New engine releases

[Graham Banks]

Thank Tony. The exe says it is v2.2.4, though.

That's a typo.

I have seen many times that, out of inattention, a new engine gets the previous version number but this is the first time I see an old engine get a new, higher version number.

I'm using Jim's 2.23 compiles without any issues that I can recall.
I use it as a wb1 engine with -h 256 on the command line.

[tpoppins]

I don't think this 'release' is very useful. Jim fixed a few things IIRC in his compilation 2.23 from 2009.
(The 'move' w/o a move thing at least is not there in 2.23JA, but WB doesn't complain for this BTW)

It's there even in the JA build when you feed it book moves. By hacking the 2.23 exec directly and routing its output through InBetween with some custom filters I was able to get the JA build to work under Cute Chess. Ah, then I found it doesn't bother with the "q" suffix on promotions to queen. OK, WB2UCI fixes that.

With the 2.24 exec I got stuck at the book stage. I can make it play from the startpos but it won't accept any book moves. Looks like it doesn't obey force and starts calculating as soon as the first book move is passed to it.

Of course, seeing the other issues listed by Guenther I suppose the above is just minor annoyances.



BTW, just because WB doesn't complain about gratuitous "move"s doesn't make throwing them around like this right or CECP-compliant. The CECP v2 spec says:

BASIC GAME DIALOG (ENGINE-to-GUI)
move MOVE

Specifies the move the engine plays for the side it is playing for.

If a GUI receives from an engine a "move" without an actual move the GUI is fully justified in treating it as invalid input.
Sorry for the rant.

[Guenther]

BTW, just because WB doesn't complain about gratuitous "move"s doesn't make throwing them around like this right or CECP-compliant. The CECP v2 spec says:

BASIC GAME DIALOG (ENGINE-to-GUI)
move MOVE

Specifies the move the engine plays for the side it is playing for.

If a GUI receives from an engine a "move" without an actual move the GUI is fully justified in treating it as invalid input.
Sorry for the rant.

I know, I just mentioned it for completeness. No idea why WB allows it, may be they (Edit: Tim Mann for that period)
made already an exception for the very old Monik 2.11. (if it does the same, I don't remember)
At that time people were grateful for each new working xb program - uci wasn't even invented

[tpoppins]

Ha! that makes me and Cute Chess devs spoiled brats.

[Norbert Raimund Leisner]

Sylvain wrote to me yesterday:
"Je ne connais pas cutechess. Est-ce que ça utilise la même interface que xboard?
Je n'ai pas beaucoup de temps libre pour travailller sur Monik. Je vais essayer de regarder ça en fin de semaine."

Conclusion: Wait a little bit. He has not enough spare time to work at Monik.
He will look at this problem and try it out at the weekend.

Best wishes,
Norbert

P.S.: Does Monik 2.2.4 x64 show the same behaviour under Arena, ChessGUI, Scid vs. PC or WinBoard Interface?

[Gabor Szots]

Sylvain wrote to me yesterday:
"Je ne connais pas cutechess. Est-ce que ça utilise la même interface que xboard?
Je n'ai pas beaucoup de temps libre pour travailller sur Monik. Je vais essayer de regarder ça en fin de semaine."

Conclusion: Wait a little bit. He has not enough spare time to work at Monik.
He will look at this problem and try it out at the weekend.

Best wishes,
Norbert

P.S.: Does Monik 2.2.4 x64 show the same behaviour under Arena, ChessGUI, Scid vs. PC or WinBoard Interface?

Thanks Norbert. Let's hope Sylvain can get it right.

[Norbert Raimund Leisner]

Hello,
Sylvain had obviously success with Monik Mac OS version and CuteChess.
"J'ai fait quelques corrections. J'ai testé avec Cutechess sur Mac et ça fonctionne bien maintenant."

Norbert

[Norbert Raimund Leisner]

Squared Chess 1.2.1 Mac OS by Dariusz https://www.solidfiles.com/v/8GwzvadaVqKP5
LCZero 0.18.0 https://github.com/LeelaChessZero/lc0/releases

[Norbert Raimund Leisner]

Hello,
Sylvain had obviously success with Monik Mac OS version and CuteChess.
"J'ai fait quelques corrections. J'ai testé avec Cutechess sur Mac et ça fonctionne bien maintenant."

v2.2.6 cf. https://github.com/slacombe/monik/blob/ ... ez-moi.txt

Norbert

[Guenther]

not yet mentioned here and at CCW:

ProDeo 2.9
Apollo 1.21
Pychess (engine) 20190928)

Moreover there is new download 'release.zip' at Tony Mokonens new site since today, which contains
a program called Montego - need to check first what it is though...

Edit:
(probably soon to come Donna 4.1)