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Subject: Re: [UPDATE] Any chess programs using Forth?

Author: Ian Osgood

Date: 09:00:44 10/02/01

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On September 19, 2001 at 20:04:42, Ian Osgood wrote:

>>>On September 18, 2001 at 13:51:07, Ian Osgood wrote:
>>>
>>>>Has anyone run across a chess program written in Forth?  I ask because I
>>>>recently ran across an asynchronous processor design optimized for Forth
>>>>(designed by the creator of Forth, in fact) which claims 2.4 Bips (or  60 Gips
>>>>for the 25x parallel version) dissipating only 10mW.
>>>>
>>>>Link: http://www.mindspring.com/~chipchuck/25x.html
>>>>
>>>>Ian

Dan pointed me to the source for a simple Forth chess program:

Link: http://ultratechnology.com/chess.html

I used very little out of it in my efforts (except the idea of a function vector
to do a different action per piece.  It was used for move generation in this
program; I use the technique in the eval function.)

>I am still curious about its chess performance, but I think it would require a
>Forth guru to transfer existing chess expertise efficiently to Forth.

...

>When I saw how deplorable their Forth chess program was (no quiescence, eval is
>simply material and kings on first rank until the endgame), I started porting
>TSCP to Forth for fun.  What a headache!  Migrating from C to Forth is hard; you
>lose types and structures and local variables and all your C idioms.  Forth is a
>*very* idiomatic language, from what I can tell.  Without knowledge of common
>patterns, efficient Forth looks like so much line noise.  Definitely a language
>for Real Programmers (TM).
>
>I thought that a chess program would make a good benchmark for this chip because
>1) no floating point required, 2) requires little memory and small word size for
>a basic engine, and 3) it can give you a real metric, nodes per second, which
>this asynchronous chip currently lacks, having no clock speed as such.
>
>Ian

I finished my port of TSCP (with some enhancements) to Forth.   I guess that
makes me a Real Progammer (TM) now.  :)  It is definitely better than the old
program.  It should soon be available on the same page as the chess program
mentioned above.

Ian



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