Frayer's opinion expressed at the Rybka forum....

[K I Hyams]

Is the Cult of Vas Crumbling

Cult? What cult? The guy is a programmer, albeit a brilliant one, and wrote the best chess engine there is. I use it because it is the best. Period. Not because of any cult. If Fritz were to come out with some superduper engine that clobbered everything around, it would become my main engine.

To the gentleman that has said I am advocating the theft of Vasik Rajlich property, I would remind him that much has be written on this very forum in regards to how much Vas plagiarized the work of programmers that came before him.

Yes, contrary to many who enjoy writing and writing and writing, I asked the highest Fruit authority in these forums (barring Fabien), and he has looked at the evidence closely and said the accusations were pure crap. So, when you consider he is an eminently qualified programmer, is the only one authorized to release builds of Fruit, and has analyzed in detail the evidence, and concluded the accusations were unfounded, I am inclined to believe him over the endless posts in these forums.

Sorry, but that is pure garbage. You don't need to be the author of program X to be qualified to determine if someone copied pieces of X, any more than you need to be the author of a book to be qualified to determine if someone copied parts of it.

That argument won't cut it in a technical discussion with people who know what they are doing.

Professor,
The common factors that Zach has specified as existing in Fruit and Rybka/Strelka look to the untrained eye to be plentiful, highly specific, very significant and easily identified. In your view, would an expert come to the same conclusion if he read the list that Zach produced?

Zach has also stated that there are other significant areas of overlap which he has not specified. I am rather surprised that what is clearly visible to Zach is apparently invisible to Ryan. Are differences in opinion of this magnitude between two experienced programmers commonplace and understandable?

[bob]

Is the Cult of Vas Crumbling

Cult? What cult? The guy is a programmer, albeit a brilliant one, and wrote the best chess engine there is. I use it because it is the best. Period. Not because of any cult. If Fritz were to come out with some superduper engine that clobbered everything around, it would become my main engine.

To the gentleman that has said I am advocating the theft of Vasik Rajlich property, I would remind him that much has be written on this very forum in regards to how much Vas plagiarized the work of programmers that came before him.

Yes, contrary to many who enjoy writing and writing and writing, I asked the highest Fruit authority in these forums (barring Fabien), and he has looked at the evidence closely and said the accusations were pure crap. So, when you consider he is an eminently qualified programmer, is the only one authorized to release builds of Fruit, and has analyzed in detail the evidence, and concluded the accusations were unfounded, I am inclined to believe him over the endless posts in these forums.

Sorry, but that is pure garbage. You don't need to be the author of program X to be qualified to determine if someone copied pieces of X, any more than you need to be the author of a book to be qualified to determine if someone copied parts of it.

That argument won't cut it in a technical discussion with people who know what they are doing.

So you are claiming that when discussing the merits of whether or not Rybka is in fact a much plagiarized clone of Fruit, he and Fabien don't know what they are talking about? Astonishing.

If they are saying they see no fruit code in strelka, or if they have disassembled Rybka 1 and see no fruit code there, then _that_ would be astonishing. Fabien has not said there is no Fruit in Rybka. He has said he doesn't care.

[Albert Silver]

So you are claiming that when discussing the merits of whether or not Rybka is in fact a much plagiarized clone of Fruit, he and Fabien don't know what they are talking about? Astonishing.

I am claiming that either you or Ryan is lying. As simple as that.

And I claim you are a bug-eyed alien from Mars. This claim has the same weight as yours.

[DomLeste]

Can we actually resolve this issue rather then hitting a brick wall with the same nonsense and creating a thread about this every day Going round in circles like a dog chasing its tail for 2years now.

[Albert Silver]

Is the Cult of Vas Crumbling

Cult? What cult? The guy is a programmer, albeit a brilliant one, and wrote the best chess engine there is. I use it because it is the best. Period. Not because of any cult. If Fritz were to come out with some superduper engine that clobbered everything around, it would become my main engine.

To the gentleman that has said I am advocating the theft of Vasik Rajlich property, I would remind him that much has be written on this very forum in regards to how much Vas plagiarized the work of programmers that came before him.

Yes, contrary to many who enjoy writing and writing and writing, I asked the highest Fruit authority in these forums (barring Fabien), and he has looked at the evidence closely and said the accusations were pure crap. So, when you consider he is an eminently qualified programmer, is the only one authorized to release builds of Fruit, and has analyzed in detail the evidence, and concluded the accusations were unfounded, I am inclined to believe him over the endless posts in these forums.

Sorry, but that is pure garbage. You don't need to be the author of program X to be qualified to determine if someone copied pieces of X, any more than you need to be the author of a book to be qualified to determine if someone copied parts of it.

That argument won't cut it in a technical discussion with people who know what they are doing.

So you are claiming that when discussing the merits of whether or not Rybka is in fact a much plagiarized clone of Fruit, he and Fabien don't know what they are talking about? Astonishing.

If they are saying they see no fruit code in strelka, or if they have disassembled Rybka 1 and see no fruit code there, then _that_ would be astonishing. Fabien has not said there is no Fruit in Rybka. He has said he doesn't care.

The discussion is not about Strelka. I have no idea why you brought it up.

[bob]

Is the Cult of Vas Crumbling

Cult? What cult? The guy is a programmer, albeit a brilliant one, and wrote the best chess engine there is. I use it because it is the best. Period. Not because of any cult. If Fritz were to come out with some superduper engine that clobbered everything around, it would become my main engine.

To the gentleman that has said I am advocating the theft of Vasik Rajlich property, I would remind him that much has be written on this very forum in regards to how much Vas plagiarized the work of programmers that came before him.

Yes, contrary to many who enjoy writing and writing and writing, I asked the highest Fruit authority in these forums (barring Fabien), and he has looked at the evidence closely and said the accusations were pure crap. So, when you consider he is an eminently qualified programmer, is the only one authorized to release builds of Fruit, and has analyzed in detail the evidence, and concluded the accusations were unfounded, I am inclined to believe him over the endless posts in these forums.

Sorry, but that is pure garbage. You don't need to be the author of program X to be qualified to determine if someone copied pieces of X, any more than you need to be the author of a book to be qualified to determine if someone copied parts of it.

That argument won't cut it in a technical discussion with people who know what they are doing.

Professor,
The common factors that Zach has specified as existing in Fruit and Rybka/Strelka look to the untrained eye to be plentiful, highly specific, very significant and easily identified. In your view, would an expert come to the same conclusion if he read the list that Zach produced?

Zach has also stated that there are other significant areas of overlap which he has not specified. I am rather surprised that what is clearly visible to Zach is apparently invisible to Ryan. Are differences in opinion of this magnitude between two experienced programmers commonplace and understandable?

I have no explanation. I could make several guesses. Perhaps Ryan does not want to come down on the "bad side" of the Fruit/Rybka debate? Perhaps he has only glanced at what has been shown and didn't see anything of interest? Perhaps .... <your favourite explanation goes here>...

There are lots of reasons to explain why this might happen, but there is no evidence to support them and they are all therefore just speculation. But the similarities between Fruit/Rybka/Strelka are striking enough that I can't imagine someone _really_ looking at what has been found and then claiming it is bogus, and being honest about it. I have been dealing with this "problem" for 40 years now. Students love to copy other student's work when they get into a time-crunch. Students will sell copies of programs for classes they have completed to make extra money. The onus is on the instructors to detect this and not let it slide by. And since students are quite adept at using an editor and a global search and replace, you can't just take a quick glance, you have to go a little deeper. Once you do it for as long as I have, it becomes second-nature. For those that have not had to do this, it might not be nearly as intuitive a process. There are even tools to compare source code, and I am _not_ talking about junk like "diff". There are programs that will semantically analyze two programs to check for equivalence even though variables are different, one uses a for () while the other uses a while() to implement loops, etc... It's a known problem, it's a problem that is understood, and it is a problem that will remain a problem so long as there is something to be copied, someone to copy it, and of course a reason to copy it.


Beyond that, speculation is futile. The argument will never be resolved. The discussion will continue to flare up. The conclusions will never be accepted. Life goes on, in spite of all of this.

[Milos]

And I claim you are a bug-eyed alien from Mars. This claim has the same weight as yours.

Certainly has, but in the universe of yours. In the real world things are a bit different. In the real world arguments like "this is true because I claim that someone (privately) told me so" have the weight equal to zero, nothing, nada...

[Milos]

Beyond that, speculation is futile. The argument will never be resolved. The discussion will continue to flare up. The conclusions will never be accepted. Life goes on, in spite of all of this.

11% of Americans still believe USA didn't land on the moon...

[K I Hyams]

Is the Cult of Vas Crumbling

Cult? What cult? The guy is a programmer, albeit a brilliant one, and wrote the best chess engine there is. I use it because it is the best. Period. Not because of any cult. If Fritz were to come out with some superduper engine that clobbered everything around, it would become my main engine.

To the gentleman that has said I am advocating the theft of Vasik Rajlich property, I would remind him that much has be written on this very forum in regards to how much Vas plagiarized the work of programmers that came before him.

Yes, contrary to many who enjoy writing and writing and writing, I asked the highest Fruit authority in these forums (barring Fabien), and he has looked at the evidence closely and said the accusations were pure crap. So, when you consider he is an eminently qualified programmer, is the only one authorized to release builds of Fruit, and has analyzed in detail the evidence, and concluded the accusations were unfounded, I am inclined to believe him over the endless posts in these forums.

Sorry, but that is pure garbage. You don't need to be the author of program X to be qualified to determine if someone copied pieces of X, any more than you need to be the author of a book to be qualified to determine if someone copied parts of it.

That argument won't cut it in a technical discussion with people who know what they are doing.

Professor,
The common factors that Zach has specified as existing in Fruit and Rybka/Strelka look to the untrained eye to be plentiful, highly specific, very significant and easily identified. In your view, would an expert come to the same conclusion if he read the list that Zach produced?

Zach has also stated that there are other significant areas of overlap which he has not specified. I am rather surprised that what is clearly visible to Zach is apparently invisible to Ryan. Are differences in opinion of this magnitude between two experienced programmers commonplace and understandable?

I have no explanation. I could make several guesses. Perhaps Ryan does not want to come down on the "bad side" of the Fruit/Rybka debate? Perhaps he has only glanced at what has been shown and didn't see anything of interest? Perhaps .... <your favourite explanation goes here>...

There are lots of reasons to explain why this might happen, but there is no evidence to support them and they are all therefore just speculation. But the similarities between Fruit/Rybka/Strelka are striking enough that I can't imagine someone _really_ looking at what has been found and then claiming it is bogus, and being honest about it. I have been dealing with this "problem" for 40 years now. Students love to copy other student's work when they get into a time-crunch. Students will sell copies of programs for classes they have completed to make extra money. The onus is on the instructors to detect this and not let it slide by. And since students are quite adept at using an editor and a global search and replace, you can't just take a quick glance, you have to go a little deeper. Once you do it for as long as I have, it becomes second-nature. For those that have not had to do this, it might not be nearly as intuitive a process. There are even tools to compare source code, and I am _not_ talking about junk like "diff". There are programs that will semantically analyze two programs to check for equivalence even though variables are different, one uses a for () while the other uses a while() to implement loops, etc... It's a known problem, it's a problem that is understood, and it is a problem that will remain a problem so long as there is something to be copied, someone to copy it, and of course a reason to copy it.


Beyond that, speculation is futile. The argument will never be resolved. The discussion will continue to flare up. The conclusions will never be accepted. Life goes on, in spite of all of this.

Thank you for that detailed response. It was exactly the answer that I was looking for and expected. I admire your patience, I would have given up long ago.

[K I Hyams]

Beyond that, speculation is futile. The argument will never be resolved. The discussion will continue to flare up. The conclusions will never be accepted. Life goes on, in spite of all of this.

11% of Americans still believe USA didn't land on the moon...

Yes, but why would you want to argue with them?