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Subject: Re: My results.

Author: Miguel A. Ballicora

Date: 15:39:11 10/05/01

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On October 05, 2001 at 17:29:28, Slater Wold wrote:

>On October 05, 2001 at 14:00:26, Dann Corbit wrote:
>
>>On October 05, 2001 at 13:41:12, Bruce Moreland wrote:
>>
>>>On October 05, 2001 at 01:33:34, Slater Wold wrote:
>>>
>>>>On October 05, 2001 at 00:44:23, Dann Corbit wrote:
>>>>
>>>>>Clearly b6+ and Be3 both win.
>>>>>
>>>>>The only question I have is, does Kb3 also win, and if not, why not?
>>>>
>>>>I believe from your posts, and Crafty's eval, Kb3 also wins.  Crafty shows a 4+
>>>>pawn advatange even with Kb3.  But I don't believe it's the quickest way, or the
>>>>best move.  But I do believe it wins.
>>>>
>>>>It's like going to the grocery store.  You have 3 means of getting there:
>>>>
>>>>Helicopter:  b6+
>>>>
>>>>Car:  Be3
>>>>
>>>>Walking:  Kb3
>>>>
>>>>Which would you choose?  I have no doubts walking will get you there, as I have
>>>>no doubt Kb3 wins.  :)
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>Slate
>>>
>>>This is sounding like a crappy problem that should either be ignored or set so
>>>that all three of those moves are taken as solutions.
>>>
>>>The problem is that you can't tell in many cases if the program sees a win, so
>>>you could give a wrong program credit for being right, and vice versa.
>>
>>I agree with your assessment.
>>I think (in particular) some EPD chess problems are simply bad problems.
>>For instance, there may be 3 ways to win, and so there are 3 solutions.  But one
>>of the 3 ways might look good in the first 6 plies, then look really bad for 4
>>more plies, and suddenly a solution appears through a surprise at ply 11.  So,
>>some program makes it 5 plies, and answers with "the right answer" at ply 5 with
>>an eval of -192 and adds one to the score.
>>
>>Ideally, a test problem should:
>>1.  Not be stupendously easy.  3 ply solutions are not worth the bother.
>>2.  Not be stupendously hard.  All day solutions are not pragmatically useful.
>>3.  Have a single *clear* answer that is found after a fairly difficult search
>>of at least one second but not more than ten minutes.  (There could be special
>>case sets that take days to solve, but they won't help you to improve your chess
>>program much.  Only to know that you have improved it after the fact).
>>
>>The very best problems are those that can be proven -- the solution move wins
>>and other moves lose.  Probably, there are very few of these problems known.
>
>Dann if you believe all this, then I think it's time to move on from WAC.
>
>80% of WAC's problems can be solved in 3 seconds.  19% can be solved in 30
>seconds.  And 1% cannot be solved in 100,000 seconds.
>
>Perhaps that 19% should be focused on, while the others are of no meaning, to
>most anyway.
>
>GCP and I just went through his EPD, and any problem that had 2 solutions, was
>removed.  Any problem that had a transposition into the winning line, was
>removed.  There are probably still some left, but most have been removed.
>
>If anyone ever gets serious about it, I would donate my computer for 14 hours a
>day to crunch positions, to come up with a "standard" EPD.  WAC is not a
>challenge anymore, and perhaps those developing chess programs now with the goal
>of solving all the WAC problems, are not striving hard enough.  It's like
>running a mile in under an hour.  That's *not* an accomplishment.
>
>IMO.
>
>
>
>Slate



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