Author: Ernst A. Heinz
Date: 19:57:27 10/22/00
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>>How old is computer chess? 17th or 18th century?
>
>Computer Chess History
>http://www.geocities.com/SiliconValley/Lab/7378/comphis.htm
Computer chess has a much richer and even longer history
than mentioned by others in this thread and on the WWW page
listed above.
* around 1750(?): Torres y Quevedo built a mechanical device
that played the endgame KRK perfectly
* around 1850(?): Charles Babbage outlined plans for yet did
not actually build his so-called "Analytical
Engine" which was the first programmable
general-purpose computer so to speak. His
co-worker Lady Ada Lovelace (gave name to
programming language "Ada") wrote programs
for this machine, including a perceived
chess program or at least ideas therefor.
* around 1940(?): Konrad Zuse developed his "Plankalkuel"
formalism which probably was the first
high-level programming language. He also
wrote a "Plankalkuel" chess program, a
Java-applet simulation of which is actually
available somewhere on the WWW (sorry, I
forgot the URL).
Moreover, the founding fathers of cybernetics and economics
deliberated extensively about the possibilities of how to make
a machine play chess at the beginning of the 20th century. The
best-known example in this respect is Norbert Wiener.
So much from the top of my head. I hope I got the time numbers
about right ...
=Ernst=
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