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Subject: Re: Strength of the engine in chess programs

Author: Rolf Tueschen

Date: 17:53:40 05/20/02

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On May 20, 2002 at 20:04:21, martin fierz wrote:

>On May 20, 2002 at 10:15:44, Rolf Tueschen wrote:
>
>>Let me demonstrate a little thought experiment. If I would gauge (in 2002) the
>>actually most known chess programs against say 1000 human chess players (first
>>step) to get some insight into the Elo numbers, I would expect that the top
>>programs would at best get Elo performances of 2200 - 2350, if I let the engines
>
>2200? you must be kidding! my rating is 2240 FIDE and even if i start all my
>games against fritz with 1.h3 or some other (quite sensible) moves to take it
>out of the book, i have no chance against it.
>maybe someone here could experiment with a few top programs using no book
>against other top programs.
>
>>How many years from now it will take to develop a real chessplaying robot who
>>could participate in human tournaments completely on his own? Buying new books
>>he reads, asking collegues for some information about this or that,
>>differentiating between truth, lies and irony.   ;-)
>
>i wonder why you have a problem with chess engines using opening books. is it
>that they did not find these moves on their own? if yes: can i ask you about
>your opinion on a computer-generated opening book? that is, an opening book
>which the chess engine works on day and night, finding opening lines all by
>itself? it stores this information and can retrieve it instantly and without
>failure (unlike humans), but unlike today's opening books it has computed
>everything itself.
>the reason i ask is that my checkers program has exactly such an opening book.
>after only a few weeks of analysis of checkers openings, my book contains much
>of the human opening theory for checkers, and some corrections of it. everything
>was discovered by the engine itself. it could never find some of the moves "over
>the board", but this book just serves as a memory for it's analysis - very much
>like a human chess master.
>
>computing such an opening book for chess is much harder, since there are many
>more viable moves. but if you went on to write a screen saver application to
>distribute the task, who knows - maybe something good will come of it.
>incidentally, this is just what dann corbit is doing. jeroen noomen once wrote
>me he also has had some success with automated opening book construction in
>chess.
>
>aloha
>  martin

Yes, of course, that would be a good method, although I doubt that you would get
serious results. How many nights the machine should calculate? Who will decide
that? And - much more important, what will you do with the losing tickets? Would
you outsort them by hand? Honestly, then you could let it as before with the GM
books. How many years it will take? Because already the exactly solvable
endgames did cost Ken Thompson weeks and months.

But I think your question shows my own in a different light now, hopefully. The
machine is either prevented to play garbage which it wouldn't find out in weeks
on its own and it is told to play moves, the quality of it couldn't discover
either. Not only the move itself but possibly a 30 moves variation...

Doesn't sound fair in games against human players, no?

As to the question of your own record against FRITZ, I would beg you to read the
first two postings I wrote in this thread. With "normal chess" you will be in a
disadvantage by definition against the machines because you must always
calculate at a given depth and you can't correct mistakes. More appriate is to
play directly the weaknesses of the machine. Of course that has no longer to do
with training for human chess. You must always search for a way to exploitate
the computer's horizon. Take a look at the many games Eduard Nemeth has played.
He is even weaker than you. And then you must become familiar with typical
characteristics of computer play. Exchanges. It's a totally different form of
chess. Excellent calculating power you must have, and you should play with
longer time controls. Then you can beat even the 2200 to 2350 computer. Just try
a bit of training with  the help of some books. Then you will get a feeling for
the weaknesses. And later you can start with your special openings.

It will cost you some time of course!

BTW here is a little hint for you. Ch. Fieberg from Germany has the idea to let
many computers analyze the whole opening theory. Perhaps you both could exchange
some ideas. Have fun with chess and computerchess.

Rolf Tueschen



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