Computer Chess Club Archives


Search

Terms

Messages

Subject: Re: The importance of opening books -- a simple experiment

Author: Vasik Rajlich

Date: 13:51:11 02/23/05

Go up one level in this thread


On February 23, 2005 at 11:36:03, Peter Berger wrote:

>On February 23, 2005 at 06:52:07, Vasik Rajlich wrote:
>
>>2) Surely there is some difference in level, but how much? I have yet to see
>>even one statistic that suggests such a difference for any two equally-matched
>>engines. There are plenty of experiments that could show this, so it's at least
>>suspicious that it hasn't happened yet.
>
>That's an interesting idea. Yes, I have not seen such a thing either. I know the
>effect is true and can easily be more than 100 ELO when it is about engines of
>different level. I don't see a very good reason why this should not work with
>engines of similar level, but I have no data to support it.

Ok, how about the following experiment:

1) You pick two engines of similar level, and post here 25 opening positions
where you think engine A will do better, and 25 opening positions where you
think engine B will do better.
2) I'll run the 100 games on my computers. You won't know in advance the time
control I use, or which versions of the two programs I use.

Good luck getting 66 points :)

>
>>>
>>>>
>>>>IMHO - an amateur engine shouldn't bother with book until let's say four years
>>>>go by. At that point, some professional chess player should be hired who will
>>>>start from an automatically generated book and spend some month or so making
>>>>some adjustments, preferably in the range of moves 5-15. In addition to this, it
>>>>may make sense to keep running the engine and "pre-computing" some results,
>>>>which can be spot-checked as appropriate. This last step will especially help at
>>>>fast time controls.
>>>>
>>>>Vas
>>>>
>>>
>>>I don't think this approach is optimal , but it will lead to a very reasonable
>>>book.
>>
>>So what is the optimal approach? (Aside from full-time professional chess player
>>spending 60 hours a week on the book? :))
>>
>>Vas
>
>Please allow me to be vague and add some IMHO at random points ;). If there is
>something like an automated book as a starting point, it should be extremely
>limitted, so that there is no risk for it to contain blunders. Ideally there
>should be no line in the book the author isn't aware of. As you pointed out
>yourself, there is a lot of stuff that has to be added manually anyway, e.g.
>replies to uncommon openings that can be used to fool the computer ( e.g. all
>kinds of unusual gambits). Although they are unlikely to come up in a tournament
>they are important. The core of the repertoire should be worked out more
>thoroughly than that and profit from existing human analysis, after having been
>blunderchecked carefully with program. A few novelties and surprises can't hurt
>either.

Of course, the more is hand-checked, the better. I just don't know how realistic
it is to hand-check everything.

>
>I don't think a full-time professional chess player is needed to do that job and
>actually I am not even sure if he is the most qualified to do it, unless he gets
>payed enough to take it very seriously :) . Judging from published comments of
>human masters many don't really understand strength and weaknesses of
>computerplayers or only in a very superficial way, although most use them
>regularly of course. I am convinced that people like you or Larry Kaufman would
>be better than professional chess players.
>
>Whether this is the optimal way I can only guess - it's what I would probably
>do.

Well, it's hard to argue too much here :) but really I must. You don't want a
book author who has to figure everything out from scatch - you want somebody who
already knows it. Of course there is a wide range - from a total beginner on one
end, to Kasparov or Anand on the other end - but there is a huge jump up when
you move to someone who is a chess player by profession.

Vas

>
>Peter



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.