Stockfish 2.0 Available

[Jim Ablett]

Stockfish 2.0 JA (UCI) by The Stockfish Team.

This is somewhat unexpected !


Stockfish 2.0 is available from Jim's site:

http://homepages.tesco.net/henry.ablett/jims.html

Diff stats from 1.9.1 says:

54 files changed, 2130 insertions(+), 2812 deletions(-)

So almost 700 lines of code removed for this release.


Actually we didn't plan to release now, but it happens that our test
framework will be down for a couple of weeks due to new year holidays
and so, instead of just waiting two weeks, we thought it could be more
useful to release.

The release number 2.0 is to be intended as the new year release not
as a much improved version from 1.9.1: we expect some ELO gain but
nothing earth shattering

Among the new user-visible changes we would like to note:

- Maximum allowed threads increased to 16 (it was 8)

- Added new option "Use Sleeping Threads" that modifies how threads
are managed during multi CPU searches. Setting to ON should greatly
help on Hyper Thread enabled machines and _could_ help also for other
SMP cases. It is off by default because is not tested a lot (also
because we don't have big hardware) and results depend on the specific
machine. So to be on the safe side we release 2.0 with the option
disabled (here specific tests by users would be _very_ welcomed and
perhaps there could be some nice surprise especially on powerful
hardware).

- Fixed some bugs in Multi PV (courtesy of Peter Petrov), hopefully
should work now, but please report any bug you may find in this area.


On the technical side :

- We now use RKISS random generator for hash keys (courtesy of Heinz
van Saanen) instead of mersenne, it is as good as the old one and is
much smaller and simpler.

- For people compiling themselves, stockfish 2.0 signature is 7224363.
It means that running from command line 'stockfish bench' you should
get at the end 7224363 searched nodes. If this not happens please
report back, it means SF is miscompiled.


As usual a big thanks to Jim Ablett for his wonderful compiles and a
special thank to the people that allow us to use a powerful testing
framework that has really helped us to speed up development and to
achieve a better code quality overall.

Have fun and happy new year 2011 !
SF Team

[MikeB]

Stockfish 2.0 JA (UCI) by The Stockfish Team.

This is somewhat unexpected !


Stockfish 2.0 is available from Jim's site:

http://homepages.tesco.net/henry.ablett/jims.html

Diff stats from 1.9.1 says:

54 files changed, 2130 insertions(+), 2812 deletions(-)

So almost 700 lines of code removed for this release.


Actually we didn't plan to release now, but it happens that our test
framework will be down for a couple of weeks due to new year holidays
and so, instead of just waiting two weeks, we thought it could be more
useful to release.

The release number 2.0 is to be intended as the new year release not
as a much improved version from 1.9.1: we expect some ELO gain but
nothing earth shattering

Among the new user-visible changes we would like to note:

- Maximum allowed threads increased to 16 (it was 8)

- Added new option "Use Sleeping Threads" that modifies how threads
are managed during multi CPU searches. Setting to ON should greatly
help on Hyper Thread enabled machines and _could_ help also for other
SMP cases. It is off by default because is not tested a lot (also
because we don't have big hardware) and results depend on the specific
machine. So to be on the safe side we release 2.0 with the option
disabled (here specific tests by users would be _very_ welcomed and
perhaps there could be some nice surprise especially on powerful
hardware).

- Fixed some bugs in Multi PV (courtesy of Peter Petrov), hopefully
should work now, but please report any bug you may find in this area.


On the technical side :

- We now use RKISS random generator for hash keys (courtesy of Heinz
van Saanen) instead of mersenne, it is as good as the old one and is
much smaller and simpler.

- For people compiling themselves, stockfish 2.0 signature is 7224363.
It means that running from command line 'stockfish bench' you should
get at the end 7224363 searched nodes. If this not happens please
report back, it means SF is miscompiled.


As usual a big thanks to Jim Ablett for his wonderful compiles and a
special thank to the people that allow us to use a powerful testing
framework that has really helped us to speed up development and to
achieve a better code quality overall.

Have fun and happy new year 2011 !
SF Team

Whoa = what a great treat - thanks very much - is there an Android version available too?

[jpqy]

Wow wow wow..Thank you very much Stockfish team and a Happy New Year 2011!!

JP.

[kgburcham]

Readme file needs to be updated for max cores

Stockfish 2.0 JA (UCI) by The Stockfish Team.

- Maximum allowed threads increased to 16 (it was 8)
SF Team

[Damir]

Hi SF Team

It is very dissapointing you have not included GTB support in this NEW YEAR

Edition.

Happy New Year 2011

[MikeB]

Hi SF Team

It is very dissapointing you have not included GTB support in this NEW YEAR

Edition.

Happy New Year 2011

and Happy Festivus to you too!!

for those who don't know:

Festivus

The holiday, as portrayed in the Seinfeld episode and now celebrated by many, includes practices such as the "Airing of Grievances," which occurs during the Festivus meal and in which each person tells everyone else all the ways they have disappointed him or her over the past year. After the meal the "Feats of Strength" are performed, involving wrestling the head of the household to the floor, with the holiday ending only if the head of the household is actually pinned.

The original holiday featured more peculiar practices, as detailed in the younger Daniel O'Keefe's book The Real Festivus. The book provides a first-person account of an early version of the Festivus holiday as celebrated by the O'Keefe family, and how O'Keefe amended or replaced details of his father's invention to create the Seinfeld episode.[6]

Some people, influenced or inspired by Seinfeld,[1] now celebrate the holiday in varying degrees of seriousness; the beginning of the spread of Festivus is chronicled in the 2005 book Festivus: The Holiday for the Rest of Us by Allen Salkin

[gerold]

Thanks Stockfish team. Got it running now.
Thanks to Jim A for all his work this year.
Happy New Year to all of you.

Gerold.

[Sedat Canbaz]

Stockfish 2.0 JA (UCI) by The Stockfish Team.

This is somewhat unexpected !


Stockfish 2.0 is available from Jim's site:

http://homepages.tesco.net/henry.ablett/jims.html

Diff stats from 1.9.1 says:

54 files changed, 2130 insertions(+), 2812 deletions(-)

So almost 700 lines of code removed for this release.


Actually we didn't plan to release now, but it happens that our test
framework will be down for a couple of weeks due to new year holidays
and so, instead of just waiting two weeks, we thought it could be more
useful to release.

The release number 2.0 is to be intended as the new year release not
as a much improved version from 1.9.1: we expect some ELO gain but
nothing earth shattering

Among the new user-visible changes we would like to note:

- Maximum allowed threads increased to 16 (it was 8)

- Added new option "Use Sleeping Threads" that modifies how threads
are managed during multi CPU searches. Setting to ON should greatly
help on Hyper Thread enabled machines and _could_ help also for other
SMP cases. It is off by default because is not tested a lot (also
because we don't have big hardware) and results depend on the specific
machine. So to be on the safe side we release 2.0 with the option
disabled (here specific tests by users would be _very_ welcomed and
perhaps there could be some nice surprise especially on powerful
hardware).

- Fixed some bugs in Multi PV (courtesy of Peter Petrov), hopefully
should work now, but please report any bug you may find in this area.


On the technical side :

- We now use RKISS random generator for hash keys (courtesy of Heinz
van Saanen) instead of mersenne, it is as good as the old one and is
much smaller and simpler.

- For people compiling themselves, stockfish 2.0 signature is 7224363.
It means that running from command line 'stockfish bench' you should
get at the end 7224363 searched nodes. If this not happens please
report back, it means SF is miscompiled.


As usual a big thanks to Jim Ablett for his wonderful compiles and a
special thank to the people that allow us to use a powerful testing
framework that has really helped us to speed up development and to
achieve a better code quality overall.

Have fun and happy new year 2011 !
SF Team

Dear Jim,

MANY THANKS to Stockfish Team and to you too !!

Happy New Year,
Sedat

[Graham Banks]

Thanks Marco, Jouni, Tord and Jim.
Happy New Year to you all.

[Joerg Oster]

Hi Graham,

I guess you meant Joona, not Jouni ...

A big thank you from me too and a healthy year to all of you!

Joerg