Author: Carsten Kossendey
Date: 14:14:20 01/12/98
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On January 12, 1998 at 00:51:19, Richard A. Fowell (fowell@netcom.com) wrote: >On January 11, 1998 at 15:50:43, William Dozier wrote: > >>Hi! Richard, thank you for responding to my questions about Crafty for >>the Mac. Who is this programmer working on the new version of crafty >>12.9 PPc? > >I believe the programmer wishes to remain anonymous. Here I am, an anonymous programmer :( I really should have waited what fairytales would have come out of this story. >>Do you think that i can get a version the way it is now? > >I'm afraid that only enough of it was running to run the benchmark. >If the programmer is willing to let me give it to you, I will. >I still have it, certainly. I have uploaded the file to ftp://fics.onenet.net/pub/chess/uploads/Macintosh/crafty-12.9-macos-ppc-raw.hqx >>if not, then let us encourage this programmer to carry this project >>through. > >Fair enough. However, apparently Crafty is in a bit of flux at the >moment. >Traditionally one thing that discourages keeping the Mac version current >is the rapid evolution of Crafty, since people have been unsuccessful >at convincing Robert Hyatt to carry the Mac compatible code with the >basic Crafty package. Right. Crafty is always morphing back and forth, so to speak. 12.9 is not quite up to date, but is rock stable. [snipped what will eventually become the start of yet another Mac vs. PC war] I am not gonna jump on that Mac vs. PC train *again*. I own one PC and four Macs. Guess my opinion. For a quick insight, here is the "Read Me?" file I have included in the package: --> Crafty 12.9 for MacOS on PowerPC The intention behind this port of Crafty 12.9 was to evaluate the PowerPC for chess programming and to provide a "sparring partner" for my own program, *not* to evaluate my skills as a porter or programmer. The whole port took less than two days (it was a weekend in October '97, actually). Therefor this version may seem rough at times, and surely there are quite a number of bugs in it - be it because they were in the original source code, caused by the compiler, or by me. This version has *not* been optimized for maximum speed either, contrary to the Intel versions, which use quite a bunch of assembly code. [Techie info: I have implemented FirstOne() and LastOne() using __cntlzw() - other than that, the code is C.] Also this port carries around lots of useless stuff (as far as MacOS operation goes) such as AutoPlayer/XBoard/ICS/command-line support. Removing this might have speeded up the program slightly. I do *not* (let me repeat, I do *not*) provide any support concerning this project. Neither will the author of Crafty, Bob Hyatt, most likely. He has no insight in what I changed in order to make this baby work. Neither Bob Hyatt nor I do take any responsibility for any possible damages caused by the use of - or the inability to use - this software. Do *not* ask me about updates either. The enclosed folders have the following purposes: The "Logs" folder will accumulate log files and game transcriptions whenever you use Crafty. It is a wise decision to empty it at times. If you want to use an opening book with Crafty, follow the instructions on how to build one available from the Crafty FTP site (ftp://ftp.cis.uab.edu/pub/hyatt/) - these are not included here. After building the book move the files into the "Books" folder. Books seem to work, mostly. If you want to use endgame databases with Crafty, move them into the "TB" folder. I have tested this to some extend, and found no problems. This version of Crafty will ignore each and any endgame database with more than 4 (four) pieces. Removal of any of the three aforementioned folders will cause unexpected behaviour, eventually including crashes. You have been warned. Use of larger hash tables may require changing the memory allocation via the Finder's "Get Info" command. Good Luck. Yours in chess, Carsten Kossendey carsten.kossendey@nrw-online.de Dortmund, Germany - Monday, January 12th, 1998 P.S.: Here is the original copyright message: Crafty, copyrighted 1996 by Robert M. Hyatt, Ph.D., Associate Professor of Computer and Information Sciences, University of Alabama at Birmingham. All rights reserved. No part of this program may be reproduced in any form or by any means, for any commercial (for profit/sale) reasons. This program may be freely distributed, used, and modified, so long as such use does not in any way result in the sale of all or any part of the source, the executables, or other distributed materials that are a part of this package. <--
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