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Subject: Re: Consensual positional problem set.

Author: Enrique Irazoqui

Date: 15:17:49 12/13/97

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On December 13, 1997 at 16:50:22, Don Dailey wrote:

>I have an idea for generating a positional problem set to
>measure our chess programs against.  This will take some
>cooperation and should involve many programs.
>
> 1. Start with (n) positions from Grandmaster games and make
>    a note of the move the grandmaster played.
>
> 2. Run each participating program for some length of time (t)
>    on each position.  Note the move the program chooses at
>    the end of the allotted time.
>
> 3. Determine which positions there is a "consensus" on.   The
>    best move must be agreed on by all programs.
>
> 4. Throw out the "easy" ones.  Consider this our problem set.
>
>
>For this to work, t (time) should be pretty high.   The rational
>is that all our programs are of Grandmaster strength, given enough
>time to think.  If all the "grandmasters" in our sample (including
>the human who played the game) agree on the best move, the evidence
>is fairly strong that the move is indeed the best move and the noise
>will be quite low.
>
>Since all the programs will be capable of solving every problem,
>the issue will be how quickly the "solutions" are found.  A
>scoring system should be determined in advance that we can use
>to rate our programs based on the problem set that is eventually
>chosen.
>
>The easy problems should be filtered away.  If every program
>chooses the right move very quickly, we probably should not
>consider this postion worthy of including in our problem set.
>The goal is to have a single "best" move, but the move should
>not be trivial.
>
>I have no idea whether this technique will produce a useful
>positional problem set.   But I would be willing to prepare
>the intial fen positions from a set of random positions I
>prepared from master games.  These positions are completely
>random and were culled from one of the CDROM databases I have.
>
>Here is what I would need from each participant:
>
>  a) The time your program first chose and kept the move that
>     was it's final choice.   It might also be useful to know
>     if the program "wavered" on earlier iterations, did it
>     change it's mind a few times?
>
>  b) The program you are using and the hardware you are running
>     on.  Probably we should adjust for hardware and choose
>     our run times based on something pretty standard, like a
>     pentium pro 200.   The exact time and hardware is not
>     critically important, but it should meet some minimum
>     requirement so as to not degrade the test.
>
>I would like some feedback on this from you guys.  Do you think
>it is worth pursing?  Will it produce a useful set?  Who is
>interested in participating?  Do you have some suggestions or
>improvements?
>
>If enough people want to try this,  I have 1000 fen positions
>with grandmaster moves attached to them.  I can run Cilkchess
>through these 1000 positions (we have access to lots of hardware
>here)  and post the results of all 1000 positions, along with
>a reduced set reflecting those positions Cilkchess "consents"
>to being in the set.  I suspect this will cut the set down a lot.
>
>I will suggest that each problem is run for 30 minutes on each
>machine of at least pentium pro 200 performance (or you can
>adjust for lesser hardware.)   I am expecting that after Cilkchess
>performs the first pass, there will only be a fraction of the
>original 1000 positions left and everyone will be willing to
>run 30 minutes on each one.
>
>Once this step is done we may have a useful positional problem
>set.  Even if we do not perhaps we will learn something!
>
>The participants would be the actual programmers whenever possible
>but we can get the data from any source, and I know there are a
>lot of enthusiastic chess program owners who might be interested
>in contributing the test time.
>
>I will wait for feedback before proceeding.
>
>-- Don

I had a very similar idea a few months ago. As a result I have a
positional test of 24 problems, all from great grandmaster games and all
commented by grandmasters. I discarded positions with solutions not
found by any programs. The main difference with your proposal is that
instead of 30 minutes I used only 5, more or less the average amount of
time in games played at 40:2.

The test has been posted on CCR under the name "CCR Test", with results
on a P200MMX/64. Below I post the global results of some programs and
the test set. Please tell me what you think of it.

Rebel 8/9          17
Hiarcs 6           16
Mchess 6           16
Rebel 6            16
Mchess 7           15
Fritz 5            13
Genius 5           12
Shredder 1         11
Fritz 4            10
CM5K               10

24 positions:

2br2k1/5pp1/1p3q1p/2pBpP2/2P1P3/P6P/2Q3P1/5RK1 w - -    ; Qa4
r1b2rk1/1p3pp1/pn3n1p/2q1p3/P3P3/2N2N2/BP1RQPPP/3R2K1 w - -    ; Qe3
4rbk1/ppp2ppp/2qprn2/8/3QP3/1PN1R3/PBP2PPP/4R1K1 w - -    ; h3
r2qk2r/4bppp/p1bp1n2/1p2pP2/4P3/1BNQ4/PPP3PP/R1B2RK1 w qk -    ; Bg5
r1bq2k1/4n1b1/p2p2p1/Pp1Pp2p/1N2P3/1NR3PP/1P3QB1/4K3 w - -    ; Qb6
r4rk1/ppq1bppp/3pbn2/4p3/4PP2/2N1B3/PPP1B1PP/R3QRK1 w - -    ; f5
4r1k1/1p1rq1pp/2p1p3/p1P1Ppb1/P2P4/1PNR1QP1/6KP/3R4 w - -    ; Nb1
2rq2rk/1p1bbp1p/p1Nppp2/8/4PP2/2N2B2/PPP3PP/R2Q1R1K b - -    ; bxc6
r1bqnrk1/p4ppp/1pnpp3/2p5/2PPP3/P1PBB3/4NPPP/R2Q1RK1 b - -    ; Na5
2r3k1/1q2ppbp/p5p1/1p1P4/4P3/3Q3P/P2B1PP1/2R3K1 w - -    ; Rc6
1r4k1/p1rqn1p1/Ppn1p2p/1B1pPp2/1P1P1P2/2R1QN2/6PP/2R3K1 w - -; R1c2
r3r1k1/pp1q1pp1/2bb1nnp/3pp3/8/1P1PNNP1/PBR1PPBP/Q1R3K1 w - - ; d4
1r1r2k1/p4pp1/2bppq1p/2p5/2P5/1P1BP3/P1QR1PPP/3R2K1 b - -    ; Qe5
r4rn1/pp3pkp/3q2p1/1b1pN3/3P4/5N2/PP1Q1PPP/2R1R1K1 w - -    ; Qa5
2r2rk1/1p1qppbp/1n1n2p1/pN1P4/P7/BP4PP/4QPB1/2R2RK1 w - - ; Bxd6
rn1qk2r/p2pppbp/1p3np1/8/2PN4/2N3P1/PP2PPKP/R1BQ1R2 b qk -    ; Qc8
5k2/1p1r1pp1/p1pp2p1/4q3/2P1P1Q1/4R2P/PP3PP1/6K1 b - -    ; Ke8
r2r2k1/ppp1qppp/4pn2/8/2P1PP2/1P6/P1B1Q1PP/3R1R1K b - -    ; e5
8/4k3/4bpp1/7p/1p2p3/4P1PB/1P2P1KP/8 b - -    ; f5
2r1nrk1/p2q1ppp/bp1p4/n1pPp3/P1P1P3/2PBB1N1/4QPPP/R4RK1 w - -    ; f4
r2q1rk1/4bppp/p2p4/2pP4/3pP3/3Q4/PP1B1PPP/R3R1K1 w - -    ; b4
2r2rk1/1p1bq3/p3p2p/3pPpp1/1P1Q4/P7/2P2PPP/2R1RBK1 b - -    ; Bb5
r1b2r1k/pp2q1pp/2p2p2/2p1n2N/4P3/1PNP2QP/1PP2RP1/5RK1 w - -    ; Nd1
bn6/1q4n1/1p1p1kp1/2pPp1pp/1PP1P1P1/3N1P1P/4B1K1/2Q2N2 w - -    ; h4

Enrique



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