Author: Alessio Iacovoni
Date: 12:27:29 10/18/98
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On October 18, 1998 at 15:11:30, John Coffey wrote: >On October 18, 1998 at 12:13:34, Alessio Iacovoni wrote: > >>1) Shouldn't computer strenght it rather be measured on "average" entry-level >>computers.. i.e. the ones actually used by the majority of people? > >Entry level is a moving target. What may be high end now might be much >more common 6 months from now. If you test on an "average" machine now >then your results will be worthless in 6 months. What? Why would they be worthless? They would just indicate exactly the same ranking of a top-level computer (with different elo's). Or wouldn't they? > > >> >>2) Also.. do programs benefit in the same way from higher speed and increased >>hash tables? If not, tests would not be comparable, therefore useless. >> > >If some programs benefit more from Hash tables then this indicates a better >written program. Memory prices are so low now that you could get 256M and >not break the bank. It used to be the most expensive component on the mahcine >but not any longer. > But 256M is not the average memory people usually have. I don't know you guys there in the states, but in the rest of the world people still have 16-32 meg and a pentium, some an MMX. > >>3) Why are books used in tests? Shouldn't a top level computer program be >>capable of doing at least decently in the opening phase *without* resorting to >>it's book? If the answer is no.. then it could be easily beaten by even >>lower-performing computers by having it systematically go out of book. Or am I >>wrong? > >The computer's opening book is very much a component of its skill, just as a >human player's book is a component of his skill. > I'm not too sure of that.. it's a component of somebody's elses skill (i.e. the international master or grand master or team of masters that have helped to make the book). Also.. I didn't say opening books should'nt be used, but that they shouldn't be used in tests because they modify greatly the results. The message people receive when fed with rankings is that x engine is stronger than y engine and not that the book of x wis better than the one of y. Also.. If an existing program was given some opening knowledge and a feature to sistematically oblige the other program to get out of its book, it would result to be stronger (while in reality it isn't). I wonder why nobody has come up with this yet. Hyat feels the need to introduce a "no tricks" function in his crafty... why hasn't he developed a switch to "DO tricks" when playing against other computers.
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