|
1.
Please visit
our "little" News-Ticker in
 User Files,
Engines
selection.
Here can be found information about
"NEW" User files / updates too!
Go to
News-Ticker:
Overview ,
Main Page,
Page 1,
Page 2,
Page 3, Page 4,
Page 5,
Page 6,
Page 7,
Page 8,
Page 9
February 22nd, 2005
Die Sekretärin ist gefeuert!
59,
FQ
So viele Neuigkeiten in so kurzer Zeit? Wir
brauchen jetzt ganz sicher eine kleine Verschnaufpause zwischen den
Konfigurationsorgien der letzten Tage. Ich denke bei dem folgenden Text können wir alle
sehr gut entspannen und frisch gestärkt in die nächste Runde gehen. Schließlich
steht das IPCCC in Paderborn vor der Tür und da sitzen wir dann alle
ganz konzentriert vor dem PC und lauschen den News.
WARUM
ICH MEINE SEKRETÄRIN FEUERTE
Vor zwei Wochen hatte ich meinen 45 Geburtstag und fühlte
mich ohnehin nicht sehr wohl. Ich ging zum Frühstück. Meine Frau sagte nicht
einmal: Guten Morgen, schon gar nicht: Alles Gute. Die Kinder sagten auch
kein Wort und ließen mich völlig links liegen. Auf dem Weg ins Büro fühlte
ich mich ziemlich niedergeschlagen. Ich ging durch die Eingangstüre meines
Büros. Als Janet, meine Sekretärin, auf mich zukam und ‚ Alles Gute zum
Geburtstag, Boss, sagte, fühlte ich mich schon ein bisschen besser.
Wenigstens Eine hatte sich daran erinnert. Ich arbeitete bis Mittags.
Pünktlich um zwölf klopfte Janet an die Tür und sagte: Es ist Ihr
Geburtstag. Lassen Sie uns doch Mittagessen gehen, nur sie und ich. Wir
gingen nicht in das übliche Lokal, sondern fuhren aufs Land zu einem
gemütlichen Restaurant, um ein wenig Privatsphäre zu haben. Wir tranken zwei
Martinis und erfreuten uns am hervorragenden Mahl. Auf dem Weg zurück ins
Büro sagte Janet Wissen Sie es ist so ein schöner Tag, und es ist Ihr
Geburtstag. Wir müssen doch nicht ins Büro zurück fahren, oder? Fahren wir
doch zu mir in meine Wohnung und trinken noch einen Kaffee. Als wir in Ihrem
Appartement ankamen, tranken wir statt Kaffee noch ein paar weitere Martinis
und rauchten gemütlich eine Zigarette. Nach einiger Zeit sagte Janet: Wenn
es Sie nicht stört, würde ich mir gerne etwas Bequemeres anziehen. Ich gehe
nur schnell ins Schlafzimmer und bin gleich wieder da. Nach einigen Minuten
kam Sie wieder heraus. Sie trug eine Geburtstagstorte in den Händen, gefolgt
von meiner Frau, den Kindern, sowie den engsten Mitarbeitern.
Alle sangen: HAPPY
BIRTHDAY und ich saß auf der Couch und hatte außer meinen Socken nichts
mehr an.
Na ja, wir werden solche Probleme ganz
sicher nicht haben. Wir hätten in der Zeit, als Janet sich etwas gemütliches
angezogen hat, sicherlich unser Notebook ausgepackt und ein paar Engine-Engine
Matches spielen lassen. Vielleicht hätten wir auch gerade den neuesten Bugfix
vom OS Windows installiert oder die Excel Tabellen zum WM Test studiert. Unsere
Frauen kennen das ja ... es gibt
so viel zu tun und nur mit Socken ist es ja auch etwas kalt um diese Jahreszeit.
Ach ja, die ATL-2 Seiten werden täglich
aktualisiert ... wir verstehen uns!
February 22nd, 2005
SOS 5.1 for Arena, bugfix!
58,
FQ
Michael Jesdinsky (Germany)
found a little bug in SOS.5 for Arena. Martin Blume checked the
bug too and Rudolf Huber fixed the bug (one day before the
IPCCC 2005 in Paderborn
will start). A really fast service.
UCI SOS 5.1 for Arena without setup can be found in our "User Files, Engines" selection!
Go to
Arena
User Files, Engines
A second good news:
Rudolf Huber will play the IPCCC 2005 with the new opening book by
Salvatore Spitaleri (Italy).
SOS.5 for Arena under
Arena Chess GUI, SOS don't show the analyze for some lines!
FIXED
with SOS 5.1 for Arena
Rudolf Huber wrote (in
German):
"Hallo Ihr beiden, Martin hat recht und SOS5fA hat einen Fehler. Im Anhang ist
eine korrigierte Version. Bitte vor Freigabe noch mal prüfen."
We wish our
main partner Rudolf Huber good luck in Paderborn 2005.
Each other participant
programmers too!
February 22nd, 2005
Zappa 1.0 released
57,
FQ
Zappa by Anthony
Cozzy (USA) won for some days the popular CCT-7 tournament.
Today the young star from US released Zappa 1.0.
v. 1.00
WB / UCI compatible
Home of Zappa (webpage by Volker Pittlik)
Text by Frank Quisinsky
Hint: Not tested by myself yet
The US boys have some years overslept the
computer chess developements. From the great power USA are not many stronger
engines available. This is a pity because in USA we have some very strong
programmers. Thinking on Mathy Hirsch (USA, MChess), Don Daily
(USA, Socrates and CilkChess), John Stanback (USA, GnuChess, Zarkov),
James Robertson (USA, Insomniac), Bruce Morland (USA, Ferret). Newer
Zarkov versions, newer Insomniac versions and Ferret are not free or commercial
available. The development of Socrates / CilkChess is stopped and it seems that
Mathy Hirsch gave up with chess programming. This is a pity for the chess
community and only Crafty by Prof. Dr. Robert Hyatt hold some
years the American flag of the stronger available chess programs. Today are
around 20 engines on the same level or stronger as the long time showcase Crafty.
The same for computer chess events. The great
Harvard Cup is stopped and the American don't have an own computer chess
championship. But all of the American boys like it to discuss about computer
chess. The
CCC Forum is the biggest
computer chess forum in the World and the most of us like CCC.
BUT THIS TIME ENDED with
full power!
The Americans worked hard and today we have two
stronger and freely available "newer" chess programs. Zappa by Anthony
Cozzy (USA) and SlowChess by Jonathan Kreuzer (USA). The most
popular computer chess tounrey (CCT) is organice by members of the CCT forum, in
the past with great publications from Volker Richey (Germany) and
Peter Skinner (Canada).
The young start Anthony Cozzy (USA) won
the latest CCT-7 tournament (see News-Ticker message 43) and since today
Zappa 1.0 is freely available.
Hint:
Possible that Zappa don't work on different systems. Please have a look on Zappa
webpage.
February 24th, 2005
Now Zappa 1.0 for all processors is available and works fine!
Again a great day for the chess community and
we all have the same question in our brains?
Have a grandmaster today really a chance
against all this strong and freely available chess programs? TheBaron as
number 43 in ATL-1 rating list don't loosed last year a match vs. GM Levon
Aronian. I am sure that stronger engines, like Zappa will beat each
Grandmaster in a ten games event with time control 40 moves in 20 minutes. In
perhaps 1-2 years we have 10 or more available engines on the level of TOP
programs, like ChessTiger or Hiarcs. I am not speaking from the
clear number one Shredder by Stefan Meyer-Kahlen but after
Shredder more and more programs will play soon on 2.600 - 2.700 ELO level. Good
examples are Fruit, Aristarch, List and ProDeo seems
to be clear number one from the free available engines.
Perhaps a grandmaster will
read this message and will hold the flag from the group of grandmasters. The
computer chess community like such matches and ZAPPA, the winner of CCT-7, ...
the most important computer chesss event ... is the right challenger at this
times.
Who is the grandmaster which
will play a match vs. Zappa?
We are waiting of you. The most important computer chess area ... the
amateurchess area ... will have a great event!
See you ...
February 22nd, 2005
About Frenzee 2.0.0
56,
FQ
For some days
Frenzee 2.00 released. Reason enough to try to find out more about Frenzee.
v. 2.00
WB / UCI / FRC compatible!
Home of Frenzee
Text by Sune Fischer (Denmark) and Frank Quisinsky:
Hint: Frenzee 1.59 is number 62 in ATL-1 Rating-List
For around two years Sun Fischer (Frenzee)
released his first "stronger" version of Frenzee. In my garden in summer time I
follows with big interest games of Frenzee vs. Chezzz, KnightX and other
programs which are on the branch to the TOP amateurs. The playing style from
Frenzee is interesting. In all sectors Frenzee have strengths and this made
Frenzee very dangerous for the others.
A little bit to the Danish number two (Gandalf
is the strongest chess program from Denmark and I am sure the new Frenzee is
stronger as Chezzz):
Sune Fischer wrote me:
I have not much time for
Frenzee these days but I still have many ideas i'd like to try. Unfortunately I
must admit it is becomming quite hard to find improvements. My hat off to those
that keep improving beyond 2500.
I've focused mainly on
refactoring the code, to make it clearer for me to read and less buggy. I think
I have succeded quite nicely with that, but it also means I haven't engaged in
many wild experiments, just mainly focusing on getting the stuff that was
already there to work.
The biggest change is perhaps
the opening book, I was tired of all those "learners" getting cheap points! ;)
One can now compile a book from
pgn by type 'genbk' in console mode and following the wizard, also some notes in
the readme about how to do that. So far it does not seem to play much better
from a binary opening file than the old random method. Perhaps my pgn files just
aren't good enough ...
Learning works though, setting
up an selfplay match with identical books and book learning for one side shows a
much bigger score for the "learner". It will take quite a few games for the
learning to really start showing, so I guess it won't have a big impact on
playing strength in regular tournaments.
Be aware that I the first
version I uploaded had some kinks in the UCI implementation, so I've uploaded a
new one with a uci fix.
---
Yesterday I created new Arena
Setups (no updates in Arena Chess GUI files).
I added Frenzee 2.0.0 in our Chess 960 Setup
3.
Note:
Frenzee is the optimal test engine! The program by Sune supported the engine
protocols WinBoard
1, WinBoard II, UCI I and UCI II support. Furthermore, Frenzee supported
Chess
960. Also the possibilities in the WinBoard configuration file are great, learn
more about the Frenzee configurations and have a look on the readme.txt by programmer
Sune
Fischer. I used Frenzee a long time for my quick test if a newer engine is
available. With around 2.350 ELO is Frenzee 1.59 with the nice playing style
the optimal test engine for me. I am very happy that after a long time a new
Frenzee version is available!
Thanks Sune!
February 21st, 2005
SOS opening book available
55,
FQ
Salvatore Spitaleri (Italy) sent a new
version of the special opening book for SOS for Arena.
|
Salvatore Spitaleri
(Italy) |
Rudolf Huber himself don't spent much
time for the developement of an opening book. Rudolf Huber gave me the
information for years and the available opening book for SOS ins't really good.
Interesting ist the text to SOS on the IPCCC 2005 webpage:
Text from
IPCCC 2005 webpage:
SOS is an amteur program which
was started in 1993 and has since then competed in a number of tournaments. The
newest versions rus on multiprocessor system with a parallelized version of
mtd(f) as its minimax search algorithm. SOS used to be a relatively fast
searcher and relied on outsearching the opponent. This has changed now and more
knowledte and special cases have been implmented which slow it down. Little
effort is spent on the opening book. It plays a very broad range of openings.
However it learns to avoid unsuccessful lines and tries not to repeat lost games.
It uses publicty available endgame databases.
Today Salvatore Spitaleri wrote me:
I
want to give to Rudolf, you and all gladiators this small piece of art.
In my tests (ChessBase format) SOS has earned beyond 100 ELO, against Shredder,
Junior, Hiarcs.
Please send it to Rudolf, if he like it, he can use it in WMCCC or I can build a
book in SOS's format.
Salvatore is working around one year on the
opening book for SOS. I used this opening book for some tests and must give
Salvatore right. The opening book is fantastic for the strategy, positional
aggressive playing style of SOS. |
Chris Tatham (England) created an
opening book in Arena's *.abk format too. The book looks strong too and is
available in "User Files selection".
User Files
February 21st, 2005
SOS 5.0 for Arena released
54,
FQ
We are now in good spirits before the IPCCC
2005 in Paderborn will start.
You can download the IPCCC 2005 version of SOS !!
IPCCC 2005 February 23rd
up to 27th, 2005
v. 5.0
UCI compatible!
Home of SOS = our Arena website ... SOS is the main engine for Arena Chess
GUI, compare to GnuChess and WinBoard GUI.
Text by Frank Quisinsky (Germany):
Hint: SOS.4 for Arena is number 10 in ATL-1 Rating-List
UCI SOS.5 for Arena without setup can be found in our "User Files, Engines" selection!
Go to
Arena
User Files, Engines
I created new Setups with SOS.5 for Arena too.
...
Each year Rudolf Huber (Germany)
released a new version of SOS for Arena. The SOS story is a little bit
curious because I got the first SOS version for Frank's Chess Page to a time I
never calculated with it (a nice surprise).
In times I started Frank's Chess Page I asked some programmers for a Winboard
compatible engine. Prof. Dr. Djordje Vidanovic and myself contact
many programmers and we are looking end of 1996 start of 1997 in games from all
official computer chess events. The amateur engine SOS by Rudolf Huber
had in official amateur tournaments fantastic results and
Roland Pfister gave us the E-Mail address from Rudolf Huber. We
contact Rudolf and his answer was:
"My engine is
compatible to Linux and don't have Winboard support. But it's interesting for me
to try to create a WinBoard engine because I can get a lot of test results from users."
... in my bad English ...
|
Rudolf find the time
and created a WinBoard engine of SOS for Frank's Chess Page around one year later. SOS programmer Rudolf Huber helps Stefan
Meyer-Kahlen with the UCI protocol and created an UCI engine of SOS.
Rudolf Huber have a very good call in the community and other
programmers like it to discuss with Rudolf in chess tournaments. For
some years in such
an official tournament in Leiden I talked with
Rudolf for the first time. An really very friendly programmer and for
our little Arena team THE BIG DEAL
that SOS is our main engine for Arena Chess GUI. Rudolf
Huber supported direct the Arena project and gave us the engine for
our webpage.
For around four weeks I
had a personal meeting with Martin Blume. We are sitting with Michael Jesdinsky in his
living room and had spoken about different new Arena analyze option. I started
Arena for an analyse on my Notebook. Martin's comment: Frank, please
with SOS ... this is
our main engine :-)
SOS.5 for Arena
supported Multi-Variant-Mode in this new available version. Martin will be happy about it
and I am sure the computer chess community too. A very fine and
strong chess engine and long time developement. A great day for us to hold the
work from Rudolf Huber in our hand. The first official tournament
Rudolf played in Munich (WMCCC 1993). |
Rudolf Huber
(right site) with
the Bionic Team in Leiden! |
SOS in tournaments!
| 1993, 12th WMCCC Munich |
4/9 points, ranking
20 of 28 |
| 1994, Single
Plattform London |
17.5/29 points,
ranking 7 of 16 |
| 1994, 4th IPCCC Paderborn |
5/7 points, ranking
2 of 18 |
| 1995, 8th WCCC HongKong |
2/5 points, ranking
15 of 24 |
| 1997, 6th IPCCC Paderborn |
4.5/7 points, ranking
4 of 16 |
| 1997, 15th WMCCC Paris |
5/11 points, ranking
26 of 34 |
| 1998, 5th Spain-ch
Granada |
3/5 points, ranking
3 of 12 |
| 1998, 7th IPCCC Paderborn |
3/7 points, ranking
11 of 16 |
| 1999, 8th IPCCC Paderborn |
4/7 points, ranking
7 of 14 |
| 1999, 9th
WCCC, 16th
WMCCC Paderborn |
2.5/7 points, ranking
24 of 30 |
|
2000,
17th WMCCC London, Amateur Champion |
5.5/9
points, ranking 6 of 14 |
| 2000, 9th IPCCC Paderborn |
3.5/7 points, ranking
7 of 16 |
| 2001, CCT-3 Internet |
5.5/8 points, ranking
6 of 32 |
| 2001, 1st Int. CSVN
tournament |
5/9 points, ranking
8 of 19 |
| 2001, 18th WMCCC Maastricht |
5/9 points, ranking
11 of 18 |
| 2001, 10th IPCCC Paderborn |
5/9 points, ranking
5 of 18 |
| 2002, 11th IPCCC Paderborn |
3.5/7
points, ranking 9 of 16 |
| 2002, 2nd Int. CSVN
tournament |
5.5/9 points, ranking
5 of 22 |
| 2002, 10th WCCC
Maastricht |
4.5/9
points, ranking
9 of 18 |
| 2003,
12th IPCCC Paderborn |
4.5/7
points, ranking 4 of 14 |
| 2003, 18th WMCCC
Graz |
5/11 points, ranking
8 of 15 |
| 2004,
13th IPCCC Paderborn |
3.0/7
points, ranking 12 of 16 |
| 2004, 12th
WCCC Bar Ilan |
6.0/11
points, ranking
7 of 14 |
| 2005,
CCT-7 Internet |
6.5/9
points, ranking
4 of 44 |
Have fun with SOS.5 for Arena!
Thanks Rudolf
February 19th, 2005
Amyan 1.595 released
53,
FQ
I will ask in the future the programmers for stronger available free and
commercial engines for more information!
To have such details on a "news" selection is interesting.
Today I started and asked Antonio Dieguez (Amyan, Chile).
v. 1.595
WB / UCI compatible!
Home of Amyan
Text by Antonio Dieguez (Chile):
Hint: Amyan 1.594 is number 23 in ATL-1 Rating-List
|
 |
Hi Frank!
you as always very heartfull :)
But In summary mainly it is a little faster in time to reach depth, but, as the
very small change in the version number suggest, there is almost no difference.
I wanted to update almost as a kidish thing that I like to do. May be there are
not even 5 rating points of difference, I don't like anymore to play a lot of
games in the pc to try to verify. See you ...
Thanks Antonio!
Here you
can see Antonio as a Samurai fighter (picture is 20 minutes old). Do you
know what a Samurai fighter will make with beta testes who don't send
the right test results? ... grreerrr, wirrrg ... short shirft ... in
German: "Kurzer Prozess" :-) |
February 19th, 2005
EVComp, Le Fou numérique *News*
52,
FQ
The most of the CC community search each day in
WWW for interesting computer chess news. Around 400 users only (after my
experience with fora systems) try to make it in different chess fora DAILY. The
secret is to collect the main news on frequently updated webpages. The most
users are searching 1-2 times in the weeks for news and can find all in one!
Example: On Arena webpage you can't find
news to the five ChessBase native engines (Fritz, Junior, Hiarcs, ChessTiger,
Anaconda) because this little group of engines don't support the standard engine
protocols, like WinBoard and UCI. For Arena not very interesting
to report about such engines. Furthermore, I have the opinion that the most
interesting commercial engines today are UCI Shredder, UCI / WB Gandalf and WB
TheKing.
I found a very good CC News-Ticker with
frequently News to ChesssBase engines. EVCOMP by Ing. Emil Vlasák
(Cezch) is just a fantastic work. An futher very good site with frequently news
comes from Patrick Buchmann (Elsass). I added the links to Patrick and
Emil in the main frame of Arena webpage.
EVComp NEWS
by Emil Vlasák (Czech)
Le
Fou numérique by Patrick Buchmann (France)
CSS-Online isn't so actual at the moment but I
am sure the News-Ticker from CSS Online will be better with time.
http://www.computerschach.de
An interesting News-Ticker I added for around
two weeks in Arena main frame.
Computer Chess News
by Steve Maughan (England)
Steve reported today about secret settings in
Shredder-Classic GUI !!
Good idea Steve! Visit the "new" NEWS page from Steve!
February 18th, 2005
Advance notive: Arena Main Book v5
51,
FQ
Harry Schnapp is working
all the time on improvements on his / our Arena Mainbook.
The new version 5.0 and a new little book of Harry is available in the next 2-3
weeks.
Today Harry sent me an interesting
text to his work on Mainbook 5.0 and
Little Mainbook 1.0:
German:
Die fünfte Version meines
Buches enthält zusätzliche 140.917 Züge aus 9.064 Varianten überwiegend
mit kurzer und besonders mittlerer Länge und eine Durchschnittstiefe von
28 Halbzügen (Gesamtumfang:153.633 Varianten mit 1.693.854 Zügen).
Damit werden die vorhandenen sehr langen Zugfolgen um etwa 8% seltener
erscheinen und das ist vorteilhafter aus verschiedenen Gründen. Das Buch
wird noch breiter und deckt praktisch die meisten ersten 16-24 Halbzügen
die üblicherweise in menschlichen Turniere gespielt werden. Durch die
langen Varianten (bis zu 63 Halbzüge), entstehen am Ende vor dem
verlassen des Buches mitunter bereits Endspielstellungen und das sollte
vermieden werden. Es hat wenig Sinn Partien ohne Mittelspiel laufen zu
lassen und wenn direkt Endspiele erwünscht sind die kann man auch
eingeben ohne auf die Hilfe eines Buches angewiesen zu sein. Sicherlich
werden diese Schlangenvarianten kaum bis zum Ende ausgespielt wenn zwei
verschiedene Bücher gegeneinander treffen und wenn beide Engines mit dem
gleichen Buch spielen dann sollte ein vernünftiges Limit gesetzt werden.
Attentione: This
opening book by Harry Schnapp works fine with more as 250 ENGINES
|
Wegen der modernen
Bewertungskriterien muss heute ein Buchautor mehr Schachwissen besitzen als
früher, es reicht nicht mehr sich immer auf die Analyse eines Shredder oder
Fritz in der Beurteilung einer Stellung zu verlassen. Früher war es deutlich
einfacher, beispielsweise ein + 1,50 bedeutete unmissverständlich materieller
und positioneller Vorteil, also Stellung unausgewogen und ungeeignet. Derzeit
reicht manchmal ein Läuferpaar und minimal mehr Mobilität für weiß plus ein
Doppelbauer für schwarz (auch wenn er nicht schwach oder isoliert ist), und
schon haben wir eine Stellungsbewertung von über + 1,xx !!. Wenn dazu der
schwarze König nicht rochiert hat dann klettert es weiter bis auf nahezu +2
Bauerneinheiten obwohl das Material auf dem Brett völlig ausgeglichen ist. In so
einem Fall muss der Autor entscheiden ob die Stellung trotzdem Chancen für beide
Parteien bringt oder nicht. Für die Engines ist dieses breite Bewertungssystem
vorteilhaft aber für den User manchmal gewöhnungsbedürftig. Man sollte in
Betracht ziehen dass leichte Positionsvorteile noch keinesfalls entscheidend
sind für den Fortgang einer Partie, weiß besitzt sowieso vom Anfang an ein Tempo
voraus und wenn schwarz immer, schnell und leicht ausgleichen könnte dann würde
man mit schwarz in Turniere nicht so oft auf Remis spielen!. Auf Wunsch vieler
Schachfreunde die auch ein kleineres Buch brauchen habe ich das "Little Mainbook
1.0" erstellt. Es ist für den täglichen Gebrauch, enthält 270.000 Züge und die
Tiefe beträgt maximal 24 Halbzüge so dass hier, auch wenn beide Engines mit dem
gleichen Buch spielen, kein Limit gesetzt werden muss. Ich empfehle jedoch für
das Spiel mit Programme der Spitzenklasse wie z. B. Shredder, The King oder
Fruit die Verwendung des Mainbook 5.0 um strategisch noch wertvollere
Mittelspielstellungen erreichen zu können. |
 |
February 18th, 2005
engines.ini version - 100 -
50,
FQ
Pedro Beltran (Mexico) sent
today engines.ini version - 100 - !!!
|
 |
In engines.ini can be
found the configurations for all available WB / UCI engines (at the moment more
as 250 engines). This file should be add in the main directory of Arena. Arena
will show you automatically each important information about author, country and
configuration from the available engine. The work by Pedro is a very big help
for us and we will give him our symbolic medal / award!
Pedro Beltran (Mexico), expert for configurations!
*** THANKS Pedro ***
|
This message is News-Ticker
message 50!
We produced since January 03th, 2005 in 46 days 50 news.
February 17th, 2005
Wilhelm 1.48 by Rafael B.
Andrist!
49,
FQ
I read that the developement of
Wilhlem by Rafael B. Andrist (Switzerland) has stopped :-(
Of course a bad message because we loosed one of the interesting GUI
developements!
Chess program Wilhelm 1.48
can be found under:
http://www.geocities.com/rba_schach2000/
Rafael released his latest version
for some days and wrote on his webpage:
v. 1.48
- support of the new EGTB format for 6-men, including 3-3 men with pawns.
Multi-metric access to the metrics DTM, DTC, DTZ, DTC50, DTZ50.
Thanks for your
contribution for the computer chess community!
February 17th, 2005
SlowChess, Crafty, DannChess,
Frenzee, ELChinito, ZL
48,
FQ
After the CCT-7 tournament (read
News-Ticker message 43) some of the "stronger" available engines are updated!
01. SlowChess 2.96 by Jonathan Kreuzer (USA)
02. DanChess CCT-7 by Daniel Shavul (Ethiopia)
03. Frenzee CCT-7 by Sune Fischer (Denmark)
04. Crafty 19.19 by Prof. Dr. Robert Hyatt (USA)
Links can be found in our
Engines, Link selection !!
Again, thanks to all engine
programmers for your freely available work. The free area of computer chess
is very strong today. More as 250 UCI / WB engines are available for free. Perhaps
a reason
that more and more clones are released?
Unfortunately, clones are the
topics which produced always the biggest threads in popular computer chess fora. In all
of these bigger discuss in the past the well-known self artists are on the first
positions with a lot of comments. A good example was the clone discuss to
ELChinito. ELChinito programmer Eugenio Castillo is working more as
12 years in chess programming. His older DOS program Eugen (playwing strenght = around 2.400
ELO) is a good example for Eugenio's fantastic work. A self artist search the
sensation and used popular chess fora for his publication. It is a disgrace for
the chess community and fora administrators to support such discuss to
outstanding personalities, like Eugenio Castillo.
Again, we are
speaking about a person,
which made chess programming since more as 12 years!
This programmer got an
attack from a lot of persons we know only from nonsens WWW forum messages. And all this
without to speak with Eugenio "Face to Face". A lot of
Manitou's are sitting in a small chambers and like it to used the keyboard for
his wild fantasy.
What can I say? Unfortunately, we are speaking from humans!
For months I delete ELChinito
in the ATL-1 tournament for get more calm to this topic (ELChinito are a partner
program of Arena Chess GUI). Fact is that Eugenio Castillo is working on his
program and the results are just great. ELChinito made 250 nps (slow) on my
Pentium IV 2.67 GHz Maxdata notebook but produce great results. Eugenio had
rewritten the search (he are working a long time on it). I like the program
ELChinito and the results of 13.5 : 3.5 vs. Crafty 19.18 with 40
moves in 20 minutes is very strong. I analyse the games and can find nothing
which is to compare with Crafty. Crafty have simple no chance, its easy ...
Absolutely clear that in this
case a wrong person got a shot across the bows and this isn't to apologise.
Today I hear, that a new program
can be a clone from Crafty.
ZT by
Josue Vazquez Torres
(Puerto Rico).
For me is clear, that it isn't
possible to create in a short time a really strong chess program. But it should be
clear, that we can't adjudge each programmers with make a new and strong engine available. I don't know ZT but I must be a visionary
to see
the discuss we will get soon. A little bit sure instinct to the younger programmers
is necessary or do you have interest to loosed young talents for the future of
computer chess? We all made in young years mistakes, or do you a perfect guy? Not only the "older" programmers are the hero's in our area. The
hero's are the young talents too and we have to give each person a chance. A mail in
a critical case can be solved a lot bad discuss the self artists search and like. Thinking
about it ...
I am sure that enough good
natured genies are in the community and will helped younger programmers and the
community in the future.
A small leak will sink a great ship!
February 17th, 2005
New ATL-2 pages modificated!
Arena website news
47,
FQ
In the latest days I am working
on the organisation for my new tournament and created the detail pages to
ATL-2
Full Arena Chess GUI power on three machines ...
Heinz Walz reported in the latest year about his tournament system in
different computer chess fora. Heinz is since a longer time sick and I
can't wait of his great work and daily reported results. So I try to copy his
tournament idea with the strongest 20 available WB / UCI engines. I will use the
favorite time control from Gandalf programmer Steen Suurballe, 40 moves
in 20 minutes. After around one year on three of my eight machines I can produce
for each of the participant twenty engines more as 1.000 games. If you have
interest you can visit from time to time the ATL-2 results. About the ATL-2
ratings I will report frequently in our News-Ticker.
I hope Heinz
is on the mend.
I hear about sign of recovery.
ATL-System 1: Pentium IV
2.67GHz Mobile, Maxdata Notebook, 512Mb RAM, Windows XP Professional SP2,
Arena 1.1 Chess GUI, 40 moves in 20 minutes, ponder = off, hyperthreading =
on, 4-pieces tablebases, 4Mb cache, ~ max. 64Mb for hashtables.
ATL-System
2: AMD Athlon64 3.5GHz, Socket
939, overclocking to 225MHz FSB = 2.475 GHz, 1Gb RAM, Windows XP Home SP2,
Arena 1.1 Chess GUI, 40 moves in 20 minutes, ponder = off, 4-pieces
tablebases, 4Mb cache, ~ max. 128Mb for hashtables.
ATL-System 3: Xeon Dual
2.8GHz, FSB 533, 2GB RAM, Windows XP Professional SP2, Arena 1.1
Chess GUI, 40 moves in 20 minutes, ponder = on, hyperthreading = off,
5-pieces tablebases, 32Mb cache, ~ max. 256Mb for hashtables.
Visit the new
ATL-2 detail sites !!
Furthermore, I am working on the
Engines, Link selection.
(with links to the group of commercial engines).
February 17th, 2005
CSS-Online, first issue
available
46,
FQ
The German computer chess magazine
CSS (Computer Schach & Spiele) released his first
issue of CSS-Online.
CSS-Online:
http://www.computerschach.de
The popular CSS forum:
http://f23.parsimony.net/forum50826/ (find out more)
Different persons try to create
here a good new and interesting online magazine. In times today it's nice to see
that we can find interesting news about computer chess. The most are thinking
only on the own news and activities and forget that the computer chess fans in
the World are only a little group of persons which should work hand in hand.
Each of this anomaly / specialty events we have to support. The first issue of
CSS-Online is free available. You can test it ...
On CSS-Online webpage can be
found much interesting downloads!
Example: 308 engines are
included in the WM-Test by Manfred Meiler. You can download the results
in *.xls (Excel) format. Of course a fantastic work by Manfred Meiler.
The WM Test with 100 positions is created by Dr. Michael Gurevich &
Heinz-Josef Schumacher (Germany).
We wish CSS
good luck ...
with the new
CSS-Online magazine!
Note:
New issues of the newspaper CSS are no longer available!
The online magazine replaced the newspaper!
February 17th, 2005
IPCCC 2005, countdown is running
45,
FQ
Also a very good organised
tournament is the
IPCCC 2005 in Paderborn
(Germany). On the list of participant programs we can find 16 engines. The
clear favourite is Deep Shredder by TOP programmer
Stefan Meyer-Kahlen,
Germany. I am sure that Stefan doesn't need more titles and gave the other
programmer a chance to win this tournament.
IPCCC-2005:
Feb. 23rd-27th, 2005
List of participant programs:
Commercial:
01. Deep Shredder,
02. Gandalf (the top available programs today)
Non available engines: 03. Hydra,
04. Nexus, 05.
Diep, 06. Ikarus,
07. IsiChess, 08. Matador,
09. Neurologic
Free available engines: 10. Quark,
11. Jonny,
12. Spike, 13.
Patzer, 14. SOS,
15. Anaconda, 16. TheBaron
For the most are this non
available versions of chess programs not very interesting, seven in only one
tournament !!
Yes, this tournament is for the NON available / secret engine programmers very
interesting :-)
But here are the more
interesting Engines news:
01. Roland Pfister (Patzer) is working on a
Chess960 version of Patzer and its possible that after the FRC WM in Mainz is a new Patzer version available.
02. Rudolf Huber (SOS) will released SOS.5 for Arena during the IPCCC or
after the IPCCC.
03. The Spike programmers Volker Böhm and Ralf Schäfer will
release the very strong new Spike version some weeks after the IPCCC 2005 in Paderborn.
Interview with Stefan Meyer-Kahlen
Special hint for Achilles
:-) / Shredder programmer Stefan Meyer-Kahlen:
Movie Troy (Summary, Capital three ... in German):
"Achilles, Achilles ... Schau in die Gesichter dieser Männer, Du kannst
hunderte (15) von Ihnen retten, mit einem einzigen Hieb Deines Schwertes
(Endspieles) kannst Du
diesen Krieg beenden, lasse Sie zu Ihren Frauen (Rechnern) heimkehren"
Stefan, lasse den
Anderen eine Chance und Sie werden glücklich zu Ihren Frauen
heimkehren!
Na ja, ob die Frauen dann wirklich glücklich sind :-)
We wish all
programmers ...
a lot of fun
and good luck in Paderborn!
February 17th, 2005
The latest ATL-1 results,
ATL-1 Elolist
44,
FQ
Quark 2.35 by Thomas
Mayer (Germany) won the latest ATL-1 tourney. A good omen for Thomas
Mayer before the IPCCC 2005 will start (see News-Ticker message 45). The ATL-League runs over one
year and produced 7.498 games (23 ATL tournaments) on Dual Xeon 2.8
GHz. I had a lot of fun with this tournament and the participant engines.
A little
statistic:
Only 27 games with problems = 0.36%.
The most of the problems comes from engines (loosed on time games -most with
Arasan-, crashes -most with -Amy-). In "ONLY" six cases Arena Chess
GUI made troubles. This is a proof for the very good work by Arena
programmer Martin Blume.
| Rank |
Engine |
Country |
Score |
Qu |
Th |
Gr |
Co |
Fa |
ET |
Jo |
Ne |
In |
Ar |
Am |
Ab |
Po |
Th |
Ph |
De |
Le |
Dr |
S-B |
| 01 |
Quark 2.35 |
 |
23.5/34 |
· · |
10 |
00 |
=1 |
10 |
1= |
11 |
1= |
11 |
1= |
=1 |
11 |
=1 |
01 |
10 |
1= |
10 |
11 |
379,50 |
| 02 |
The Baron 1.50
|
 |
23.0/34 |
01 |
· · |
01 |
1= |
=1 |
1= |
1= |
1= |
11 |
0= |
11 |
01 |
=0 |
00 |
=1 |
11 |
11 |
11 |
376,25 |
| 03 |
Gromit 3.82 |
|
21.5/34 |
11 |
10 |
· · |
11 |
00 |
01 |
1= |
== |
01 |
01 |
01 |
=1 |
11 |
== |
10 |
== |
11 |
=1 |
358,75 |
| 04 |
Comet
B68 |
|
20.0/34 |
=0 |
0= |
00 |
· · |
11 |
1= |
01 |
=1 |
1= |
== |
1= |
10 |
=1 |
0= |
01 |
=1 |
=1 |
11 |
317,75 |
| 05 |
Fafis
X 0.3a |
 |
19.0/34 |
01 |
=0 |
11 |
00 |
· · |
0= |
01 |
01 |
11 |
01 |
10 |
1= |
0= |
11 |
00 |
== |
11 |
11 |
307,00 |
| 06 |
ETChess 07.12.04 |
 |
18.5/34 |
0= |
0= |
10 |
0= |
1= |
· · |
0= |
1= |
1= |
=0 |
00 |
01 |
11 |
=1 |
11 |
01 |
=1 |
1= |
295,25 |
| 07 |
Jonny
2.75 |
|
18.5/34 |
00 |
0= |
0= |
10 |
10 |
1= |
· · |
01 |
10 |
00 |
11 |
01 |
1= |
11 |
11 |
10 |
01 |
1= |
292,25 |
| 08 |
Nejmet 3.06 |
|
17.0/34 |
0= |
0= |
== |
=0 |
10 |
0= |
10 |
· · |
=0 |
1= |
11 |
== |
== |
=1 |
0= |
== |
01 |
11 |
271,75 |
| 09 |
Insomniac 0.69a |
 |
16.5/34 |
00 |
00 |
10 |
0= |
00 |
0= |
01 |
=1 |
· · |
=1 |
== |
00 |
== |
01 |
1= |
11 |
11 |
11 |
250,00 |
| 10 |
Arasan 8.3 |
|
16.0/34 |
0= |
1= |
10 |
== |
10 |
=1 |
11 |
0= |
=0 |
· · |
0= |
01 |
00 |
=1 |
=1 |
00 |
=1 |
=0 |
279,50 |
| 11 |
Amy
0.87 |
|
16.0/34 |
=0 |
00 |
10 |
0= |
01 |
11 |
00 |
00 |
== |
1= |
· · |
00 |
=1 |
=0 |
11 |
== |
11 |
=1 |
253,25 |
| 12 |
Abrok
5.0 |
|
15.5/34 |
00 |
10 |
=0 |
01 |
0= |
10 |
10 |
== |
11 |
10 |
11 |
· · |
10 |
== |
=0 |
01 |
00 |
01 |
259,00 |
| 13 |
Post
Modernist 1010a |
 |
15.0/34 |
=0 |
=1 |
00 |
=0 |
1= |
00 |
0= |
== |
== |
11 |
=0 |
01 |
· · |
1= |
0= |
11 |
01 |
00 |
254,00 |
| 14 |
The
Crazy Bishop 0052 |
|
14.5/34 |
10 |
11 |
== |
1= |
00 |
=0 |
00 |
=0 |
10 |
=0 |
=1 |
== |
0= |
· · |
=1 |
00 |
00 |
11 |
251,00 |
| 15 |
Phalanx 22 |
 |
14.5/34 |
01 |
=0 |
01 |
10 |
11 |
00 |
00 |
1= |
0= |
=0 |
00 |
=1 |
1= |
=0 |
· · |
00 |
=1 |
=1 |
243,00 |
| 16 |
Der
Bringer 1.9 |
|
14.5/34 |
0= |
00 |
== |
=0 |
== |
10 |
01 |
== |
00 |
11 |
== |
10 |
00 |
11 |
11 |
· · |
00 |
0= |
242,50 |
| 17 |
Leila
0.53h |
 |
13.0/34 |
01 |
00 |
00 |
=0 |
00 |
=0 |
10 |
10 |
00 |
=0 |
00 |
11 |
10 |
11 |
=0 |
11 |
· · |
01 |
207,00 |
| 18 |
Dragon 4.6 |
|
9.5/34 |
00 |
00 |
=0 |
00 |
00 |
0= |
0= |
00 |
00 |
=1 |
=0 |
10 |
11 |
00 |
=0 |
1= |
10 |
· · |
148,75 |
306 games played / Tournament finished
Tournament start: 2005.02.06, 23:20:58
Latest update: 2005.02.15, 14:01:32
Site/ Country: Schweich, Germany
Level: Turnier 40/10
Hardware: 4x Intel(R) Xeon(TM) CPU 2.80GHz mit 2.047 MB Speicher
Operating system: Microsoft Windows XP Professional Service Pack 2 (Build 2600)
Axon Benchmark: Axon-Benchmark-4 (00:00:38.9 sec.) [2367545 pps.] PowX= 7.376
Table created with: Arena 1.1
February 17th, 2005
Zappa won CCT-7
43,
FQ
Zappa by
Anthony Cozzy (USA) won
CCT-7 (detail page)
tournament organized by Peter Skinner (Canada), engine programmers and
some other persons.
Our main engine: SOS.for Arena made ranking 3-5 / 44 !
Congratulations to the programmers of Zappa and SOS!
And of course to the
other participant programmers!
Notes:
The available ZAPPA version on the
webpage by Volker Pittlik don't works on some machines!
SOS.5 for Arena is soon available!
The most amateur programmers
like this ICC (chess server) tournament. This year 44 engine programmer
participant! Unfortunately, it seems that the commercial programmers don't
have interest on CCT. This is a pity because the internet presentation is a lot
better as the official
ICGA events. Peter
Skinner does a great job and wrote an interesting longer text on the detail
page to CCT-7. In the past
Volker Richey works
on the CCT internet presentation.
CC-Calendar is updated!
Go to
News-Ticker: Main Page, Page 1,
Page 2,
Page 3, Page 4,
Page 5,
Page 6,
Page 7,
Page 8,
Page 9 |