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xkcd: Magnus[^]
Lot of times people think that just because I'm a software developer I'm good at chess too (I'm not that bad, but definitely not that good)...
And seeing XKCD I was wondering why chess is so interesting after all these years...
My guess - the (almost) endless number of variations of games...
Skipper: We'll fix it.
Alex: Fix it? How you gonna fix this?
Skipper: Grit, spit and a whole lotta duct tape.
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Chess is considered by all who do not play as the ultimate expression of intelligence. As such it is the ideal game for AI developers to have their creations play in order to bamboozle and astonish the public while achieving nothing of any true importance and maintain their grants. Cynical, moi?
I am not a number. I am a ... no, wait!
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Because I'm a software developer people think I can install their new RAM, set-up their printer, or rid their machine of viruses.
It's a funny old world 
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People are full of strange fantasies...
Skipper: We'll fix it.
Alex: Fix it? How you gonna fix this?
Skipper: Grit, spit and a whole lotta duct tape.
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I usually explain that to people in by asking if the last time they wanted to have their teeth cleaned the went to a proctologist.*
* meant on multiple levels of inuendo
| "The difference between genius and stupidity is that genius has its limits." - Albert Einstein | | "As far as we know, our computer has never had an undetected error." - Weisert | | "If you are searching for perfection in others, then you seek disappointment. If you are seek perfection in yourself, then you will find failure." - Balboos HaGadol Mar 2010 |
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F-ES Sitecore wrote: Because I'm a software developer people think I can install their new RAM, set-up their printer, or rid their machine of viruses.
Can, yes; willing, not so much.
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Shhhhhh....keep that to yourself 
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Ah, chess...
I think about it once in a while. Remember this question from October? The Lounge - CodeProject[^]
I think of it this way:
0) There are sixty-four spaces on a chess board
1) Each space may be unoccupied or occupied by one token (I'll try not to say "piece")
2) There are six types of token: King, Queen, Bishop, Knight, Rook/Castle, Pawn
3) There are two colors of token: Black, White (usually)
4) That makes twelve distinct token values, plus we can use a "null" token to represent an empty space, for a total of thirteen values
I chess position can therefore be reduced to a sixty-four digit base-13 value.
Windows calculator calculates 13^64 as 1.9605347643076107333065976042357e+71 .
A great many such values will not represent a valid chess position.
So all you need to do is enumerate from zero to 1.9605347643076107333065976042357e+71, eliminate the invalid values and determine a pair of "best next position" values (one for black, one for white), and store them. Then during a game, a simple look-up is all that is needed to select your move.
It becomes boring really; hardly any challenge at all.
Here's what I wrote in October; this is the hard part:
[System.ComponentModel.DescriptionAttribute("Chess piece definition")]
public enum Piece
{
[System.ComponentModel.DescriptionAttribute("No piece, empty square")]
None = 0
,
[System.ComponentModel.DescriptionAttribute("Piece has a special or limiting movement rule")]
SpecialMask = 1
,
[System.ComponentModel.DescriptionAttribute("Piece can move only in ranks or files")]
OrthogonalMask = 2
,
[System.ComponentModel.DescriptionAttribute("Piece can move diagonally")]
DiagonalMask = 4
,
[System.ComponentModel.DescriptionAttribute("Black chess piece")]
BlackMask = 8
,
[System.ComponentModel.DescriptionAttribute("Knight")]
Knight = 1
,
[System.ComponentModel.DescriptionAttribute("Rook")]
Rook = 2
,
[System.ComponentModel.DescriptionAttribute("Pawn")]
Pawn = 3
,
[System.ComponentModel.DescriptionAttribute("Bishop")]
Bishop = 4
,
[System.ComponentModel.DescriptionAttribute("Queen")]
Queen = 6
,
[System.ComponentModel.DescriptionAttribute("King")]
King = 7
}
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Actually all chess programs are combining two things...
1. Basic knowledge of the chess rules
2. A lookup of pr-recorded strategies (for opening, play and end-play separately in most cases)
The reason for that is that there is on really best-move for most parts of the game...Chess is not only about moving the pieces around but to build a defense/offense strategy that will provide you not only with small victories but winning the war too...
There is a few estimates of the number of possible chess games (between 10^50 to 10^120) and they say there is more chess games than atoms in the universe (which of course has no base and only effective as a way to tell that there are unimaginably large number of games)...
Skipper: We'll fix it.
Alex: Fix it? How you gonna fix this?
Skipper: Grit, spit and a whole lotta duct tape.
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Your analysis doesn't allow for en passant or "You can/can't castle"...
I'm retired. There's a nap for that...
- Harvey
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Yes it does:
[System.ComponentModel.DescriptionAttribute("Piece has a special or limiting movement rule")]
SpecialMask = 1
Knight, King, and Pawn all have that Flag.
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Having the flag doesn't complete the problem. The state of a board position needs to include whether an en passant move or a rook/king move has recently or already taken place. Just knowing that a move could have taken place doesn't work.
[... not sure what you mean about knight. I think you meant rook.]
I'm retired. There's a nap for that...
- Harvey
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Pfft. That's details.
I meant Knight. Rooks have nothing special other than being at the mercy of the King during a castling move. The goal of that exercise was merely to assign 4-bit values to the tokens in a "logical" manner. I have no ambition to implement the system as described.
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Kornfeld Eliyahu Peter wrote: the (almost) endless number of variations of games
Relax and play[^]
What we got here is a failure to communicate
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How about a nice game of chess?
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Amazing that I would have never known either of them had died, if it weren't for the breaking news reporters here on CP. 
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Aye, well, um .... oops![^]
I am not a number. I am a ... no, wait!
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Still dead...
New version: WinHeist Version Tequila, the nigh time, snuffly, sneezing, how the hell did I end up on the bathroom floor medicine.
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Please no, say it ain't so...
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Just wiped my Yahoo account (90 days and counting)...
Skipper: We'll fix it.
Alex: Fix it? How you gonna fix this?
Skipper: Grit, spit and a whole lotta duct tape.
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I cant do it - I am too sentimental. My first e-mail nearly 20 years. 
Press F1 for help or google it.
Greetings from Germany
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Mine was my, still active, hotmail account that must be somewhere near that.
veni bibi saltavi
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Nah Compuserve died some time ago.
Never underestimate the power of human stupidity
RAH
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