Gerd Isenberg wrote:With hindsight - after Vasik's statement - Strelka's source shouldn't be published. It is a great source, but contains reverse engeneered stuff from a commercial program. The bitboard infra-structure, the unique way to index and use pre-calculated tables by pawn-structure and material etc..
What did he say? Do you have a link?
BTW, the reverse engineering of source code is not illegal in many circumstances. I do not think it has been proven that anything illegal has taken place.
How would chessbase act, if somebody publishes decompiled fritz-sources?
The ethical dilemma now - the idea of science (and open source) to share and publish ideas - versus the violated vital interests of a commercial programmer, whose initial ideas got uncovered and illegally published.
I agree that there is an ethical dilemma. I do not know if there is a legal dilemma.
The source, already widespreaded, will engourage other programmers to use ideas from it, even if the original source got banned by a restraining order. We will likely get more clones. Some may adapt their own bitboard infrastructure with the search and evaluation routines of Strelka, or simply replace identifiers or simplify some expressions. The less they understand the semantics and principles, the more likely they may simply copy and paste on syntactical level.
Is it for instance ethically correct now, to discuss or explain the ideas - to encourage people to implement those ideas on their own way?
This whole think leaves a bad taste in my mouth from everyone involved (perhaps even me).
Gerd Isenberg wrote:With hindsight - after Vasik's statement - Strelka's source shouldn't be published. It is a great source, but contains reverse engeneered stuff from a commercial program. The bitboard infra-structure, the unique way to index and use pre-calculated tables by pawn-structure and material etc..
How would chessbase act, if somebody publishes decompiled fritz-sources?
The ethical dilemma now - the idea of science (and open source) to share and publish ideas - versus the violated vital interests of a commercial programmer, whose initial ideas got uncovered and illegally published.
The source, already widespreaded, will engourage other programmers to use ideas from it, even if the original source got banned by a restraining order. We will likely get more clones. Some may adapt their own bitboard infrastructure with the search and evaluation routines of Strelka, or simply replace identifiers or simplify some expressions. The less they understand the semantics and principles, the more likely they may simply copy and paste on syntactical level.
Is it for instance ethically correct now, to discuss or explain the ideas - to encourage people to implement those ideas on their own way?
If that is true, I wonder how much of other already-released programs are incorporated into Rybka? Sounds a lot like the old pot/kettle thing to me... I'd bet you could find parts of other programs scattered in Rybka. He was not the one to "invent" the bitboard stuff at all, and I'd bet there are exactly zero "new bitboard tricks" in Rybka.
This is a tired, old, pointless discussion IMHO...
A day will come when Rybka is "yesterday's news" and this will all end by a natural death...
Sounds like the statement of a scientist filled with bitterness and animosity against commercial chess programmers. Of course Vasik didn't invent bitboards - but his initial Rybka was a kind of revolution, with so many elo-points above other top commercials at that time.
It is absolutely Ok, if one tries to make a living from that. And that he don't shares his tricks, to protect his work and livelihood - even if he profits from former forum discussions - and uses ideas from open source programs - and the community feels he should give something back.
It might be bad for science - but it is imho no justification to disassemble the program and to publish the sources. One may argue that Osipov's work is a great contribution for the computer chess community. But imho this is ethically dubious if not worse.
It is actually a statement from a scientist that is simply tired of seeing this repeated, over and over. Vas is _not_ the first. Nor will he be the last. Most commercial programmers were, at some point, amateurs openly discussing new ideas with their peers. If you want to work by yourself, that's acceptable. But to ask lots of questions about specific things (say parallel search in a case or two I certainly can point to) and then "go commercial" 6 months later???
I'm not "bitter" as I really don't care what happens to 'em. If they get disassembled, so be it. Anyone can disassemble my code, I certainly won't object at all. I find it hard to be sympathetic, given the past circumstances I have seen...
bob wrote:All I will say is that (a) Vas used to ask questions, look at other engines (hence the self-proclaimed fruit influence on his program among other things) and so forth. Then when he discovered something new, off he went. Compare that with the _wealth_ of computer chess papers describing everything from iterated deepening, to hash table implementations, to bitboards, to null-move, to singular extensions, to endgame databases, to you-name it. There is a big difference.
(b) I am completely unconcerned about the reverse-engineering that has been done. Seems like a fair way to "even the playing field" by forcing a secretive author to expose secrets he has desparately tried to hide by obfuscation of this PV, depth and node counter displays. I'm not going to lose any sleep over this at all. It isn't my concern...
I completely agree.
After all, if he asked questions on known and published issues that you and others were willing to explain, he has an obligation to reveal his trade secrets, and if he doesn't, then he should be forced by disassembling his program to "even the playing field". After all, there is nothing ethical about an uneven one when it is the result of secrets he discovered and won't share with others.
Graham Banks wrote:Mainly the legally dubious threats regarding disassembling several engines and releasing the source code without permission from the engine authors.
Guetti wrote:It appears that it was ethically wrong to disassemble Rybka in the first place, but I think it was the best decision to make the source available to all people, instead of making them available to only 'selected' people. As soon as some persons got the source, and could analyze or modify it, I felt that it was only fair if everybody had the chance to do so. So I'm glad the sources are available now. Furthermore, the Rybka version it derives from is 2 years old, as I understand.
I don't really want to get in on this discussion, but I don't really understand this. Publishing the sources from strelka was of course no friendly act. The people that do this, they are just the equivalent of programming hooligans, or whatever term you want to come up with, they do this for the attention they are getting and the interest people have in learning about programming ideas that were not meant to be made public by the author.
Is it okay to rob a bank as long as you don't keep the money for yourself but give it away to everybody else, stealing from the rich and giving to the poor? Osipov as Robin Hood? 'Hood' is right, Robin Hood I don't think so...
There is really no waterproof programming way to protect the intellectual property of programmers ideas for long by encryption, obfuscation or whatever, but if a whole community of looters actively would start banding together to decipher commercial programs, chess programs in this case, publishing the sources for everybody, to spread as many clones as possible, under any name they can come up with, what chance do you stand as a lone commercial programmer against that?
This does not hurt computer chess? Would you justify this? Come on people!
Eelco
OK, then what about the people that come here, ask questions, get lots of ideas and algorithms from active programmers, then they find a new idea, hide it and go commercial. I think they are "hooligans" just as much as this case.
Robert,
if we extend your example then "all those students who go to universities and later invent something and use their invention to become successful are also hulligans." ... that doesn't seem right. The reason is that there is no equivalence, neither in spirit nor intent, that can be drawn between a forum where people exchange ideas, learning from one another, hoping to invent something and the action of stealing the unique ideas that someone might actually have.
Regards,
Hristo
For me, that analogy doesn't work. Here's why. At the university, there is a specific "quid-pro-quo" between faculty and students. Students pay tuition, which pays our salaries. We, in turn, teach the students about various subjects. There is a two-way interchange.
Between many of us here, there is a two-way interchange. We discuss ideas, we exchange ideas, we make suggestions, we might keep secrets for a tournament, but then we reveal what we are doing (in my case, this is pretty obvious since I release source).
The example I cited was missing exactly 1/2 of that. Discuss ideas, ask questions, even get pointers that take you in a good direction, but once you discover something new and different, clam up...
Not what we in academia do at all, which was my point...
Robert,
in a different world it would be possible to share ideas and property and be happy. But in our world we need people to be successful in order to have you (educational system) and other people be employed -- and this often means not sharing for free, but instead making money.
It seems that you claim that so long as one has paid money for the education received then one can "clam up", but if one has received education (knowldge) without actually paying to academia then one must contribute all ideas back to the general public.
This, if that is what you are saying, is untenable and contrary to the way our society works.
Many people don't have the funds that you have to run computer labs (clusters) to test their ideas and must find resources -- some of those resources might come from the application and development of their own ideas. It is not an easy path to start a business and make a living and pay taxes (some of which go towards funding universities) when people are unscrupulous and willing to demolish your chances for success -- merely because some believe that the inventor doesn't have a right to his own invention.
I have a fundamental problem with the above expressed [yours] notion that "Unless academia is paid up you don't have a right to your own ideas".
bob wrote:All I will say is that (a) Vas used to ask questions, look at other engines (hence the self-proclaimed fruit influence on his program among other things) and so forth. Then when he discovered something new, off he went. Compare that with the _wealth_ of computer chess papers describing everything from iterated deepening, to hash table implementations, to bitboards, to null-move, to singular extensions, to endgame databases, to you-name it. There is a big difference.
(b) I am completely unconcerned about the reverse-engineering that has been done. Seems like a fair way to "even the playing field" by forcing a secretive author to expose secrets he has desparately tried to hide by obfuscation of this PV, depth and node counter displays. I'm not going to lose any sleep over this at all. It isn't my concern...
I completely agree.
After all, if he asked questions on known and published issues that you and others were willing to explain, he has an obligation to reveal his trade secrets, and if he doesn't, then he should be forced by disassembling his program to "even the playing field". After all, there is nothing ethical about an uneven one when it is the result of secrets he discovered and won't share with others.
Yes, I completely agree....not.
Albert
Albert,
for a moment you had me!
Vas can regain his status with academia by writing a nice donation check -- lest he is completely immoral and his children should be sent to Siberia and his ideas should be extracted from him by any means necessary.
Graham Banks wrote:Mainly the legally dubious threats regarding disassembling several engines and releasing the source code without permission from the engine authors.
Graham Banks wrote:Mainly the legally dubious threats regarding disassembling several engines and releasing the source code without permission from the engine authors.
Graham Banks wrote:Mainly the legally dubious threats regarding disassembling several engines and releasing the source code without permission from the engine authors.
bob wrote:All I will say is that (a) Vas used to ask questions, look at other engines (hence the self-proclaimed fruit influence on his program among other things) and so forth. Then when he discovered something new, off he went. Compare that with the _wealth_ of computer chess papers describing everything from iterated deepening, to hash table implementations, to bitboards, to null-move, to singular extensions, to endgame databases, to you-name it. There is a big difference.
(b) I am completely unconcerned about the reverse-engineering that has been done. Seems like a fair way to "even the playing field" by forcing a secretive author to expose secrets he has desparately tried to hide by obfuscation of this PV, depth and node counter displays. I'm not going to lose any sleep over this at all. It isn't my concern...
I completely agree.
After all, if he asked questions on known and published issues that you and others were willing to explain, he has an obligation to reveal his trade secrets, and if he doesn't, then he should be forced by disassembling his program to "even the playing field". After all, there is nothing ethical about an uneven one when it is the result of secrets he discovered and won't share with others.
Yes, I completely agree....not.
Albert
I think that the fact that he asked questions is not relevant here.
I do not blame Vas for not publishing his source
It is clearly logical to do it and I plan to do the same(except not releasing misleading information about nodes per second and other things) because situation when I release source and other do not do it is not a fair situation and gives opponents unfair advantage but the main question is
if the rules should allow people to release or sell programs without source.
People do not sell books without source and I think that it may be good for the world if it is going to be impossible(or at least illegal) to sell or release programs without source.
It will also be more easy to check if a program is a clone of another
program in that case because people will be able to look at the source to compare unlike the situation today.
I find it hard to be sympathetic, given the past circumstances I have seen...