Touch-move rule the player touches his rook at the same time as touching the king, he must castle with that rook if it is legal to do so. If the player completes a two-square king move without touching a rook, the player must move the correct rook accordingly if castling on that side is legal. Otherwise, the move must be withdrawn and another king move made. When a pawn is moved to its eighth , once the player takes his hand off the pawn, a different move of the pawn can no longer be substituted. However, the move is not complete until
Null-move heuristic to guess cutoffs with less effort than would otherwise be required, whilst retaining a reasonable level of accuracy. The null-move heuristic is based on the fact that most reasonable chess moves improve the position for the side that played them. So, if the player whose turn it is to move can forfeit the right to move (or make a null move - an illegal action in chess) and still have a position strong enough to produce a cutoff, then the current position would almost certainly produce a cutoff if the current player actually moved. In employing the null-move heuristic, the