Houdini 1.03 is available

[Frank Quisinsky]

Dann,

"but the moral standpoint is another matter."

And the kind of dicussion is very blending to these "another matter". Not really an computer chess event we have here!

Best
Frank

[Dann Corbit]

Dann,

"but the moral standpoint is another matter."

And the kind of dicussion is very blending to these "another matter". Not really an computer chess event we have here!

Best
Frank

There is a very different environment in chess programming. Because it is so competitive, it is not unlikely that a programmer will ruffle feathers if he takes short cuts, even if they are legal according to the law.

Another problem is that behavior standards are open to the interpretation of each person. What one person finds acceptable, another may not.

As to the final verdict, I prefer to err on the side of caution. That does not mean that my opinion is any better or worse than anyone else's.

[Frank Quisinsky]

Hi Bob,

in 14 years computer chess in combination with internet fora only one programmer i know gave such answered back the Houdini programmer gave here. And in the past I had contacts with around 250.

Thinking on Gabriele Müller (Voyager, LaPetite, LaGrande and so one). After she leaked out she gave the comment ...

"All my interest are to improve the learning options from Crafty."

Indeed but why she have a problem to wrote it directly?
I think the same reason other cloners have ... to find a little bit success in the community.

Gabriele Müller:
All others message after this one are answered back. I believe "answered back" are the right words for in German "Patzig - bolshy or cheeky".

Now each person which asked Robert Houdert a normaly question will be a liar! So this group of persons have to life with the comment Robert Houdert gave here.

Best
Frank

[Frank Quisinsky]

Hi Dann,

thats true.
But you know it from your own "life-experience" ...

An opinion are bulding from the combination of events.
What I read here is enough from my point of view.

Best
Frank

[Steve B]

a post in this thread has been removed due to complaints about offensive language


if one of your posts seems to be missing this is because the thread was split at the offensive post and all repies to it
the member initiating the post has been contacted

Steve

[bob]

Hi Bob,

in 14 years computer chess in combination with internet fora only one programmer i know gave such answered back the Houdini programmer gave here. And in the past I had contacts with around 250.

Thinking on Gabriele Müller (Voyager, LaPetite, LaGrande and so one). After she leaked out she gave the comment ...

"All my interest are to improve the learning options from Crafty."

Indeed but why she have a problem to wrote it directly?
I think the same reason other cloners have ... to find a little bit success in the community.

Gabriele Müller:
All others message after this one are answered back. I believe "answered back" are the right words for in German "Patzig - bolshy or cheeky".

Now each person which asked Robert Houdert a normaly question will be a liar! So this group of persons have to life with the comment Robert Houdert gave here.

Best
Frank

I believe it is amazing how someone's "intent" changes after being caught red-handed.

But in any case, the ip* case really leaves a bad taste in anyone's mouth if they have been involved in computer chess for any length of time. Some simply must have instant gratification. Too lazy to do the work, walk the extra mile, etc, better to copy something that is already incredibly strong, and then make a minor tweak or two and take credit for the entire thing.

I don't get it. You'd think someone would actually want to do some work to build something they can be proud of. But alas...

[Dann Corbit]

It is unfortunate that Robert did not want to answer uncomfortable questions.
This means that the source code will not be published.
And that the author builds a very definite ambitious plans. It remains to wish success to the author.

The Ivanhoe/Iggorit/Ippolit/Robbolito project is public domain:
http://ippolit.wikispaces.com/Features

Public domain means this:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public_domain

You can do anything you want to do with public domain software. That includes things that are not nice.

There are very nice projects that are public domain. Examples (off the top of my head) are Sqlite and Snippets:
http://www.sqlite.org/copyright.html
http://c.snippets.org/

However, despite being the most liberal possible of license types (it means literally NO legal restrictions on usage of any sort) it also has a few downsides. First, someone can take a large body of work, make a proprietary version and then sell it. They do not have to contribute back the changes or even say that they used it. It is even possible to hijack such projects in some cases:
http://www.awid.org/eng/Issues-and-Anal ... lic-domain
and an inverse type:
http://ideas.repec.org/p/wpa/wuwpdc/0404008.html

Here is what I see as the bottom line:
No matter what kind of license type we create, they all depend upon the honesty and integrity of the recipients. Public domain can be abused. GPL or standard copyrights can be stolen. Even patents can be intentionally violated. There is no software protection system that I can imagine that is fully safeguarded from whinging twits. Since the world has a never-ending supply of whinging twits, expect every sort of software safeguard to be violated, bent, twisted, spindled and mutilated.

Now, in the case of someone releasing a public domain project, they literally have no right to complain when somebody picks up the big sack of goodies and runs away with it. It was their choice to choose that model. So in the case of public domain software release, it is really the authors who are literally and totally abandoning all rights to the software.

I guess that often those who release software to the public domain do not know that this has happened. I have released software to the public domain, and I expect to see any sort of result afterwards, including the expunging of my name, etc. Of course, I do not care if that happens with those projects that I released in that manner.

I am rather fond of Dr. Richard Hipp's public domain release note:

Code: Select all

**
** The author disclaims copyright to this source code.  In place of
** a legal notice, here is a blessing:
**
**    May you do good and not evil.
**    May you find forgiveness for yourself and forgive others.
**    May you share freely, never taking more than you give.
**

I echo his sentiments. You will not be able to control misuse of software by others -- no matter what the license type. There may be some possibilities of prosecution if there is a definite legal violation of some legal software protection, but I guess that the only ones who will profit from such a thing are the lawyers.

My favorite license type is the new BSD format. But that is neither here nor there.

[Werewolf]

Hi Alex,

could you see on how many positions (which are important) Houdini was changed.

Thinking on the thread from Thinker programmer.

Best
Frank

Hello Frank Quisinsky,

Let me see if I understand you clearly:

You are advocating that someone disassemble a closed source engine to provide you with answers.

Soooooo...where does that stop exactly?

Does this need to know only apply to engines which you are certain are derivatives? Or can any commercial program now be ripped apart?

I find that request odd coming from you.

I would prefer open to closed source BUT one is free not to download and use the thing.

Requesting disassembly be done and the results published seems a dangerous road to tread on.

Later.

I think here things are a bit different. Houdini is not the "classic closed source." It is a clearly plagiarized program that has been modified very slightly, which does not exactly meet any existing standard of "new engine." I don't get the idea of copying someone's source, making a few changes, then hiding the modified source and making waves about a "new engine." One of those "things that make you go hmmm." Ethically, _any_ engine based on ip* should be open-source since ip* is open-source. Of course, not everyone is ethical...

Bob,
This is a QUESTION so don't get offended. But can you explain to a non-programmer like myself how someone can come along and make substantial improvements that may put Houdini above Rybka 4 and yet still be blamed for just copying?

Although there may be code from the clones in Houdini, houdini itself must be more than just a straightforward copy because the guy makes 20 elo improvements every new release.

As a punter I'm excited that progress is being made at the very top. It's your phrase 'modified very slightly' that perplexes me; surely he's done quite a lot of modification.

Also he didn't seem to hide the fact that a lot of ideas (code?) came from other programs - but perhaps I'm missing something.

[Houdini]

The evaluation function of Houdini 1.03 is somewhat stronger than previously, I hope you'll enjoy this new release.

To demonstrate the improvement, below the results from a 1200-game fast TC match between Rybka 4, a recent Ivanhoe, and Houdini 1.03 and 1.02 that were published on another computer chess forum.



1'+1'', 1 core, 1200 games, Houdini 1.03a seems ~75 Elo points ahead of Rybka and best Ivanhoes.

These results are in good agreement with the 64-bit 1-core/2-core results I obtained during the development of Houdini 1.3.

All the best,
Robert

[bob]

Hi Alex,

could you see on how many positions (which are important) Houdini was changed.

Thinking on the thread from Thinker programmer.

Best
Frank

Hello Frank Quisinsky,

Let me see if I understand you clearly:

You are advocating that someone disassemble a closed source engine to provide you with answers.

Soooooo...where does that stop exactly?

Does this need to know only apply to engines which you are certain are derivatives? Or can any commercial program now be ripped apart?

I find that request odd coming from you.

I would prefer open to closed source BUT one is free not to download and use the thing.

Requesting disassembly be done and the results published seems a dangerous road to tread on.

Later.

I think here things are a bit different. Houdini is not the "classic closed source." It is a clearly plagiarized program that has been modified very slightly, which does not exactly meet any existing standard of "new engine." I don't get the idea of copying someone's source, making a few changes, then hiding the modified source and making waves about a "new engine." One of those "things that make you go hmmm." Ethically, _any_ engine based on ip* should be open-source since ip* is open-source. Of course, not everyone is ethical...

Bob,
This is a QUESTION so don't get offended. But can you explain to a non-programmer like myself how someone can come along and make substantial improvements that may put Houdini above Rybka 4 and yet still be blamed for just copying?

Although there may be code from the clones in Houdini, houdini itself must be more than just a straightforward copy because the guy makes 20 elo improvements every new release.

As a punter I'm excited that progress is being made at the very top. It's your phrase 'modified very slightly' that perplexes me; surely he's done quite a lot of modification.

Also he didn't seem to hide the fact that a lot of ideas (code?) came from other programs - but perhaps I'm missing something.

The same way I do this in Crafty. In some cases, we gain significant chunks of Elo just by tuning. Changing a score a little or a lot. Or changing a search control a little or a lot. Sometimes we add code to correct or improve something.

There is no program that is "perfect" yet. And most changes are modest. If you start off near the top, little changes make a difference. If you write your own code, it takes a few years to reach that point, if you are good enough.