Author: Dann Corbit
Date: 13:37:24 04/10/00
Go up one level in this thread
On April 10, 2000 at 16:12:03, James T. Walker wrote: >On April 10, 2000 at 11:24:18, blass uri wrote: > >>On April 10, 2000 at 08:03:41, James T. Walker wrote: >> >>>On April 10, 2000 at 03:24:17, Bernhard Bauer wrote: >> >><snipped> >>>>Someone in the past stated that commercial programs are at least 100 rating >>>>points stronger than Crafty, so now we may ask: >>>>Where are the commercials??? >>> >>>************************************************** >>>What am I missing?? >>> >>>1 Fritz 6.0 128MB K6-2 450 MHz 2721 39 -37 368 67% 2594 >>>8 Crafty 17.07/CB 128MB K6-2 450 MHz 2624 46 -44 251 62% 2541 >>> ----- >>> 97 Points >> >>97 is not at least 100 >> >>Uri > >Hello Uri, >I believe the difference is more than 100 points at blitz. Also 97 points has a >tolerance which means it could be more or less. The point is that Crafty is >still behind the top commercial programs. Because they only come out once each >year, Crafty appears to be catching up more quickly than it really is. The >improvement in Fritz this time was really great. Crafty is still behind but >with Bob working overtime, it is slowly closing the gap. One thing for sure, >you can't complain about the price of Crafty. I really like Crafty in the >Chessbase interface. It seems that all the problems have been fixed as far as >Chessbase/Crafty goes. Crafty seems to score better using the Fritz book too. Since you have used "programs" it shows that you do not fully understand the publication by the SSDF. Within experimental uncertainty (which they do list), crafty is clearly as good as many of the commercial programs. With the tiny average figure ELO difference between crafty and some of the best commercial engines, it would take many thousands of games to figure out which is really stronger. All of which really misses the point anyway. The real value of commercial programs is not their playing strength. It is the rich list of additional features. Allow me to mention some from Bob Pawlak's book (discussed on pp 24-28): * Variations in the Game Score * Database Header Search * Opening Book Editing Tools * Internal Chess Engine [This is the point we are discussing ...] * Played Line and Principal Variation Scored * Infinite Analysis Mode * Automated Analysis * Position Search * Material Search * Drag and Drop * Libarary Maintenance * Chess Tree * PGN Support * Time Controls * EPD Export/Import * Multiple Chess Engines * Winboard Engine Interface * Modifiable Engine Parameters and again, from pages 48-50 * Supports engine in background * Automatically analyzes entire game * Scores played move and principle variation * Automatic EPD analysis * Natural language advice * Explains all moves * Warns of blunder * Position search * Material search * Header search * Reads/Writes PGN * Reads/Writes EPD * Ply depth setting * Turn off permanent brain * Hash tables * Form book from database * Modify move sequences * Prints diagrams * Prints game score * Fischer/Bronstein time controls * Separate time controls for each side * Game in X time controls * Tournament time controls * Chess tree * Search for position from tree in database * Variations support * Spoken move announcement * Engine verses engine * External electronic board support * Rendered 3-D board view with controls [ick - DC] * Network play * Includes tablebases As you can see, the engine barely touches upon this list (although crafty *can* manage quite a few of them). The tiny delta in ELO between crafty and the top programs (whatever it may be) is really of no concern to the average user. It is the enourmous feature set of commercial programs that offer the true value.
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