Gaviota EGTB in Houdini 1.5 + contacting Eugene Nalimov

[yanquis1972]

i agree. from what i've heard of this nalimov, i like the gaviota concept quite a bit better, & i'd recommend encouraging both it & a switch. if they don't have the HD space, tell them to buy a thumb drive. i put my nalimovs there in the hope they'd increase speed; whether they did or not, i don't think any damage was done, & now i don't have to worry about redownloading them if my computer gets wiped.

anyway, as someone whose work rests on the shoulders of giants, i think you should support a free-for-all path, which is what GTB represents...would also love to see robbobase implementation in perhaps a future version. with houdini's already very solid endgame knowledge, tablebases + bitbases that could be accessed from RAM far earlier & much faster would create a real endgame monster. and if you feel enough have upgraded to the bit/tablebases, some knowledge could presumably be cut out to speed search or move to other areas.

please keep at it & prove the skeptics (i'm one of them!) wrong --

john

[Denzwell]

Hi Robert,

According to your post we can have a new version of Houdini in December. Please, Could you tell us approximately when ?

[Houdini]

Max, the plan is to release it sometime this month, but it's difficult for me to be more precise.

[tomgdrums]

Max, the plan is to release it sometime this month, but it's difficult for me to be more precise.

Will Houdini ever have the limit strength feature?

Thanks!

[George Tsavdaris]

No need to waste your time on Mr Nalimov, it is very unlikely he will reply to your posts. You will have to go through Fire and Water if you want an answer from him...

A phone call can settle this in 5 minutes, one just needs the right phone number...

It is not that simple or easy as it seems.. If I remember it correctly, it took Raimund Heid ( author of Protector ) couple of months before Nalimov gave the permission to use his code... He was thinking of giving up. If you don't believe me, you can ask him. Nalimov enjoy in pure pleasure and delight to see people on their knees begging.. I doubt it's what you have in mind. No need to give greedy, selfish Nalimov capitalist such an enjoyment, when you can do it without. What kind of a person would ask for restrictions for using his code? Either the code is free for all to use it, or it's not. It is simple as that...

I think the story is slightly different than what you describe.

It seems that Nalimov is just very busy with other things than computer Chess so it's rather extra difficult to contact him, rather than the thing you describe of him just want to torture people and want to see them begging on his knees.

[Houdini]

Will Houdini ever have the limit strength feature?

Hi Tom, not in the next release, but I never say never.

[M ANSARI]

I think the best solution would be a mix of bitbases and EGTB's. Problem with EGTB's is that they slow down search, which could be counterproductive. With bitbases you can have the information of only win lose or draw, which could fit in much faster RAM. Once you get a good hit then you can revert to slower EGTB's as by then speed would not be a factor. I think Shredder is using such a system and it seems to give quite a boost in ELO gain to the engine.

I have looked at the Gaviota interview and it seems that this is a compromise between bitbases and EGTB's and maybe that is the best solution. I have not seen it in action but it looks interesting.

[Alex Lobanov]

Problem with EGTB's is that they slow down search, which could be counterproductive.

Buy a SSD drive, and will not be a problem.

Купите SSD диск и не будет проблемы.