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Subject: Re: What is a root node processor?

Author: Uri Blass

Date: 06:17:51 10/02/01

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On October 02, 2001 at 08:38:01, Steve Maughan wrote:

>Gordon,
>
>Some programs do a 'thorough' static analysis of the position before they start
>to search.  They then assign values for a piece being on any one of the squares.
> This is root node processing or pre-processing.  The advantage is speed of
>evaluation but the (big) dissadvantage is that what seems like a good idea at
>the root may not be so good at the tip of a search e.g. rook on 7th when King is
>on 8th is good but when the king starts to advance up the board the preprocessor
> still thinks that the rook on the 7th is good.  Moreover, as machines get
>faster and search deeper the problem gets worse since the tips are further away
>from the root.
>
>The alternative is tip evaluation which is slower but *MUCH* more accurate when
>done well.  The famous pre-processors are early Fritz versions, Rex chess,
>Travel Champion, Novag Constellation and anything that claims to do >1.5 million
>nodes / sec on a single processor e.g. Little Goliath.  Junior was always
>considered to be a preprocessor but I seriously doubt it now as the evaluation
>is usually rock solid between moves and the scores seem to contain extensive
>king safety elements.

Junior was not considered to be a preprocessor.
It is known to have a stable evaluation from the first commercial
version(Junior4.6)

Amir admitted that Junior6 did some preprocessing but he said that it is a
problem that he is going to correct and he corrected it in Junior7.

Uri



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