BB+ on the matter

[Roger Brown]

I was of course being sarcastic about the prison sentence. I have not looked closely at this specific issue because it is not relevant to me. Rybka is so strong compared to Fruit that nothing of any real importance in the program came from Fruit.

Hello Don,

I sincerely hope that this is not an example of your emotionless logic and wisdom.

Then again, this is the typical argument of the strongest there is group. Essentially it says that if the predecessor is significantly weaker than the successor then there must not have been much of P in S. When I hear this from non-techies like me I am bemused but I just did not expect to hear it from a chess engine programmer, someone who knows the positive effect that ideas or code snippets can have on engine performance.

Once there was a program called Rybka. It was relatively weak. Then there was Fruit code. Then there was Rybka, the monster beta that crushed everything.

Now you are asserting that nothing of any real importance came from Fruit. On what objective basis? You are the logical, non-idiot here, enlighten me please.

No-one here has Rybka's code to test these statements so are these statements which can be subjected to scientific analysis or are they statements of faith, to be accepted because you spoke them into being?

Later.

[Milos]

Once there was a program called Rybka. It was relatively weak. Then there was Fruit code. Then there was Rybka, the monster beta that crushed everything.

Yes there was a program called Rybka, then in summer 2005 came Fruit 2.1, 800 elo stronger than that original Rybka.
Then 4 months later came Rybka 1.0 beta 60 elo stronger than Fruit 2.1 (forget about CCRL, CEGT crap, test it yourself if you don't believe).
4 moths was time necessary to put Fruit into bitboard which brought roughly 60 elo. Just not to be too critical to Vas, maybe he put 1 or 2 ideas of himself worth 10-20 elo.

Just then started the process of development of Rybka as we know it today...
Problem is that to Dan, all this is perfectly ok, just because in later 5 years Rybka gained 300 more elo.
However, it was demonstrated in other thread, there were some programs that gained more than Rybka in the same period.
A question is where those other programs would be if they started their development as bitboard Fruit 2.1 (number 2 program at the time)?

Well one thing I give credit to Vas - he was much more successful than Toga developers.

To add couple of more things for thinking regarding Vas's chess programming genious. If you took original Fruit 2.1 and put values from modern piece-square tables and modern material values (modern lets say Rybka 3) you would gain over 100elo + 50elo from bitboard representation, you are already 20 elo over level of Rybka 2.3.2.
Without any change in search, any change at all. Some ppl already did this experiment.

[Dann Corbit]

I was of course being sarcastic about the prison sentence. I have not looked closely at this specific issue because it is not relevant to me. Rybka is so strong compared to Fruit that nothing of any real importance in the program came from Fruit.

Hello Don,

I sincerely hope that this is not an example of your emotionless logic and wisdom.

Then again, this is the typical argument of the strongest there is group. Essentially it says that if the predecessor is significantly weaker than the successor then there must not have been much of P in S. When I hear this from non-techies like me I am bemused but I just did not expect to hear it from a chess engine programmer, someone who knows the positive effect that ideas or code snippets can have on engine performance.

Once there was a program called Rybka. It was relatively weak. Then there was Fruit code. Then there was Rybka, the monster beta that crushed everything.

Now you are asserting that nothing of any real importance came from Fruit. On what objective basis? You are the logical, non-idiot here, enlighten me please.

No-one here has Rybka's code to test these statements so are these statements which can be subjected to scientific analysis or are they statements of faith, to be accepted because you spoke them into being?

Later.

All chess programs start out as fairly weak. That includes Fruit.

[Graham Banks]

... he has made an important contribution to computer chess.

What do you feel his contributions have been? Selling a strong product isn't most people's idea of a contribution (I mean if you have to pay for the thing). Contributions are what you give without thought or promise of a return.

This is like saying that teachers make no contribution to society since they get payed.

They don't (unless they teach for free). The idea that they do make contributions to society is just a politically correct kliche, IMO.

Selling a strong product IS a HUGE contribution. It's just not appreciated by stingy people who want something for nothing. Whenever you make a purchase both parties should feel they profited otherwise there would be no transaction.

But it goes WAY beyond that. In another post I mentioned that the very presence of a "strongest" program telegraphs to everyone else that something is possible and the very possibility makes everyone else push forward. It's like the 4 minute mile, or the space race program - it would have never happened if the Soviets had not "embarrassed" the western world into pushing forward.

There were unintended contributions too. Because of Rybka we have Robo, Ippo, critter, Houdini, firebird, Stockfish, Komodo, ....

Part of my inspiration for resuming chess programming was the interest generated by Rybka in the computer chess community.

Likewise, Fruit was an inspiration to many because they showed that you could build a very strong program without any radically new ideas - just solid engineering. That's why your position that Vas "stole" Fruit such a ridiculous notion - even if Vas had literally started with that source code it did not provide anything other than a few days head start and even that was probably negated by the necessity to completely rewrite whatever he initially had in order to make any serious progress.

The Fruit argument is just noise and has absolutely no relevance to the real issues going on here and I think you should drop it for your own credibility. I think some of things you are saying may be valid or at least arguable, but pinning everything on this one thing just makes you look like you are flailing.

There is a big difference between the contributions of fruit and those you claim for Rybka. Vas took much from the forum that was given freely, but didn't give freely in return. The appearance is that a programmer comes here to take, then goes commerical, never to return -- all takin amd no givin. Then he sells you his winning program and you say, gee thanks, that's a great contribution.

I don't think so, Tim.

According to your reasoning, nobody who gets paid for what they do makes a contribution to society. That's crazy.

[Graham Banks]

Without Fruit or without open-source Fruit there would be no Rybka at all. As simple as that, Rybka would not exist!!

Rybka existed before open source Fruit, but was a lot weaker.
A lot of very strong engines that didn't exist in any form before Rybka 3 and whose "authors" had never been heard of before Rybka 3 have suddenly appeared after Rybka 3 was reverse engineered.

[Milos]

All chess programs start out as fairly weak. That includes Fruit.

Sure, translating to bitboards is the work that asks for a lot of concentration. Any little mistake and your program ends up much weaker .

[Dann Corbit]

Without Fruit or without open-source Fruit there would be no Rybka at all. As simple as that, Rybka would not exist!!

Rybka existed before open source Fruit, but was a lot weaker.
A lot of very strong engines that didn't exist in any form before Rybka 3 and whose "authors" had never been heard of before Rybka 3 have suddenly appeared after Rybka 3 was reverse engineered.

Without Alpha-Beta we would all be using mini-max and it would take months to get to 7 plies.

If nobody invented the computer and we had to use an abacus to do the computations, it would make a lot of clicking sounds whenever we were pondering.

[Milos]

Without Alpha-Beta we would all be using mini-max and it would take months to get to 7 plies.

Not really. On fast 8 core, it would take only half an hour to reach depth 8 with just pure mini-max.

[Don]

I have heard that some interface code may have been copied, but nothing to do with the playing engine itself. I am willing to forgive this small crime if that is what happened, but perhaps the Fruit author is not? What is bizarre is that this is trivial to write yourself - which is probably why Vas "forgot" that part. I think he should go to prison for a very long time for this oversight.

There is also the concept of "fair use" even for copyrighted code.
If credit is given, and a small portion is used, then it is not illegal.

I have literally no idea whatsoever if this is the case or not, but I thought it should be mentioned.

I was of course being sarcastic about the prison sentence. I have not looked closely at this specific issue because it is not relevant to me. Rybka is so strong compared to Fruit that nothing of any real importance in the program came from Fruit.

I knew you were joking.

On the other hand, I think that things of real importance that came from fruit are in every strong chess program.

That's not what I mean. You can say that about every major program going back for decades. Fruit is nothing without hash tables pioneered by programs several decades ago. Fruit was another trailblazer just like Rybka.

But every program quickly starting using Fruit ideas and this does not constitute the stealing of ideas and it does not explain why Rybka is so much stronger than Fruit.

People on this forum are asserting that Rybka is just a clone of Fruit and that's why it's so strong but they are not explaining why it is so much stronger than Fruit. It's obviously not because of Fruit that Rybka is so much stronger than Fruit as that makes no sense whatsoever.

If there are strong chess programs that did not learn anything from fruit's ideas, then the author was not trying hard enough, or was so clever it did not matter whether he learned from fruit or not. In every case, advances would have been made faster if the fruit code had been studied.

Put another way: "Chess authors are remiss if they do not study the fruit code."

An opinion:
Fabian's use of assert() is utterly fabulous, and this facet alone is worth reading the fruit source code.

[Don]

I was of course being sarcastic about the prison sentence. I have not looked closely at this specific issue because it is not relevant to me. Rybka is so strong compared to Fruit that nothing of any real importance in the program came from Fruit.

Hello Don,

I sincerely hope that this is not an example of your emotionless logic and wisdom.

Then again, this is the typical argument of the strongest there is group. Essentially it says that if the predecessor is significantly weaker than the successor then there must not have been much of P in S. When I hear this from non-techies like me I am bemused but I just did not expect to hear it from a chess engine programmer, someone who knows the positive effect that ideas or code snippets can have on engine performance.

Please don't take my statement out of context.

Every program benefited from Fruit because it was a trail-blazer. Your assertion is that Rybka is so strong because it's a clone of Fruit which does not explain why it is so much stronger than Fruit.

When I say that there is nothing of any real importance in Fruit the context is the fact that Rybka is far stronger than Fruit - it's just no contest. So what I am calling things of of "real importance" is whatever it is that makes Rybka so much stronger than Fruit.

What you need to explain is how Rybka can be so much stronger than Fruit and yet claim that it is really nothing more than a clone of Fruit and that Vas did nothing but make a copy of something. That is the assertion that you have yet to talk about.

You seem to believe that all you have to do is take the currently existing strongest program and then just add a few hundred ELO and you have created the new strongest program in the world without having to do any work. That's why it's impossible to take you seriously.

Once there was a program called Rybka. It was relatively weak. Then there was Fruit code. Then there was Rybka, the monster beta that crushed everything.

Now you are asserting that nothing of any real importance came from Fruit. On what objective basis? You are the logical, non-idiot here, enlighten me please.

Rybka is far stronger than Fruit, so nothing of any real importance (in the context of this massive strength difference) came from Fruit.

The truth of the matter is that computer chess is composed of several discoveries and ground breaking programs that influenced all the good programs that came after them and Fruit is one of them. Even Vas has publicly acknowledged that ideas from Fruit helped his program. Is that what bothers you so much? But then every program in active development has the same issue - is that a problem for you?

The problem for you is that Rybka is far stronger than Fruit and this does not fit your theory that all Vas did was clone Fruit. You have yet to explain why it is so strong compared to Fruit. In your own words, "Then there was Rybka, the monster beta that crushed everything." I might add, "including Fruit."

No-one here has Rybka's code to test these statements so are these statements which can be subjected to scientific analysis or are they statements of faith, to be accepted because you spoke them into being?

Later.