Author: Christophe Theron
Date: 20:26:41 10/15/03
Go up one level in this thread
On October 14, 2003 at 18:47:31, Uri Blass wrote:
>On October 14, 2003 at 17:58:04, Christophe Theron wrote:
>
>>On October 14, 2003 at 03:54:28, Uri Blass wrote:
>>
>>>On October 14, 2003 at 03:49:38, Christophe Theron wrote:
>>>
>>>>On October 13, 2003 at 15:44:30, Joachim Rang wrote:
>>>>
>>>>>On October 13, 2003 at 14:19:14, Christophe Theron wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>>>On October 13, 2003 at 13:09:03, Charles Roberson wrote:
>>>>>>
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> You make the statement that Diep is a positional engine and you chose it based
>>>>>>>on that. So, why did you run G/5 matches? At G/5 tactics and search depth
>>>>>>>is crucial.
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>>I would like to bring to your attention that tactics and search depth are
>>>>>>crucial at any time controls in chess.
>>>>>>
>>>>>>Showing dimishing returns from increased search depth is so difficult that in
>>>>>>practice there is little difference between blitz and long time controls.
>>>>>>
>>>>>>If engine A gets a beating at blitz, expect it to get the same beating if you
>>>>>>repeat the match with long time controls.
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>> Christophe
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>Hi Chrisotphe,
>>>>>
>>>>>this interesting statement was many times repeated from you, but in the meantime
>>>>>a lot of tests have shown, that there are certain programs (not all) which give
>>>>>different results at short and long games. Hiarcs i.E. is better at short
>>>>>timecontrols, for Rebel the contrary is true.
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>I do not think that your examples are true.
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>>I think one could easily tune an engine to short or long time controls (not that
>>>>>this is necessarily a good idea, but it is possible and therefore you can not a
>>>>>priori know if y program plays wiht equal relative strenght at all time
>>>>>controls).
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>It is possible, if you try hard enough, to build a very unbalanced chess
>>>>program.
>>>>
>>>>But it is relatively easy to get rid of this problem. So I don't see why someone
>>>>would design on purpose a program that would be weak at blitz and strong at long
>>>>time controls.
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> Christophe
>>>
>>>If somebody has a bad data structure so he cannot calculate the functions that
>>>he needs fast then he may prefer instead of improving the data structure to
>>>improve the branching factor so the program may earn more from time relative to
>>>the opponents.
>>>
>>>Uri
>>
>>
>>
>>You do not need to be slow to have a state of the art branching factor.
>>
>>Take a very slow program (slow because it spends a lot of time ordering the
>>moves) and add on top of that two plies of very fast search (not perfectly
>>ordered, but not too bad either).
>>
>>You get a very fast searcher with an excellent branching factor (the last two
>>plies might not very good in branching factor but you won't notice).
>>
>>Being fast is not an excuse for having a bad branching factor.
>>
>>Being slow won't give you any advantage in branching factor.
>>
>>
>>
>> Christophe
>
>I do not say that you need to be slow in order to have state of the art
>branching factor but being fast is also a function of the data structure that
>you choose.
>
>programmers have limited time and if they choose to improve order of moves
>instead of improving the data structure then they may achieve being 200% faster
>at slow time control and 50% faster at blitz instead of being 100% faster in
>both cases.
>
>Uri
I have repeated many times that it is possible to build an unbalanced chess
program.
But competitive chess programs are not unbalanced, because it is not excessively
hard to build a balanced chess program.
In the example you mention, the program would not be competitive because it
would be anyway also slower at long time controls than programs based on a
reasonably fast data structure. Not to mention the disaster at blitz.
Christophe
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