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Subject: Re: Explanation needed

Author: Robert Hyatt

Date: 21:00:16 09/07/98

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On September 07, 1998 at 12:54:56, Ilya P. Kozachenko wrote:

>Maybe, it is stupid or already discussed question but I decided that it's
>simpler to ask nevertheless.
>I wonder why Crafty is weaker than top commercial programs (someone can
>say it's point at issue, but there exist some facts to prove it) ?
>Is Bob Hyatt less experienced than authors of commercial programs ?
>Surely, not.


probably not, since my first program played its first move in November,
1968.  :)

>Does Crafty has been developed for short time in comparison w/others ?
>Again, not.

actually, yes.  It is just over 3 years old... maybe almost 4.  Pretty
young, actually.


>Knowledge implemented ? Smth else ?

Impossible to answer, since the commercial programmers don't reveal what
they are doing.. But it is probably not a knowledge issue compared to all
programs.  IE Fritz/Junior are *very* fast and don't do near the work at
endpoints that Crafty does...

>Maybe, the key is in code optimization ? I don't know...

Crafty is a 64 bit program, and started 4 years ago as a test to see how
64 bit "bitmaps" would function, since I had not used that approach in the
past.  It is definitely not the fast way to do things on 32 bit machines,
but on 64 bit machines, this approach begins to work really well.

It is not written in assembly, like some of the faster engines are.  So that
does make a speed difference.


>Bob, EXPLAIN, please.
>If I'm wrong, my apologizes.



I don't think you are wrong...  Crafty isn't growing up as a program written
to beat other programs.  It is growing up in a viper's pit full of IM and
GM players that hit on it hundreds of times in a week, sometimes a hundred
times in a single day.  So it is really being tuned more against humans and
handling their particular strategies against computers, rather than being
tuned by auto testing against other programs.  It also has things going on
that commercial programs don't... one example is the parallel search that
can more than equalize the difference between it and commercial programs
with the huge speed kick this can provide on new hardware...

Also, it is not ever going to be an overwhelming opponent against other
programs when everyone can peek at the most recent version to see what it
does and what it doesn't do.  But that's life..


>
>Ilya.
>
>P.S. I start to work on Botvinnik's project. Anyone familiar w/it,
>     pls e-mail me.



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