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Subject: Re: Fail-hard, fail-soft question

Author: Robert Hyatt

Date: 12:05:15 05/06/04

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On May 06, 2004 at 14:31:08, Gerd Isenberg wrote:

>On May 06, 2004 at 11:58:11, Robert Hyatt wrote:
>
>>On May 06, 2004 at 11:38:44, Dan Honeycutt wrote:
>>
>>>Yet again I apologize for asking a question which I'm sure has been asked many
>>>times before, but could someone explain the difference between a fail-hard and a
>>>fail-soft and how does is affect a PVS search?
>>>
>>>I made the guess that, ie, if (score >= beta) if I return score it's a fail-hard
>>>and if I return beta it's a fail-soft.  It would seem that what I return doesn't
>>>so much matter as what I put in the hash table.  If I put in the (possibly)
>>>higher value of score then I have a higher lower bound and a greater chance for
>>>a hash cut if this position arises again.
>>>
>>>Thanks in advance.
>>>Dan H.
>>
>>That is backward.  But you have the right idea.  Fail-hard never returns a value
>>outside the initial alpha/beta window.  Fail-soft does.
>
>I often confuse this hard/soft definitions too - i have the wrong mnemonic
>trick. Intuitively i found it harder if i jump outside a window ;-)


It is just as intuitive as where you store a lower bound but flag the position
as an UPPER bound position.  Makes sense after a lot of thought, but it still
leads to confusion...  :)



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