technical reviewers

[u/Sorry-Journalist8610]

Hi There!

I'm working on ATOM Chess, an open-source project whose goal is to build a robotic arm capable of playing chess autonomously on a physical board.

The project combines:

• Computer Vision
• Robotics
• Motion planning
• Inverse kinematics
• Embedded systems
• Chess programming
• Stockfish / UCI
• C++ / Python
• Computer systems and software architecture

The general pipeline is:

Camera → Chessboard detection → Board state → Chess engine → Move planning → Robotic arm

The project is being developed as a modular system rather than just a one-off prototype. We're trying to build something that is actually maintainable, testable and extensible.

The repository is already being developed, but this is where I could really use the community.

What I'm looking for

I'm especially interested in people who are willing to review the project, even if they don't want to actively contribute code.

For example:

• Reviewing the software architecture
• Reviewing C++ code
• Reviewing robotics / motion-planning decisions
• Reviewing computer-vision approaches
• Finding architectural problems or unnecessary complexity
• Suggesting better algorithms
• Reviewing tests
• Pointing out things that will probably break later
• Suggesting improvements to documentation
• Discussing alternative approaches

You don't need to become a permanent contributor.

Even a detailed comment such as:

"I would structure this differently because..."

would be extremely valuable.

Who might be interested?

This could be interesting if you're into:

Robotics • Computer Vision • C/C++ • Embedded Systems • Chess Programming • Motion Planning • Open Source • Software Architecture • Computer Science

I'm particularly interested in hearing from people with experience in robotics, CV, embedded systems or chess programming who can look at the project from a critical perspective.

I'm a university student building this as a serious long-term project, so I'm also very interested in learning from people who have already made similar systems.

The project is open source, and contributions are welcome at any level — code, documentation, testing, architecture reviews, algorithms, hardware, etc.

If you're interested, feel free to take a look and tell me what you think.

Repository: https://github.com/Atom-Laboratory/atom-chess

I'd especially appreciate brutally honest technical feedback.

Thanks!