Fizbo 1.5 released

[Graham Banks]

From the author:

1. I switched it to UCI protocol: this should make it more compatible with modern chess interfaces.I tried running it under cutechess-cli, Winboard, Arena, ChessGUI - they all worked. I implemented all UCI commands, except for debug mode and search with parameters "searchmoves/depth/nodes/mate/movetime". These are not used in actual games, so it should not cause any problems.

2. I made various improvements, mostly to search. As a result playing strength should be improved by around 40 ELO. I ran a match of 400 games, Fizbo1.5/1 CPU vs Fizbo1.4/1 CPU, 40 moves in 4 minutes, 256 Mb hash; result was +38 ELO.

3. i think i fixed the bug in parallel search: i still don't know what the bug was, but i made many changes to parallel search and the bug does not seem to occur anymore. I ran a match of 200 games, Fizbo1.5/4 CPU vs Fizbo1.4/1 CPU, 40 moves in 4 minutes, 512 Mb hash; result was +111 ELO. So strength increase due to using 4 CPUs was +73 ELO - not great, but reasonable.

Youri.

https://sites.google.com/site/fizbochessengine/

[Werner]

Thanks Youri and Graham,
when I start the engine inside command prompt I see:

Found 0 syzygy tablebases.
Found 0 syzygy tablebases.
uci
id name Fizbo 1.5
id author Youri Matiounine
option name Threads type spin default 1 min 1 max 60
option name Hash type spin default 128 min 1 max 16384
option name NalimovPath type string default c:\
option name Ponder type check default false
uciok

So what settings work: syzygy or Nalimov and how?
Can you please contact Youri ?

best wishes
Werner

[Jamal Bubker]

Thanks Youri for releasing a new version and ported it to uci protocol
Thanks Graham too for reporting this new release

[Graham Banks]

Thanks Youri and Graham,
when I start the engine inside command prompt I see:

Found 0 syzygy tablebases.
Found 0 syzygy tablebases.
uci
id name Fizbo 1.5
id author Youri Matiounine
option name Threads type spin default 1 min 1 max 60
option name Hash type spin default 128 min 1 max 16384
option name NalimovPath type string default c:\
option name Ponder type check default false
uciok

So what settings work: syzygy or Nalimov and how?
Can you please contact Youri ?

best wishes
Werner

I will do that. It's been causing headaches for me as well.
It should be named SyzygyPath and not NalimovPath.

[Charly]

Many thanks to Youri for this updated version !

I don't know if he reads here but it will play in my Karpov league, and I can't wait to see the games !

Good luck for this release.

[SzG]

Thanks Youri and Graham,
when I start the engine inside command prompt I see:

Found 0 syzygy tablebases.
Found 0 syzygy tablebases.
uci
id name Fizbo 1.5
id author Youri Matiounine
option name Threads type spin default 1 min 1 max 60
option name Hash type spin default 128 min 1 max 16384
option name NalimovPath type string default c:\
option name Ponder type check default false
uciok

So what settings work: syzygy or Nalimov and how?
Can you please contact Youri ?

best wishes
Werner

I will do that. It's been causing headaches for me as well.
It should be named SyzygyPath and not NalimovPath.

I'm not in the position to try it right now but can't you give it your syzygy path and see if it can see them? If not, do the same with your Nalimov path.
If it can see either of them, set up a 5-man position and ask it to analyze then you'll see whether it uses them or not.

[ThatsIt]

Thanks Youri and Graham,
when I start the engine inside command prompt I see:

Found 0 syzygy tablebases.
Found 0 syzygy tablebases.
uci
id name Fizbo 1.5
id author Youri Matiounine
option name Threads type spin default 1 min 1 max 60
option name Hash type spin default 128 min 1 max 16384
option name NalimovPath type string default c:\
option name Ponder type check default false
uciok

So what settings work: syzygy or Nalimov and how?
Can you please contact Youri ?

best wishes
Werner

I will do that. It's been causing headaches for me as well.
It should be named SyzygyPath and not NalimovPath.

Inside the code of Fizbo you can find:
H:/SyzygyTablebases
this causes the problems.
I've changed that with an Hex-Editor
into: D:/ ...

Best wishes,
G.S.

[Graham Banks]

Thanks Youri and Graham,
when I start the engine inside command prompt I see:

Found 0 syzygy tablebases.
Found 0 syzygy tablebases.
uci
id name Fizbo 1.5
id author Youri Matiounine
option name Threads type spin default 1 min 1 max 60
option name Hash type spin default 128 min 1 max 16384
option name NalimovPath type string default c:\
option name Ponder type check default false
uciok

So what settings work: syzygy or Nalimov and how?
Can you please contact Youri ?

best wishes
Werner

I will do that. It's been causing headaches for me as well.
It should be named SyzygyPath and not NalimovPath.

Inside the code of Fizbo you can find:
H:/SyzygyTablebases
this causes the problems.
I've changed that with an Hex-Editor
into: D:/ ...

Best wishes,
G.S.

Thanks.
I've pointed this out to Youri as well.

[ThatsIt]

Another problem: too many time losses @ level xy move in zz time repeated !
I got 8 within only 200 games.

Best wishes,
G.S.

[Werner]

Another problem: too many time losses @ level xy move in zz time repeated !
I got 8 within only 200 games.
Best wishes,
G.S.

example

Werner

[Event "40 Züge in 10 min"]
[Site "fizbo2, I7"]
[Date "2015.08.18"]
[Round "50.1"]
[White "Cheng 4.39 x64 1CPU"]
[Black "Fizbo 1.5 x64"]
[Result "1-0"]

1. e4 c5 2. Nf3 d6 3. d4 cxd4 4. Nxd4 Nf6 5. Nc3 a6 6. Be2
e5 7. Nb3 Be7 8. Qd3 O-O 9. O-O Be6 10. Be3 Nbd7 11. Nd5
Bxd5 12. exd5 Rc8 13. c4 Ne8 14. Qd2 f5 15. g3 Nef6
{+0.12/19 24s} 16. Qb4 {+0.18/18 16s (f3)} Rc7 {0.00/18 24s
(b6)} 17. Rad1 {+0.25/19 24s (f3)} Qc8 {0.00/20 42s} 18. f3
{+0.27/19 17s (Tde1)} f4 {-0.23/19 24s (g6)} 19. gxf4
{+0.49/19 21s (Lf2)} exf4 {+0.39/20 23s (Sh5)} 20. Bxf4
{+0.31/20 14s} Nh5 {+0.43/21 18s} 21. Bg3 {+0.31/22 25s
(Le3)} Nxg3 {+0.40/20 31s (Sf4)} 22. hxg3 {+0.57/23 25s}
Ne5 {+0.43/20 13s} 23. Qe1 {+0.49/22 44s} Bd8 {0.00/20 39s}
24. c5 {+0.51/21 24s} Re8 {0.00/20 8s} 25. Qf2 {+0.39/19
21s (f4)} Nd7 {+0.15/21 21s} 26. c6 {+0.34/21 19s (Tfe1)}
bxc6 {-0.08/20 14s} 27. Rde1 {+0.37/21 23s} Rf8 {-0.30/20
14s} 28. Bc4 {+0.47/21 19s} Kh8 {-0.10/21 17s (Sf6)}
29. Kg2 {+0.38/21 19s} h6 {+0.05/20 17s (Lf6)} 30. Qe2
{+0.91/20 22s (Sd4)} cxd5 {-0.18/20 14s} 31. Bxa6 {+0.64/24
26s} Qa8 {-0.29/21 34s} 32. Bd3 {+0.26/20 18s (Lb5)} Qxa2
{-0.33/21 25s} 33. Nd4 {+0.47/24 26s} Rb7 {-0.26/21 12s}
34. Bb5 {+0.50/23 18s} Qa5 {-0.04/20 14s} 35. Ne6 {+0.49/22
23s (Lc6)} Rxb5 {Buch 0s (Dxb5)} 36. Nxf8 {+0.35/23 25s}
Nxf8 {Buch 0s} 37. Ra1 {+0.12/25 21s} Qb6 {0.00/25 18s}
38. Qe8 {+0.16/26 31s} Rxb2+ {+0.86/24 2:25m} 39. Kh3
{+0.60/26 34s time} 1-0