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Subject: Re: The world of AUTO232 ?

Author: James Robertson

Date: 16:53:03 09/29/99

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On September 29, 1999 at 12:51:53, Jon Dart wrote:

>I have wondered this myself.
>
>Supporting direct play against another engine with sockets (TCP/IP)
>is certainly an option.
>
>But this requires everybody signing on to a new standard.
>
>If I were doing a lot of machine-machine testing, I'd get a third
>low-end machine, hook them all up with network cards and a simple
>hub, run some kind of simple FICS clone on the middle machine, and
>have the engines talk to it with the Winboard protocol.
>
>Right now few commercial engines speak Winboard. But it is not hard
>to add this support and perhaps they should be encouraged to do so.
>Certainly it doesn't have the problems AUTO-232 does.
>
>--Jon

I think the winboard language could be improved a lot. There are many aspects
that don't make sense. Take the 'edit' command; it has no way to pass castle and
ep rights without sending two more commands. If winboard would just send an EPD
string it would be much simpler. Also 'time' and 'otime' are cumbersome; why not
just send 'time whitetime blacktime'?

If we could like have a powwow and 'invent' a new (but similar) protocol that is
a bit easier and leaner to use, I think it would make it much easier to convince
commercial programs to implement it.

James



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