Author: Christophe Theron
Date: 13:19:51 11/15/01
Go up one level in this thread
On November 15, 2001 at 12:39:27, Slater Wold wrote:
>On November 15, 2001 at 12:20:37, Christophe Theron wrote:
>
>>On November 15, 2001 at 12:06:24, Slater Wold wrote:
>>
>>>I heard it through the grapevine that Microsoft is working on a chess program.
>>>
>>>Nothing like Deep Blue, but something to rival Chessmaster, and I am guessing,
>>>Chessbase.
>>>
>>>With the money, resources, and brains at Microsoft, I think they have the
>>>ability to make one of the best chess programs on the market. They could afford
>>>to get the best GM's and use some of the best programmers in the world.
>>>
>>>I was curious on what the thoughts of this forum is, on such an idea. I know
>>>most people here don't like Microsoft, but please keep in mind I am asking for
>>>your input on a Microsoft chess program, not their business ethics.
>>
>>
>>
>>I guess that if Microsoft wanted to publish a chess program they would not
>>gather together GMs and programmers.
>>
>>They would just buy an existing chess program.
>>
>>Time has shown that it takes a lot of time (years) to build a strong chess
>>program, and that you do not need to involve grandmasters in the process.
>>
>>What you need the most is TIME.
>>
>>So I think that's the way they would do it: by buying an existing one. That's
>>what they do usually.
>>
>>
>>
>> Christophe
>
>You have a point. But from what I understand, this is *NOT* the case. They are
>actually making their own.
>
>Microsoft buying Chessbase makes NO sense, since Chessbase probably makes 1% of
>what Microsoft does. Chessbase is worth what? A few million? Microsoft can
>create their own software and run Chessbase out of the market for less money.
>
>There already is a Microsoft Chess program, that came with an add on pack a few
>years ago. It wasn't very good, but it shows they had started on something.
It was a game pack for Windows 3.0 called the Xmas pack or something like that
(December 1991).
And it actually supports my point: none of the programs published in this pack
came from people working at Microsoft.
Even the famous Mine program has not been written by a MS guy, as far as I know.
The chess program was Winchess, by David Noris, not Microsoft, and apparently
based on the Turbo Chess free source code (this is written in the help file). I
still have it on my hard disk.
Just from an economic point of view it makes no sense for them to build a chess
program from scratch. When they go for a market, they go as fast as possible.
They bought mosaic in order to provide an internet browser for Win95 as soon as
possible.
Remember, they did this right from the start: they bought QDos, and renamed it
to DOS to sell it to IBM.
Microsoft working on a chess program internally? That makes no sense.
Christophe
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