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Subject: Re: North American Open 2003.

Author: Sune Fischer

Date: 11:38:47 07/18/02

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On July 18, 2002 at 13:35:11, Dann Corbit wrote:

>On July 18, 2002 at 04:42:20, Sune Fischer wrote:
>[snip]
>>If they run at the same speed, and you have a lower branch factor, you should
>>win.
>>If you don't, then I guess your pruning is faulty in the lower plies.
>>
>>The thing gets muddy when people do pruning/extensions, the simple exponential
>>model doesn't really hold water, eg. I suspect the branch factor is not even a
>>constant as a function of depth.
>
>At some point the curve will look like a simple exponential model.
>
>Near the origin, OF COURSE it is not true.  You have all sorts of possible start
>up costs -- clearing hash tables, generating lists of structures -- all sorts of
>overhead possibilities.
>
>The whole notion of O(f(n)) behavior is that at some point, the most dominant
>part of the function will start to dominate.
>
>So consider the function:
>
>f(x) = 5 + 3x + 2x^2 + exp(3*x)
>
>Near zero, the most important part of this equation is the constant term!
>
>
>We would expect that early on, the branching factor is practically irrelevant,
>but very soon it becomes the main focus of the equation.

Yeah, but your model:
>>C0 * exp( C1 * x)
>>verses
>>C2 * exp( C3 * x)

assumes you have a constant branch factor (C1 and C3).
That is probably true for a clean alpha-beta, but you need to prove it also
holds when pruning, extensions, hashtables, repetition detection are in use.

I believe a more accurate model should include variation with depth:
N1 = A1(d) * exp( B1(d) * x) + C1
N2 = A2(d) * exp( B2(d) * x) + C2

with the depth d possibly being a function of x (not to mention a function of
position:).

-S.



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