Author: José Carlos
Date: 00:27:37 06/01/04
Go up one level in this thread
On June 01, 2004 at 03:01:46, Sune Fischer wrote: >On June 01, 2004 at 02:49:55, José Carlos wrote: > >>On June 01, 2004 at 02:33:18, Sune Fischer wrote: >> >>>On May 31, 2004 at 20:06:37, Robert Hyatt wrote: >>>> >>>>I don't understand all this "fiddling". IE oddball books. ponder=on vs >>>>ponder=off, endgame tables on, endgame tables off. Learning on. Learning off. >>>>Etc. >>>> >>>>I would have no objection if someone plays a long match, crafty vs program S, >>>>then clears the learning data and plays a long match crafty vs program T. But >>>>not disabling learning completely. Then I _know_ the book will cause a >>>>problem... Because it isn't hand-tuned whatsoever... >>> >>>I don't see what is so interesting in trying to win the same games over and >>>over. That kind of book cooking hasn't got very much to do with smarts of the >>>engine, IMO. >>> >>>Most programmers are interested in real algorithmic progress, not in whether >>>they can win every game just by getting the same couple of completely won >>>positions out of the book. >> >> >> Book learning, as well as any other kind of learning, is a nice algorithmic >>exercise. It takes time to develope and fine tuning. Disabling it is telling the >>programmer "you wasted your spare time". > >It's a very powerful feature, too powerful IMO if not all engines have it. >I'm quite sure even Ruffian would lose 10-90 if Crafty had aggressive learning >and Ruffian just used a small book without learning. >You can be of the opinion that's a fair result, I think it is pure nonsense. >Granted, it demonstrates that Crafty has learning that works, but what other >conclusions can you hope to draw from it? I disagree but I think we can agree that it's a matter of taste. IMO, Ruffian has a very good selective search. Using your reasoning, we could say "if Ruffian beats Crafty we can draw the conclusion that Ruffian has a much better selective search, but the result is not fair, it should use only null move. Otherwise, the comparison is nonsense". :) >> As for getting won positions out of book... isn't that what a book is finally >>meant to do, after all? > >For me it's to get the game started at a random point, to avoid determanistic >engines playing the same game every time. Being obtuse, I could say that search and eval are only important to finish the won position the book got. :) But of course, randomizing the starting position is a primary goal of book, but stopping at that point is, in my view, like dividing remaining time by the number of remaining moves. Yes, time management is to divide the time to search, but you can try much more elaborated strategies to use your time. Same for book. >I don't want a completely won position out of book anymore than I want a >completely lost one. I want to see the engine play and win/lose the games for >itself, that's what it's all about, IMO. A totally respectable point of view, of course. >>Don't human players try to do this all the time? When I >>played in tournaments, I got a couple of full points out of book. I studied >>games of my opponents, found weaknesses in their openings and analyzed them with >>my brothers (computers were too weak back then). Nice memories of the past... > >Sure if book programming your interest, I'm interested in engine programming :) >Books only serve to obscure the picture in my view. > >-S. >> José C. I like programming, no matter what. What you call "engine" and "book" separately, I call the whole thing "engine", and enjoy working on my concept of engine. But I also like to program anything else, specially those things that demands some thinking to figure out the algorithm, much more than the part of converting an algorithm in actual code. José C.
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