Durandal

[Roland Chastain]

I have just found and fixed a bug. I deleted the previous tag and created another one with the same number.

https://gitlab.com/rchastain/durandal/-/releases/0.1.0

[Gregory Owett]

Hi , Your engine responds immediately without thinking. It's made for ?

[Roland Chastain]

Hi , Your engine responds immediately without thinking. It's made for ?

Hi. Thank you for trying Durandal. Yes, it's a toy engine. If I knew how to make a real engine, which uses all the allowed time, I would do it. But for now I am glad to have done an engine that simply works (plays legal moves and beats a random mover).

[mvanthoor]

If you could add some 'time management', even if it is only a command-line option that "wastes" random percentage of the set time so the engine "appears" to think, then it would be a nice option for her

Good idea. Done.

https://gitlab.com/rchastain/durandal/-/releases/0.1.0

(Only Linux binaries for now.)

Please run Durandal with option -w or --wait. I made a quick test. It seems to work.

I made another little modification. When there are several "best moves" (which happens often), the engine takes a random one instead of taking always the first.

Cool

Will test it tomorrow. My GF is a beginner, but still she wants to feel as if she's playing a proper game of chess, so:

- No obviously stupid or random moves all the time (but hanging a piece now and then is OK because that's what beginners do)
- Not play instantly

As soon as she reaches somewhere around 1000-1200 Elo, MinimalChess 0.2 will become a nice opponent, but for now, she needs something (even) weaker. Texel 1.07 on low skill levels also works, but having two or three different engines is always nice. Maybe I'll look into Stockfish level 1-2 again; but it is even stronger than MinimalChess already.

Thanks for the addition, I'll let you know if it works

[Roland Chastain]

Thanks for the addition, I'll let you know if it works

You're welcome.

Uploaded Windows binaries: https://gitlab.com/rchastain/durandal/-/releases/0.1.0

[Odd Gunnar Malin]

Hi.

I created a little utility for these fast movers so it use some time and should be less stressful to play against.
You can find it here: https://github.com/OGMalin/Binaries

[Roland Chastain]

Hi.

I created a little utility for these fast movers so it use some time and should be less stressful to play against.
You can find it here: https://github.com/OGMalin/Binaries

Hi. Yes, I already saw it. (I follow you on GitHub.)

I imagine that you used the code of Wb2Uci? Is there any hope of a Linux version?

[Odd Gunnar Malin]

I imagine that you used the code of Wb2Uci? Is there any hope of a Linux version?

Yes, and even more like Inbetween, the skeleton could be used for many such utilities. My finger print are all over the source.
I'm not familiar with Linux programming. I guess the there isn't too many windows exclusive in there. Critical section have many replacement in linux. I've been using CS for many years, I think I tested different things some 20 years ago and stuck with what I found then was giving me best result. Then there is some Window specific in talking with the engine and gui, but I think this is even easier on Linux.
I have some linux boxes both home and at work, but they all are servers without any gui. I guess I could use nano for programming

[Roland Chastain]

I have some Linux boxes both home and at work, but they all are servers without any gui. I guess I could use nano for programming

It would be great to have a Linux version of your utilities. I would be glad to help if I can.

By the way, I had started to work on something like InBetween. For now the program sends what it receives, without any modification. It has not been much tested, but seems to work, on Linux and on Windows. It is written in Pascal: https://github.com/rchastain/substitute

[Roland Chastain]

Hello!

For people interested in toy engines, there is a new version of Durandal, slightly stronger than the previous one.

Code: Select all

Rank Name                    Elo    +    - games score oppo. draws 
  26 TuxedoCat 0.0.2         442   49   49   144   42%   505   36% 
  27 Alouette 0.1.6          353   21   21   784   58%   307   36% 
  28 Alouette 0.1.1          319   24   24   496   58%   275   52% 
  29 Durandal 0.1.1          290   29   29   320   56%   254   54% 
  30 Durandal 0.1.0          253   19   19   816   42%   308   47% 
  31 Luciole 0.0.6           245   20   20   768   43%   290   42% 
  32 NEG 1.3                 181   22   22   640   35%   278   42% 

It plays almost instantly. It you run it with -w or --wait parameter, it will... waits.