Author: Dann Corbit
Date: 13:06:10 10/29/99
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On October 29, 1999 at 15:55:41, Ed Schröder wrote: [snip] >What do you have against commercial programmers anyway? They give a lot of >people the joy of a good program and interface to enjoy their hobby named >chess. Because some are commercial they can afford to spend all their time >improving their product. Without being commercial the interface and engine >would be on a level of years back. The benefit from commercial programs is that the programmers can go at it full time. Dr. Hyatt has to teach (and probably publish too). Pretty much the same for all of the other ameteur programs, since the inventors do not derive income from them. If someone is able to focus on the same problem day in and day out around the clock, they can come up with better solutions through better effort. On the other hand, private and ameteur programs can also advance chess programming. Maybe they don't advance it much for *YOU* but they sure do a lot for *ME* and for many other ameteur chess programmers. At some point, all of the commercial programs will benefit from ameteur efforts. Eugene Nalimov's tablebase files are a good case in point. Programs that use them will have stronger endgames (indeed, perfect endgames when the man count is small enough). If a commercial programmer makes a monumental discovery, they will be more likely to keep it to themselves because it gives them a clear advantage in sales if they win more than the other programs. The fact is that we benefit from both efforts but in different ways. I like crafty and rebel both. I have and use both. Both are valuable and interesting to me (but in different ways, even for these chess programs).
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