Author: Uri Blass
Date: 12:22:22 09/20/04
Go up one level in this thread
On September 20, 2004 at 13:17:50, Robert Hyatt wrote: >On September 20, 2004 at 12:56:27, Uri Blass wrote: > >>On September 20, 2004 at 10:48:57, Robert Hyatt wrote: >> >>>On September 19, 2004 at 21:28:16, Uri Blass wrote: >>> >>>>On September 19, 2004 at 20:37:08, Robert Hyatt wrote: >>>> >>>>>On September 19, 2004 at 15:10:54, Stuart Cracraft wrote: >>>>> >>>>>>On September 19, 2004 at 14:03:52, martin fierz wrote: >>>>>> >>>>>>>[snip] >>>>>>> >>>>>>>hi stuart, >>>>>>> >>>>>>>you seem to be very active programming your engine if the number of posts here >>>>>>>at CCC is any indication. i guess you have put in all the basic stuff in your >>>>>>>engine, and now it's playing some decent chess but is getting bashed on by the >>>>>>>stronger engines, and you're not happy. >>>>>>> >>>>>>>i made a similar experience. after years of checkers programming, i started >>>>>>>writing a chess program, which played it's first game about one month after i >>>>>>>started on it, and improved in leaps and bounds for a couple of months, which >>>>>>>was no big surprise to me since i'm rather familar with most of the techniques >>>>>>>for chess programming from my checkers program. >>>>>>>after half a year progress got slower, and after 9 months i couldn't detect any >>>>>>>progress any more. i let it lie around for half a year now, and will try to find >>>>>>>areas of improvement. but i think that from now on, progress is not so simple >>>>>>>any more. i will have to take a good look at my evaluation for instance, and at >>>>>>>the various extensions, and do a lot of testing. i don't believe there is any >>>>>>>magic bullet that will do the trick. once you reach a certain level, every >>>>>>>further improvement will have to be earned the hard way. >>>>>>> >>>>>>>in this sense, i encourage you to keep working on your engine, without resorting >>>>>>>to this kind of 'senior programmer to the rescue' attitude! >>>>>>> >>>>>>>cheers >>>>>>> martin >>>>>> >>>>>>I pulled back on an extension idea today and reduced another extension >>>>>>and the program reached 250 out of 300 on WAC. So that's a "good weekend" >>>>>>for me at this point. That I have two more days beyond today off to work >>>>>>on it makes it only taste sweeter. I saved the version under "4.06" >>>>>>and it is filed in the dusty history book area. >>>>> >>>>> >>>>>You need to think about "cause" and "effect". IE does doing well on WAC make a >>>>>program good, or does being good make a program do well on WAC? >>>>> >>>>>I believe the latter. I don't tune for test suites at all. As the program gets >>>>>better, it will do better at wac as a result... Don't be confused and try to >>>>>make it the other way around... >>>> >>>>I believe both. >>>> >>>>There are cases that you can be almost sure of improvement in games based on the >>>>result of test suites. >>> >>>"in some cases". But that isn't quite what is being discussed here. It is >>>always "N is better than M if N > M" and that isn't always true. IE you will do >>>better at WAC with Crafty, by setting the one-reply and recapture extensions >>>higher. But it will play worse as it will extend too much and drop a ply or >>>more in normal positions... >> >>Yes but I believe that you can probably learn from it and extend more single >>reply in the right part of the cases and not extend in another part of the cases >>so you can score better both in test suites and not have the problem of droping >>one ply or more in normal positions. >> >>I do not extend single reply the same in all cases. >> >>Uri > > >Neither do I. The deeper into the tree, the less they get extended. In my case I use the evaluation to decide how much to extend. The idea is basically not to extend when you are relatively sure about the outcome of the game. I think that I can improve it. I evaluate every node but I do not have function to evaluate different components and I think that one of the possible improvement that I probably can get is by remembering a vector of the different components(Gothmog does it) and using it for better decisions of pruning or extensions and I probably should use the king safety evaluation to decide how much to extend checks and single reply to checks. Uri
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