18 days from SF4 release and about ~30+ ELO gain!

[carldaman]

The term "tactics" is ill-defined anyway and almost useless except as something we as humans can wrap our brains around. It really means finding a checkmate or the win of piece AFTER someone has made a stupid move. It has nothing to do with the most important part of chess, the part where using finesse and skill you create a position that makes it difficult for your opponent. In other words that is the hard part - the tactics is the easy part that comes only after you already have a won game.

In general tactics is what impresses weaker players the most, but is not what really separates the strong players from the weak ones.

This reminds me of what Spielmann said about Alekhine: (paraphrasing here) he said he was able to see the same moves (tactics) as Alekhine, but could not get the same positions (!) -- basically making the very same point you did.

Awesome post, Don.

CL

[Michel]

Although I cannot see this ever happening they could even in the future "close the sources" and keep the changes contributed and there is nothing you could do. They OWN the licence.

I think this is untrue. If you contribute to Stockfish you become a copyright holder. It is not necessary to explicitly claim copyright.

Being a copyright owner you can object to the closing of the source code (at least you may request that your contributions are removed first).

[Red Hood]

Although I cannot see this ever happening they could even in the future "close the sources" and keep the changes contributed and there is nothing you could do. They OWN the licence.

I think this is untrue. If you contribute to Stockfish you become a copyright holder. It is not necessary to explicitly claim copyright.

Being a copyright owner you can object to the closing of the source code (at least you may request that your contributions are removed first).

Don't let Don's capitalistic mind get the better of you. He is just jealous because Stockfish is getting stronger week by week for FREE! He charges for something that is weaker than it's free counterpart! SF team made a promise
something that greedy people don't get. SF team has honor! They said they will never charge for their work! Their work is real bytheway they use their own ideas and give it to the world for free! Now Marco and the team are bad people because they copyright they work. Marco "exploits" people for his FREE product! Get real! If they wanted they can strip Houdini, improve
it and sell it if they want to! So Don don't use your snake tongue to bad mouth SF team! You should be grateful! I bet you used some of the code from SF! Everybody does especially you commercial people on a dead line. SF is strong with good ideas inside. Even if they some day sell SF they would get my money and trophy for original work!

[Don]

Although I cannot see this ever happening they could even in the future "close the sources" and keep the changes contributed and there is nothing you could do. They OWN the licence.

I think this is untrue. If you contribute to Stockfish you become a copyright holder. It is not necessary to explicitly claim copyright.

Being a copyright owner you can object to the closing of the source code (at least you may request that your contributions are removed first).

That is incorrect - you do not become a copyright holder and you do not become part owner. That is one of many misconception about GPL and many other licences. Most people think it represents freedom - but it's primary value and reason for being was so that you could obtain software, use it as you see fit, and modify it as you see fit but all of this with many restrictions - restrictions for the user, not the licence holder. It would really be silly if doing this with your own software restricted YOU - who in their right mind would do that? And it doesn't give away control either.

For the SF project it's almost meaningless because the same thing could be done regardless of whether the sources were closed, open or Tord was his own company - you can still collaborate on projects owned by others and that is what this is. I have had several people contribute to Komodo development even though Komodo is closed source. I did not need GPL to do this.

Think of GPL as a gift by the owner to the users of his software. It's a way of reassuring the users that they can use and modify the software, make as many copies as they want and give those copies away. But some of those "rights" come with serious restrictions, the primary one is that you cannot own it or claim it for yourself. Only the licence owner can do that.

There are many different licences but most of them don't vary too much with respect to these basic things.

[Don]

Although I cannot see this ever happening they could even in the future "close the sources" and keep the changes contributed and there is nothing you could do. They OWN the licence.

I think this is untrue. If you contribute to Stockfish you become a copyright holder. It is not necessary to explicitly claim copyright.

Being a copyright owner you can object to the closing of the source code (at least you may request that your contributions are removed first).

Don't let Don's capitalistic mind get the better of you. He is just jealous because Stockfish is getting stronger week by week for FREE! He charges for something that is weaker than it's free counterpart! SF team made a promise
something that greedy people don't get. SF team has honor! They said they will never charge for their work! Their work is real bytheway they use their own ideas and give it to the world for free! Now Marco and the team are bad people because they copyright they work. Marco "exploits" people for his FREE product! Get real! If they wanted they can strip Houdini, improve
it and sell it if they want to! So Don don't use your snake tongue to bad mouth SF team! You should be grateful! I bet you used some of the code from SF! Everybody does especially you commercial people on a dead line. SF is strong with good ideas inside. Even if they some day sell SF they would get my money and trophy for original work!

Everyone on this forum knows I am a huge fan and supporter of Stockfish so I have to conclude that you are having a bad day.

[zamar]

Although I cannot see this ever happening they could even in the future "close the sources" and keep the changes contributed and there is nothing you could do. They OWN the licence.

I think this is untrue. If you contribute to Stockfish you become a copyright holder. It is not necessary to explicitly claim copyright.

Being a copyright owner you can object to the closing of the source code (at least you may request that your contributions are removed first).

That is incorrect - you do not become a copyright holder

This is not about GPL. This is about Copyright laws which vary from country to country.
In most European countries a person automatically has a copyright for the work he has done. Of course the copyright laws only apply when work done is"non-trivial", so changing a single value or adding two lines of code usually doesn't count.

E.g. FSF explicitly requests everyone who has done significant contributions for their code, to surrender their rights (see: https://www.gnu.org/prep/maintain/maint ... al-Matters, section 6.2) to avoid copyright claims later.

[Red Hood]

First i don't have a bad day and second you sure don't act like you support SF.

[Don]

First i don't have a bad day and second you sure don't act like you support SF.

Just look at all my posts over the past 5 years and it will reveal the depth of your ignorance.

I advocated using Stockfish 4 as the canonical reference program to be preserved for future generations because it represents the strongest of the day (or at least among the very strongest) and it's open source.

I have stated many times about the superb scalability of Stockfish. Did you miss all of that or are you just opening your mouth without thinking - or are you just jumping to conclusions? I even once said that it may scale better than Komodo.

I congratulated the team for their awesome progress - maybe you didn't see that either?

I have stated POINT BLANK on may occasions that I am a big fan of Stockfish and that I have gotten more ideas from Stockfish than any of the Ippolit clones. Maybe you missed that too? Don't open your mouth unless you actually know what you are talking about.

In my opinion the Stockfish developers are the best software engineers in computer chess - way above Houdart (who is also an excellent engineer) and the really crappy Ippo stuff. Heaven knows how the Ippo team got that stuff working so well.

I think you have spoken out of turn, just opening your mouth based on an impulse that proved to be completely false. Don't worry - I do the same thing and I'm working on it. I just hope this doesn't represent your natural state.

[Don]

Don't let Don's capitalistic mind get the better of you. He is just jealous because Stockfish is getting stronger week by week for FREE! He charges for something that is weaker than it's free counterpart! SF team made a promise
something that greedy people don't get.

Greedy people like me? I hope that you are not talking about those who try to make a living working their butts off like I do for very little compensation.

What is it that you do to support yourself? And whatever that is, does it make you greedy?

What a truly unreasoning person you are.

[syzygy]

Although I cannot see this ever happening they could even in the future "close the sources" and keep the changes contributed and there is nothing you could do. They OWN the licence.

I think this is untrue. If you contribute to Stockfish you become a copyright holder. It is not necessary to explicitly claim copyright.

Being a copyright owner you can object to the closing of the source code (at least you may request that your contributions are removed first).

That is incorrect - you do not become a copyright holder and you do not become part owner.

Of course someone that contributes code to Stockfish DOES become a copyright holder. If someone else would later try to close the Stockfish sources, the contributor can sue that person in court, unless his contribution is removed.

That is one of many misconception about GPL and many other licences.

This has nothing to do with the GPL. It is how copyright works.

If you don't know how copyright works, then be wise and do not spread misinformation.