(updated Dec 2012, FEN Reader replaced by ChessOnline; Dec 2013, use of copgn;
Nov 2018, added further choice to use Chess Tempo Viewer)

Various ‘Plugins’ ( ‘ChessOnline‘, ‘Embed Chessboard‘ and ‘Chess Tempo Viewer‘) are installed to provide chess-graphics for your posts. These can show single game positions, or a whole game animated on one board.

Display a single game position

1) One way to show a specific game position, either as part of an annotation for a game or to present a chess puzzle, is to simply insert your FEN text between square brackets as described here. The example below, uses the text string,
r2qk2r/ppp1bppp/3p4/4n2n/2B1P1b1/2NPBN2/PPP3PP/R2Q1RK1 !w !- !- !0 !1
The string has to be exactly right to be picked up by the ChessOnline plugin and show the board in your post. If you only see a text string instead of a diagram when you preview your post, double check that you have entered a valid string (and no spaces between bracket and string!).

N.B. ChessOnline seems to need the above ‘!’ characters to work. Another quirk,  depending on users window magnification, might cause the right-side row numbers to display ‘under’ the table instead of alongside. It has been 7 years since the last available update, so you may prefer to use an alternative viewer for new diagrams (and edit tags for existing diagrams?).

2) The Chess Tempo Viewer can also demonstrate a board position (or complete game) using ctpgn tags as described here and shown below for the same position.

Display an animated game

To place an animated graphic of a full game into your post you have a choice of tools.
1)  You can insert the pgn text string for the game between pgn tags as described here and shown in the example below which uses the ‘Embed Chessboard’ plugin.
Your readers can single-step through the moves, or click the ‘+’ button for auto-play.

2) The ChessOnline tool has been extended to also deal with pgn.
It was described as experimental, but seemed workable, and is shown in the example below. (though presently lacking a few features such as initialising the display to a specific move and no autoplay). Similar to above but use copgn instead of pgn in your tags.(shown here for the same game).

3) Here is the Chess Tempo Viewer version of same game.

A further example shows how this viewer can be used to give a start position/study with follow-on moves and comments.