Richard Allbert wrote:Well, now FRC and Knightmate are done, Chinese is next on the list!
That would be great! Don't let the repetition rules deter you; just ignore them, or score a repetition that is not a check evasion as -400. I just started working this week on a new engine as well, based on a 32x8 mailbox board. (But there is no real reason why it could not be configured as 20x10 or any other format, as long as the total number of squares remains below 256, so it can be encoded in a byte.) Today it played its first full games, (i.e. not ending in an illegal-move forfeit), and even managed two score two rep-draws against Fairy-Max, in won positions. (Not bd, without even null move implemented!)
I hope to use it at the Programmer's Tourney in two weeks, in stead of Joker!
Wow. I added null move, and it scored its first win ever! No hash table yet. (i.e. I already programmed it, and it does the probing, but it forces a miss to prevent using the result of the probe.) Also seems only to use half the time Fairy-Max uses. Not bad, as I made the first keystroke for it on Monday. And not a letter copy-pasted from elsewhere! (Except the Linux InputCheck and TimeOfDay, but they are in inactive #ifdefs, as I run on Windows, so I guess I am forgiven for cheating on those.) So I went from 0 to ~2000 Elo in 6 days. And there are stil 14 days to go!