Who are the best programmers of dedicated's?

[Larry]

The recent thread about Ron Nelson's work got me wondering
what the pecking order of dedicated chess programmers are.
This is the order that I would rank them:

1. Richard Lang
2. Franz Morsch
3. Ed Schroeder
4. Dave Kittinger
5. The Spracklens
6. Julio Kaplan
7. Ron Nelson.

I'd be interested in reading the thoughts of others on this.
regards
Larry

[Robert Weck]

The recent thread about Ron Nelson's work got me wondering
what the pecking order of dedicated chess programmers are.
This is the order that I would rank them:

1. Richard Lang
2. Franz Morsch
3. Ed Schroeder
4. Dave Kittinger
5. The Spracklens
6. Julio Kaplan
7. Ron Nelson.

I'd be interested in reading the thoughts of others on this.

Not bad!

I only would exchange 2. and 3.

F. Morsch's programs were mostly similar to each other, while Ed Schroeder had many different versions. And his best, Risc 1 MB resp. Risc II, should be better than Morsch's leading Magellan/Atlanta.

And Ed's computers (esp. Polgar/Milano/Risc) had many interesting features, that the others were lacking...


Robert

[Steve B]

The recent thread about Ron Nelson's work got me wondering
what the pecking order of dedicated chess programmers are.
This is the order that I would rank them:

1. Richard Lang
2. Franz Morsch
3. Ed Schroeder
4. Dave Kittinger
5. The Spracklens
6. Julio Kaplan
7. Ron Nelson.

I'd be interested in reading the thoughts of others on this.
regards
Larry

hi Larry
interesting question
of course"Best " is very subjective
if you mean the strongest program then Lang of course is the first and one can simply check the Elos of the strongest program and make the order

but for me..the Best Programmer was Kittinger because i always found his style of play very enjoyable as a human to play against
lively attacking games with a good possibility to refute the attack and maybe win which does not work so well against other computers so he never achieved very high elos for his computers

second after Kittinger for me is Schroeder who i think also programs a more human like play then Lang or even the Spracklens did

no list would be complete of course without mentioning also:

de Koining(Tasc-Mephisto-Saitek)
Kaare Danielsen(Saitek)
Ulf Rathsman(Conchess)
and others

one can even say de Koinig was the BEST because his program (King) remains today the highest rating from any dedicated computer ever sold(not counting the Resurrection-Fruit)

Even Chrilly Donninger programmed one chess computer but i guess one computer does not deserve to be on an all time listing

Subjective Regards
Steve

[Terry McCracken]

The recent thread about Ron Nelson's work got me wondering
what the pecking order of dedicated chess programmers are.
This is the order that I would rank them:

1. Richard Lang
2. Franz Morsch
3. Ed Schroeder
4. Dave Kittinger
5. The Spracklens
6. Julio Kaplan
7. Ron Nelson.

I'd be interested in reading the thoughts of others on this.
regards
Larry

Where's Johan de Koning?

[Terry McCracken]

The recent thread about Ron Nelson's work got me wondering
what the pecking order of dedicated chess programmers are.
This is the order that I would rank them:

1. Richard Lang
2. Franz Morsch
3. Ed Schroeder
4. Dave Kittinger
5. The Spracklens
6. Julio Kaplan
7. Ron Nelson.

I'd be interested in reading the thoughts of others on this.
regards
Larry

hi Larry
interesting question
of course"Best " is very subjective
if you mean the strongest program then Lang of course is the first and one can simply check the Elos of the strongest program and make the order

but for me..the Best Programmer was Kittinger because i always found his style of play very enjoyable as a human to play against
lively attacking games with a good possibility to refute the attack and maybe win which does not work so well against other computers so he never achieved very high elos for his computers

second after Kittinger for me is Schroeder who i think also programs a more human like play then Lang or even the Spracklens did

no list would be complete of course without mentioning also:

de Koining(Tasc-Mephisto-Saitek)
Kaare Danielsen(Saitek)
Ulf Rathsman(Conchess)
and others

one can even say de Koinig was the BEST because his program (King) remains today the highest rating from any dedicated computer ever sold(not counting the Resurrection-Fruit)

Even Chrilly Donninger programmed one chess computer but i guess one computer does not deserve to be on an all time listing

Subjective Regards
Steve

For pure strength, I would have to rank the top in this order.

1. Richard Lang

2. Dan Spracklen

3. Dave Kittinger

Johan de Koning appeared late on the scene, so it's harder to rank him.

When he did appear he slowly overtook them all, as far as dedicated units are concerned.

Terry

[Bill Rogers]

I think you have the order a little wrong as Kittingers first program "MyChess" was a whole lot stronger than Spracklens first three programs, ie. Sargon I, II, 2.5
I only say that because I own most of them, however, I have never had any of their hard wired games. I realize they went to work for a game company for a while.
Bill

[Terry McCracken]

I think you have the order a little wrong as Kittingers first program "MyChess" was a whole lot stronger than Spracklens first three programs, ie. Sargon I, II, 2.5
I only say that because I own most of them, however, I have never had any of their hard wired games. I realize they went to work for a game company for a while.
Bill

Strictly speaking we're referring to the "hard-wired" dedicated units.
No doubt some of Kittinger's early work with PCs was ahead of the Spracklen's.

Come to think of it, Dan Spracklen never took the PC programs to any real great level. I believe Chessmaster 2100 was the best of his PC software back in 1988.

Terry