Firenzina 2.2.2 xTreme, a clone of Fire 2.2 xTreme

[Gusev]

I tested the recent advice of Jose Velasco and decided to clone Fire. The following famous quote is attributed to Thomas Edison: “Many of life's failures are people who did not realize how close they were to success when they gave up.” While Kranium (Norman Schmidt) is not a failure, it now appears that he discontinued open-source development of Fire on the verge of a significant success, at least among open-source engines. It makes little sense to test old compiles of Fire. Instead, please test Firenzina 2.2.2 xTreme, its faster clone. I created it and made available at http://dgusev.cs.edinboro.edu/GameDev/C ... nzina.html. The sources are just a little different from Kranium's. They are available, too.
At this point, only a 64-bit binary for computers that support SSE4.2 is released.
I fully understand how little credit I deserve. However, having seen at TCEC how Stockfish suffered on two occasions from the lack of EGTB support, I feel that this dormant open-source project needs to be revived for the benefit of the chess programming community. If you would like to contribute, please let me know. As far as testing is concerned, the main opponents of interest to me are the open-source Stockfish, Gull II, and IvanHoe 999946h. For testing / best performance(?), please set Firenzina's Max_Threads equal to the number of CPUs (say, 8 for a hyperthreaded quad). Criticism and suggestions are welcome! My experiments with Stockfish and Gull strongly suggest that a better set of compiler options exists than the one that I quickly came up with. This is a low hanging fruit, can as well go after it first?.. Requests to compile for other equipment configurations are welcome, too!

[carldaman]

Thank you, Dmitri. Nice that some folks still have a strong interest in the Fire engine.

Regards,
CL

[jpqy]

Thanks Dmitri,

But when i want to start in console it ask first for "msvcr110.dll"
when i put this dll file in same folder and start again ,i get this error:

"The applcication was unable to start correctly (0xc000007b). Click OK to close the application."

Jean-Paul.

[velmarin]

Here is a compilation no exclusive to Intel. popcnt x64 only.
Beta, the author is responsible for expanding it in more compilations.
Compilation universal static linking.

Dmitry also have the visual project, is how I usually compile,
Intel IPPs Nothing unique, nothing of Q / paralell, I think console only gives low performance, none of those things.

MFC and paralell MT in Static linking, so we do not need separate dlls.


I hope for support.
http://www.mediafire.com/?fnb5bcwbe1ou7pl

[Tomcass]

Thanks, Dimitri!.

Let's start testing your new compile. Jose Maria version works well in my computers.

Tom.

[jpqy]

Core i7 2670QM @2.2Ghz .Blitz 5m,

1 Firenzina_2.2.2pop64 4c ½½½½0½½1½½ 5.0/10 25.00
2 Fire 2.2 xTreme TrII intel x6 ½½½½1½½0½½ 5.0/10 25.00

This one works ,Thanks Jose

JP.

[kranium]

Hi Dimitri-

did it really need a whole new fork and new engine name, etc. ?
the only real code changes are the inclusion of and compile w/ Intel intrinsics...
it's basically Fire 2.2 recompiled a bit faster just like Fire 2.2 GH, Fire 2.2Q, Fire 2.2Tr, etc.

oh well, that being said...
thanks much for respecting the GPL and releasing the source (unlike the compiles mentioned above)
and 'cudos', you deserve much credit for being so forthcoming and informative concerning the origins and subsequent changes

good luck with any future releases
Norm

[Gusev]

Jose,

I tried to download your compile, but encountered the following message:

The file you attempted to download is an archive that is damaged or possibly encrypted. MediaFire does not support unlimited downloads of broken or encrypted archives and the limit for this file has been reached. This file may only be distributed from a premium account.

I also realize that another person downloaded successfully. What am I doing wrong?

BTW, yes, I do have a regular MSVC compile as well, I can make it available, it just seems to give lower node counts than the Intel one. Thank you very much for your help!

Dmitri

[Gusev]

Dear Norm,

I totally agree with what you wrote. And yes, I respect the GPL. The decision to fork and rename was based on the following factors.

1. It seemed pointless to ask for your permission to continue Fire under its last name, given that you chose to discontinue it and work on RobboLito. I totally respect your decison! But the GPL allows to proceed without such a permission, appropriately so. This is part of the open-source ideology.

2. Then it looked like it was more appropriate to rename the continuation of the project. Besides, this way you can resume Fire under its old name at any time if you choose to do so, without any confusion. And if you happen to choose to contribute to the Firenzina fork, that will be greatly appreciated and promptly acknowledged.

3. Historically, the project was renamed from FireBird to Fire before, in order to avoid confusion with the database management system, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Firebird_% ... _server%29. Mozilla acted likewise earlier, when they renamed their browser from Firebird to Firefox. So Fire was not the first name choice. I hope it won't be missed much if not continued.

4. Then I consciously chose another name similar to Fire, with an allusion to Renaissance ("rebirth"), in which the city of Florence (Firenze, pronounced [fiˈrɛntse]) played an important role. Now, Firenze is also a name of a centaur in the Harry Potter series, and Firenza was once an Oldsmobile model. If you google the name selected, I hope you'll agree that I chose wisely enough. I found that Firenzina is a brand of very expensive Italian shoes for women and was once a name of a thoroughbred. Firenzina is also mentioned in Italian political articles, apparently as an informal alternative name for Florence. This use traces back to the XIX c., at least. The name is also close to "Fire engine".

5. Roberto Pescatore might appreciate the renaming.

Best regards,
Dmitri

[velmarin]

limelinx :
http://limelinx.com/bhn6e