Comments/Ratings for a Single Item

You can always download all back-versions of ChessV from the
sourceforge.net website.  If you, or anyone else, would like a copy on
CD-ROM, please contact me by e-mail.  I'm more than happy to send you a
CD-ROM free of charge (the blank costs about 10 cents, and the stamp 37...
I can handle that.)

Yes, versions of ChessV vary widely in performance, and the program is
really, really in flux.  That is because it is still in it's infancy, and
it has lots and lots of bugs.  I will become far more conscientious about
revision-testing before putting out updates when I get it to a reasonably
bug-free state (which will be version 1.0)  Meanwhile, ChessV is a mixed
bag, and I depend on the kind help of those in the chessvariants community
to playtest and let me know what is better and what is worse.  I have so
far put approximately 1,500 hours of work into this program...  It is safe
to say that when I started, I had absolutely, positively, NO IDEA just how
hard this was going to be.  I totally underestimated the complexity in a
big way.  If I had understood, I never would have even started in the
first place.  I also thought that other open-source programmers in the
sourceforge community would take an interest and offer to help.  So far,
despite the fact that it has been downloaded over 3000 times, not a single
person has offered any coding assistance of any kind.  Until they do, the
progress is going to be slow.  We will creep up to version 1.0, and it
might take another year or two.

Regarding I-Depth, that setting is not intended to determine how strong
the program is; only play-testing will do that.  The I-Depth is there so
that different people running on different hardware can run ChessV and
discuss their results and know that they are compairing apples to apples. 


Regarding C vs. assembly language, you have said something really
rediculous.  Please understand that I have no wish to insult you, only to
make the facts clear to you and anyone else who may be watching this
conversation.  You said that C-code is 'inscrutable' while
well-commented assembly language makes sense.  This is not so much an
opinion as it is a statement that is just factually incorrect.  Assembly
is much older than high-level languages, such as C, but yet the entire
world of professional software developers use high-level languages simply
because they are easier to read and more managable.  If assembly was the
way to go no one would use anything else, whereas less than one-tenth of
one percent of the world's code is written in assembly, and those people
who do do it, do it generally because they are writing device drivers or
the core of an operating system, and thus they have no choice.  Assembly
makes more sense to you simply because you understand it better.  You also
added the qualification 'well-commented.'  There you have something. 
Regardless of language, code is easier to understand the better the
comments and documentation.  Here, also, ChessV is a mixed bag.  There are
some files that are pretty well commented, and others that have almost no
comments at all.  If other programmers were helping me on this project I
would feel more of a need to comment...  Also, I would mention that ChessV
is C++ and not C, C++ being much more logical and easier to understand
(provided you understand the concepts of object-oriented programming,
something which assembly language does not have and cannot emulate.)

Regarding your recent questions on the ChessV thread:  I have not meant to
ignore them.  It is just that you have raised questions that will take some
time to answer.  Also, they are questions that I can't really answer very
well because, considering the hardware you are running, I really don't
know the answers.  We are playing the same game, but taking approaches
that are as radically different as could be imagined.  I really don't
know about trying to do something like Ultima with the hardware
limitations imposed by the Atari ST.  My opinion is that it is flat-out
impossible.  Orthodox Chess programs which ran on the Motorola 68000 were
not very good, and Ultima is a much, much harder problem.  Quite frankly,
I think you could be the best programmer in the whole world, and you would
still fail to make an Ultima program that plays at even the level of a
beginner.  Sorry, I just don't think that it is possible.

Greg, I'm interested in something that is immediately executable, no
compilation required, no downloading or leeching required.  Which
'Windows' operating system can it run under?  Or perhaps Linux, or the
Mac?  I don't really mind which, any of them is fine.  At no time have I
represented myself as a C programmer, nor am I able to tell the
difference
between C and C++.  Like you, I prefer the environment I have the most
experience in.  I shun the ones I have no experience in.  I'll send you
an email along those lines, as soon as I get to a Pine interface.  (The
webmail interface here at www.chessvariants.org isn't exactly what I'd
call 'my cup of tea.')

Greg, I sent you an email but it bounced back with a 'host unknown'
message.  Are you still at umd.edu?  The mailserver that I use is
run by OregonVOS.net, with over 60 different dialups in the state of
Oregon, but that shouldn't make any difference.  (But practical
experience says it does; direct dialing is almost always superior to the
indirect service of the many mailservers needed to facilitate the
transmission of packets across the country - so if perchance you had a
real BBS (not a website) with a real 'direct dial number' I could go
there, maybe, cut out all the middlemen and send you email directly?)

I have tried some code programming in the past, including C++, but,
honestly, I don´t consider myself a very good programmer, and it is the
main reason I have not offered help with Chess V, because more than a help
it may be a new source of tons of bugs, but it is possible I´ll try to open
the code in some moment, to see, but at first I have to install the correct
C++ compiler in my computer, because I don´t own one. I agree with Greg,
Ultima/Baroque can need a lot of computer resources if you want a good
cyber-player, I doubt we can perform it in a Atari ST, all chess programs
in all the old computers I know are good examples of the difficulties
everybody can find for this purpose, being the main factors the running
time and memory resources, but there are others. And for code simplicity,
well, everyone can have its preferences, it may depend on the training
time with a language, but I think high-level languages are much more
user-friendly, and, for me, C++ is not the most comfortable, but I repeat,
it depends on each one. Chess V is a great concept, I´ll try to give a hand
seeing the code, but I doubt I would help too much, perhaps I can add more
to the program with testing and giving hints for evaluations, as I have
did to the present.

Matthew:  I have no doubt that you have had lots of problems with Intel
systems.  I would suggest that this is because Microsoft has released a
lot of really, really bug-ridden piece-of-crap operating systems.  This
has finally gotten better, after a long wait... Windows 2000 is
rock-solid, and I hear that Windows XP is too.  Please, please do not
think that Intel hardware sucks just because Microsoft has behaved so
irresponsibly.  The Intel hardware is flawless, at least since the
infamous Pentium floating-point bug of about 10 years ago, and that was a
pretty minor bug at that.

I have heard glowing words of praise about Windows XP; my own brother
loves
it, for instance.  And what's this I hear, the next version to come out
is
code-named 'Windows Vista' (?) but I fear that software compatible with
one version won't be compatible with the next.  (That is the main
problem
with Windows XP - I can't use Wordperfect 5.1 for DOS unless I format a
wholly separate partition for a world of 'DOS files' safe and separate
unto itself.)  Windows XP with all the new doo-dads around will be a
wonderful thing to see.  As I said, those little thumbdrives that are
coming out, they're going to be the wave of the future.  I don't know
about their lifespans, but that is rarely a concern to anyone anymore. 
Maybe there will come a day when you can get 'ChessV' preinstalled on a
thumbdrive, and just plug it into your PC, straight out of the package?