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Subject: Re: the "greatest achievement of any computer program in history"

Author: Adrien Regimbald

Date: 02:29:33 08/06/00

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Hello,

>Agreed, but certainly it will sell copies of Deep Junior, which is clearly what
>is intended by these statements.  For I can't figure out any other possible
>explanation for the claims I see.  I mean, clearly 50% against some of worlds
>best is not as good as +3 against the World Champion.  There is NO possible


I think that being able to beat so called "Anti computer chess experts"
regularly would be a much more tremendous feat.  I would rather see a program
which could perform at a "legitimate master level" than one that gets an overall
performance rating of 2700 or so against the cream of the crop.  By this I mean
that the computer wouldn't fall into draws with players rated at 1200 (yes, I've
seen some players rated that low manage to hold some of the best computer
programs around to draws, and not by any cheap opening trick either, just by
steering the game into certain types of positions), and to be able to
consistently beat any player <2000, not just those that don't know how to play
an anti computer game (I've seen A-class players with a penchant good anti
computer play absolutely rip some of the top programs apart and for the most
part, rarely ever actually lose a game.  You won't see this happen with a human
of 2700 strength, EVER).

There is a legitimate argument to be made about the strengths of the players -
the comps are tactical monsters, and if you can subdue them, you win.  However,
you simply won't see a human player be made to look like an absolute patzer to
someone rated over 600 points below them, unless something extraordinary happens
(perhaps this person just watched a sibling die or some such).

I don't know about the rest of you, but I would rather have a "solid" program
that performs at a slightly lower ELO (I don't mean solid in a positional style
way, I mean it in the sense that the program will ALWAYS play at that level, and
won't look like crap against certain styles) than one which has on average an
ELO of 300 more which can be turned into an absolute walk-over if you play in a
certain style.


>calculation that can be made that could change that.   As to programs in non
>Chess areas, well, the software that runs various life saving medical equipment
>comes to mind.  I would venture that any OS is a more important achievement then


Perhaps when they started out, but now making new OSes is for the most part
expanding upon already existing ideas now.


>a chess program.  And if Microsoft actually came out with a stable Windows that
>would clearly be one of the greatest software engineering feats of all time.


Let me tell you a secret (it's not much of a secret, it is actually well known
among most developers): Microsoft doesn't _WANT_ to make a completely stable
version of Windows.  If they did, you wouldn't be forever having to purchase
upgrades, and probably many people would stick with the OS they have.  Such
things wouldn't be good for their bottom line, and with Bill Gates, it is _ALL_
about the bottom line, I don't think he has a single shred of a sense of pride
in good workmanship left in him.  (If he did, how could he possibly in good
conscience continue putting out a plethora of new versions of M$ products when
there are millions of known bugs in the old versions, and the new versions
probably have a million and then some, most of which I assure you M$ knows about
well before it releases the product.)


Regards,
Adrien.



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