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Subject: Re: triangular pv vs. hash move pv

Author: Stuart Cracraft

Date: 07:10:29 09/11/04

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On September 11, 2004 at 01:21:44, Michael Henderson wrote:

>On September 11, 2004 at 01:03:37, Stuart Cracraft wrote:
>
>>Well, here's the result. Two runs on Win-at-Chess at 1 second per move
>>on a P3. The compilation flag UTM is with the triangular array and
>>its entry taken as the best move.
>>
>>Walking the Hash for best move/pv:
>>+ 6.78/27.44 81% 243/300 250.06 74259544 247532/1/296973 0/855173/1429928/507556
>>/17118632/97735
>>
>>Triangular Array for best move/pv:
>>+ 6.78/23.28 82% 248/300 250.70 73645824 245486/1/293757 0/851605/1423773/506165
>>/17084388/98392-DUTM
>>
>>The bottom line is that 5 more positions got solved with the
>>triangular array method than for walking the pv in the hash table.
>>
>>5 positions is a lot since progress has become slower.
>>
>>This is proof enough for me though I hope to hear the specifics from
>>Bob Hyatt of how a hash table can get trashed if there are no collisions
>>and length >= depth for replacement algorithm is used which would seem
>>to all guarantee that nothing worse for the same position would ever be
>>stored. Obviously it's something in the tree that I can't see.
>>
>>Good stuff.
>>
>>Stuart
>
>That's good news!  The extra +5 positions may be due to stuffing PV in hash
>table (improved move ordering and longer PVs).  I found Hyatt's explantion here:
>http://chessprogramming.org/cccsearch/ccc.php?art_id=343272
>
>I don't understand how it causes blunders, but I do see how extensions can cause
>move disagreements.

Okay I think I undersand now from the comments in the thread, and heck,
we didn't even need Bob Hyatt.

Hash PV's can get bolixed up due to the hashkey % mask coming out to the
same thing -- the low-order bits being masked are only so random after all.
There's probably something more obscure than this.

Regarding the extra +5, I am not even stuffing the PV in the hash table
yet and got the +5 before trying it (still have yet to try to try stuffing).
The +5 is just from the global "bestmove" which is updated by the search
at ply == 0 when there is a move improvement being ignored, completely
and instead using pv[0][0] instead of bestmove when the final move is
chosen from the search. That one change is the one that did the +5. Not
sure I understand why because ply == 0 move changes should be very
straightforward.

I can live with that for now that's sure. Perhaps the bugfix will turn up
some day.

Stuart



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