Free Playchess accounts for original engine authors

[Albert Silver]

Before anything, I want to be clear that the use of the term original, is not the standard some have here, but is simply to avoid requests by anyone compiling yet another IPPO (for example).

If you are an engine author and would like a full-fledged account in Playchess, here is what you need to do:

1) Via Fritz or the free Playchess client, create an account using the formula "Comp <name of engine>" or "Engine <name of engine>"

2) Fill in the account info with your name and email (required).

3) Email holger.lieske AT chessbase DOT de explaining you are an engine author. If for any reason you do not get an answer, or have a problem, send me an email to silvertongued AT gmail DOT com

[JuLieN]

Excellent initiative! Thanks Albert and everyone involved!

[Rebel]

Thanks Albert for the service. Not sure if Playchess is a healthy place for me One question and perhaps I am missing the obvious, how to download (interesting) games? Does Playchess offer something like FICS?

http://ficsgames.org/download.html

[Richard Allbert]

Nice idea

Richard

[Albert Silver]

Thanks Albert for the service. Not sure if Playchess is a healthy place for me One question and perhaps I am missing the obvious, how to download (interesting) games? Does Playchess offer something like FICS?

http://ficsgames.org/download.html

I do not know of any search system for games played in Playchess. It has existed, but there were issues with abuse.

Regarding WWW access for viewing (only guest access) there is

http://www.chesslive.de/playchess/

And of course the web-based database search (not for Playchess games though)

http://www.chesslive.de/

[Roman Hartmann]

A few years ago a fellow from Germany got permission to run my engine in the main hall on the playchess server. I don't remember exactly which version it was but the engine was still in very early stage and played rather spectacular chess as the quiescent search was not yet implemented. It was rather fun to watch those games. At least much more fun than to watch a game between two engines. Some human player were really quick in discovering flaws in the engine play and could take advantage of that after just a few games.

But for some reason the anti-cheating software on the Playchess-server went havoc and flagged the engine account as being human over and over again. Somehow the software used to detect cheating obviously couldn't deal with a horrible playing engine. It was rather annoying to have the account enabled again and again so we stopped playing the engine there.

But anyway the Fritz-Gui and the Playchess server are quite nice and it's definitely fun to watch your engine play there.

Roman

[Albert Silver]

I just wanted to welcome the authors who have taken up the offer so far (there is no deadline BTW):

Comp Raptor
Comp Rebel
Engine Bouquet
Engine Jabba
Engine Big Lion
Engine Telepath
Engine Nemo
Engine Sjeng

and say that I look forward to watching them.

Cheers!

[JBNielsen]

I just wanted to welcome the authors who have taken up the offer so far (there is no deadline BTW):

Comp Raptor
Comp Rebel
Engine Bouquet
Engine Jabba
Engine Big Lion
Engine Telepath
Engine Nemo
Engine Sjeng

and say that I look forward to watching them.

Cheers!

I would like my engine Dabbaba to join this.
But I am not quite sure how much I have to do myself?!

I have just made a DabbaFun version of it that has an amusing style of play for human opponents.
Look here: http://talkchess.com/forum/viewtopic.ph ... 77&t=47165
And here: http://talkchess.com/forum/viewtopic.ph ... 65&t=47165
(I need a few human testers, btw)

Could they both join?

[Albert Silver]

I just wanted to welcome the authors who have taken up the offer so far (there is no deadline BTW):

Comp Raptor
Comp Rebel
Engine Bouquet
Engine Jabba
Engine Big Lion
Engine Telepath
Engine Nemo
Engine Sjeng

and say that I look forward to watching them.

Cheers!

I would like my engine Dabbaba to join this.
But I am not quite sure how much I have to do myself?!

I have just made a DabbaFun version of it that has an amusing style of play for human opponents.
Look here: http://talkchess.com/forum/viewtopic.ph ... 77&t=47165
And here: http://talkchess.com/forum/viewtopic.ph ... 65&t=47165
(I need a few human testers, btw)

Could they both join?

Preferably, it would be one account unless they are completely different engines. If DabbaFun is a flavor of Dabba, you can always add it in the profile notes when running it. Also, the server will use the UCI identifier so it would help show which engine was which.

In any case, by all means come and run it in Playchess.

Albert

[velmarin]

In the account you can change the engine when you want, if you use book, ect.
But do not think I can play with the engine out of the "Engine Room", is strictly prohibited.

I think so.