The end of a journey?!

[amanjpro]

Hello,

Back in February when I started working on Zahak, I had a few goals:

- Learn the basics about Chess Programming
- Learn Chess strategy by actually implementing them

While I accomplished the first, I actually didn't succeed in the second goal.

It has been a long 8 months for me. I achieved things that I didn't dream of. Being #16 or #25 (depending on the rating list) in the world is not something I was ever imagining. Participating in TCEC was another dream that I was not even daring to have. The journey was fun, but it was tiring too. Having the strongest GoLang engine, or Having the strongest engine written in a managed language was also a very far fetched dream.

It wouldn't have been possible for me to achieve what I have so far, without the help of:

- Everyone who has contributed to the Chess Programming Wiki
- Vice videos
- Gabor and Guenther for discovering and testing Zahak first
- CCRL, CEGT, GRL, FastGM, Alex Brunetti, Lars, and all other testers who had interest in testing Zahak
- Andrew Grant and noobpwnftw for letting me in the main instance of OpenBench
- Jay Honnold (the author of Berserk) for helping me with so many things
- Aryan Parekh (the author of Bit-Genie), for helping me with NNUE implementation. I am sure he will have a very bright future as a software engineer.
- Niels Abildskov (the author of Loki) for helping me with Texel Tuning
- Basti and Scally for having interesting in Zahak and generating Data and various networks
- Frank Quisinsky (for letting Zahak into FCP), Graham for letting Zahak in his various tournaments and the TCEC organizers
- I am sure I am forgetting many other names still, so thank you all

It is time for me to take a break, I am not even sure if I will return to chess programming again, but nothing is impossible
I am sure I'll still visit the forum from time to time, attend the tournaments where Zahak competes, add a post here and there.
But I doubt I'll be actively working on Zahak anytime soon.

What will happen to ZaTour you may ask? I doubt I will start a new tournament anytime soon. I am too tired to be able to organize
a successful tournament.

I saw many beautiful things in this forum, many people who really wanted to help. I am always happy to be part of this community

Thanks to all the great people

[dkappe]

I am in the middle of implementing Bender in golang, a mcts/ab hybrid engine based on the principles of a0lite and VICE.

I was hoping to dethrone you from the #1 golang perch, having taken the python crown with a0lite. If you retire now, who will I trash talk?

[amanjpro]

I am in the middle of implementing Bender in golang, a mcts/ab hybrid engine based on the principles of a0lite and VICE.

I was hoping to dethrone you from the #1 golang perch, having taken the python crown with a0lite. If you retire now, who will I trash talk?

Once you will achieve your goal, I will make sure to come and congratulate you, and send you a google meet link so you can have your trash talk session

But, seriously that is an interesting project. Good luck

[eduherminio]

Very impressive journey Amanj, congrats on what you achieved in less than a year, a total inspiration for a lot of people (including myself!).

[matejst]

I feel genuinely sad. But you leave a good, usable engine, with levels, multiPV. a very decent evaluation, so, it is not an unfinished job, and there's always hope you will come back. I thought, like always for no good reasons, that it could be time for experimentation -- an engine with the Elo of 3200 is strong enough -- about style of play, endgame NNs, etc. Things that have more to do with chess. Anyway, I wish you the best in your future endeavors.

[bastiball]

Hello,

Back in February when I started working on Zahak, I had a few goals:

- Learn the basics about Chess Programming
- Learn Chess strategy by actually implementing them

While I accomplished the first, I actually didn't succeed in the second goal.

It has been a long 8 months for me. I achieved things that I didn't dream of. Being #16 or #25 (depending on the rating list) in the world is not something I was ever imagining. Participating in TCEC was another dream that I was not even daring to have. The journey was fun, but it was tiring too. Having the strongest GoLang engine, or Having the strongest engine written in a managed language was also a very far fetched dream.

It wouldn't have been possible for me to achieve what I have so far, without the help of:

- Everyone who has contributed to the Chess Programming Wiki
- Vice videos
- Gabor and Guenther for discovering and testing Zahak first
- CCRL, CEGT, GRL, FastGM, Alex Brunetti, Lars, and all other testers who had interest in testing Zahak
- Andrew Grant and noobpwnftw for letting me in the main instance of OpenBench
- Jay Honnold (the author of Berserk) for helping me with so many things
- Aryan Parekh (the author of Bit-Genie), for helping me with NNUE implementation. I am sure he will have a very bright future as a software engineer.
- Niels Abildskov (the author of Loki) for helping me with Texel Tuning
- Basti and Scally for having interesting in Zahak and generating Data and various networks
- Frank Quisinsky (for letting Zahak into FCP), Graham for letting Zahak in his various tournaments and the TCEC organizers
- I am sure I am forgetting many other names still, so thank you all

It is time for me to take a break, I am not even sure if I will return to chess programming again, but nothing is impossible
I am sure I'll still visit the forum from time to time, attend the tournaments where Zahak competes, add a post here and there.
But I doubt I'll be actively working on Zahak anytime soon.

What will happen to ZaTour you may ask? I doubt I will start a new tournament anytime soon. I am too tired to be able to organize
a successful tournament.

I saw many beautiful things in this forum, many people who really wanted to help. I am always happy to be part of this community

Thanks to all the great people

Wow, It's been an incredible journey for both you and Zahak. I would like to congratulate to all of your accomplishments within a span of 8 months for making Zahak strongest in its respective language, GoLang. . I hope you take break well and comeback again soon. Take your time and enjoy your break! Thank you for all the contribution you had done to this community. I think the next goal you should aim is to make Zahak top 10 engines in the world and comeback after you take a break. I wish you the best, take care, and God bless!

[CMCanavessi]

You still owe me FRC support!

Good luck in your next project, whatever that may be

[JVMerlino]

You will be missed! But what you have accomplished in such a short time is nothing short of miraculous, and in fact would be quite suspicious if your source weren't open, and you weren't such an excellent contributor to the community.

Enjoy your break!

jm

[amanjpro]

Thank you all for your nice words

My next project is for me to become as good as Zahak in chess

[algerbrex]

Bittersweet news Amanj!

As others have already said, thanks for being a great contributor to the community, and thanks for the many questions I've had that you've helped to answer, directly and indirectly. I've been very impressed with Zahak's rise to being one of the best chess engines in the world, and it's inspired me to continue working hard on Blunder. And who knows, maybe soon it'll be stealing the number one spot from Zahak

Best wishes in all your future endeavors, both chess and non-chess related