Author: Eugene Nalimov
Date: 10:28:05 01/06/99
Go up one level in this thread
On January 06, 1999 at 10:21:59, Christopher R. Dorr wrote: >On January 05, 1999 at 20:29:57, KarinsDad wrote: > >>On January 05, 1999 at 19:35:23, Eugene Nalimov wrote: >> >>[snip] >> >>>>I agree that collaboration is very important. But which do you think is going to >>>>produce the better outcome: two world-class leaders in the field (with vast >>>>amounts of prior experience and education in the field between them) or one team >>>>leader, and 50 fantastic programmers, who know *nothing* about chess >>>>programming? >>> >>>Why do you think that optimal group will be "1 leader + 50 fantastic >>>programmers"? I'd suggest something like "1 leader + 2 grandmasters + >>>5-7 fantasic programmers + 5 very good testers + 1 specialist on >>>particular CPU architecture + 1-2 administrators + 2 fast computers >>>per developer + lot of *very fast* test computers". And I'm reasonable >>>sure that such a team will produce much better results than team that >>>consist of just 2 leaders. >>> >>>Eugene >> >>Chris, >> >>I agree with Eugene. Obviously, "50 fantastic programmers, who know *nothing* >>about chess programming" isn't going to cut the mustard. >> >>Hence, you would use a sophisticated team of computer software developers >>including testers, technical writers, managers, accountants (well, maybe one >>accountant), researchers, reverse engineering specialists, AI experts, chess >>programming experts, and possibly a few of us grunts who are really interested >>in it (plus a bunch of people I neglected to mention). >> >>Well, I have to go to the chess club. :) Darn! >> >>KarinsDad > >Can we toss in a couple of lawyers?! I know a couple of them that I'd love to >send to Seattle for while. :) > >Seriously, though, I'm not disagreeing that MS could make things better. The >could make interfaces much better, opening book editors much better, databases >much better and easier to use. But my issue here is more about the role of >large-team based software engineering and a project like chess programming. I >simply disagree with the quoted MS manager who said that MS could easily and >significantly 'blow away' what currently exists. > >I don't think that a large team (as talented as they might be) would advance the >state of the art to any large degree simply because of the nature of the task. I >don't think that chess programming lends itself to the necessary partitioning >that would benefit from having a large team work on it. > >I believe that a program like a chess program (or a specialized modeling >program, etc. ) is fundamentally different from a large application. It's >inconceivable that a single programmer could put together a world-class word >processor or spreadsheet today. No one person can write a million lines of code >in a reaonable amount of time. > >But a chess program? Crafty is world-class, and it's source fits on a single >disk. How would a team of programmers be any more efficient than Bob by himself? >The code doesn't partialize out well. Of course he could benefit from a >full-time GM, or a tech writer, but I feel that a single person (or *very* small >team) would be at more efficient in producing the core functions than a large >team. To me, it's just the nature of the beast. > >Chris Ok. Here is the example: good optimizing C compiler. I'm not talking about great effort necessary to confirm with C++ standard, about MFC classes, about different libraries, etc. - just about code quality. Look at MS Visual C/C++. If you'll ask "What x86 C compiler generates the best (fastest) code", you'll have to admit that VC is *the* answer. Ask Bob. Crafty - without any assembly routines - is at least 10% faster when it's compiled with VC than when it's compiled by other C compiler. I'd bet that size of the optimizer and code generator is comparable with size of the modern chess engines. Maybe it's 2 times larger, but not 5 times. Yes, it's part of the huge application, MS Development Studio. But that part is still the best. Eugene
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