Author: William Bryant
Date: 10:15:28 10/29/99
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On October 29, 1999 at 03:24:40, Will Singleton wrote: >Lastly, I'd like to point out that I don't like the idea of distributing highly >advanced source code, I think it's detrimental to the spirit of discovery and >individual achievement. It dissuades the true amateur from the game. I know >this because I have looked at crafty's code and found it beautiful, elegant, and >good. And I won't copy it, though others do. The way to advance the theory of >chess programming is not to publish your code, but rather to publish your ideas. > >Will Will, You and I are going to clearly disagree on this point. This forum discusses a lot of heuristics and their use within a program. But this needs to be balanced with clear and well written examples. Crafty is, IMHO, the gold standard for a teaching tool in chess programming. With this source code you can separate out the theory from the exact implementation(?SP) due to its clear coding style and comments. I understand null moves, hash tables, and PVS/Aspiration windows (which really game me trouble) by good examples. There is good code for the beginner, there also needs to be good code to use as your understanding and skill advance. Crafty source is indispensible for learning. The price, that some will copy more than learn from the code. But to me, the known benifit far outweights the problems. BTW -- Crafty is much easier to obtain than all the back issues of ICCAJ. Perhaps, they could all be put on a cd in PDF or other format and included with membership for an additional fee, say $100. The $400+ cost of back issues is somewhat prohibitive. William wbryant@ix.netcom.com
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