ACCA stance on Ippo, Robbo and such

[hgm]

But what would happen if the strongest available Toga was entered that is clearly stronger than the last release of Fruit but then Fabien has a new Beta of Fruit that he wants to enter? I think the decision should be up to the original author or who ever he delegates the decision to in the case of Fruit that is Ryan.

I don't think so. The original author gave up the right to make that decision in a legally binding way the very moment he released his sources under GPL. And the GPL cannot be renegociated, if in hindsight persons have used your code in a way that is not so hot after all.

If the original author would contribute in any way to preventing usage of the code as if it was your own, it would be breach of contract, and he would be punishable by law.

[Rolf]

just wondrin,

is the ACCA tournament that impt.

I don't think the Toga vs. Fruit issue is any different from the Stockfish vs. Glaurung issue. You cannot have both, so you should allow the strongest to participate.

Participating in tournaments is an important marketing activity for commercial engines.

Luckily we don't have this burden nor we want to damage other people's business.

I disagree, in certain cases silence is worse than speaking out loud. Couldnt you make a comment on the ropilito affair with the displaying of stolen Rybka code? You or any other in the team?

[Harvey Williamson]

But what would happen if the strongest available Toga was entered that is clearly stronger than the last release of Fruit but then Fabien has a new Beta of Fruit that he wants to enter? I think the decision should be up to the original author or who ever he delegates the decision to in the case of Fruit that is Ryan.

I don't think so. The original author gave up the right to make that decision in a legally binding way the very moment he released his sources under GPL. And the GPL cannot be renegociated, if in hindsight persons have used your code in a way that is not so hot after all.

If the original author would contribute in any way to preventing usage of the code as if it was your own, it would be breach of contract, and he would be punishable by law.

So if we have to pick 1 GPL derivative of Fruit - who decides which one? Does it have to be released already? Which ratings list do we use to decide on the version?

[hgm]

Well, with "original" I think of the name - while Stockfish is the continued Glaurung for instanse, it's still under a new name. Versionnumbers is a different matter. I don't see that this makes less sense than "strongest".

I don't think the name of a program should play any role whatsoever. If authors want to use a different name for a marginally modified program, or the same name for a total rewrite, it is up to them.

[K I Hyams]

Hi Charles,

I was drafting something very close to what you stated here in regards to the CCT tournaments.

For the record, Ippolit, Robbolito, or for that matter Itsafreakingreversedengineeredchessprogramofsomesortolito, will not be allowed in the CCT Tournaments.

So for all those emailing if they can enter those programs in the CCT, or asking if they can operate them in the CCT, the answer is a simple no.

If it is a clone, then so be it. If it isn't, no one has claimed to be the original author. On those two points alone, it doesn't qualify to enter.

Nuff said

Peter Skinner
CCT Tournament Director

There is enough evidence to convince a number of CCC members that there is a real possibility that both Rybka and Robbolito are clones. The implications of Rybka being a clone are far more serious than those of Robbolito being a clone. Have you ruled out the possibility that Rybka does not qualify for your tournament because it is a clone?

I think that the word clone is clearly not correct for rybka even based on the people who believe that rybka broke the GPL.

and people agree that the move generator is not taken from fruit and that most of the code of the evaluation is not copied directly from fruit because fruit does not use bitboards in the evaluation.

Uri

A program that most of its code is an original code cannot be described as a clone.

That is a moot point and because of that, my original instinct was to call it a derivative. However some of our members believe that the word “clone” is more appropriate and I have no interest in an argument about semantics.

There is however a strong possibility that significant portions of Fruit appear in Rybka 1, thereby casting doubt on the authenticity of Rybka 3. Professor Hyatt can point to, amongst other things, the same tables appearing in Fruit and Rybka1 and Zach can produce strong evidence of copying as well.

The following comment appears under the name of Vas on the Rybka site “Once again: Rybka is 100% original at the source code level, not counting public-domain snippets like population cnt, etc.” If Professor Hyatt and Zach are correct, then Vas appears to be a liar. If Professor Hyatt and Zach are correct, then Vas appears to have engineered a situation in which end-user’s money, may well have been fraudulently diverted away from the pocket of the authors of Fritz and Shredder into his own pocket, a cause for serious concern

Peter does not give Robbolito the benefit of the doubt (and nor do I). However I am curious to find out why he is willing to give Rybka the benefit of the doubt. I don't have a dog in this fight. I am simply curious about how Peter's mind works.

[mcostalba]

just wondrin,

is the ACCA tournament that impt.

I don't think the Toga vs. Fruit issue is any different from the Stockfish vs. Glaurung issue. You cannot have both, so you should allow the strongest to participate.

Participating in tournaments is an important marketing activity for commercial engines.

Luckily we don't have this burden nor we want to damage other people's business.

I disagree, in certain cases silence is worse than speaking out loud. Couldnt you make a comment on the ropilito affair with the displaying of stolen Rybka code? You or any other in the team?

???

You are quoting a post of mine where in _no_ place is mentioned the Robbo name..and you say you disagree

But you disagree in what ?

Please don't feel obliged to answer. You can entirely skip this if you feel your answer is not pertinent. Thanks.

[swami]

Good post Charles. I suppose it begs the question will Stockfish be allowed if Toga is not? I certainly agree that both Stocfish and Glaurung can not play.

Yes !

I also would agree that only Hiarcs can participate, so perhaps you have some little chance to win

Don't worry for you little Hiarcs, we never made tournaments and we are not interested in any of them (at least I am not).

Stockfish should definitely play. It did play in ACCA world champs last year IIRC.

I will ask my friend Sherif Khater to offer to operate for the engine again in upcoming CCT or ACCA.

Best,
Swami

[hgm]

So if we have to pick 1 GPL derivative of Fruit - who decides which one? Does it have to be released already? Which ratings list do we use to decide on the version?

If the tournament organizer does not want to have multiple programs that similar in his tournament, the burden is on him to make this decision. Of course this would only happen in practice when there were actually two derivatives that were both trying to register, and could not agree who of them would have to step down.

It would be in the interest of the tournament to admit the strongest version. In most cases it will be clear which one that is. If not, you can flip a coin, or require the would-be participants to play a qualification match. If I were a TD faced with this decision, I would do the latter.

[Rolf]

I don't think so. The original author gave up the right to make that decision in a legally binding way the very moment he released his sources under GPL. And the GPL cannot be renegociated, if in hindsight persons have used your code in a way that is not so hot after all.

If the original author would contribute in any way to preventing usage of the code as if it was your own, it would be breach of contract, and he would be punishable by law.

But if it still happened that the author (Fabien in this case) has given away code and ideas would you argue that then the whole GPL of his code were senseless? In case of Vas, how could he still become a scapegoat especially chased by Prof Hyatt, if in truth Vas didnt _take_ any code at all from Fruit but he used stuff that was _at the time for a period of unknown length_ open to several interested by personal information from Fabien himself? Please try to translate what I want to say in readable computer nerds speak so that the known specialists get the message. Thanks so much.

In general I cant imagine that the GPL which is always depending on what the author wanted, cant be interpretated if the author himself has not properly controlled the process. In case of Fabien, it seems real that he gave away many details before he then gave his code via GPL. In such a case GPL cant enforce that others must delete everything they got through other channels.

I am confident that someone like you with knowledge in different fields must be able to cut the knot of the irrelevant allegation if Vas lied or not. It would in special help a fraction around Hiarcs/Hyams/Hyatt et al. Forget about me, you must not act in a direct reply here if it looks too offensive for you. If I am justified here is totally uninteresting. I am totally independent of this here. I am an observer.

[Sven]

But what would happen if the strongest available Toga was entered that is clearly stronger than the last release of Fruit but then Fabien has a new Beta of Fruit that he wants to enter? I think the decision should be up to the original author or who ever he delegates the decision to in the case of Fruit that is Ryan.

I don't think so. The original author gave up the right to make that decision in a legally binding way the very moment he released his sources under GPL. And the GPL cannot be renegociated, if in hindsight persons have used your code in a way that is not so hot after all.

If the original author would contribute in any way to preventing usage of the code as if it was your own, it would be breach of contract, and he would be punishable by law.

The decision whether an engine or engine version may enter a tournament is not related to the GPL, nor to engine authors, but is purely made by the tournament responsibles based on their rules.

Also reading your post may give the impression that publishing source code of the own engine is equivalent to "giving away all rights". It is not. The original author always remains the creator of his program, nobody may claim that he is the one instead, even after making changes to the software. The GPL requires modified versions to be marked as such. But this aspect is not related to the "entering tournaments" question.

In my opinion all derivative engines that are fully GPL compliant and whose authors are known should in general be allowed to enter tournaments provided there are no other conflicting tournament rules. So Toga, being a branch of open source Fruit, should be allowed, and Stockfish as Glaurung branch too, of course. The only difference between the Toga/Fruit and Stockfish/Glaurung cases is that Glaurung development is not continued and its author now supports the Stockfish branch. But that cannot have any influence here.

Sven