WCCC 2019 Macau..

[mclane]

Participate in the social event

[hgm]

The question remains: what is it that the operator needs to do in person that can't be done remotely? These discussions sound like the things you'd expect to send by snail mail, taking ages to send and receive letters to communicate, ignoring the existence of emails, or online forums.

The WCCC, as if the Internet never existed

Stupid question. Move the physical pieces on the physical board, of course...

If you would organize a robot to be there to do that you could do it remotely. I don't think this would be against ICGA rules.

So all yea travel-shy folks, beware! For next year in Tokyo, just call your Japanese friend who has a robot, and ask him to connect it to the WCCC router, then you can do the rest remotely. You could even have the robot attend the dinner, to scavenge some food and e-mail its recipe to you!

[Peter Berger]

Yeah, where did you dug up him? My wife would have done better.

The truth is probably somewhere in the middle.
I like crem’s approach that one of the lead developpers should always be present if at all possible. It must be a very disappointing experience for a developper who faces a team that is only represented by an operator who knows zilch about the inner workings of the program. And after all: WCCC +is+ designed as a social event for the programmers indeed.
But the operator part is probably underestimated by newcomers in general. It does need some consideration if you want to be competitive. For example: what do you do if your machine or the internet connection breaks down? What is your backup solution? What to do if the engine crashes? What to do if a wrong move has been entered? How do you change engine version and/or opening books between rounds? And all these things +do+ happen.
It makes little sense to do your very best to get the greatest hardware and engine version, and then just completely ignore the operator question IMHO.
It is probably enough to do some real life training games in advance in general. We are not talking rocket science here of course.
Maybe with the exception of the (kind of silly) speed event. Here the operator can make all the difference. If you are able to get your moves executed in like 2-3 seconds on the board and not commit errors. this is definitely like 100-200 ELO points. One more minute thinking time for the engine is relevant.
E.g. Junior would have lost against Crafty in the speed event because Amir Ban executed a wrong move on the board in Israel. And Frans Morsch was really not that competent either - as an operator.
Peter

[hgm]

Well, my wife would do better because she would take it seriously, be properly instructed by me, and she would practice it in advance.

It is not my intention to clobber last year's operator after the fact. But it seems that because of the events the impression now has arisen that you do not stand a chance in WCCC if you don't have an operator that belongs to the 10 best in the world. And that it totally false, and a very harmful misconception, which better be dispelled as quickly as possible. True, you should not pick a blind person, or one without arms, or one suffering from panic attacks. But the other 99% of the human race would do fine, when properly instructed and properly prepared. What happened was not just a matter of lack of experience, it needed a whole lot of additional shortcomings. Experience merely would be proof you don't have these shortcomings. Like you say, it is not rocket science.

That in case of an emergency an operator without any knowledge of the project would be in trouble is another matter; I suppose Leela would be f*cked if the remote connection cannot be restored anyway, even with the most knowledgeable developer present at the site. Running it on the laptop doesn't seem an option. But this is a calculated risk you can take. We are not talking about failure to properly handle an emergency here; we are talking about failure to perform te basic task, for which it was certain in advance that it would have to be performed.

Besides, the tournament is played in a hall full of computer-chess experts, most of which probably very willing to help in case of an emergency. I was there, most of the time... There were even days where I had nothing else to do, and I could conceivably have operated Leela during those days myself. After all, Leela would only participate in the WCCC and not in the equal-hardware event, so it would not need that many days of operation. I don't say I would have done it, but the point is that no one even bothered to ask me. Playing tourist and seeing sights in Macao, as I did today, was nice too.

Changing the engine version or the book need not be a task for the operator. If you play on a remote machine, the actual developer (or another expert) could be left in (remote) control of the remote machine.The operator would only use it to play games against, when he gets the word that it is ready for the next match.

The blitz is another matter. There a slow operator will lose always. Even with a fast operator Leela would not stand a chance, as it typically needs more than a few thousand moves to convert a certain win. So just don't enter the blitz.

[Ovyron]

Stupid question. Move the physical pieces on the physical board, of course...

I never say something like this, but that's a very stupid rule.

It's as if we couldn't have these conversations in a timely manner, because we were required to write our text directly on some notes made of paper, and had to send them by mail to each other...

What matters is the information.

What matter in chess are the moves.

Why doesn't the IGCA provide robot arms for participants anyway? If it's a stupid requirement that they have, at least fulfilling it shouldn't be the participant's responsibility.

[hgm]

Why doesn't ICGA provide opening books for the participants? And engines? That would make it easier for everyone, wouldn't it? Then even someone who hadn't ever seen a computer in its life could participate, and have a good chance to become world champion.

Everyone knows that requiring any effort from a participant to become world champion is so unfair. Whatever you require, some are bound to be better at it than others.

[Ovyron]

Better at building a robot arm to make moves on the board? Really?

Building a robot arm to make moves on the board is unrelated to chess, and a stupid requirement. Of course, the best would be to just allow people to send moves remotely.

(this applies to FIDE chess as well, the World Champion would still be World Champion if the tournament to decide it was online. But it wouldn't be if the strongest human in the world was missing.)

[zullil]

Why doesn't ICGA provide opening books for the participants? And engines? That would make it easier for everyone, wouldn't it? Then even someone who hadn't ever seen a computer in its life could participate, and have a good chance to become world champion.

Everyone knows that requiring any effort from a participant to become world champion is so unfair. Whatever you require, some are bound to be better at it than others.

Well, I think I might agree with Ovyron, which is scary by itself. Why not require that each team must create a robot to act as its operator? Seems more in the spirit of a computer chess event than relying on some specially trained human operator.

This event seems like it belongs in another era ...

[IanO]

Well, I think I might agree with Ovyron, which is scary by itself. Why not require that each team must create a robot to act as its operator? Seems more in the spirit of a computer chess event than relying on some specially trained human operator.

This event seems like it belongs in another era ...

I would be delighted to see a robot operator at these tournaments! It would be a great point of interest, and a juicy source of sponsorship I bet. (Robotic operation in other types of games like shogi and go might be even more challenging!)

You nailed it that the rules are from another era. I don't think the rules have changed substantially since the 1970s when the WCCC was created. At that time, the physical board was a more reliable standard for communication than anything else, in the pre-internet era, with mainframes vs. dedicated prototypes. Maybe the operators no longer have to record moves, since DGT boards are available?