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Subject: Re: Starting a new chess program(again), need help

Author: Sylvain Lacombe

Date: 03:27:42 03/30/99

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On March 29, 1999 at 17:49:31, Derrick Gatewood wrote:

>A couple of months ago I was so intrigued by computer chess programs and having
>a small background with C++ I began to write my own program.  I have to say one
>thing,  my programming skills are comparable to the ability of a dog trying to
>beat crafty...  I am not that great.   I began my program with a 64 array.  and
>had the values of the pieces in the array with 0 representing an empty square..
>So far,  so good.  I then programmed all the legal moves for the pieces.  Then
>here is where my lack of knowledge comes into place...  I made it to where the
>search function is no actually a function,  it is just a bunch of if, then,
>statements...  So it played a random game of chess,  but no real search.  I soon
>became sick of this,  errrr,  program.  I trashed that whole project.  I am now
>starting from scratch.  I was wondering if there are any web pages or books out
>there that will guide you from the beginning to the completion of a program.  I
>dont want to look at any source in fear that I will copy...  I dont want to do
>it this way.  Please,  any responses will be greatly appreciated.
>Thanks all.

Hi Derrick,

Get a book on Data Structures. Study the parts that deals with recursivity. You
will need to fully understand recursivity. You'll have to understand the
difference between Local and Global variables for that. Alpha-Beta is a
depth-first search algorithms and you will easily find many books about that
kind of algorithms in Data Structures books.

Don't trash your project. In a few years you will probably regret it. It's fun
to come back later to look a your old code. It's the best way to see if you are
making progress. Put your name and a date on it. This way you'll will remember
when you wrote it.

Sylvain.



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