Final, definitive Post about Nelson....

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Fernando
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Post by Fernando »

Reinfeld wrote:Hello, friends. Sorry for butting in and being absent. Great thread.

I agree that Igor/GM plays a strange but strong game. I am trying to find an analogy to describe it, and I don't have moves in hand to support my position; these are just impressions, without discussing the Nelson/Horvath question.

We have lots of measurements, but it's tough to measure feel, as in the way it feels to sit down and play these machines in a screw-around way, perhaps armed with a cooling beverage, hanging with Fernando and Thorsten.

1. Igor/GM is crudely materialistic. In this sense, it does seem to differ from the Horvath program in Systema Challenge, a more passive player to my eye.

Another way to say it - Challenge feels wimpy. It plays not to lose. Igor/GM doesn't do this. It swings wild, tries to counter and punch you in the mouth, but it recovers from misses. Igor seems to have different priorities - more like aggressive, anti-positional liquidation, but without vision.

2. Igor/GM doesn't play the pleasingly silly, speculative moves I associate with Kittinger machines. Nor does it have the steamrolling, pitiless quality of Spracklen machines, or the whiplash tricks of Morsch. It shows nothing like the anti-provocative style of Lang machines, and it is not well-rounded like Schroder, who is beginning to be my favorite programmer.

3. In style, Igor/GM reminds me most of another crude program I've never seen mentioned here: The Oak Systems engine for Kindle, a pretty simple player, recently jacked up with an opening book. This software is a dumb brute, especially at lower levels. It almost always takes material when offered, at the expense of position. Igor feels more sophisticated, but the approach is similar.

Now, despite my promise, an attempt to address the Horvath theory. Random thoughts, no particular order:

a. I've weighed in on this lingering debate elsewhere, noticing housing and level tuning similarities between Horvath/Challenge/Regency and Igor, but I think Nick's old argument suggesting that Igor is a re-tuned Horvath with more aggressive priorities makes a certain amount of sense.

b. What one wants to know is similarity, right? isn't that the point? How to find out? How to be sure?

c. We have pure hardware tests based on non-book moves (for instance, Steve, long ago, showed me the way to measure which model of Excellence I owned by starting with 1. f3 and measuring response time.)

d. We have Nick's ever-evolving clone test, which sets a threshold of 90 percent similarity while demonstrating conclusively that known machines of similar strength by different programmers indeed behave differently.

e. We have test suites based on positions. When I look at Wiki-Elo, I see no Colditz test results for Igor/GM. I see a set for Challenge/Regency/Legend II, however. Surely running a Colditz test on Igor/GM isn't too much trouble? No BT test results, either, though I recognize those are better for stronger machines.

f. The strong Excalibur machines add to that voluminous, vague ELO level of 1750-1800+, where some of our most beloved machines reside. And they all have the same tedious tendency to suck at endgames, where the horizon gets too long.

g. Is there an unexplored testing possibility here? A group of endgames beyond the horizon effect that would show the differing tendencies of the Excalibur machines (and others?) In other words, what is the choice these machines make when no clear choice exists? Any juice here?

- R.

I just realized a simple explanation to explain this GM enigma, this strength associated with old materialistic approach, etc. I think that is what happens when simple full width search is capable of going beyond the limit of 5 ply that was the average for middle game in old challenger by Nelson and others.
Even more; those old machines did not performed full wodth search. Many many years ago I asked the people of Fidelity about his searching techniques for Chess Challenger 7 and to my surprise I received an answer from the engineers -perhaps even from Nelson- with a diagram about that. I recall it vaguely, but by example in level 5 or 7, the scheme was full-full-5-3-2 or something of the sort, meaning full width just in the first two or three ply and then prunning until reachin 5 ot 6 ply.
With a lot faster processor and lot more memory GM can do brute force search many times more effective than that, more than 2 or 3 ply, perhaps 5 or 6, which in the old Zylog 80 processor with almost no RAM for some hash tables was not posible. So you are tactically lot more strong BUT still you exude the same air of the old models with lesser power because the evaluation still is centered in materialistic values.

Fern
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mclane
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Post by mclane »

What I wanted to show is that igor/grandmaster has something in the program/engine that the others can't handle very good.

I don't know if it is search depth, neither igor nor GM shows search info while computing. We can only guess it.
But it is strong enough to compete with strong dedicated chess computers.

The playing style is neither morsch, nor horvath or any other I know. And it is also not the playing style of the Einstein chess wizard engine or the phantom force. There btw. We have information about search depth and evals and it plays very different. Igor/grandmaster play materialistic, but not as materialistic then Einstein chess wizard / phantom force.
Last edited by mclane on Mon Jun 29, 2015 3:46 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Fernando
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Post by Fernando »

mclane wrote:What I wanted to show is that igor/grandmaster has something in the program/engine that the others can't handle very good.

I don't know if it is search depth, neither igor nor GM shows search info while computing. We can only guess it.
But it is strong enough to compete with strong dedicated chess computers.
A way to see the depth reached in a lapse of time is to set mate problems.
A 3 moves mate need 6 ply and so on. So if discovered, perhaps that shows by implication the depth reached.
Just an idea probably wrong...

Fern
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Post by mclane »

Yes true.but Little Boring.
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SirDave
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Post by SirDave »

Reinfeld wrote:Hello, friends. Sorry for butting in and being absent. Great thread.

I agree that Igor/GM plays a strange but strong game. I am trying to find an analogy to describe it, and I don't have moves in hand to support my position; these are just impressions, without discussing the Nelson/Horvath question.

We have lots of measurements, but it's tough to measure feel, as in the way it feels to sit down and play these machines in a screw-around way, perhaps armed with a cooling beverage, hanging with Fernando and Thorsten.

1. Igor/GM is crudely materialistic. In this sense, it does seem to differ from the Horvath program in Systema Challenge, a more passive player to my eye.

Another way to say it - Challenge feels wimpy. It plays not to lose. Igor/GM doesn't do this. It swings wild, tries to counter and punch you in the mouth, but it recovers from misses. Igor seems to have different priorities - more like aggressive, anti-positional liquidation, but without vision.

2. Igor/GM doesn't play the pleasingly silly, speculative moves I associate with Kittinger machines. Nor does it have the steamrolling, pitiless quality of Spracklen machines, or the whiplash tricks of Morsch. It shows nothing like the anti-provocative style of Lang machines, and it is not well-rounded like Schroder, who is beginning to be my favorite programmer.

3. In style, Igor/GM reminds me most of another crude program I've never seen mentioned here: The Oak Systems engine for Kindle, a pretty simple player, recently jacked up with an opening book. This software is a dumb brute, especially at lower levels. It almost always takes material when offered, at the expense of position. Igor feels more sophisticated, but the approach is similar.

Now, despite my promise, an attempt to address the Horvath theory. Random thoughts, no particular order:

a. I've weighed in on this lingering debate elsewhere, noticing housing and level tuning similarities between Horvath/Challenge/Regency and Igor, but I think Nick's old argument suggesting that Igor is a re-tuned Horvath with more aggressive priorities makes a certain amount of sense.

b. What one wants to know is similarity, right? isn't that the point? How to find out? How to be sure?

c. We have pure hardware tests based on non-book moves (for instance, Steve, long ago, showed me the way to measure which model of Excellence I owned by starting with 1. f3 and measuring response time.)

d. We have Nick's ever-evolving clone test, which sets a threshold of 90 percent similarity while demonstrating conclusively that known machines of similar strength by different programmers indeed behave differently.

e. We have test suites based on positions. When I look at Wiki-Elo, I see no Colditz test results for Igor/GM. I see a set for Challenge/Regency/Legend II, however. Surely running a Colditz test on Igor/GM isn't too much trouble? No BT test results, either, though I recognize those are better for stronger machines.

f. The strong Excalibur machines add to that voluminous, vague ELO level of 1750-1800+, where some of our most beloved machines reside. And they all have the same tedious tendency to suck at endgames, where the horizon gets too long.

g. Is there an unexplored testing possibility here? A group of endgames beyond the horizon effect that would show the differing tendencies of the Excalibur machines (and others?) In other words, what is the choice these machines make when no clear choice exists? Any juice here?

- R.
Reinfeld: just wanted to say what an impressive post that is. It takes considerable time & trouble to put together such well thought out points & ideas.

Perry Mason Regards,
Dave
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mclane
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Post by mclane »

The Igor / GM is no Styled horvath. This is nonsense.
The Programs are completely different, from the usage and from the behaviour.
I have done styling on the horvath.
The programs are different.
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Post by Fernando »

mclane wrote:The Igor / GM is no Styled horvath. This is nonsense.
The Programs are completely different, from the usage and from the behavior.
I have done styling on the horvath.
The programs are different.
As I said above: the mystery of stronger Excalibur by Nelson comps. comes from same code or similar but running in vastly better hardware.
Going from 4-5 ply in middle game to 6-7 makes a great difference in force and even looks like a "style".

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JMark
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Post by JMark »

There are actually two different Igor machines. Igor Model 711 and Igor Model 711-2. The later has an openings trainer and grandmaster games much like the GM. It also has a random on/off setting and a FAST setting which I believe has to do with selective search/brute force. The 711-2 has rotating info when the machine is playing which shows depth and other info much like Alexandria. Igor I & II are very different.
mclane wrote:What I wanted to show is that igor/grandmaster has something in the program/engine that the others can't handle very good.

I don't know if it is search depth, neither igor nor GM shows search info while computing. We can only guess it.
But it is strong enough to compete with strong dedicated chess computers.

The playing style is neither morsch, nor horvath or any other I know. And it is also not the playing style of the Einstein chess wizard engine or the phantom force. There btw. We have information about search depth and evals and it plays very different. Igor/grandmaster play materialistic, but not as materialistic then Einstein chess wizard / phantom force.
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Post by mclane »

The Igor I refer to has no rotating info and no info during computation.
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Post by mclane »

So my Igor is 711E.

I have no different Igor. I guess the other Igor must have a program
Like the Einstein chess wizard or the phantom force. They have rotating information about evaluation, search depth etc.

This is a different program then the 711 is.

One can proof this by looking on the evaluation, Einstein chess wizard and phantom force show evaluation from point of view of the opponent, no matter if they compute or wait for the move. This is very unique and helps to identify,
Normally computers show their evaluation from own point of view or do it like fritz and chess base GUI are doing it: + means for white and - means for black,
Novag switches point of views depending if it computes or awaits move.
What seems like a fairy tale today may be reality tomorrow.
Here we have a fairy tale of the day after tomorrow....
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