Houdini 1.03a The New Nr 1 !!!

[Milos]

The best Rybka 4 on the CCRL 40/4 is only +45 Elos compared to the best Rybka 3, so it didn't take much to overtake it. As Ippo is only better at fast controls, I guess its gain is merely due to removing obfuscation code. In the case of Ippo, the gain was not spectacular. In the case of Robbo/Fire the removal of obfuscation code may have been accompanied by some bug fixing and optimizing, so a further gain was obtained. No original ideas were necessary (although I don't claim there weren't any), only some programming skills were needed.
In the case of Houdini the base may have been Robbolito or Fire, so it is not unlikely that there wasn't any progress at all as far as the introduction of new ideas are concerned.

Vincent's quote is the most appropriate comment to this:

Both programmers wrote a 3000+ elo engine and obviously are not doing the testing themselves. They got: "a bunch of idiots" for that.

Houdini and Ippo derivatives programmers don't have such a luxury.
And despite "a bunch of idiots" doing testing for one of them, he can't even tune TM properly. And without external support, even with strong cluster can't improve his program for more than 45elos in 2 years. His real skills were clear to some ppl when he released the first and totally mediocre 1600 elo version of his engine. After that came fruit, and than external help financed from who knows whom with a huge amount of money to do the tuning for him (since he didn't have, and still doesn't have a clue about engine parameter tuning)...

[Dr.Wael Deeb]

Hi,

How do those results square with the one's posted here which suggest Deep Rybka 4 tops Houdini ?

http://www.talkchess.com/forum/viewtopi ... 7&start=20

Must be a Belgian conspiracy.

Conspiracy ? 100 Euro for Rybka 4, but I get better customer service from the free programs like Houdini 1.03a. A bug in Houdini and it is fixed with a new release in a few days. with a sorry from the programmer for putting out a version with a bug!! Maybe for you its Belgian conspiracy but for us its just Belgian service.
Bugs are bugs and they will show up from time to time. It is how the author reacts to the bugs that makes the difference. Does the author take care of his customers?
We don't expect Vasik Rajlich to give any of his customers money back, but to not fix what are now known problems is just disrespectful to his customers.

Actually,I've come to the conclusion that Vasik is not only suffering from greed,he's also damn arrogant regarding his acts toward his customers....not that I give a damn anymore....
Dr.D

Greed and arrogance, in such situations, is very normal. He used to be nice at the beginning, didn't he?

The world isn't such a rosy place like it used to be.

Bearing that in mind, Vas is OK, people simply have to bow down to him, and he will be as giving as he feels is appropriate.

He also seems to have given us the strongest machine to date, clearly a head and shoulders above all others (at long time controls....... see Martin Thorsten matches. The next 2 come nowhere near!)

Will you believe me Shimon if I tell you that I have 2 FireBird 1.1 personalities that are stronger than Deep Rybka 4 and that at long time controls....I don't play bullet or blitz time controls....There is something special in the FireBird 1.1,something original and if you find the right tweak,you we'll be surprised by the result....
Dr.D

[Dr.Wael Deeb]

The best Rybka 4 on the CCRL 40/4 is only +45 Elos compared to the best Rybka 3, so it didn't take much to overtake it. As Ippo is only better at fast controls, I guess its gain is merely due to removing obfuscation code. In the case of Ippo, the gain was not spectacular. In the case of Robbo/Fire the removal of obfuscation code may have been accompanied by some bug fixing and optimizing, so a further gain was obtained. No original ideas were necessary (although I don't claim there weren't any), only some programming skills were needed.
In the case of Houdini the base may have been Robbolito or Fire, so it is not unlikely that there wasn't any progress at all as far as the introduction of new ideas are concerned.

Vincent's quote is the most appropriate comment to this:

Both programmers wrote a 3000+ elo engine and obviously are not doing the testing themselves. They got: "a bunch of idiots" for that.

Houdini and Ippo derivatives programmers don't have such a luxury.
And despite "a bunch of idiots" doing testing for one of them, he can't even tune TM properly. And without external support, even with strong cluster can't improve his program for more than 45elos in 2 years. His real skills were clear to some ppl when he released the first and totally mediocre 1600 elo version of his engine. After that came fruit, and than external help financed from who knows whom with a huge amount of money to do the tuning for him (since he didn't have, and still doesn't have a clue about engine parameter tuning)...

Well said...I'd like to add that Vasik has hit the wall regarding further improvements and I personally think that the so called Rybka cloud project is just a hoax to mislead people that he has a much stronger version of Rybka that can be rented online....the truth is that he couldn't improve Rybka 4 more than 40 Elo and by that still full of nasty bugs....
Dr.D

[Frank Quisinsky]

Hi Milos,

I never would do that ... but I do it ... an own opinion must here

I test a little bit Houdini 1.0.3a and compare it with Rybka 3 statistics.

After all what I saw I can say that many things are different. Most differents I saw in endgame statistics. With more time Rybka 3 produce more "better" moves, Houdini found all very fast, positions Houdini don't found Rybka found with more time. Most of the positions Houdini found very fast, Rybka found it too ... with more time.

Houdini don't have so many endgame bugs Rybka have. Rybka works more stabil. In late middlegames often no ponder reactions under Fritz GUI. Can be see, if the next move analyzes started. Houdini starting with Ply 1 in ponder hit. Often the engine crashed after such a move. Same error in Firebird 1.0 Beta (don't look in others of this engines).

But all in all ... the sources from Ipp family engines aren't clear. Furthermore, first versions seems to be an easy copy from one of the IvanHoes (Thread from Thinker programmer). I believe that.

But what I can say ...
It seems that Robert Houdert improve Houdini indeed. Most he do ... looks for me to more endgame knowledge, a lot of more selectivity.

So, the programmer seems to know what he make. Not a typical work I know from "Cloners" (endgame knowledge added, that is a good and I believe perhaps own work).

But the sources are unclear (Ipp fam.) and this is reason enough not to add this engine in SWCR.

But clear is after my test ... compare different things to Firebird 1.0a too that the programmer seems to be able to improve the ipp fam. sources.

Best
Frank

[frcha]

It seems to me that Vas is very innovative but not always that good at fine tuning or fixing the bugs in his program. ->hence bad customer support.

Clearly R4 different from R3 in many ways.

Now how different is ippolit/houdini from R3?

I think once we get past the fact that Ippolit /houdini ARE legal and once discussion moves to the uniqueness of these engines -- we might find out that Ippolit is not at all innovative

[James Constance]

Clearly R4 different from R3 in many ways.

Now how different is ippolit/houdini from R3?

Clearly ippolit/houdini is different from R3 in many ways.

Now how different is R3 from R4?

[Dr.Wael Deeb]

Clearly R4 different from R3 in many ways.

Now how different is ippolit/houdini from R3?

Clearly ippolit/houdini is different from R3 in many ways.

Now how different is R3 from R4?

Rybka 4 is the promised Rybka 3+ that should had been released as a free update for the Rybka 3 customers....anyone telling you something elas is either a liar or an idiot....
Dr.D

[Milos]

But what I can say ...
It seems that Robert Houdert improve Houdini indeed. Most he do ... looks for me to more endgame knowledge, a lot of more selectivity.

So, the programmer seems to know what he make. Not a typical work I know from "Cloners" (endgame knowledge added, that is a good and I believe perhaps own work).

But the sources are unclear (Ipp fam.) and this is reason enough not to add this engine in SWCR.

But clear is after my test ... compare different things to Firebird 1.0a too that the programmer seems to be able to improve the ipp fam. sources.

Hi Frank,
Yes Robert managed to bring some improvement but Ivanhoe itself also improved quite a bit. Ivanhoe in its current state is around 15 elo stronger then the best single core version Robbo g3.
And Houdini 1.03a is around 20 elo stronger than that which gives in total around 35 elo from the best version of Robbo, and around 45 elo from the first Ippo (exactly the same amount that Rybka improved in more than two years with extensive cluster tuning and testing community support).
I don't wish to go into details, but the newest Houdini beside some new endgame evaluation terms has complatelly different mobility/attack calculation from which it benefits in speed. Also other part of evaluation have been noticeably changed. And SMP implementation is Robert's own (not the one from Ivahoe).

[Frank Quisinsky]

Hi Milos,

smp things I don't check (don't have the knowlege and interest to look in detail).

BTW:
I must make changes in the Random Book v4.0. C00-C99 comes to rarely. So I must delete same openings, which comes over 1.d4 or 1.Nf6 (for an example). Version 4.1 have now 3.395 positions after black move 8. The books played more C00-C99 opening systems and all is more reality if I compare it with GM ECO statistics. Now all works fine in version 4.1, checked with 800 SWCR games again. I saw optimal Random statistics.

Only as information for you after our thread to my topic.

Best
Frank

[frcha]

Clearly R4 different from R3 in many ways.

Now how different is ippolit/houdini from R3?

Clearly ippolit/houdini is different from R3 in many ways. Not many.

Now how different is R3 from R4? More different than Ippolit is from R3.

If ippolit was so different from R3 - then we would not have ANY controversy. It had to be shown that ippolit was a legal derivative .. I think the paper by BB maybe shows it to be a legal derivative not to mention the considerable evidence on this forum to show that its evaluation is very close to R3 --- see Larry Kaufman's and Dan's posts.

...not to mention Graham Banks might never add these engines to his rating list!