A Very Novel Idea Concerning Vas- BE FAIR

[Alexander Schmidt]

Did Graham call you all those things. I think 1 hour is enough time for you to post a link or links to each thread where i can read Graham's exact words. That's a kick in the butt, isn't it.

I wont spend one hour to search for insults which are maybe deleted. Here is his last one:

http://talkchess.com/forum/viewtopic.ph ... 02&t=37826

[Adam Hair]

Did Graham call you all those things. I think 1 hour is enough time for you to post a link or links to each thread where i can read Graham's exact words. That's a kick in the butt, isn't it.

I wont spend one hour to search for insults which are maybe deleted. Here is his last one:

http://talkchess.com/forum/viewtopic.ph ... 02&t=37826

I think that you are choosing to forget that, in many cases, he was insulted first.

[bob]

Factually??? What facts do you have to support this? The only facts I have seen support the opposite. "legally innocent"? How can you prove that? You might go thru a court and get a verdict of "legally not guilty" but that is not the same thing at all.

None of your above statement makes any sense at all...

The proof is that there is no verdict yet against Vas. That is meant by innocent until a court called him guilty. And that is a fact. That this didnt happen. So I called it a factually existing still innocence without any court verdict. This our legal system.

The phrase is "presumed innocent until proven guilty". He is either innocent or guilty in real life. He knows which. I am pretty certain which as well.

[bob]

This is pretty funny. And also just a "tad" hypocritical. For the longest, you stated "Fabien doesn't have a problem with this so it is ok." Now it appears that he _does_ have a problem with it, and now his opinion doesn't matter?

Look up "hypocrite" and think about it.

Please try to differ. What I said about Fabien when there was no public concern, I took the easiest argument against the Vas critics and said Fabien didnt say something qhixch was true after I had read Dann Corbit. Now Fabien is concerned and I argue that nothing has been decided legally against Vas. Would you deny that?

As we know at least in Germany, if someone sees a direct and urgent need to get legal assistance then this is possible to get usually after advice by a lawyer. All that is still not done or not publicly announced. So why attacking me, Bob? I did not say or mean that I have nothing seen from critics like you that accused Vas. That would be a lie because you have made your public statement. But again, this isnt yet a legal verdict.

I didn't attack you at all. I just pointed out that when it was convenient to use Fabien, you did. Not is it is not so convenient and you now don't bother with his opinion at all...

I think it would almost make us really decent, if we could differentiate. Although we know all the critics, we still treat Vas as innocent and with politeness until he would be sentenced to any real punishment either financial or else. My term innocent means in a legal sense just that Vas never was convicted by a court and this is what is essential. So, he's no liar nothing. And especially Graham therefore should also be treated with respect.

OK, you watch someone kill somebody, with your own two eyes you see the entire act. Do you consider him innocent until he is found guilty in court? I do not. I _know_ what I saw. Same with the fruit/rybka issue. I _know_ what I saw.

And we should behave this way NOT only for any thinkable advantage of Vas but for the best of our little community.

Also to Keith. Hostility doesnt lead anywhere. Yes, many here see him under suspicions, but then it's our legal system that must tear the conclusions but not we in a sort of social branding. Let's show some style. If we could wait for 5 years now let''s wait what Fabien could achieve during his attempts now. But calling Vas guilty just because Fabien appeared on the scene now this is neither fair nor well designed for our community.

[Alexander Schmidt]

I think that you are choosing to forget that, in many cases, he was insulted first.

And in many cases he insulted first.

[Watchman]

And again, i say 4 programmers who have studied it will never reach a unified decision.

Amazing! How about 5?! I believe I understand these gentlemen correctly and there is a general consensus.

Dr. Bob Hyatt, Matthias Gemuh, Fabien Letouzey, Dr. Alexander Schmidt, Zach Wegner... I would be willing to bet there are others who "know what they are talking about" would say at least a "more likely than not" burden of proof... if not much stronger.

I would be surprised one could not find 4 more!

We are getting dangerously close to what i call "Follow the crowd simpletons".

I would not say the "naysayers" are simpletons... just dyed-in-the-wool supporters of Vas or simply willing to naysay to justify what engine they wish to use.

I've talked to too many programmers-off the record and dont want to get involved in what they call this- a snake pit.

=================================================

Notable Quotes I pulled... and this just from the, "Fabien's open letter to the community" thread.

"- Vasik claimed that Strelka 2.0 is a clone of Rybka 1.0 (and you know what that would imply!)" > Fabien Letouzey " - Zach Wegner found many Fruit ideas (and nearly identical code) in Rybka 1.0; I think someone else did, too" > Fabien Letouzey

"Implemented algorithms were "translated" to a bitboard infrastructure. The translator ends up with a working implementation of an algorithm he may never have been able to code from scratch. It is "copy and paste" with unavoidable adaptations/translations. That is how DanChess once cloned Crafty's evaluation, and was condemned in this forum as a clone." Matthias Gemuh

"More important is "It was however a whole re-write (copy with different words if you like, similar to a translation) of the algorithms. Not just an extraction of a couple of ideas as is common, and normal. " That says a lot about the issue. In a short summary, strelka encapsulates the ideas and data structures in Fruit, although there is not a character by character match since strelka came from reverse-engineering of Rybka 1. He makes it pretty clear that the "source" for strelka was obviously fruit. Which is what several of us have been saying for a long time. Function names and variable names are, of course, meaningless, assuming the original Rybka beta was stripped of all symbols for reasons unknown. But as I mentioned when the debate started, there are global similarities that are way too significant to write off as random chance of two different programmers writing the same code..." Bob Hyatt

"Of course, this is nothing new to those of us that looked and listened in the first place..." Bob Hyatt "Bob, We never really met, so, nice to meet you! I am sorry that many people apparently did not listen to you." Fabien Letouzey. " Me too. But if someone believes something strong enough, _nothing_ will alter their opinion. Basic human nature. We have now reached a totally insane point in computer chess where we have dozens of strong programs, claiming to not be derivative works." Bob Hyatt

"Proof that Rybka is a Fruit derivative has been presented since Rybka 1.0 beta, though some people will never accept any amount of proof as adequate." Matthias Gemuh

"VR used Fruit code. Noone who looked at the facts can disagree." " Takeing the code, and changeing it is a GPL violation. Thats what happened. There is no other explenation for similaries in non-chess-playing-related-parts like the UCI communication, error messages, crashes." Alexander Schmidt

Bob Hyatt: "Just for the record, to eliminate this specific argument, when Zach, CT, I and others looked at the fruit/rybka1 question, we did _not_ involve Strelka. Strelka was the thing that exposed the issue, but we directly compared fruit to rybka, so the strelka issue could not be raised again..."
Fabien Letouzey: " What happened then?"
Bob Hyatt: "We found _lots_ of similarities. Zach created a web page that went into great detail with the analysis. There are some obvious differences between Fruit and Rybka, but there are a _ton_ of similarities. Too many to be pure luck."


"I would like to put events into proper time-frame / perspective.

1. Strelka came along.

2. Vas looked at it, claimed it was Rybka and therefore he was going to release the strelka source under his name.

3. He then discovered that even if you take a source from a questionable place, once you modify it, the modifications are _your_ copyright. Since Strelka admittedly had some changes made (improvements according to Vas) he then realized he could not release it as his code as then he would be violating the "author's" copyright. Even though Vas had violated the Fruit GPL.

So he was damned if he did (release the code as his own) or damned if he didn't (someone else was getting credit and his ideas were exposed)...

That's all there was to that little episode." Bob Hyatt


"I am not sure how Rybka would be legal in light of the GPL fruit was issued under. I've not seen any source code for Rybka 1 beta, yet I have seen executables, which is a direct violation of the GPL. Strelka is a reverse engineered derivative of fruit. I am not sure what in the hell that means, however. " Bob Hyatt


"Maybe we can ask other people whether they would consider it a new engine. Apart from the different ordering of moves with equal score (due to mailbox vs. bitboard move generation order), the engine behaviour would be identical.

Same search, same eval.

By "huge undertaking", maybe you mean that one has to understand CC basics and modify a lot of code.
But the way I see it is different:
Which is the hugher undertaking:
a) convert Fruit to bitboards
b) write a world-class engine (as of 2005) from scratch"

Fabien Letouzey


"I have always said that changing the infrastucture of move generation (e.g. from mailbox to bitboards) and then adapting (or "translating") the remaining source code is just another form of "copy and paste". The result of the adaption is not a new engine. As a chess programmer, I know what I'm talking about." Matthias Gemuh

"If you start with the complete Fruit code and change it, is it copy and paste? Yes. It's a copy of the whole code. You answered the question yourself. Thats what happend with Rybka, there is no other logical explenation for the similaries in not chess related parts." Alexander Schmidt

[Steve B]

Hi Rob

am i reading your post correctly?
it seems you are acknowledging the Friut---> Rybka connection here

a fairly significant reversal for you i think?
or do you feel that Fruit--->Rybka is one thing and Rybka----> Ippo and Family is another?
i have always maintained that the connection of Ippo and family cannot be viewed in a vacumm and must be looked at in terms of Fruit and its first derivative..Rybka ..what follows from that basically is moot..meaning..if you can justify Rybka..then you can justify direct derivates from Rybka
i think you will remember me suggesting that
Regards
Steve

[michiguel]

And again, i say 4 programmers who have studied it will never reach a unified decision.

Amazing! How about 5?! I believe I understand these gentlemen correctly and there is a general consensus.

Dr. Bob Hyatt, Matthias Gemuh, Fabien Letouzey, Dr. Alexander Schmidt, Zach Wegner... I would be willing to bet there are others who "know what they are talking about" would say at least a "more likely than not" burden of proof... if not much stronger.

I would be surprised one could not find 4 more!

Who think otherwise...

BTW, Fabien did not give any opinion at all. He asked questions, and nothing else. He said that Strelka was legal[1], Ryan agreed (From a fruit perspective), but somehow, because VR said that Strelka was a copy of R1, there was an insinuation that R1... "you know what that mean". Mean what? if Strelka is legal and R1 is 100% Strelka, R1 is automatically off the hook according to FL and RB assertions.

Even worst, JO said that he built the engine patching things from Fruit and R1.

If there is any evidence, comes from Zach, but even that one was not prorperly discussed and an agreement was not reached.

Of course, magically, some people think that FL words and condemning. But that is a huge non sequitur.

Miguel
[1] Found similarity in "substance" but no GPL violation.

We are getting dangerously close to what i call "Follow the crowd simpletons".

I would not say the "naysayers" are simpletons... just dyed-in-the-wool supporters of Vas or simply willing to naysay to justify what engine they wish to use.

I've talked to too many programmers-off the record and dont want to get involved in what they call this- a snake pit.

=================================================

Notable Quotes I pulled... and this just from the, "Fabien's open letter to the community" thread.

"- Vasik claimed that Strelka 2.0 is a clone of Rybka 1.0 (and you know what that would imply!)" > Fabien Letouzey " - Zach Wegner found many Fruit ideas (and nearly identical code) in Rybka 1.0; I think someone else did, too" > Fabien Letouzey

"Implemented algorithms were "translated" to a bitboard infrastructure. The translator ends up with a working implementation of an algorithm he may never have been able to code from scratch. It is "copy and paste" with unavoidable adaptations/translations. That is how DanChess once cloned Crafty's evaluation, and was condemned in this forum as a clone." Matthias Gemuh

"More important is "It was however a whole re-write (copy with different words if you like, similar to a translation) of the algorithms. Not just an extraction of a couple of ideas as is common, and normal. " That says a lot about the issue. In a short summary, strelka encapsulates the ideas and data structures in Fruit, although there is not a character by character match since strelka came from reverse-engineering of Rybka 1. He makes it pretty clear that the "source" for strelka was obviously fruit. Which is what several of us have been saying for a long time. Function names and variable names are, of course, meaningless, assuming the original Rybka beta was stripped of all symbols for reasons unknown. But as I mentioned when the debate started, there are global similarities that are way too significant to write off as random chance of two different programmers writing the same code..." Bob Hyatt

"Of course, this is nothing new to those of us that looked and listened in the first place..." Bob Hyatt "Bob, We never really met, so, nice to meet you! I am sorry that many people apparently did not listen to you." Fabien Letouzey. " Me too. But if someone believes something strong enough, _nothing_ will alter their opinion. Basic human nature. We have now reached a totally insane point in computer chess where we have dozens of strong programs, claiming to not be derivative works." Bob Hyatt

"Proof that Rybka is a Fruit derivative has been presented since Rybka 1.0 beta, though some people will never accept any amount of proof as adequate." Matthias Gemuh

"VR used Fruit code. Noone who looked at the facts can disagree." " Takeing the code, and changeing it is a GPL violation. Thats what happened. There is no other explenation for similaries in non-chess-playing-related-parts like the UCI communication, error messages, crashes." Alexander Schmidt

Bob Hyatt: "Just for the record, to eliminate this specific argument, when Zach, CT, I and others looked at the fruit/rybka1 question, we did _not_ involve Strelka. Strelka was the thing that exposed the issue, but we directly compared fruit to rybka, so the strelka issue could not be raised again..."
Fabien Letouzey: " What happened then?"
Bob Hyatt: "We found _lots_ of similarities. Zach created a web page that went into great detail with the analysis. There are some obvious differences between Fruit and Rybka, but there are a _ton_ of similarities. Too many to be pure luck."


"I would like to put events into proper time-frame / perspective.

1. Strelka came along.

2. Vas looked at it, claimed it was Rybka and therefore he was going to release the strelka source under his name.

3. He then discovered that even if you take a source from a questionable place, once you modify it, the modifications are _your_ copyright. Since Strelka admittedly had some changes made (improvements according to Vas) he then realized he could not release it as his code as then he would be violating the "author's" copyright. Even though Vas had violated the Fruit GPL.

So he was damned if he did (release the code as his own) or damned if he didn't (someone else was getting credit and his ideas were exposed)...

That's all there was to that little episode." Bob Hyatt


"I am not sure how Rybka would be legal in light of the GPL fruit was issued under. I've not seen any source code for Rybka 1 beta, yet I have seen executables, which is a direct violation of the GPL. Strelka is a reverse engineered derivative of fruit. I am not sure what in the hell that means, however. " Bob Hyatt


"Maybe we can ask other people whether they would consider it a new engine. Apart from the different ordering of moves with equal score (due to mailbox vs. bitboard move generation order), the engine behaviour would be identical.

Same search, same eval.

By "huge undertaking", maybe you mean that one has to understand CC basics and modify a lot of code.
But the way I see it is different:
Which is the hugher undertaking:
a) convert Fruit to bitboards
b) write a world-class engine (as of 2005) from scratch"

Fabien Letouzey


"I have always said that changing the infrastucture of move generation (e.g. from mailbox to bitboards) and then adapting (or "translating") the remaining source code is just another form of "copy and paste". The result of the adaption is not a new engine. As a chess programmer, I know what I'm talking about." Matthias Gemuh

"If you start with the complete Fruit code and change it, is it copy and paste? Yes. It's a copy of the whole code. You answered the question yourself. Thats what happend with Rybka, there is no other logical explenation for the similaries in not chess related parts." Alexander Schmidt

[geots]

Did Graham call you all those things. I think 1 hour is enough time for you to post a link or links to each thread where i can read Graham's exact words. That's a kick in the butt, isn't it.

I wont spend one hour to search for insults which are maybe deleted. Here is his last one:

http://talkchess.com/forum/viewtopic.ph ... 02&t=37826

No, no, no. Thats garbage. You said he called YOU all this. I dont see that. You better reread what you wrote. At any rate, I compliment him anyway. I went round and round with him for 4 years telling him his threads were too nice. Nice to see him let loose at someone- "who" is irrelevant. His mistake has always been trying to be too nice. I tell him over and over you dont take a screwdriver to a gunfight.

[Watchman]

Hi Rob

am i reading your post correctly?
it seems you are acknowledging the Friut---> Rybka connection here

Hi Steve,

You read "correctly".

a fairly significant reversal for you i think?

The short answer is yes...

I cannot possibly understand how a "reasonable" person presented with the information (weeding out or having to wade through all the irrelevant hyperbole)... I cannot understand how one comes to a different conclusion.

Maybe they are similar to me in the respect of needing sufficient time to digest what has been presented. I am not frequent at visiting this board...I think you know this... hence my unfamiliarity with much of what has taken place and what has been presented. Fabien's arrival (and posts) and the posts generated by his arrival has definitely tipped the scales in my view.

It hurts... I do not like acknowledging these things... irrespective of that, I feel a certain duty to the "truth". What matters most to me is what actually happened; not my feelings or how it makes me feel or how I will look to others when acknowledging such things... or even being able to purchase a "good" engine.

or do you feel that Fruit--->Rybka is one thing and Rybka----> Ippo and Family is another?
i have always maintained that the connection of Ippo and family cannot be viewed in a vacumm and must be looked at in terms of Fruit and its first derivative..Rybka ..what follows from that basically is moot..meaning..if you can justify Rybka..then you can justify direct derivates from Rybka

Yes I remember our discussions. I agree with you Steve... call it "fruit of the poisonous tree"; beginning with Rybka that is. It just is not logical... Fabien, Dr Hyatt and others have made that clear to me.

Best to you Steve,
Rob