On discussing clones

[bob]

If the general feeling here is that discussing clones is a no-no here, then I am more than willing to take my discussions back to r.g.c.c where while we have to live with excessive noise, we don't have to live with excessive "thought police" running around.

The "no libel" idea is a crock, and is just an excuse to avoid discussing a specific topic that nobody likes. Namely the Rybka came from Fruit discussion. I have my own thoughts which primarily leads me to conclude that there is way to much similarity to be purely based on random chance. I have looked at several open-source programs and never found duplicated piece/square table values as an example. But I'll admit that it is possible to come up with the same values independently, if you think flipping 1,000 heads in a row is something that won't take years at least. It is possible that two different programmers would use the same odd constructs. About the same again as 1,000 heads in a row. But both together? Now it is like 1,000,000 heads in a row.

Regardless of what is done in Rybka of today, R1 _clearly_ has significant parts of fruit included. That's old news. Those that want absolute proof know that such is impossible when anyone can write a 10 line program that will, given enough time, produce source code that is identical with fruit. The fact that this might take a few billion years to happen is not important to them. And given that, absolute proof is not possible. Fortunately, in most court systems, it is not necessary to have a video showing the crime being committed and with a clear facial image of the accused.

Trying to suppress such discussions is a sign of several problems:

(1) "author XXX" can't possibly have copied his program. It is stronger than what was supposedly copied. Argument is pointless, but still is made. And it is more in support of the author than in attacking the claim.

(2) Cowardice. I watched things happen for years at ACM events. And I reported them each time, and finally decided to set up a video camcorder to offer ultimate proof. Jan Louman was the world's worst at interfering in a chess game by using the "move now" key to make the program he was operating move quickly when obvious, or to make it move before it changed to a worse move if a human IM/GM commentator had suggested that the current move being displayed is the obvious choice to win. Most did not want to discuss the topic when this was going on. Which was an indirect approval of the actions. If we are not going to discuss clones, and just stick to the "pablum" (baby cereal that is very bland for those not knowing the word) topics, then this place is not worth saving.

I've always been forthright about where _my_ code came from. It was originally 100% written by myself. Eugene wrote the egtb.cpp code and then let others use it as well,even though it was originally developed in Crafty by him. I am using Pradu's magic move generator idea, others used my rotated bitboard idea and some still do. But we are all quick to give credit to the source of the idea or code... Or "almost all". And many don't like to see proof offered that more was taken than should have been taken. We had this problem in many previous discussoins concerning Crafty clones. But suddenly discussing clones is not acceptable?

This is a crock. This is the major place where enough technically adept people are available to discuss this topic and reach a valid conclusion. And some want to suppress that entirely. Yes, accusing someone of creating a clone is a distasteful discussion. But if it isn't done here, and someone gets away with it, it is _far_ more distasteful, IMHO. And some want to suppress this. Until there is absolute proof. Which they _know_ is the old chicken and egg argument used to close off discussion to develop that kind of proof...

Vas could have taken several actions to avoid this entire mess (with respect to the Rybka discussion). He could have said "yes, I copied parts of Fruit code initially... I have since rewritten those parts and they are mostly gone..." He could have said "yes, I report a fictitious node count and depth value because I wanted to make it more difficult for others to figure out the new idea I have found and am using with great success. I knew that if I showed too much information, someone would discover my trick (this has happened for many programs over the years, dating back to Genius)." But he didn't, and the discussions have pretty well nailed him for doing exactly that. And some don't like it. But most of this has been purely self-inflicted.

Naum's status is unknown to me. If it is a clone, it will be discovered. If not, so much the better. But not allowing the discussion here really tends to render CCC as irrelevant. If that is the goal, you are getting there. If not, you need to re-think what is going on. I know that in the many terms I have served as a moderator, we _never_ cut off these kinds of discussions. This is a recent "bad idea". And I'll bet I have served as a moderator more than any other person here. Food for thought...

[Steve B]

Discussion of possible clones is of course well within the purveyance of this forum Bob
The previous thread however did not have much discussion but was rather little more then pure speculation and personal attack

it is our(Moderation team) position that for a discussion of cloning to remain unmoderated on the board then it needs to be a discussion with debatable evidence offered which can in turn be considered by the membership and analysed freely .. and not just pure speculation
it seems that many members feel this way as well ..evidenced by the fact that we received more complaints about this thread then any other during our three months as moderators here
Steve

[towforce]

if you think flipping 1,000 heads in a row is something that won't take years at least. It is possible that two different programmers would use the same odd constructs. About the same again as 1,000 heads in a row. But both together? Now it is like 1,000,000 heads in a row.

Assuming a fair coin, the odds of flipping 1,000 heads in a row in 1000 flips is 2^1000=1.07E301

If one then flipped another 1000 heads, the odds for the overall result would be 2^2000=1.15E602 - not 2^1000000.

I think that it's fair to say that from around 1960, every program has used ideas taken from other programs - and open-source does has obvious drawbacks - think what would happen to your income if a good open source computer based training package that taught computing appeared on the scene...

[Volker Pittlik]

...Naum's status is unknown to me. If it is a clone, it will be discovered. If not, so much the better. But not allowing the discussion here really tends to render CCC as irrelevant... Food for thought...

Naum's status is unknown for me too. I haven't seen the smallest part of evidence it is a clone. So speculating about if it is is just a waste of time. To bring up rumors about is possibly a violation of the charter but surely something dishonest.

I'm personally not sure about Rybka. However, I have nothing to make a public statement about it. Therefore I simply shut up.

Discussions about clones haven't been disallowed and they aren't. Just to accuse someone that he made a clone ("Crafty is a Fritz clone!!!") is simply stupid and most likely a violation of the charter.

Not very moderative

Volker

[Sylwy]

Naum's status is unknown to me. If it is a clone, it will be discovered.

A new war on CCC ?

[Matthias Gemuh]

The truth is that recent and current moderators handle cloning issues clearly differently than earlier moderators. Has the charter changed ?

We know from experience that there are people who dismiss all proof as inadequate, so the recent requirement that all and conclusive proof must be offered with the very first posting about a clone, is no guarantee that the thread will not disappear within 5 minutes.

I personally find this new trend tragic because it is the old, open discussions that have helped keep the chess scene relatively clean of clones.
Nowadays a programmer feels much safer at cloning. That is bad.

In what percentage of cases have cloning issues been proven wrong ?

The new trend almost made me quit chess programming. It at least has negatively influenced work on my chess engine, as zeal has not returned since I lost it.

Matthias.

[AdminX]

I think that it's fair to say that from around 1960, every program has used ideas taken from other programs - and open-source does has obvious drawbacks - think what would happen to your income if a good open source computer based training package that taught computing appeared on the scene...

I like your choice of words, "Taken", and opposed to "Borrowed", Which I heard used in the past. Like they are really going to give it back! As to the second part of your statement, I don't think much would happen. People would still pay for what they could get for free. That's why Linux has not displaced Windows even in the Server Room yet. On the Desktop they still have a longer way to go. Sad really when you think that Unix based systems were there from the very early days.

[michiguel]

Naum's status is unknown to me. If it is a clone, it will be discovered.

A new war on CCC ?

Thi s is absolutely unbelievable.


Miguel

[Steve B]

The truth is that recent and current moderators handle cloning issues clearly differently than earlier moderators. Has the charter changed ?

We know from experience that there are people who dismiss all proof as inadequate, so the recent requirement that all and conclusive proof must be offered with the very first posting about a clone, is no guarantee that the thread will not disappear within 5 minutes.

of course there was no such requirement made by us
the thread in question was allowed to run for days with no clone evidence given except for some weak speculation that Mr. X also Thinks it is a clone

if debatable evidence is offered that an engine is a clone then the thread can run for weeks even months
and the evidence need not be offered in the very first post
but Prudence would dictate that before an accusation is made then at least some shred of debatable evidence be forth coming shortly .
it serves no purpose to make wild accusations and then offer no evidence at all and it has in fact resulted in a rash of member complaints to come in to us

i wonder what a member created poll on the acceptability of posting clone accusations here with no evidence what-so-ever would reveal?

i would be interested to see a poll like that

Regards
Steve

[bob]

if you think flipping 1,000 heads in a row is something that won't take years at least. It is possible that two different programmers would use the same odd constructs. About the same again as 1,000 heads in a row. But both together? Now it is like 1,000,000 heads in a row.

Assuming a fair coin, the odds of flipping 1,000 heads in a row in 1000 flips is 2^1000=1.07E301

If one then flipped another 1000 heads, the odds for the overall result would be 2^2000=1.15E602 - not 2^1000000.

I think that it's fair to say that from around 1960, every program has used ideas taken from other programs - and open-source does has obvious drawbacks - think what would happen to your income if a good open source computer based training package that taught computing appeared on the scene...

Bad statistics. The probability of flipping 1000 heads in a row is simply 1 / 2^1000. The probability for flipping 2000 heads in a row (two successive 1000 head runs back to back as my post clearly implies) is 1 / 2^2000 It is actually much worse than the more simplistic 1 in 1,000,000...

And once again, you are twisting the conversation back to using ideas. I am not talking about _ideas_. I am talking about source code. Find two programs that use piece/square tables (and most do) which have the _same_ numbers for all pieces... That's only 6 x 64 numbers. Obviously you would think it is quite easy to pick the same 384 numbers I picked without looking at mine?

I _know_ that won't happen in the real world...