Author: Owen Lyne
Date: 09:11:41 09/17/99
Go up one level in this thread
On September 11, 1999 at 13:37:26, Steven Schwartz wrote: >When I got into work this morning (yes, I work on Saturday, GGRRRR!), >I noticed a post by Jim Walker entitled, "Steve, You Must Be Proud". >It read, "Just look at the information/ideas being exchanged on this >page. This is great stuff!" > >Not having yet read the posts on that page, I did not know whether >Jim was being facetious or not. Apparently, he was not. Indeed not - it sure is great!! [stuff snipped] >Unlike most of you, I get to read the discussions by moderators over >issues concerning the CCC, and I can assure you that even though >members often disagree with moderation decisions and sometimes believe >that they are being too harsh or too lenient (that's usually 50/50), >every moderator has been dedicated in his task and truly wanted to do >the right thing for CCC. Yes - I support the efforts of all the moderators, they may not always do what any one of us would like them to do, but they do what they believe to be best and generally the majority I would expect to be with them on particular decisions. [stuff snipped] >In glancing over at the CCC Opinion Polls, I have some observations: > >1) Computer chess fans do not think that computers should be part of >human world championship qualifying matches. > >2) When I compare the tolerance for off-topic posts from June, 1998 >and now, I see that, whereas a year ago there was a distinctive bell >curve; that is no longer the case. Now we have almost a straight >line with fewer people at the intolerant end and more people at the >tolerant end than a year ago. But the mean is now stuck midway between >extreme tolerance and extreme intolerance. I think this might mean a year ago many people weren't sure were they stood, either not been with CCC long, or not sure what type of stuff was meant. Now people have made up their minds somewhat, some in one direction, some in the other. >3) About 70% of us would purchase a dedicated computer for a price of >$100 or more if it could incorporate the strength of the top software >programs running on a middle-of-the-road Pentium. I somehow do not >think that this is going to convince the chess computer companies to >produce such a beast. I think the era of the super-strong dedicated >chess computer is over. > >4) I was surprised to learn that, amongst us computer chess "geeks", >fewer than half actually own a dedicated chess database program. I >would have suspected that over 80% of us own databases, but what do >I know. Well I'm one of those 80% but planning to change that soon! Till now I've had Crafty on machines at work, so I'm not going to be spending money on software, I just grab what's free. Crafty can do a few database-like things byt, for example, building books from special PGN files, exploring them, using them to play versus Crafty. Extract has been my other free tool of choice, and some use of Emacs for searching in PGN files can work wonders too sometimes! Extract I've customised with my own ECO file, so I have invented code F-Z to add to the A to E codes, so extract will pull out games in my new codes (lines I am interested in). I can then bin anything which was remains coded A-E as it must not have been in my specified lines of interest. Since I'm working on Solaris, there wasn't much else I could get, so now I've got my nice new Athlon, I can put on the free stuff, try the free versions of ChessBase etc which I never could before, and see whether I will spend any cash on chess software! >5) As far as electronic format wish lists? "Updates to the software >I now have" leads the way and that is probably no surprise to anyone. > >6) In the closest CCC poll ever, "Should the game, Rebel-Hoffman, be >taken in account to calculate the performance rating of Rebel in the >GM challenge?" the winner is still in doubt. And the voting is lagging >behind because we put up the question a few days after all the others. >A hotly debated issue for sure. I do not suspect that we heard the >last of it especially since hardware is most likely to crash >when we need it most:-). > >Thank you to all of our members for making CCC a success beyond what >we ever thought could be. Hosting this sight has been a bumpy road >along the way and certainly has not paid for itself, but it cannot >be rated as anything but a tremendous success from the standpoint of >the computer chess community, and for that I AM proud, Jim!!! > >- Steve (ICD/Your Move) Be proud, be very proud.. ;) Owen (a lurker who'd decided to really start posting now, one line bio: 28 years old, married, mathematician, Crafty fan, got Athlon 4 days ago :)
This page took 0 seconds to execute
Last modified: Thu, 15 Apr 21 08:11:13 -0700
Current Computer Chess Club Forums at Talkchess. This site by Sean Mintz.