Author: Dann Corbit
Date: 20:44:47 05/28/01
Go up one level in this thread
On May 28, 2001 at 19:45:52, Peter McKenzie wrote: >On May 28, 2001 at 16:18:06, Frank Phillips wrote: > >>On May 28, 2001 at 13:30:44, Bruce Moreland wrote: >> >>>On May 28, 2001 at 08:33:19, Peter Berger wrote: >>> >>>>I think the CCT3 was a great and enjoyable event ! The atmosphere was very >>>>friendly and there were no debates this time . >>>> >>>>A few ideas and suggestions for future events though: >>>> >>>>a.) Every engine participating should be able to and do write logfiles . These >>>>should be sent to some arbiter right after the game has been finished in case of >>>>debates. >>>> >>>>As far as I know every participant would have been able to do so ( for example >>>>for the WinBoard programs the winboard.debug would be sufficient ) . >>> >>>There are some weird people out there who either want to take credit for other >>>people's work. I think there have been some others who don't realize that their >>>own work is pretty insignificant compared to what was already present in what >>>they started from. >> >> >>This is interesting from the other end so to speak. I start with Marsland’s 'A >>review of Game Tree Pruning' (said anatomy of chess program elsewhere), that >>too, all the relevant internet basic articles about move generation, various >>type of search, GNU chess source and tscp. After trying to figure out basic >>alpha-beta, Negamax, Mtdf (heaven forbid), 0x88, mailbox, bitboards, piece >>square tables, and many headaches, I (and really I mean one, as in >>hypothetically) decide on mailbox, basically follow the reciepe in Marsland >>guided by tscp and end up after some time and effort with a basic engine. Then >>add hash tables, then killer moves, history moves etc etc. Later null move. >>Following discussions on CCC add sophisticated tweaks like IID, adaptive null >>moves. All this gets refined and improved as time goes on and understanding >>increases. Parallel developments include move ordering using captures first >>sorted by SEE, then over time (again guided by discussion on CCC and articles) >>full blown ordering into hash move, winning and even captures, killer moves, >>non-captures sorted by history and finally losing captures. And so on and so >>on. Finally the whole entity is like Marsland described but with modern tweaks >>and hence fundamentally like Crafty, Dark Thought, GNU, etc, but not exactly >>copied as in at a point in time and the source looks entirely different. >> >>Similar story about evaluation. I hear about outside pawns, the lack of >>knowledge of which has cost me dearly. Look at Crafty’s source. Talk on CCC. >>Do not understand Crafty source but implement the well explained algorithm in my >>own way. So it goes on. Again, program tends to Crafty but not exactly >>copied. On the surface it looks entirely different. Maybe no bitboards at all >>for example. Finally I start to implement independent ideas (tweaks really) and >>it begins to diverge again. >> >>At which stage in this process, if ever, is one allowed to turn up to a >>tournament and say here I am with my program, rather than my version of >>Marsland/tscp/GNU/Crafty/Heinz/Kerrigan/….? At any time my contribution to the >>fundamental approach is minor. I did not invented minimax, negamax, alpha beta, >>Zorbrist hashing, bitboards, mailbox, 0x88 or whatever? Sure I use them. But I >>might equally well, I suppose, have just taken Crafty (after all it is better) >>and messed around with its code or just the data and weightings. Heck there is >>even an input file for doing this now (I think?) so I do not even need a >>compiler. >> >>I have no point here. Nor do I now know where I stand. Maybe however I now >>understand what Will was really asking :-/ >> >>Frank > >Nice post Frank, and congratulatons on your result in CCT3. >I think your approach is abolutely fine and sensible and legitimate. > >I do wonder how much time you saved being guided by TSCP and GNU Chess. I'd >estimate that starting with say TSCP, even if you rewrite every line of code in >it, would still give about a one year head start over starting from scratch >without any source code as reference. > >Why? Because what you get: > >- a clean framework and structure >- a complete working test bed >- a relatively bug free implementation >- a decent starting point for an evaluation function (sensible tunings etc) > >There is just so much you can get from source code that you don't get from >straight descriptions or explanations. > >This is not a criticism in anyway, just me thinking out loud. Heck, if I was >starting a chess program today then I'd probably start with TSCP or something >similar. In fact, there is so much crap in LambChop now that I might even do a >new program built up from something like TSCP! I'd start with SCP instead. It does 200K NPS right out of the gate, and is no larger than TSCP.
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