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Subject: Re: Back in time

Author: Robert Hyatt

Date: 07:30:39 08/31/01

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On August 30, 2001 at 20:25:49, Pham Minh Tri wrote:

>On August 30, 2001 at 11:28:54, Robert Hyatt wrote:
>
>>On August 30, 2001 at 10:20:12, Mark Young wrote:
>>
>>>On August 30, 2001 at 09:51:42, Robert Hyatt wrote:
>>>
>>>>On August 30, 2001 at 08:50:52, Mark Young wrote:
>>>>
>>>>>It has been suggested here that programs have made little progress in the last
>>>>>10 years other then hardware speed. Here is the list of top programs 6 years
>>>>>ago. Does anyone really think a program of 4, 6 or 10 years ago running on
>>>>>modern but equal hardware would have a chance of beating a Junior 7, Deep Fritz,
>>>>>Chess Tiger in a match. I think someone is pulling our legs.
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>I think someone can't read.  "slow and steady" is not equal to "little"
>>>>I _clearly_ said that "there has been no revolutionary ideas in computer chess
>>>>in a long time.  progress has been slow and steady."
>>>>
>>>>How you make the giant leap to "little progress" is a mystery only you can
>>>>answer.
>>>
>>>You will answer it for my Bob! Here is your Quote and the full text.
>>>
>>>Bob's Statement:
>>>"Part of the progress has been due
>>>to incremental changes to chess engines/evaluations/etc, part has been due to
>>>the hardware speed advances.  Probably more of the latter than the former, if
>>>the truth is known..."
>>>
>>>
>>
>>
>>
>>OK... I give up.  Where did I say "there has been little progress in software
>>over the past 10 years or so."??
>>
>>The above seems to be exactly what I have been saying for many years.  Slow
>>and steady progress in the software, with more rapid progress in the hardware
>>speeds.
>>
>>So again, please answer _the question_ and show me where I said there had been
>>little software progress in the past 10 years.  You haven't shown that so far.
>>
>
>Hi Bob,
>How do you think about parallel algorithms? Just in few years, many top chess
>programs apply them to speed up search several times. Is it a little or big
>progress? Do you consider them as a software or hardware achievement?


It is both, but it is _also_ old.  I did a parallel search in 1978 using a
dual-CPU univac machine.  This later became cray blitz.  Monty Newborn also
did a parallel search in the late 70's, a bit earlier than mine, using a
cluster of data general novas.

The problem, then, is that this simply isn't new.  Parallel search could be
considered a significant leap, both in software and hardware.  But it isn't a
phenom of the past 5 years.  It dates back to the early "academic" days of
computer chess.



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