Computer Chess Club Archives


Search

Terms

Messages

Subject: Re: Why Fritz and Junior not among Top Computers at ICC?

Author: George Sobala

Date: 00:40:11 10/21/02

Go up one level in this thread


On October 20, 2002 at 21:16:37, Bob Durrett wrote:

>On October 20, 2002 at 20:23:08, Mike Byrne wrote:
>
>>On October 20, 2002 at 17:55:55, Bob Durrett wrote:
>>
>>>Why Fritz and Junior not among Top computers at ICC?
>>>
>>>I just looked at "best computers" at the Internet Chess Club [ICC] and noted
>>>that the top blitz programs are NOT Fritz and Junior.
>>>
>>>{{Note:  at ICC, "best" is a command.}}
>>>
>>>
>>>Why is that?  Maybe Kramnik was playing against the wrong engine?
>>>
>>>Bob D.
>>
>>The ICC is an uncontrolled enviroment -
>>
>>1.  You have muiltple ranges of TC's.
>>2.  You have unscrupolous operators that will repeatedly plays games against a
>>machine that is having problems.
>>3.  You have rating fanatical operators that do the following:
>>
>>A.  Will only play certain players.
>>B.  Force the computer to make moves it didn't make.
>>C.  Will only play higher rated opponents.
>>D.  Etc
>>
>>4.  A variety of hardware, some with SMP, some with not.
>>5.  Internet instability - causing some programs to lose a won position, or win
>>a lost position.  Various glitches happen.
>>6.  A wide range of operator experience - some are better than others.
>>
>>SSDF is a much better guess because is has better controlled enviroment - but
>>that has it faults too.
>
>True enough.  Not nearly a controlled environment.  But there is one merit of
>the ICC environment.  Games are being played between the top programs and
>HUMANs.  The SSDF may have a much better controlled environment.  But they are
>the wrong kinds of games!  If you wish to obtain any information at all about
>how computers would do against the humans, then SSDF seems like the last place
>in the world to go.  They do not even address the issue.
>
>The question is:  "Which program would be best in a match with the top human?
>The answer must be "The best choice would be the chess engine has been the top
>performer against humans, especially the top GMs."
>
>Only then can there be an answer to the more general question:  "Have the chess
>engines yet reached the performance level needed to beat the top human?"
>
>Bob D.

Yes, but nearly all human v comp play at ICC is at Blitz, which favours the
comps (pick up wins for blunders), and the comps are thus not put to a real
chess test.



This page took 0 seconds to execute

Last modified: Thu, 15 Apr 21 08:11:13 -0700

Current Computer Chess Club Forums at Talkchess. This site by Sean Mintz.