TalkChess.com

Terry McCracken wrote:

Milos wrote:

Don wrote:To give an example, I think I could take one of the best clones and add 50 ELO to it within a few weeks. I think any top 10 programmer could do this. In fact it's clear that any really GOOD programmer can do this, as is witnesses by Houdini and others.

Maybe a great programmer could do it, but you could never do it.
You took every possible idea from Ippolit in Komodo, you even copied some code, you have all the values from Larry (even though these have nothing to do with Rybka 3 eval) and your Komodo still sucks as nothing.
Be realistic man, Robert Houdart is a programming genius for you and you are simply jealous.
All this you and other guys do is nothing but an envy. Bringing things on the issue of ethics is just a lousy excuse.

Where do you come up with all this nonsense? You should be removed from this discussion before you do further damage.

How many other good programmers do you want to kick in the teeth with your libel?

I'm surprised you're allowed this much leeway.

Several reasons:

1. someone who cleaned and translated bogus Ippolite code so it can be readable into a human language.

2 . Robbolito 0.09

SzG wrote:

paulo wrote:Today only a complete asshole would start coding a new engine from scratch, i.e., ignoring all the (best) available ideias and resources.

The two are not the same. You can start from scratch using all the available ideas together with yours. And you can start from a complete code and put in your ideas.

Nope. It's exactly the same thing as long as you agree the existing code you are basing is the best. Furthermore I strongly believe any experienced software developer agrees with this.

paulo wrote:

SzG wrote:

paulo wrote:Today only a complete asshole would start coding a new engine from scratch, i.e., ignoring all the (best) available ideias and resources.

The two are not the same. You can start from scratch using all the available ideas together with yours. And you can start from a complete code and put in your ideas.

Nope. It's exactly the same thing as long as you agree the existing code you are basing is the best. Furthermore I strongly believe any experienced software developer agrees with this.

Houdini IS Ivanhoe which IS Robbolito.

Any reasonable programmer here can tell you that.

Damir wrote:

Terry McCracken wrote:

Milos wrote:

Don wrote:To give an example, I think I could take one of the best clones and add 50 ELO to it within a few weeks. I think any top 10 programmer could do this. In fact it's clear that any really GOOD programmer can do this, as is witnesses by Houdini and others.

Maybe a great programmer could do it, but you could never do it.
You took every possible idea from Ippolit in Komodo, you even copied some code, you have all the values from Larry (even though these have nothing to do with Rybka 3 eval) and your Komodo still sucks as nothing.
Be realistic man, Robert Houdart is a programming genius for you and you are simply jealous.
All this you and other guys do is nothing but an envy. Bringing things on the issue of ethics is just a lousy excuse.

Where do you come up with all this nonsense? You should be removed from this discussion before you do further damage.

How many other good programmers do you want to kick in the teeth with your libel?

I'm surprised you're allowed this much leeway.

Several reasons:

1. someone who cleaned and translated bogus Ippolite code so it can be readable into a human language.

2 . Robbolito 0.09

I'm not sure what your point is?

Milos cleaned up a derivitive and...?

paulo wrote:

SzG wrote:

paulo wrote:Today only a complete asshole would start coding a new engine from scratch, i.e., ignoring all the (best) available ideias and resources.

The two are not the same. You can start from scratch using all the available ideas together with yours. And you can start from a complete code and put in your ideas.

Nope. It's exactly the same thing as long as you agree the existing code you are basing is the best. Furthermore I strongly believe any experienced software developer agrees with this.

You are not thinking about this correctly. Yes, experienced software developers build on the work and libraries of others. That is not what I am discouraging.

Take your program to a chess tournament. Tell the organizers that you want to enter version 1.5 of your program, but that you also would like to enter version 1.4, 1,3, 1.2 and 1.1 of your program in addition. You will NOT be allowed to do this, because it's wrong on so many levels.

Instead, you will be asked to pick a representative program, presumably the latest and greatest version.

So just starting with the robbo base, changing the name and author does NOT make this a program worthy of new moniker. Even if you do substantial work on it, you cannot easily shed it's original roots. In the same way I cannot enter Komodo 1.3 in a tournament and also some ancient version of Doch claiming it is completely different.

The same goes for the rating lists. When SF 2.0 came out, they stopped testing 1.9 because in their wisdom they believe that only a single program should be represent a family of programs.

I know that what you said seems reasonable to you, but it was not well thought out. Here is the way this should be done:

Let's say I want to branch off from the robbo sources. There is no legal or ethical reason I cannot do so. However, I cannot and should not represent this as some kind of separate family of programs. When any tournament or competition is held, the BEST of a given family can be chosen to represent the entire family, to be decided by the original author. And it's far better when doing this to make it all transparent. Make the sources available and don't hide anything, just be up-front and forthcoming.

If you don't like that, then write your own program from scratch and make it a true original and figure out how to do evaluation for yourself and give your program a real personality and a playing style of it's own. Then you can compete as a distinct entity.

You should keep in mind too that a tournament is in fact a real competition between program authors. Every author there wants his program to win. When I go to a tournament with Rybka in it, I know that I will be competing in some sense against Vas. Is it really right that I have to compete against him several times in the same tournament facing a "pseudo author" opponent who probably knows only a fraction of what I know about computer chess?

The presence of really strong programs in tournaments adds to the prestige and dignity of the tournament, but having multiple versions of the same program tears it down by turning it into a "single author" competition. It becomes, who can improve Ippolitto the most? Let's have a contest to see!

But more importantly, you have to ask the question, "is it really good for computer chess for any author to be able to create yet another 'brand new' chess program in 5 minutes?"

Don wrote: So let's start with the assumption that we have identified a program that is not a source code clone of something original, but is heavily based on it. Let's also assume there are no legal issues. If there are, that of course is a separate matter with its own considerations.

Is this acceptable? Should we as the computer chess community endorse this behavior, or discourage it?

I think THAT is what we need to decide. We all have our various viewpoints on this which I think should be respected, but I think this is really at the heart of the matter and what we SHOULD be talking about but rarely do.

Whether this is acceptable does depend on your point of view I guess.

I see computer chess programming as a competition between programmers: who can build the strongest program.
That's why I am not realy happy about all the strong open source programs (legal or otherwise),
they spoill the competition element

I don't buy the argument that open source is important because it advances the state of the art in computer chess,
the scientific value of computer chess is very limited in my opinion.

But another argument for open source is that it helps increase the value for people who use chess programs
as tools to analyse chess positions / games. This is a good argument for open source I think,
and it is acceptable to use a strong open source program as a starting point and just try to improve it.

But for those who enjoy the competition element, unfortunately the strong open source programs are out there, nothing that can be done about it.

Perhaps we should look at writing programs for other games, less well known games or even newlu invented games,
where there will be a level playing field to start with, and less incentive for cloning / reverse engineering etc.

I am curious to hear the reasons from other chess program authours to pour so much time into this hobby...

Terry McCracken wrote:

Damir wrote:

Terry McCracken wrote:

Milos wrote:

Don wrote:To give an example, I think I could take one of the best clones and add 50 ELO to it within a few weeks. I think any top 10 programmer could do this. In fact it's clear that any really GOOD programmer can do this, as is witnesses by Houdini and others.

Maybe a great programmer could do it, but you could never do it.
You took every possible idea from Ippolit in Komodo, you even copied some code, you have all the values from Larry (even though these have nothing to do with Rybka 3 eval) and your Komodo still sucks as nothing.
Be realistic man, Robert Houdart is a programming genius for you and you are simply jealous.
All this you and other guys do is nothing but an envy. Bringing things on the issue of ethics is just a lousy excuse.

Where do you come up with all this nonsense? You should be removed from this discussion before you do further damage.

How many other good programmers do you want to kick in the teeth with your libel?

I'm surprised you're allowed this much leeway.

Several reasons:

1. someone who cleaned and translated bogus Ippolite code so it can be readable into a human language.

2 . Robbolito 0.09

I'm not sure what your point is?

Milos cleaned up a derivitive and...?

and he also has great programming knowledge and knows what he is talking about. If he puts someone here firmly back to their place they most certainly deserve it.

Some people here might get offended by Milos' post ( like you), but that's because they don't understand the true purpose of his writings.

Jan Brouwer wrote:

Don wrote: So let's start with the assumption that we have identified a program that is not a source code clone of something original, but is heavily based on it. Let's also assume there are no legal issues. If there are, that of course is a separate matter with its own considerations.

Is this acceptable? Should we as the computer chess community endorse this behavior, or discourage it?

I think THAT is what we need to decide. We all have our various viewpoints on this which I think should be respected, but I think this is really at the heart of the matter and what we SHOULD be talking about but rarely do.

Whether this is acceptable does depend on your point of view I guess.

I see computer chess programming as a competition between programmers: who can build the strongest program.

Yes! I completely agree with that. If it were not a competition, I think there would be much less motivation for making a strong program, but that is part of the fun.

There is also the pride factor. I want to have a strong program because in some sense it represents ME. It's my baby. I cannot understand the point of view of those who want to start with someone else's "baby" but deny it's origins. There is no pride in that.

If someone wants to start with someone else's "baby" and improve on it, I am all for it, as long as it's not allowed to be considered an entirely separate program. It should be considered a different version of the same program and it should be completely transparent and open.

That's why I am not realy happy about all the strong open source programs (legal or otherwise),
they spoill the competition element

You are not competing on equal footing. If I had the strongest chess program and was allowed to place 10 copies of it in a tournament, and nobody else was allowed to do this, it would be like rigged competition.

I don't buy the argument that open source is important because it advances the state of the art in computer chess,
the scientific value of computer chess is very limited in my opinion.

But another argument for open source is that it helps increase the value for people who use chess programs
as tools to analyse chess positions / games. This is a good argument for open source I think,
and it is acceptable to use a strong open source program as a starting point and just try to improve it.

If it's represented in competition as just another version of the same family of programs and there is only one.

But for those who enjoy the competition element, unfortunately the strong open source programs are out there, nothing that can be done about it.

Perhaps we should look at writing programs for other games, less well known games or even newlu invented games,
where there will be a level playing field to start with, and less incentive for cloning / reverse engineering etc.

I am curious to hear the reasons from other chess program authours to pour so much time into this hobby...

Watchman wrote: "Sophistry" as I think K. I. Hyams and "Jean-Luc Picard" would also describe that.

Jean-Luc Picard needs to be a bit careful if he uses the sophistry word, otherwise he won’t just have the Klingons and the Borg after him, he will have Ansari to contend with, as well.

I don’t know what stardate he used the word on but as it was clearly after me, I might have to get him for cloning.

Damir wrote:

Terry McCracken wrote:

Damir wrote:

Terry McCracken wrote:

Milos wrote:

Don wrote:To give an example, I think I could take one of the best clones and add 50 ELO to it within a few weeks. I think any top 10 programmer could do this. In fact it's clear that any really GOOD programmer can do this, as is witnesses by Houdini and others.

Maybe a great programmer could do it, but you could never do it.
You took every possible idea from Ippolit in Komodo, you even copied some code, you have all the values from Larry (even though these have nothing to do with Rybka 3 eval) and your Komodo still sucks as nothing.
Be realistic man, Robert Houdart is a programming genius for you and you are simply jealous.
All this you and other guys do is nothing but an envy. Bringing things on the issue of ethics is just a lousy excuse.

Where do you come up with all this nonsense? You should be removed from this discussion before you do further damage.

How many other good programmers do you want to kick in the teeth with your libel?

I'm surprised you're allowed this much leeway.

Several reasons:

1. someone who cleaned and translated bogus Ippolite code so it can be readable into a human language.

2 . Robbolito 0.09

I'm not sure what your point is?

Milos cleaned up a derivitive and...?

and he also has great programming knowledge and knows what he is talking about. If he puts someone here firmly back to their place they most certainly deserve it.

Some people here might get offended by Milos' post ( like you), but that's because they don't understand the true purpose of his writings.

That's a Load of Crap.

I don't have time for nonsense.