Any eta for the next version of Komodo?

[Damir]

Usually people who ask for new Komodo release are those who don't even want to buy the engine in the 1st place..

[mjlef]

Usually people who ask for new Komodo release are those who don't even want to buy the engine in the 1st place..

I do not mind being asked, and this is a good place to do it, since more people get to see it. I think customers of products have a right to ask. It helps them make better decisions on what to buy, or to maybe delay a bit. So I think it is a good question, whether they buy or not.

[Uri Blass]

Usually people who ask for new Komodo release are those who don't even want to buy the engine in the 1st place..

I did not ask but no reason to buy the engine in the 1st place because Stockfish is free.

I know that you probably meant komodo by the word engine but
I think about the engine that is leading most rating lists when I read the words: "the engine in the 1st place".

[Amateur]

Stockfish is at least 20-30 elo stronger of the two commercial engines komodo and Houdini, on all game times. Tactically is superior to all, what sense have to spend so much money if the best is free ?!

[cc2150dx]

Stockfish is at least 20-30 elo stronger of the two commercial engines komodo and Houdini, on all game times. Tactically is superior to all, what sense have to spend so much money if the best is free ?!

imo It all boils down to variety (more engines the better) and different gameplay styles

[BrendanJNorman]

Stockfish is at least 20-30 elo stronger of the two commercial engines komodo and Houdini, on all game times. Tactically is superior to all, what sense have to spend so much money if the best is free ?!

imo It all boils down to variety (more engines the better) and different gameplay styles

Yep. Also comes down to style and budget.

I bought Houdini because I was interested in its style and could justify the expense.

If you only care about having the strongest engine and/or don't have the budget to justify spending thirty bucks (or whatever) on a passion, then you certainly won't spent it on a small exe file.

Despite already having the Houdini 5 engine, yesterday I still bought the ChessBase version, just because I wanted to upgrade by Fritz GUI.

This is an irrational passion (as marketers would call it).

Even if Ed was still commercial with Rebel/Prodeo or Pawel went commercial with Rodent, I'd still buy it for non-strength reasons.

If you only care about strength, then you don't need Fire 5, Houdini 5, Shredder 13, Komodo 10.2 or anything...

Just run matches between various builds of Stockfish.

That sounds like fun.

[carldaman]

Stockfish is at least 20-30 elo stronger of the two commercial engines komodo and Houdini, on all game times. Tactically is superior to all, what sense have to spend so much money if the best is free ?!

Komodo has its own distinct style, besides being immensely strong, and very useful features such as smart contempt, which Stockfish lacks. Even Komodo's few adjustable parameters do allow the user to create new engine personalities that can play incredibly attractive chess - and possibly stronger than the default settings.

(All that's missing is a learning capability.)

CL

[leavenfish]

I'll bet you a great big donut that we will not see Komodo 11 until TCEC 10. No incentive to.

[mjlef]

Stockfish is at least 20-30 elo stronger of the two commercial engines komodo and Houdini, on all game times. Tactically is superior to all, what sense have to spend so much money if the best is free ?!

Komodo has its own distinct style, besides being immensely strong, and very useful features such as smart contempt, which Stockfish lacks. Even Komodo's few adjustable parameters do allow the user to create new engine personalities that can play incredibly attractive chess - and possibly stronger than the default settings.

(All that's missing is a learning capability.)

CL

My old program NOW had a learning feature. What it would do is save the root hash positions into a disk file. Before each future search, it loads these positions back into the main hash. So the next time you go down a line, new searches "learn" from the previous search information, so they will play better. Is that what you have in mind?

Mark

[carldaman]

Stockfish is at least 20-30 elo stronger of the two commercial engines komodo and Houdini, on all game times. Tactically is superior to all, what sense have to spend so much money if the best is free ?!

Komodo has its own distinct style, besides being immensely strong, and very useful features such as smart contempt, which Stockfish lacks. Even Komodo's few adjustable parameters do allow the user to create new engine personalities that can play incredibly attractive chess - and possibly stronger than the default settings.

(All that's missing is a learning capability.)

CL

My old program NOW had a learning feature. What it would do is save the root hash positions into a disk file. Before each future search, it loads these positions back into the main hash. So the next time you go down a line, new searches "learn" from the previous search information, so they will play better. Is that what you have in mind?

Mark

Well, just a learning file, where it saves whatever improvements it discovers during its (deeper) searches. Similar to what previous Houdini versions had, and also Critter. Jeremy Bernstein added something similar to his Stockfish fork a few years ago. The additional advantage is that the learning file can stay small, growing gradually, for a long time.

Thanks,
CL