ICC for CCT11

[Spock]

I have never used ICC before, but I wanted to follow CCT11. I was pleasantly surprised. I registered a free 7-day trial and installed Dasher. It took but a few minutes to figure things out, and then I "wasted" most of the weekend following games and analysing with my engine of choice. And then I followed the blitz tourney. That was superb - an automato command brought up a multi-tab browser type window, with tabs for current standings, games in progress etc. Very slick indeed

In short - I was very impressed, I thought it was a really excellent choice. I saw some people suggesting playchess, but apart from the obvious proprietary nature of it, I think ICC was better anyway.

Only issue on a permanent basis is cost, plus I have no idea how people actually played engine games on it. Some using winboard I think, some ChessPartner? Maybe even Arena I don't know Although I got the feeling ICC is all about human matches primarily.

[bob]

I have never used ICC before, but I wanted to follow CCT11. I was pleasantly surprised. I registered a free 7-day trial and installed Dasher. It took but a few minutes to figure things out, and then I "wasted" most of the weekend following games and analysing with my engine of choice. And then I followed the blitz tourney. That was superb - an automato command brought up a multi-tab browser type window, with tabs for current standings, games in progress etc. Very slick indeed

In short - I was very impressed, I thought it was a really excellent choice. I saw some people suggesting playchess, but apart from the obvious proprietary nature of it, I think ICC was better anyway.

Only issue on a permanent basis is cost, plus I have no idea how people actually played engine games on it. Some using winboard I think, some ChessPartner? Maybe even Arena I don't know Although I got the feeling ICC is all about human matches primarily.

The beauty of icc is the population. At any moment there are many GM players logged in. It uses a non-proprietary interface that is well-documented and works with many GUIs, xboard, winboard, icc has a couple like blitzen they do, plus chesspartner, and who knows what else. You won't ever see me on playchess because I don't/won't run windows, and I won't buy a commercial interface to connect.

[swami]

The beauty of icc is the population. At any moment there are many GM players logged in. .

* Yahoo and playchess have more than twice the number of users online than ICC. So not sure about your claim about the population.

* ICC while interesting has one thing it lacks, the interface graphics and speed are second rate compared to playchess.

* Add to the above list, the commands the newbie has to learn before making himself familar with the ICC. That's why there are not many kids playing in there.

* Advantages of ICC over playchess is: Sysops/Administrators are rather friendly. Whereas in playchess they are usually crude.

[bob]

The beauty of icc is the population. At any moment there are many GM players logged in. .

* Yahoo and playchess have more than twice the number of users online than ICC. So not sure about your claim about the population.

What are the typical numbers?

at 1am there are 1300 players on ICC, 47 IM/GM players.

* ICC while interesting has one thing it lacks, the interface graphics and speed are second rate compared to playchess.

?? You have a choice of a dozen different interfaces, not just one. As far as speed goes, the internet is the internet there...

* Add to the above list, the commands the newbie has to learn before making himself familar with the ICC. That's why there are not many kids playing in there.

* Advantages of ICC over playchess is: Sysops/Administrators are rather friendly. Whereas in playchess they are usually crude.

Not sure what you mean about commands. You can use something like blitzen and just point and click to play. The "match" command is not particularly hard. And they go to extremes to catch humans using computers, which is also a plus.

But the proprietary issue is a _huge_ one. I'm not buying a commercial interface that only works on one O/S and one server, to play chess...

[CRoberson]

The beauty of icc is the population. At any moment there are many GM players logged in. .

* Yahoo and playchess have more than twice the number of users online than ICC. So not sure about your claim about the population.

* ICC while interesting has one thing it lacks, the interface graphics and speed are second rate compared to playchess.

* Add to the above list, the commands the newbie has to learn before making himself familar with the ICC. That's why there are not many kids playing in there.

* Advantages of ICC over playchess is: Sysops/Administrators are rather friendly. Whereas in playchess they are usually crude.

Ok, I tell you my #1 beef with Playchess. I have had several paid
Playchess accounts. I have multiple computers in my house. Each
new account uses new software tha goes on my newest and fastest
machine. So, on the occasion that I access playchess from one
of my older machines, the server has a fit. I think tying my account
to a serial number on one piece of software that keeps me
from playing on any machine other than the one I installed the
most recent version is wrong.

On ICC, I purchase an account for a year. They notify me when
that year is running out. During that year, I can play from any
machine I want to. I have more than one machine in my house
so I may want to use a different one from time to time. Also,
sometimes I like to play from another person's house on their computer. My
time on the server needs to be linked to my account name, not
to a piece of software that ties me to one and only one machine.

[sje]

But the proprietary issue is a _huge_ one. I'm not buying a commercial interface that only works on one O/S and one server, to play chess...

I'd say that the proprietary issue is just about the only issue, and it's the deal breaker all by itself. There's not much of a need to compare any other aspects.

What is really needed is a new server program that isn't a big pile of kludges. Not just a typical piece of server software, but one that can operated in a distributed fashion simultaneously on a hundred machines around the world sharing both data and the overall load. A game could start on one server, migrate to a different server if needed, and have its real time data shared among all servers.

[swami]

What are the typical numbers?

at 1am there are 1300 players on ICC, 47 IM/GM players.

Usually about 4000, Highest got to be 6000 in playchess when there's a GM tournament going on. 5000 anytime at yahoo.

?? You have a choice of a dozen different interfaces, not just one. As far as speed goes, the internet is the internet there...

Yes, their main software is Dasher and it's graphics is second rate compared to the chessbase GUI. Winboard could be better but an average person on the street use Dasher just because it's the main program recommended on ICC page itself and they would probably have never heard of winboard. Piece movement and pre-moves are what constitutes speed, playchess leads without doubt...but ICC is better than other servers out there.

Not sure what you mean about commands. You can use something like blitzen and just point and click to play. The "match" command is not particularly hard. And they go to extremes to catch humans using computers, which is also a plus.

But the proprietary issue is a _huge_ one. I'm not buying a commercial interface that only works on one O/S and one server, to play chess...

Agreed. That's also the main advantage of ICC over other softwares. I'm just trying to be unbiased here...It's just that I see that software is way advanced in playchess than at ICC. Population is lot more there. But propriety issue and Administrators are two points where ICC is step ahead...but it doesn't mean that it leads in everything else.

[swami]

The beauty of icc is the population. At any moment there are many GM players logged in. .

* Yahoo and playchess have more than twice the number of users online than ICC. So not sure about your claim about the population.

* ICC while interesting has one thing it lacks, the interface graphics and speed are second rate compared to playchess.

* Add to the above list, the commands the newbie has to learn before making himself familar with the ICC. That's why there are not many kids playing in there.

* Advantages of ICC over playchess is: Sysops/Administrators are rather friendly. Whereas in playchess they are usually crude.

Ok, I tell you my #1 beef with Playchess. I have had several paid
Playchess accounts. I have multiple computers in my house. Each
new account uses new software tha goes on my newest and fastest
machine. So, on the occasion that I access playchess from one
of my older machines, the server has a fit. I think tying my account
to a serial number on one piece of software that keeps me
from playing on any machine other than the one I installed the
most recent version is wrong.

On ICC, I purchase an account for a year. They notify me when
that year is running out. During that year, I can play from any
machine I want to. I have more than one machine in my house
so I may want to use a different one from time to time. Also,
sometimes I like to play from another person's house on their computer. My
time on the server needs to be linked to my account name, not
to a piece of software that ties me to one and only one machine.

I completely agree. I support online events to be played on ICC in the future. I'm not arguing about that. I was just trying to make comparison between ICC and other servers as unbiasedly as I could. It looks like I've missed the key point you've just raised.

With my initial post, I was mainly refuting Bob's point that "beauty of ICC is population", but facts that remain are that there are already two servers that are far ahead of ICC population-wise: namely, playchess and yahoo...yahoo's interface and features are awkward but still populated nonetheless.

[playwaycool]

The beauty of icc is the population. At any moment there are many GM players logged in. .

* Yahoo and playchess have more than twice the number of users online than ICC. So not sure about your claim about the population.

* ICC while interesting has one thing it lacks, the interface graphics and speed are second rate compared to playchess.

* Add to the above list, the commands the newbie has to learn before making himself familar with the ICC. That's why there are not many kids playing in there.

* Advantages of ICC over playchess is: Sysops/Administrators are rather friendly. Whereas in playchess they are usually crude.

Let me help out with what I felt Bob really meant. ICC is professional chess club that have a great deal of title players. As a whole they have a massive of title players played at least once in their life time in the club and not to forget the total amount of title players that login at a time on ICC server, sometimes this will be enough # to call it a small server!


In yahoo I doubt there is any near the amount of title players that ICC have and you have to consider the amount of cheating that really goes on there, unlike ICC that have a staff that track this type of behavior. Also ICC have interesting events that involve cash prizes, Including the recent Dos Hermandos that took place on ICC just 2 weeks ago.



In terms of speed, obviously I think both ICC & playchess probably around the same to each other I think ICC must be running under T3 connection which is very fast to keep up with networking and It's consider strange to be lagging on ICC unless it your own ISP acting up. So all around ICC is indeed a place for serious players looking for improvement for their blitz/opening play and for a challenge as well and last but not least the great deal of (C) accounts probably not near playchess # but still enough for authors of chess engines to test out their programs, Crafty is an example of that

[swami]

Let me help out with what I felt Bob really meant. ICC is professional chess club that have a great deal of title players. As a whole they have a massive of title players played at least once in their life time in the club and not to forget the total amount of title players that login at a time on ICC server, sometimes this will be enough # to call it a small server!

In yahoo I doubt there is any near the amount of title players that ICC have and you have to consider the amount of cheating that really goes on there, unlike ICC that have a staff that track this type of behavior. Also ICC have interesting events that involve cash prizes, Including the recent Dos Hermandos that took place on ICC just 2 weeks ago.

Well, In playchess, there are a lot of GM's, probably far more than those at ICC. With members like Kasparov, Svidler, Morozevich, Gashimov, Seirawan, Shirov, Aronian, Nigel, Judith Polgar...who were all always in the broadcast room whenever the tournament is in progress.

About yahoo, It's not the right example to choose it and talk about GM's there, for sure there are hardly any, but the point is that it being popular attracts more hobby players than other servers.

When we are talking about computer chess in specific, ICC is definitely the place due to the obvious reason. But It seems Bob is talking in general terms, like population and GM's for instance... so playchess is step ahead there.