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Subject: Re: Hydra and Ken Thompson?

Author: Robert Hyatt

Date: 12:40:39 05/05/05

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On May 05, 2005 at 12:00:40, Keith Evans wrote:

>On May 05, 2005 at 11:56:12, Robert Hyatt wrote:
>
>>On May 05, 2005 at 00:01:48, Keith Evans wrote:
>>
>>>On May 03, 2005 at 16:40:06, Robert Hyatt wrote:
>>>
>>>>On May 03, 2005 at 04:06:35, Jouni Uski wrote:
>>>>
>>>>>I just watched 19 minutes video from Hydra site. It claims, that Ken Thomson
>>>>>is father of Hydra! Really?? I doubt a lot...
>>>>>
>>>>>Jouni
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>"Belle".
>>>>
>>>>Hydra's design is based on "belle" just like deep thought/deep blue was as
>>>>well...
>>>
>>>Shouldn't Joe Condon get a mention?
>>
>>
>>Certainly...  he had just specifically asked about Ken, which is what I
>>responded to.  I don't think Joe was into "chess" at all.  He was an engineer
>>that helped ken put things together from an engineering perspective, not from a
>>chess perspective.
>
>I was always curious about what Condon contributed, versus what Ken contributed.
>For example the Belle move generator was a clever idea, and it seems like nobody
>has come up with a radically different and better method for a purely hardware
>design. I wonder who came up with the idea? Ken Thompson or Joe Condon. Any
>idea?
>
>-Keith


Ken.  Joe primarily helped with the engineering aspects of Belle.  For example,
it was all based on PLAs, and interfaced to a PDP-11/44 minicomputer.  The
chess-machine to PDP-11 was one thing Joe did himself.  Helping Ken lay things
out, wire-wrapping, etc was also his kind of expertise.  The design was all Ken
however...




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