Hi Joshua, Yes, I think it was implicitly understood that these chess competitions were about creating the best chess playing (non-human) entity. However human nature being what it is we attach the author to the program and judge the author through his program.
However, if you create a really strong program even on modest hardware, opportunities open up. Some company, or in my case a university, will approach you and give you some support. - Don On Thu, 2009-01-15 at 00:16 -0500, Joshua Shriver wrote: > When I was big into Chess programming this was a sore topic for me as > well. I felt it was unfair for people competing in the WCCC to win if > they had a cluster of of 100 PCs, a Cray, etc, when another person > was using a P200mhz. > > I believe it was Dr. Hyatt that said this and it made a lot of sense > to me "It's not just about creating the best chess program, it's > creating the best playing machine" > > So when you look at competitions that dont have hardware limits, you > can't look at it like Engine X is the best in the world. You have to > look at it like Engine X + this hardware setup is the best in the > world; and take it with a grain of salt. > > Even if you did set hardware limits, it would be a hard task. Even if > it's just a single PC do you use single core or multicore? Multicore > would help those who have parallelized their code but hurt others. Is > it fair? There's no real line that can be drawn, because on the flip > side I wouldnt find it fair if I had written a parallel engine and > spent all that time and effort to only be limited to 1 core. > > Just my $0.02. > -Josh > > > > For now I tend to be of the opinion that in competitions, one > should be able to bring your own hardware or run on standard > hardware provided by organizers. The restriction that the > hardware be physically present allows for enough flexibility > that people or teams can try different set-ups (like a row of > PS3s) while avoiding having people with access to a big > cluster compete with people who only have access to a PC. > > But similarly to the competition of building the most powerful > computer in the world, I can see room for a competition > between big clusters that play Go as well. One doesn't have to > be to the exclusion of the other. Think of car-racing. You > have drag-racing where they use rockets to cross half a mile > as fast as possible and you have F1-racing where the > 'hardware' is constrained within certain limits. > > _______________________________________________ > computer-go mailing list > computer-go@computer-go.org > http://www.computer-go.org/mailman/listinfo/computer-go/ _______________________________________________ computer-go mailing list computer-go@computer-go.org http://www.computer-go.org/mailman/listinfo/computer-go/
