Author: kaqs.1662@bumpymail.com
Date: 21:23:22 08/28/05
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On August 28, 2005 at 23:38:08, David Mitchell wrote: >Someone with a real interest in this area could do a big service to the CC >community by just collecting whatever is out there, helping to get those >programs that can be, transferred over to a portable language, and providing >enough distribution through the net to ensure that they're not just lost. I've tried contacting the people I know of, but usually I don't get a reply. Only a couple people ever bothered to reply. I only know of a very limited number of people to even ask. I just don't know who else to ask or where to ask. >Jonathan Schaeffer(Phoenix and Chinook checkers) & Monty Newborn (Ostrich), and Dr. Schaeffer is the one who suggested I contact Tony Marsland. >all those guys must have their programs still around, somewhere. Research Not necessarily... It's been a long time. Systems change. Things get lost. Printouts get lost or thrown away. Tapes decay or you no longer have a tape drive. You stored it on an 8" floppy and no longer have a system to read it on. And so on. In 20-30+ years, a *lot* can happen. Not everybody is a 'pack-rat' like I am, and keeps everything. Some people only keep what they need, and in some cases, trust the computer systems to keep electronic copies, instead of a bulky printout. It truely is possible they don't have a copy anymore. Not only possible, but actually *likely*. Even Dr. Hyatt has said he does *not* have a copy of his early versions of Blitz or CrayBlitz. And that maybe, just maybe, he might possibly know of where a tape containing VAX Blitz was at. (I presume he does still have the more advanced versions of Cray Blitz, which had lots of asm, but not the older more portable versions.) This was a couple years ago, so I presume either the tape didn't exist, or was damaged, or there was no way to read it. Probably one of the first two. Finding MacHack VI was sheer luck. All because Greenblatt distributed lots of copies back then, and *two* copies happened to surive because somebody decided to put the pdp tapes on the web. For programs that weren't distributed much, if at all, finding them becomes much less likely. >programs like Wilken's Paradise would also be great to save. If you can find where to contact somebody, go ahead... I just don't know that many people to contact. And when I have emailed them, the messages were usually ignored. Profs Hyatt, Schaeffer and Marsland were three notable exceptions. >I'm sure all the authors would want some assurance that their programs weren't >just going to be held up to ridicule and matched up against the latest and >greatest programs of today, to be laughed at. That is certainly something to think about. I have to admit that I tend to look at these programs in a very positive way, so I wouldn't think of ridiculing them. I have a few old chess programs I've written myself. Maybe 15-18 years old. Looking at them now, I do have to admit that I am not pleased about the coding style & qaulity. (Never mind about the play quality....) I was looking at Ken Thompson's 1979 chess program in the PDP archives and I was thinking how different it was. Not that it was poorly written etc., but just that the style was so different from what I was used to. Beyond just K&R differences. >Obviously Marsland has reservation about giving his program out to you, perhaps >because of the above concern. No, not "obviously". His first reply (and come to think of it, his second reply too) was very positive. We talked about the best way to preserve them, how to read some paper tape copies of some chess programs he had, etc. It was almost productive. But he was busy and just didn't have time, and suggested I contact him later, after the academic year ended. I waited a couple of months and tried again, I didn't get any more replies. I think I tried a couple times in the year after that, and didn't get any reply then either. [shrug] I'm just not important enough for busy, important people to immediately reply to. >Thanks for the stroll down memory lane, anyway. You're welcome. When it comes to computer chess, I happen to like memory lane.... No offense to Mr. Hyatt, but I'd much rather look over the source of Sargon or Chess 0.5 than his much more powerful Crafty.
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