Computer Chess Club Archives


Search

Terms

Messages

Subject: Re: definition of clones: Danchess an Crafty

Author: Bob Durrett

Date: 11:24:04 02/15/04

Go up one level in this thread


On February 15, 2004 at 14:01:26, Dann Corbit wrote:

>On February 15, 2004 at 13:53:33, Bob Durrett wrote:
>
>>On February 15, 2004 at 13:24:54, Uri Blass wrote:
>>
>>>I understood from the winboard forum that Bob considers DanChess as a crafty
>>>clone and the question is what is the definition of a clone.
>>>
>>>I remember from slater's post in this forum that if most of the code is
>>>different you cannot win in court by complaining that it is a clone.
>>>
>>>I understood from Dann's post that only 30% of the code of DanChess is
>>>similiar(that does not mean the same as Crafty).
>>>
>>>Dann Corbit posted in the winboard forum the SEE function of Danchess that is
>>>similiar to Crafty.
>>>I wonder if it is really the main reason that Bob considers Danchess as a clone
>>>or only one of the reasons.
>>>
>>>Uri
>>
>>Can you patent or copyright an algorithm????
>
>You can patent an algorithm.

That begs the questions:  "Has the alpha/beta algorithm been patented?"  "If so,
when will the patent run out?"

Since everybody is using the alpha/beta algorithm, I assume this problem has
been solved.  But what about all the other algorithms and tricks used in chess
software?  It sounds like a potential legal nightmare to me.

Bob D.

Bob D.

>
>You can copyright your source code.  You cannot copyright an algorithm.
>
>What constitutes fair use of copyrighted materials could certainly be subject to
>much debate.



This page took 0 seconds to execute

Last modified: Thu, 15 Apr 21 08:11:13 -0700

Current Computer Chess Club Forums at Talkchess. This site by Sean Mintz.