Author: Jeroen Noomen
Date: 00:06:03 12/27/97
Go up one level in this thread
>>Correct. But don't we all agree that this should come to an end? I fear >>that in a few years the main part of work of the openingbook expert is >>to detect 'cooks' and to repair those lines. I find this disgusting and >>this has NOTHING to do with opening theory, playing strength or >>whatever. >> >>Best regards, Jeroen Noomen > > >Hi Jeroen, > >I completely agree with you in everything you said. I see this as >really being 2 different problems: > > 1) How strong is the engine really? > 2) How good is the opening book? > >Most of want the best program they can get (without considering the >opening book.) We feel a little cheated when we thought we were >buying a strong chess program but we were really buying a strong >opening book database! We want to play our own games, experiment >and try out endings etc, in short we want the best calculating >engine we can get. Exactly my point! Opening books containing cooked lines have only one goal: to get more elopoints on the swedish list and let the consumers think this is the best program. I don't like this at all. >But the "book cookers" have a point of view also. It has always >been a part of Master chess to prepare hard for your opponents. >They are doing nothing that all strong humans do not do. Or are >they? I think there is a big difference. When humans prepare for a match, they don't know how the opponent will react to novelties. But in computerchess everybody can buy the other programs and direct the openingbook in such a way that your own program always beats the other one. IMO this is not a good development. >In principle I agree with them but NOT in practice. I know they >are only defending themselves against others who do this too and >it's difficult to blast them too much for it. But this is a grey >area thing and you must look at their motives. Are they legitimately >trying to improve their chess program or are they trying to get >as many wins as possible? The two things are different I believe. Well, IMO it has nothing to do with improving playing strength! >Of course if you ask them, they will say of course they want to >improve the overall chess play. And it's hard to defend this. >But if they had a choice between getting cheap wins and getting >to the top of the list, or actually making the program stronger >but not getting there, which would they choose? I think this >is the real crux of the matter, how genuine is the improvement? >Certainly a well tuned book makes a program legitimately stronger >as it does with humans but a fudged book designed to take unfair >advantage does not. In this way you could make f.e. the super constellation 200 Elopoints 'stronger'. Not because it really IS stronger, but it has a much better opening book, full of anti-comp lines... >This is really a moral issue because they have legitimate arguments >that can not be easily refuted. And also they are in the difficult >position of being forced to compete against others who may also >do this which puts them in a very difficult situation. > >I like the idea of eliminating the "book factor" in some way. >But this is a real difficult problem too since it's certainly >legitimate to tune your book to your programs style. In some >ways the book really is an integral part of your program just >as it is with people. I do not think there is an easy solution >to this although there are some interesting possibilities. > Here I agree with you. It really is not an easy problem. As far as I am concerned there would be no learners and cooked lines anymore. But the reality is different, unfortunately. Regards, Jeroen
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