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Subject: Re: How To Improve Your Chess: Write a Chess Program?!?

Author: Rémi Coulom

Date: 03:59:36 04/23/02

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On April 22, 2002 at 22:56:32, Christophe Theron wrote:

>On April 22, 2002 at 22:40:10, Ralph Patriquin wrote:
>
>>I was just toying with this idea tonight. Would writing a chess program help
>>your chess playing? I'm thinking in particular of a program that relies more
>>on evaluation than brute force search. Would the act of explicitly writing
>>out the algorithms so that a computer can understand, for example, weak squares
>>or passed pawns help your play? Would this exercise help clarify your own
>>thinking in actual play? Is it worth doing with chess improvement as the
>>primary goal? Any comments from all who've been there are appreciated.
>>
>>Ralph
>
>
>
>It has definitely improved my understanding of the game and my chess skills. But
>I am still a weak player.
>
>One thing that is very important to understand is that chess is really 90%
>tactics. And writing a chess program will not help you in this area.
>
>
>
>    Christophe

Yes, it did help me to improve my tactics. A few years ago, when I used to play
on the chess servers, I noticed that programs set up to search 1 ply obtained
surprisingly good ratings (1600-1700) at blitz. I could not believe it because I
had a rating of about 1450, and I thought that my thinking was much better than
a 1-ply search. Then, I forced myself to do a mental one-ply search before
playing any move, and my rating made a 150 point jump in one day (playing
against humans, of course. Killing a program that does a 1-ply search is
extremely easy when you know how to do it).

Remi



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