chess programmer benefits

[Daniel Shawul]

This is a Henk style question. But I was wondering if any of you programmers have benefited from the skills you developed here elsewhere in your jobs or life. I don't mean the bare satisfaction you get from chasing some obscure objective, I mean money, house or impressing the opposite sex. Scratch that last one ain't gonna happen Is it even safe to mention this in a resume. What does it convey if you did so? That you are some looser who probably will spend work time chasing stupid stuff or that you have something you are passionate about (meaning good). I know some of you 'smart guys' will probably try to extrapolate this , and throw some cheap shots so i say this beforehand to extinguish that satisfaction. Be honest and try and recall if something good came out of your experience here.
Daniel

[Tom Likens]

Hey Daniel,

Yes, it's listed on my resume under "hobbies" near the end. I'm an electrical engineer and I once spent an hour with an interviewer discussing my chess program. He was extremely interested in the algorithms and grokked bitboards almost immediately, (which ironically, made *me* want to work with him). It definitely didn't hurt as I got the job and worked there for a number of years. I'm still friends with the interviewer.

More recently, when I competed in CCT-15 I sent out an email to my entire group (about 40+ engineers) with a link to the web site. The feedback from everyone in the group was very positive and the interest was quite high. One of the more amusing comments I got back from a co-worker was, "Good luck in the tournament with your chess simulator!" Which was appropriate since we run circuit simulators all day long.

If you're in a technical field then I think it's an enhancement to your resume. If you're in finance, probably not so much. One recommendation I'd make though is let the interviewer bring it up or work it in towards the end of the interview, *AFTER* you've established your qualifications for the job.

As for the skills themselves, yes again. It's amazing the amount of programming I do in my job. Although "technically" I'm an analog IC designer, I write tons of python, perl and occasionally C++ code. Programming is programming and if you don't use it, it will atrophy. Chess programming keeps those "muscles" strong.

BTW, I can't speak of its efficacy as an aphrodisiac, but I think I'd keep it to myself for at least the first few dates!

regards,
--tom

[mar]

Actually yes, sort of. I used a zobrist hashing scheme at work when we were trying to construct polygonal approxmation models of rooftops. I could decribe the process in more detail but that would be way OT. This part worked well but in the end we failed (read not happy with the results) and had to move on.

Martin

[michiguel]

This is a Henk style question. But I was wondering if any of you programmers have benefited from the skills you developed here elsewhere in your jobs or life. I don't mean the bare satisfaction you get from chasing some obscure objective, I mean money, house or impressing the opposite sex. Scratch that last one ain't gonna happen Is it even safe to mention this in a resume. What does it convey if you did so? That you are some looser who probably will spend work time chasing stupid stuff or that you have something you are passionate about (meaning good). I know some of you 'smart guys' will probably try to extrapolate this , and throw some cheap shots so i say this beforehand to extinguish that satisfaction. Be honest and try and recall if something good came out of your experience here.
Daniel

Zero.

It is not in my C.V. either, which does not have a hobbies section.

Miguel

[Daniel Shawul]

Tom, that was a nice read. I actually lol-ed at the 'chess simulator' thing. Trying to communicate chess to someone outside this zone can result in some inside giggles. Actually why I asked this is I see this job that has many requirements that any chess programmer who had parallelized a chess engine can do blind fold. They even ask for a phd in a computer science for it because they usually don't find someone from that specific stream to do it. I am thinking to make my chess background not in the hobby's section and am serious about it, don't have computer science certificates to show for it but simply projects i did here and there.
Thanks for the input.

[Daniel Shawul]

Good to know Martin. I am remotely familiar with that subject but surely not qualified for a full time job for it. Just wondering what would be a perfect job for a chess programmer, probably something like programming + whatever background aside from that.

[Daniel Shawul]

Hey you don't have to brag about it Some of us have to fill our CVs with whatever we can get. Remember there is one after zero, and there is a first to everything.

[michiguel]

Hey you don't have to brag about it Some of us have to fill our CVs with whatever we can get. Remember there is one after zero, and there is a first to everything.

In my area it does not help to include hobbies in the CV. Since my job is not related to programming, I cannot get anything useful out of it, even if I wanted. If I feel it could help me, I would not include it in hobbies, but in "artificial intelligence" skills or something a bit more formal.

But then again, my perception of what a private company may be looking for could be completely wrong. In academia things are different.

Miguel

[Henk]

If someone has nothing with chess or worse hates it, chess should be considered a forbidden word.

I saw contracts where it is forbidden to do other work.

So I think its best to keep it a secret, but that's very difficult for me.

All hobbies are a waste of time, but what isn't.

[Daniel Shawul]

Hey you don't have to brag about it Some of us have to fill our CVs with whatever we can get. Remember there is one after zero, and there is a first to everything.

In my area it does not help to include hobbies in the CV. Since my job is not related to programming, I cannot get anything useful out of it, even if I wanted. If I feel it could help me, I would not include it in hobbies, but in "artificial intelligence" skills or something a bit more formal.

But then again, my perception of what a private company may be looking for could be completely wrong. In academia things are different.

Miguel

I am surprised you think so. In fact my thought was it should help even more in academics than anywhere else. There is no such thing as 'doesn't help' if you can communicate it well. If I am not mistaken you are what a layman calls biologist/chemist guy. I hear those are the heaviest users of clusters here though i have no idea what they do with it (cancer research maybe). So my belief is programming skills and hpc stuff should help anyone in academics let alone engineers.