Author: Jorge Pichard
Date: 10:30:11 12/20/01
Go up one level in this thread
On December 20, 2001 at 12:59:13, Scott Gasch wrote: Crafty is an exception it could easily be sold and converted to commercial, just take a look at this match: http://www.icdchess.com/forums/1/message.shtml?202622 >Commercial chess engines are, I think, much more heavily tested than typical >amateur engines. That contributes to their strength. The stronger amateur >engines like crafty and ferret are, because of the calibre of the authors, very >rigorously debugged. This is one of the reasons they compete on the same level >as the pros. > >Commercial engines are not using any "unknown" board representations or search >techniques. Perhaps some are using forward pruning techniques that are not >published anywhere. The degree to which this affects their playing strength is >debatable. I'd be surprised if there was another technique like nullmove out >there but it wouldn't be the first time I was wrong... > >I also think commercial engines tend to focus their evals on important >positional features better than most amateurs. This is one result of the >superior formal testing these engines enjoy. I, for one, _know_ my eval is >lacking in a lot of areas. It's hard to write a good eval. It's even harder to >write a good eval that is still fast. > >Note, I'm probably not the best one to answer this question because I don't pay >very much attention to the pro engines. I've thought about buying one or two to >test my engine with and try to get ideas from in the past, but so far I haven't >done it. The only experience with pros I have is watching my engine fight for >its life against them on ICC. > >Scott > > >On December 20, 2001 at 12:28:45, Russell Reagan wrote: > >>I held a discussion recently in IRC with one of the founders of the website >>www.gamedev.net. We talked about several topics, but I recall him saying that >>the techniques used in commercial software will always be ahead of what is >>common knowledge and freely available to the general amateur programmer. >> >>Gamedev.net is mostly concerned with video games, and mostly 3D video games. In >>the 3D video game market, this is probably true. Is the same true in the chess >>programming market? I know that there are quite a few amateur programs that are >>capable of giving today's top commercial programs a good game. Crafty is always >>near the top of the pack in tournaments it competes in, and Ferret won the last >>CCT ahead of Fritz if I recall correctly. >> >>My question is twofold. 1) Are commercial programs significantly stronger than >>amateur programs today, and 2) are the techniques used in commercial chess >>programs vastly different from the techniques used in top amateur programs? In >>other words, is there likely to be any alternative (better) board representation >>or alternative to alpha-beta that a commercial chess program uses that the >>general computer chess programming public isn't aware of? >> >>Russell
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