Author: Roger D Davis
Date: 12:01:32 09/19/04
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On September 19, 2004 at 11:10:14, Stuart Cracraft wrote: >Hi -- I am looking for 2 or 3 beta testers who would receive >(full) source code to my program and in return would provide >input and comments about improving the search. They would >simply agree not to redistribute it and in fact discard it after >a week or two of looking at it (and commenting.) The program is in C, >5000 lines. The search and quiescence routines are 600 lines total. > >The reason I am considering this is due to hitting a brick wall at 249/300 >on WAC for several weeks now and knowing there are things I just cannot >find or go further with. The above score is at 1 second per position on a >1ghz P3 with a small transposition table. I am told that 270-300 is considered >"good" for this time control on this test. On this same machine >at the same time setting, with WAC, Crafty gets 270/300. > >The kind of beta testers I'm looking for are experienced programmers >who have written their own program and it has long since graduated >from Win-at-Chess as a test suite, perhaps scoring 270 or above at >1 second per move on a Pentium III 1ghz or above. To them, WAC has >become ho-hum and in fact they are currently just sitting on their >laurels without a lot of major advances. Their program has "matured." >They see themselves as senior chess programmers helping less >experienced authors. > >What I would favor > > 1) beta tester with solid program agrees to simultaneous exchange > of source code > > --and-- > > 2) beta tester agrees to seriously review the quiesce(), search(), > store(), retrieve(), and iterate() functions. > >I am fine to sign any non-disclosure agreement. > >This is just an attempt to break through a brick wall. > >Stuart Stuart, How about posting your code on a website, with copious comments, and invite anyone who wants to join your project? This would go far beyond just making the source available for download, because the source would be commented at a level intended to introduce everyone to chess programming. As a result, your project could become THE reference for up and coming programmers. Everyone would take a look...and who knows. Everyone might make contributions. Every class in your program would be a learning module. Of course, you lose exclusive ownership of your engine. People won't say, "That's Stuart's chess program" anymore. Instead they'll say, "That's Stuart's teams chess program. Realistically, of course, the odds of you getting into the ranks of the Top Five going it alone are pretty slim anyway. But those odds inprove dramatically if everyone contributes their best ideas. And if nothing comes of it, you'll have helped enlarge the ranks of new programmers, the engine is still your engine, and no one can take that away from you. Roger
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