Author: KarinsDad
Date: 08:44:25 02/16/99
Robert, It is unfortunate the position you are in. You have a great research project which is abused by others, but at the same time, you are a person who wants to share his ideas without seeing others harmed by that sharing. I see no simple solutions. Yes, you could try the following: 1) Release new versions of Crafty source with some key elements missing so that it will not compile. 2) No longer release Crafty source except to some few trusted individuals who have in the past given back to the Crafty project. 3) No longer release Crafty source, but put your ideas into other forms of media such as white papers or books. 4) Continue as you have and watch the problems propogate. Like I said, no easy answers. One idea I had is to extend #1 and #2 above by creating a "keyed" version of a .dll that requires a special user name and password. Each keyed DLL is specially created by you and requires a different user name and password. In this manner, you could give out a different DLLs to select individuals that you trust and everyone else would have to earn that trust. Also, each DLL forces a display on the screen and in communication across the Internet stating that this is "Tom's" version of Crafty playing. This way, nobody could run the new code in a tournament without it getting documented that Crafty was running. Now this would take some work to ensure that the routines within the DLL are both critical and hard to reproduce, however, it probably could be done. You could also have a generic DLL that you could give out with the source. This DLL would have to be linked in and used with the code or the code would not work properly (dropping 300 ELO would probably be sufficient). This DLL would also advertise heavily that Crafty is running. The released source version of Crafty with this DLL could also be forced to play at 150 ELO or so less since it is not using one of the "trusted" DLLs. Of course, none of these solutions will resolve problems with Crafty source that is already out there. But, what is done is done. Hard measures for hard times. Good Luck with whatever you decide. KarinsDad :) ;)
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