Refutation of Theories From 4 Mousquetiers - Holy or not?

[Rolf]

In the last hours many important messages have been written on the subject "Cloning, Plagiarism, Research, Refutations in a community of a forum like CCC and in computerchess as such". Many questions have been asked, most remained unanswered. Bob Hyatt clarified that this is the forum where such topics should be discussed, if not here, where else, he asked.

From an interdisciplinary angle I've seen enough to do a short summary now. If we do some research it's always important to describe a setting of main conditions and how main factors influence each other. It must then be defined what exactly is the intention of the new approach of a specific person. What he has observed in the past, how he sees relations to actual processes and what should now be researched.

To make this quite clear, such a practice is doable here in CCC. It should proceed without any personally colored allegations, propaganda or hate speech. It's more or less like solving a chess mate problem. Would we e´ver see such a nonsense where a designer of chess mate problems would go into rambles about that his collegue NN had not answered his letter and that it would therefore be unexpected if he now sold his problem to say the FIDE YB 2008-2010 which shall appear in 2014 together with a tome about EG studies. Would such a crap be imaginable? I dont think so and I have never seen it. If it happened then the community has quickly made its mind up and condemned such irregular approaches. See the so called toilet-gate created by the ingenious Danailov as manager of Topalov. Danailov has recently explained and so far confessed that he had nothing real and serious in hands, but it was a war this match and things then just happen. Everything should now be forgotten etc. Of course Danailov is very wrong because what he did, he intentiously imported lies and nonsense into a sphere of ethically well defined seriousness of such matches and nobody will believe anything in future what Danalov had to say.

Like Danailov had violated the codex of a friendly attitude among competitors for a title match, the four main figures of the research desaster in CCC about the origines of Rybka 1.0 and its possible genetic from Fruit have done it in a chaos of illogical procedures.

While in other clone affairs much chess stuff could be shown for apparent reasons that this way a relationship in the origines could be demonstrated and finally proven. I'm certainly no expert in this field but until now these cases were always solved without loud protest by the "culprits" who might have shown why their creations were perfectly normal, not clones and own babies. Without insulting the many authors of such copies I can assume that they all were fooled by their own activities as if such similarities would not be detectable. However we have many experts in the scene who analyse such novelities with their instruments of chess positions and tests.

I leave out the whole history of Rybka's first entry into the scene. Although some tremendous steps were taken in a completely new fashion that for all pleased the many fans and lovers of the game.

Imediately questions arose and are posed in almost the same tenor, could it all have happened legally, didnt Vasik at least speed up his progress by lending material he should have been forbidden to take? From the mere success in strength people argued that this because never happened before couldnt be realistic now. This is sill the main drive which motivates some iron hard critics of Vas and his Rybka. Unfortunately these critics and exactly them - it's known in history that exactly many big experts came off the road in their speculative reasoning so that is absolutely no contradiction or impossibility - must have lost their logical thought process. They began to compare apples with oranges or worse with road appleas (horse dung). But here in CCC they always confirmed us that it well should be allowed to examine this or that, for instance if Vas was honest when he took this or taht. The reader hopefully noticed that I have now the main critic from my side:

It's one thing to examine chess programs, practices, origines and it is something else and near to libel and character assassination if we begin to discuss why a veritable human being should have done something forbidden, but the proof for the forbidden activities and why the activities should have been forbidden in the first place isnt there. We see a typical hear say game of assumptions and allegations. Now this is what Graham lectured to some imbelievers who thought that Free Speech and debating would also mean to discuss the honesty problems of a programmer. Just in case we were interested in such stuff and we are! Bt Graham showed that this isnt in accorfance with the charter of CCC. Period.

Now what is left from the original fresh approach by our Four Musquetiers?

==============================================


Christophe Theron actually nothing.


==============================================


Norman Schmidt wrote this letter:

I for one have not been 'pouring through the code' trying to provide evidence. i have done nothing in regard to this topic for the last month. i've been working on websites, my business, and cyclone 2.0, without any thought to this issue.

I do want to point out that it all started as a simple discussion motivated by Rick Faddens post, and Vas's declaration that Strelka was his own software. the issue started as a simple discussion, not as a smear campaign.

it was a question begging to be asked:
if Stelka is known to be a clone of Rybka, (stated as such in Wikipedia, confirmed by Vas himself, w/ apparent agreement by CEGT and CCRL)
and since the Strelka source code was released with abundant Fruit code in it..., isn't it logical, fair, and correct to question the legitimacy of both Strelka and Rybka?

the chess community has said no:
to paraphrase: "we want 100% proof. what has been disasembled and shown is only UCI parser stuff, non-critical engine AI code, etc. and besides, Vas is respected and liked, and has stated it is clean."

I can and have accepted the chess communities decision, and have moved on 100%, and urge everyone to do the same.
Norm
Last edited by Norman Schmidt on Mon Sep 29, 2008 10:30 pm; edited 2 times in total

Now all this was already answered and criticised by also me, for details please look into the archives of CCC. The main reason why this is confused nonsense is the distortion of the terms how we know them in this field and in this World. Just one characteristic example. It's always repeated and taken for almost the fingerprint of the Vas' guilt. Norm writes that Vas himself had claimed that Strelka is a clone of his Rybka 1.0. then we could conclude etc pp. But where has Vas ever claimed such a nonsense? Please dont make up in language what nobody has ever said.For all Vas has never said what all his hunters are claiming, that because Strelka is Fruit and Rybka, then Rybka must also be almost Fruit... In fact the Strelka episode was created to simply prove with a hoax what is at first to be proved in all sewriousness but never was!
The so called 'parser stuff' is yet another topic and it's also failing to condemn Vas because if you look around and examine modern progs then they have all a lot in common but that doesnt mean that they cant be called seperate and independent entities.

I know well that a lot of questions are connected with all what Norm writes, but his conclusion is wrong that just a sort of social decision had been made against the evidence that it was simply defined that this evidence wouldnt be relevant. This is simply the poisenous comment of a man with a wrong perspective who lost hist delusions from the start.


===============================================



Zach Wegner gave the following statement:


Posted: Mon Sep 29, 2008 10:13 pm Post subject: Re: rybka and plaggerism: has the case been compiled yet

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I'd rather not go into much detail here at the risk of starting another flame war, but here is the basic situation:

1. There has been additional findings since the last ones were publicly posted.
2. I have had very little time to work on it, as I have about 10 other projects that I am actively involved in. It's going pretty slow.
3. I haven't talked much with the other "investigators" in the past few weeks.
4. I don't know how long it will take to get everything assembled. Decompiling in itself is pretty tedious, but that cannot compare to creating a whole web page documenting it all.


We see a similar argumentation like in Norm's conclusion. They both have so many other things to do, so that their interest and motivation for the proof they formerly had started for the whole campaign because they clearly propagated that they WOULD prove that Vas has done something wrong. What they simply missed is that they miscalculated what is seen as wrong. Zach wants to open a perspective that goes like: if we had more time we would already now be able to present the proof but as it is it will take much longer. Or as Graham commented it, it will take decades more and nobody knows in what persons' lifetime. That's a very postive view on something when the word 'never' is to avoid.

In this situation I call practically all our members and friends, all experts all over the World to join and help these four musquetiers in their almost super-human attempt to prove the wrong of some other programmer, so it must be seen as a second CEN experiment so to speak. I can also promise everybody gets diploma and prizes plenty of in case of a mere subscription to the common approach. A monthly income of say 7000 US dollars is guaranteed, or look, let's just say 8000 € so that we have a stable outlook for all the scientists. A group of investors, who want to remain anonymous, is behind that what I promised to you all. Please join us, we have money for at least 10000 researchers for a period of the next 20 years. Of courswe you should read this with a little humor in your eyes.

=============================================


Let's come to our final and forth candidate and this is the most important scientist available in CCC and CC.

Bob Hyatt wrote this in his last statement:


I do not know what you are talking about. Uri said something to the effect that it is quite likely that two different programmers could produce the same blocks of code and finding such was not a sign of plagiarism. That I do know something about, and such a statement is simply incorrect. And I made that point repeatedly. And that was the _only_ point I tried to continue making. If there are significant similarities between any two programs, it is _not_ the result of pure chance.

I don't care whether my "status" suffers or not. The people it might "suffer" with do not particularly mean anything to me anyway, so who cares? My point was, and still is, both clear and accurate. Duplicate code does _not_ happen by chance. Anyone that believes it does is delusional at best, dishonest at worst. Which is irrelevant.

I have seen some of the evidence presented and it strikes me as suspect. I have said that, and only that. I will wait until the whole picture is presented and then form an opinion.


Basically the case is closed for Bob, because he's waiting for the whole picture which might never come. I miss the former stamina in Bob because now he's only just another average scientist who deals with facts. Of course always hoping on the whole picture, but we are all hoping for something like that, many call it Heaven.


Dann Corbit gave his final say and this ended the actual series of messages about this topic.


===========================================


Dann Corbit, someone out of the computer business, wrote this:


Posted: Tue Sep 30, 2008 3:41 am Post subject: Re: rybka 1.0 and plaggerism: has the case been compiled yet

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

What I have seen so far:
There has been enough evidence presented to prove without a shadow of a doubt that Vas studied the UCI parser in Fruit. His is very similar, but not the same. The use of strtok() inline is a good idea, and somewhat unusual.

There are some similar eval terms (of course nearly every engine has some similar eval terms).

There is some similar search functionality (of course every engine has some similar search functionality).

Of course, there is nothing wrong with that.

Perhaps there is some other important evidence I have missed.

I guess that the crimes of which people are raising the red flag there is some merit:
Clearly, Vas has learned a lot from Fruit.

But (of course) every chess programmer has learned a lot from other chess programmers. Has Vas done more than they have?

Trying to stage a trial in the court of public opinion is a bad idea in my eyes.

Even in a court trial, the person performing the examination is not allowed to call for a conclusion on the part of the witness.

I think that if the possibly injured parties are interested, they should be the ones to perform the inquiries, and they should do it through proper channels.

Now, I am not against publication of evidence and allowing us to form our own opinions, as long as it is extremely clear that what we are viewing is not misrepresented.

But proclamations of guilt or innocence are best left to a judge unless the evidence is very, very clear.

And (buy the way) plagiarism clearly does not apply in this case. We are not talking about fraudulent publication of academic or literary works that were copied without permission or acknowledgement.

Copyright violation is a possibility. I am not convinced (in either direction) that something bad has taken place {or has not taken place}.

I think that there is something very sad about this whole process.

I also think that those making charges often have a lot at stake and so it may be impossible for them to be truly neutral, even though they do not know it and really do intend to be fully neutral.


=============================================

We still have members like Peter Aloysius who fantasize that here in CCC the evidence is just not there because certain imagined forces forbid this evidence to be presented. But this myth can quickly be deleted because if that were true then Bob and Zach are wrong with their hope on exactly this evidence that isnt simply existing at this very moment. Norm disagrees somewhat because like Aloysius he insinuates that the proof was already presented but it wasnt estimated by the crowd. This again would contradict Bob and Zach who are still waiting that the proof will come.

Dear reader, let me finish this summary, short as it was, with a nice anecdote from E. Manev. He sees us in the grip of a delusion of someone Holy incarnated by Vas and Rybka. While here among us we have four musquetiers who are waiting for the exact opposite, namely the evidence that Vas is a false Holy incarnation.

Stay tuned.


Rolf

[bob]

In the last hours many important messages have been written on the subject "Cloning, Plagiarism, Research, Refutations in a community of a forum like CCC and in computerchess as such". Many questions have been asked, most remained unanswered. Bob Hyatt clarified that this is the forum where such topics should be discussed, if not here, where else, he asked.

From an interdisciplinary angle I've seen enough to do a short summary now. If we do some research it's always important to describe a setting of main conditions and how main factors influence each other. It must then be defined what exactly is the intention of the new approach of a specific person. What he has observed in the past, how he sees relations to actual processes and what should now be researched.

To make this quite clear, such a practice is doable here in CCC. It should proceed without any personally colored allegations, propaganda or hate speech. It's more or less like solving a chess mate problem. Would we e´ver see such a nonsense where a designer of chess mate problems would go into rambles about that his collegue NN had not answered his letter and that it would therefore be unexpected if he now sold his problem to say the FIDE YB 2008-2010 which shall appear in 2014 together with a tome about EG studies. Would such a crap be imaginable? I dont think so and I have never seen it. If it happened then the community has quickly made its mind up and condemned such irregular approaches. See the so called toilet-gate created by the ingenious Danailov as manager of Topalov. Danailov has recently explained and so far confessed that he had nothing real and serious in hands, but it was a war this match and things then just happen. Everything should now be forgotten etc. Of course Danailov is very wrong because what he did, he intentiously imported lies and nonsense into a sphere of ethically well defined seriousness of such matches and nobody will believe anything in future what Danalov had to say.

Like Danailov had violated the codex of a friendly attitude among competitors for a title match, the four main figures of the research desaster in CCC about the origines of Rybka 1.0 and its possible genetic from Fruit have done it in a chaos of illogical procedures.

While in other clone affairs much chess stuff could be shown for apparent reasons that this way a relationship in the origines could be demonstrated and finally proven. I'm certainly no expert in this field but until now these cases were always solved without loud protest by the "culprits" who might have shown why their creations were perfectly normal, not clones and own babies. Without insulting the many authors of such copies I can assume that they all were fooled by their own activities as if such similarities would not be detectable. However we have many experts in the scene who analyse such novelities with their instruments of chess positions and tests.

I leave out the whole history of Rybka's first entry into the scene. Although some tremendous steps were taken in a completely new fashion that for all pleased the many fans and lovers of the game.

Imediately questions arose and are posed in almost the same tenor, could it all have happened legally, didnt Vasik at least speed up his progress by lending material he should have been forbidden to take? From the mere success in strength people argued that this because never happened before couldnt be realistic now. This is sill the main drive which motivates some iron hard critics of Vas and his Rybka. Unfortunately these critics and exactly them - it's known in history that exactly many big experts came off the road in their speculative reasoning so that is absolutely no contradiction or impossibility - must have lost their logical thought process. They began to compare apples with oranges or worse with road appleas (horse dung). But here in CCC they always confirmed us that it well should be allowed to examine this or that, for instance if Vas was honest when he took this or taht. The reader hopefully noticed that I have now the main critic from my side:

It's one thing to examine chess programs, practices, origines and it is something else and near to libel and character assassination if we begin to discuss why a veritable human being should have done something forbidden, but the proof for the forbidden activities and why the activities should have been forbidden in the first place isnt there. We see a typical hear say game of assumptions and allegations. Now this is what Graham lectured to some imbelievers who thought that Free Speech and debating would also mean to discuss the honesty problems of a programmer. Just in case we were interested in such stuff and we are! Bt Graham showed that this isnt in accorfance with the charter of CCC. Period.

Now what is left from the original fresh approach by our Four Musquetiers?

==============================================


Christophe Theron actually nothing.


==============================================


Norman Schmidt wrote this letter:

I for one have not been 'pouring through the code' trying to provide evidence. i have done nothing in regard to this topic for the last month. i've been working on websites, my business, and cyclone 2.0, without any thought to this issue.

I do want to point out that it all started as a simple discussion motivated by Rick Faddens post, and Vas's declaration that Strelka was his own software. the issue started as a simple discussion, not as a smear campaign.

it was a question begging to be asked:
if Stelka is known to be a clone of Rybka, (stated as such in Wikipedia, confirmed by Vas himself, w/ apparent agreement by CEGT and CCRL)
and since the Strelka source code was released with abundant Fruit code in it..., isn't it logical, fair, and correct to question the legitimacy of both Strelka and Rybka?

the chess community has said no:
to paraphrase: "we want 100% proof. what has been disasembled and shown is only UCI parser stuff, non-critical engine AI code, etc. and besides, Vas is respected and liked, and has stated it is clean."

I can and have accepted the chess communities decision, and have moved on 100%, and urge everyone to do the same.
Norm
Last edited by Norman Schmidt on Mon Sep 29, 2008 10:30 pm; edited 2 times in total

Now all this was already answered and criticised by also me, for details please look into the archives of CCC. The main reason why this is confused nonsense is the distortion of the terms how we know them in this field and in this World. Just one characteristic example. It's always repeated and taken for almost the fingerprint of the Vas' guilt. Norm writes that Vas himself had claimed that Strelka is a clone of his Rybka 1.0. then we could conclude etc pp. But where has Vas ever claimed such a nonsense? Please dont make up in language what nobody has ever said.For all Vas has never said what all his hunters are claiming, that because Strelka is Fruit and Rybka, then Rybka must also be almost Fruit... In fact the Strelka episode was created to simply prove with a hoax what is at first to be proved in all sewriousness but never was!
The so called 'parser stuff' is yet another topic and it's also failing to condemn Vas because if you look around and examine modern progs then they have all a lot in common but that doesnt mean that they cant be called seperate and independent entities.

I know well that a lot of questions are connected with all what Norm writes, but his conclusion is wrong that just a sort of social decision had been made against the evidence that it was simply defined that this evidence wouldnt be relevant. This is simply the poisenous comment of a man with a wrong perspective who lost hist delusions from the start.


===============================================



Zach Wegner gave the following statement:


Posted: Mon Sep 29, 2008 10:13 pm Post subject: Re: rybka and plaggerism: has the case been compiled yet

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I'd rather not go into much detail here at the risk of starting another flame war, but here is the basic situation:

1. There has been additional findings since the last ones were publicly posted.
2. I have had very little time to work on it, as I have about 10 other projects that I am actively involved in. It's going pretty slow.
3. I haven't talked much with the other "investigators" in the past few weeks.
4. I don't know how long it will take to get everything assembled. Decompiling in itself is pretty tedious, but that cannot compare to creating a whole web page documenting it all.


We see a similar argumentation like in Norm's conclusion. They both have so many other things to do, so that their interest and motivation for the proof they formerly had started for the whole campaign because they clearly propagated that they WOULD prove that Vas has done something wrong. What they simply missed is that they miscalculated what is seen as wrong. Zach wants to open a perspective that goes like: if we had more time we would already now be able to present the proof but as it is it will take much longer. Or as Graham commented it, it will take decades more and nobody knows in what persons' lifetime. That's a very postive view on something when the word 'never' is to avoid.

In this situation I call practically all our members and friends, all experts all over the World to join and help these four musquetiers in their almost super-human attempt to prove the wrong of some other programmer, so it must be seen as a second CEN experiment so to speak. I can also promise everybody gets diploma and prizes plenty of in case of a mere subscription to the common approach. A monthly income of say 7000 US dollars is guaranteed, or look, let's just say 8000 € so that we have a stable outlook for all the scientists. A group of investors, who want to remain anonymous, is behind that what I promised to you all. Please join us, we have money for at least 10000 researchers for a period of the next 20 years. Of courswe you should read this with a little humor in your eyes.

=============================================


Let's come to our final and forth candidate and this is the most important scientist available in CCC and CC.

Bob Hyatt wrote this in his last statement:


I do not know what you are talking about. Uri said something to the effect that it is quite likely that two different programmers could produce the same blocks of code and finding such was not a sign of plagiarism. That I do know something about, and such a statement is simply incorrect. And I made that point repeatedly. And that was the _only_ point I tried to continue making. If there are significant similarities between any two programs, it is _not_ the result of pure chance.

I don't care whether my "status" suffers or not. The people it might "suffer" with do not particularly mean anything to me anyway, so who cares? My point was, and still is, both clear and accurate. Duplicate code does _not_ happen by chance. Anyone that believes it does is delusional at best, dishonest at worst. Which is irrelevant.

I have seen some of the evidence presented and it strikes me as suspect. I have said that, and only that. I will wait until the whole picture is presented and then form an opinion.


Basically the case is closed for Bob, because he's waiting for the whole picture which might never come. I miss the former stamina in Bob because now he's only just another average scientist who deals with facts. Of course always hoping on the whole picture, but we are all hoping for something like that, many call it Heaven.


Dann Corbit gave his final say and this ended the actual series of messages about this topic.


===========================================


Dann Corbit, someone out of the computer business, wrote this:


Posted: Tue Sep 30, 2008 3:41 am Post subject: Re: rybka 1.0 and plaggerism: has the case been compiled yet

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

What I have seen so far:
There has been enough evidence presented to prove without a shadow of a doubt that Vas studied the UCI parser in Fruit. His is very similar, but not the same. The use of strtok() inline is a good idea, and somewhat unusual.

There are some similar eval terms (of course nearly every engine has some similar eval terms).

There is some similar search functionality (of course every engine has some similar search functionality).

Of course, there is nothing wrong with that.

Perhaps there is some other important evidence I have missed.

I guess that the crimes of which people are raising the red flag there is some merit:
Clearly, Vas has learned a lot from Fruit.

But (of course) every chess programmer has learned a lot from other chess programmers. Has Vas done more than they have?

Trying to stage a trial in the court of public opinion is a bad idea in my eyes.

Even in a court trial, the person performing the examination is not allowed to call for a conclusion on the part of the witness.

I think that if the possibly injured parties are interested, they should be the ones to perform the inquiries, and they should do it through proper channels.

Now, I am not against publication of evidence and allowing us to form our own opinions, as long as it is extremely clear that what we are viewing is not misrepresented.

But proclamations of guilt or innocence are best left to a judge unless the evidence is very, very clear.

And (buy the way) plagiarism clearly does not apply in this case. We are not talking about fraudulent publication of academic or literary works that were copied without permission or acknowledgement.

Copyright violation is a possibility. I am not convinced (in either direction) that something bad has taken place {or has not taken place}.

I think that there is something very sad about this whole process.

I also think that those making charges often have a lot at stake and so it may be impossible for them to be truly neutral, even though they do not know it and really do intend to be fully neutral.


=============================================

We still have members like Peter Aloysius who fantasize that here in CCC the evidence is just not there because certain imagined forces forbid this evidence to be presented. But this myth can quickly be deleted because if that were true then Bob and Zach are wrong with their hope on exactly this evidence that isnt simply existing at this very moment. Norm disagrees somewhat because like Aloysius he insinuates that the proof was already presented but it wasnt estimated by the crowd. This again would contradict Bob and Zach who are still waiting that the proof will come.

Dear reader, let me finish this summary, short as it was, with a nice anecdote from E. Manev. He sees us in the grip of a delusion of someone Holy incarnated by Vas and Rybka. While here among us we have four musquetiers who are waiting for the exact opposite, namely the evidence that Vas is a false Holy incarnation.

Stay tuned.


Rolf

Rolf, the above is a direct reminder of _why_ CCC was created in the first place, namely to escape your incessant drivel about subjects you have no expertise in. It is time to "go quiet" and wait for analysis to be completed, without trying to make every thread set a new world record for length and lack of content.

[mclane]

100 % agree with you Bob. Normally moderators should have made sure this kind of behaviour like rolf is doing is not possible here.

[Rolf]

Rolf, the above is a direct reminder of _why_ CCC was created in the first place, namely to escape your incessant drivel about subjects you have no expertise in. It is time to "go quiet" and wait for analysis to be completed, without trying to make every thread set a new world record for length and lack of content.

So, the CCC, following you, is the forum, where members are allowed and entitled, to make a campaign against Vasik Rajlich, with the pretense that this is just a fair science research and after all the allegations and suppositions, nothing else is now known than that the two main activists have many other things else to do and that there simply is no proof. As if this is totally their own private business after such a long campaign. Will this case be held open now for the next decades (Graham's notion) to come? Or could we close it somehow because the evidence couldnt be found in a reasonable time frame? Please explain this at the end of the whole debate.

Now you even tell stories about length as if I who QUOTED your own texts have written it myself. I quoted and summarized.

I insist that although I'm no programmer and therefore leave aside all the programming threads consequently, I have a right like all members, I would even call it a duty when others fail to make the point, to criticise such ufair smear activities against the reputation of Vasik Rajlich. - If you had made similar critical considerations I wouldnt have been forced to so it from the outside from an interdisciplinary angle. I didnt make up this case. I comment and warn when other people's character is potentially hurt in monthlong campaigns.

From where do you take your verdict that I had no expertise in such genuinely psychological topics like a smear campaign against a former member who has his own forum in the meantime? Are you a psychologist or I?

Still it's clear that I respect your unfair intervention for the sake of the peace in this forum, also because I really thank you for your many, long and helpful feedback to my questions.

Peace!

[bob]

Rolf, the above is a direct reminder of _why_ CCC was created in the first place, namely to escape your incessant drivel about subjects you have no expertise in. It is time to "go quiet" and wait for analysis to be completed, without trying to make every thread set a new world record for length and lack of content.

So, the CCC, following you, is the forum, where members are allowed and entitled, to make a campaign against Vasik Rajlich, with the pretense that this is just a fair science research and after all the allegations and suppositions, nothing else is now known than that the two main activists have many other things else to do and that there simply is no proof. As if this is totally their own private business after such a long campaign. Will this case be held open now for the next decades (Graham's notion) to come? Or could we close it somehow because the evidence couldnt be found in a reasonable time frame? Please explain this at the end of the whole debate.

No, CCC was just the place where programmers raised this issue for the nth time and posted some data to support their suspicion. CCC is also the place where _you_ continue to keep the thread alive. Notice that in the current threads about this topic, neither Z or CT have posted anything new, and have made no new claims, just responded to misstatements made by the masses. I introduced nothing new other than to reiterate my believe that duplicate code does not happen naturally. You continue to try to spin the thread out of control.

Now you even tell stories about length as if I who QUOTED your own texts have written it myself. I quoted and summarized.

You added no new information, insight, or anything that sheds any new light on the topic.

I insist that although I'm no programmer and therefore leave aside all the programming threads consequently, I have a right like all members, I would even call it a duty when others fail to make the point, to criticise such ufair smear activities against the reputation of Vasik Rajlich. - If you had made similar critical considerations I wouldnt have been forced to so it from the outside from an interdisciplinary angle. I didnt make up this case. I comment and warn when other people's character is potentially hurt in monthlong campaigns.

There is no "smear campaign". That is in your head. There is simply a search for facts, based on some observations made that appear to be suspicious in nature. The same thing happened with Voyager. Where were you then? The same thing happened for Le Petite. Where were you then? Where were you when any of the previous clone discussions sprang up? So why now???

From where do you take your verdict that I had no expertise in such genuinely psychological topics like a smear campaign against a former member who has his own forum in the meantime? Are you a psychologist or I?

I am not a psychologist. Based on postings by you, neither are you. But whether or not you are has no bearing in a technical discussion that is not about personalities and behavior, but about actual coding comparisons between two different programs. That is where you have _no_ expertise to chime in.

Still it's clear that I respect your unfair intervention for the sake of the peace in this forum, also because I really thank you for your many, long and helpful feedback to my questions.

Peace!

This will play out at its own pace, regardless of what is written, posted or demanded. Everyone just has to wait. Or else pitch in to help speed the process up.

[Rolf]

This will play out at its own pace, regardless of what is written, posted or demanded. Everyone just has to wait. Or else pitch in to help speed the process up.

The danger I see from my perspective as a social science expert is that because you hold open such a case the hurting of the reputation of Vas will go on with your assistance. And you want to justify it with your expertise as a computer scientist? Dont you see the legal and humanitarian aspect of the whole thing? Also what would this mean if you could show something in Rybka 1.0? You are potentialy damaging Rybka versions 3 and later. Is this intentional? Graham asked similar questions but nobody of the researchers gives answers. Is that sound application of compiling etc.? Also as a amost last question, were you surprised that the other players and also the organisers ICGA did NOT doubt the legal state of Rybka 3 playing there actually? What is your comment?

Let me repeat it in all clarity why people should ask the legitimacy of the activities of the 4 experts:

If they had started their examinations in private, also as a team, then it would have been fine, but to come here and at first alarming everybody and having no case yet, just assumptions and then going into closet to examine further gives the alarmed members a right to ask what they are really doing right now because the smear campaign without proving anything would call for public apologies and perhaps more.

So, everybody should realise that this is no longer a privacy thing of four innocent activists, no, it's now the period where something either must be found quickly or the whole campaign must be stopped for ever. Rybka 1.0 was three years ago, Bob, please get real. Thanks and Peace again.

[Graham Banks]

With all due respect Rolf, it's time to give this a rest.

Regards, Graham.

[Rolf]

With all due respect Rolf, it's time to give this a rest.

Regards, Graham.

Ok, and thanks for your support.

[bob]

This will play out at its own pace, regardless of what is written, posted or demanded. Everyone just has to wait. Or else pitch in to help speed the process up.

The danger I see from my perspective as a social science expert is that because you hold open such a case the hurting of the reputation of Vas will go on with your assistance.

How "with my assistance"?? I didn't start this thread at all. The people that claim to want to see it end are the very people that keep re-starting these threads that serve no useful purpose...

And you want to justify it with your expertise as a computer scientist? Dont you see the legal and humanitarian aspect of the whole thing? Also what would this mean if you could show something in Rybka 1.0? You are potentialy damaging Rybka versions 3 and later. Is this intentional? Graham asked similar questions but nobody of the researchers gives answers. Is that sound application of compiling etc.? Also as a amost last question, were you surprised that the other players and also the organisers ICGA did NOT doubt the legal state of Rybka 3 playing there actually? What is your comment?

I have given my personal opinion. If R1 has copied code, R2 almost certainly does as well. Nobody rewrites everything from scratch for each new version. I have done this exactly once in 40 years, when I went from Fortran to C in late 1994. In Cray Blitz that Carey has published on his old program web page, you can find code that dates back to the early 1970's. The original FEN came from "Forsythe notation" that I found in COKO IV. I borrowed the encoding (not the source as it did not fit my program at all) to have a portable way of saving and entering positions. That remained unchanged until Steven modified it a bit years later to deal with omissions such as castling and enpassant status as well as the move counter...

So if code was copied in R1, it is almost certainly still present and accounted for in R2 and R3. That, too, can be verified, but again the effort required is significant. Only way for it to go faster is to get more people involved. I have been 100% busy on my code here recently, rewriting the evaluation almost 100%, to get ready for the next CC event. If I had nothing to do, I would contribute to the "search for the truth" as well...

Let me repeat it in all clarity why people should ask the legitimacy of the activities of the 4 experts:

If they had started their examinations in private, also as a team, then it would have been fine, but to come here and at first alarming everybody and having no case yet, just assumptions and then going into closet to examine further gives the alarmed members a right to ask what they are really doing right now because the smear campaign without proving anything would call for public apologies and perhaps more.

Let me repeat as well. I believe Zach said he started to look at this after reading CT's post about the similarities. Others had pointed this out earlier, Vincent being the first I recall that suggested Rybka 1 might have come from Fruit. How could it have been handled differently? How would Zach and CT have "gotten together" to discuss this if neither knew the other had noticed something suspicious? Should they send out a broadcast email to all the people they know to ask for help? Isn't that the same thing as was done _here_? When they asked what I thought, should I have sent out an email to the 1,000 or so members of the Crafty mailing list? Wouldn't you have then claimed that I was trying to smear Vas through email rather than through a message board?

So there is essentially no private way this could have proceeded. In fact, it followed the same pathway we have followed dozens of times in the past when someone voices a suspicion. We investigate, we consult, we compare notes, and we reach a conclusion. And there is absolutely no way that can be done in private. One email to the wrong person and the genie is out of the bottle forever.

So get off this bandwagon, it is pointless to continue the discussion about the discussion.

So, everybody should realise that this is no longer a privacy thing of four innocent activists, no, it's now the period where something either must be found quickly or the whole campaign must be stopped for ever.

And what, exactly, gives you the right/authority to make that decision? If you want it faster, pitch in to help. Otherwise stay out of the way and watch until everything is analyzed. You don't get to set the time-frame for anything except for things you are responsible for. Calling for haste has no weight with anybody but yourself. So save your breath.

Rybka 1.0 was three years ago, Bob, please get real. Thanks and Peace again.

Crafty was started in 1994. There is a _ton_ of code from 1994 still in the 2008 version. Anybody that actually writes a chess engine understands that. Nobody rewrites 40,000 lines of code each year by starting over. It is a waste of time and effort. You need to get real and try to understand software development and "how it really is" as opposed to "how you think it ought to be.."

[Graham Banks]

With all due respect Rolf, it's time to give this a rest.

Regards, Graham.

Ok, and thanks for your support.

For me, it's never been a problem with those involved Rolf, only the manner of the process.
Regardless, I suspect that many members are sick of reading about it, which is why I suggested giving it a rest.

Cheers, Graham.