Blitzing to win at computer chess.Blitzing to win at computer chess It took more than speed and processing power to win the world computer chess championship World Computer Chess Championship (WCCC) is an annual event where computer chess engines compete against each other. The event is organized by the International Computer Games Association. this week in Cologne, West Germany. After its first two games in a five-game tournament, CRAY BLITZ, the defending champion, was in trouble. It has just lost a game to a lightly regarded opponent. But a mid-tournament correction--the removal of four lines in a 28,000-line computer program -- saved the day and the title. CRAY BLITZ became the first program in the tournament's 12-year history to repeat as world champion. In the tournament, four of the 23 competing chess computers finished at the top with identical 4-win and 1-loss records. CRAY BLITZ won the championship over Hitech, BEBE and Sun Phoenix in a tie-breaking scheme. CRAY BLITZ's initial problems stemmed from four lines that program developer Robert Hyatt, a graduate student at the University of Alabama The University of Alabama (also known as Alabama, UA or colloquially as 'Bama) is a public coeducational university located in Tuscaloosa, Alabama, USA. Founded in 1831, UA is the flagship campus of the University of Alabama System. in Birmingham, had inserted after testing some parts of his program on a VAX (Virtual Address eXtension) A venerable family of 32-bit computers from HP (via Digital and Compaq) introduced in 1977 with the VAX-11/780. VAX models ranged from desktop units to mainframes all running the same VMS operating system, and VAXes could emulate PDP models minicomputer (1) An earlier medium-scale, centralized computer that functioned as a multiuser system for up to several hundred users. The minicomputer industry was launched in 1959 after Digital Equipment Corporation introduced its PDP-1 for $120,000, an unheard-of low price for a computer in and finding an apparent weakness in the way the computer evaluated pawn movements. But when the modified program was run on a CRAY supercomputer, which is fast enough to allow a much deeper search than a VAX, the effect was not unlike "putting glue on the bottoms of all the pawns," says Hyatt. That change probably led to the losses at last year's North American North American named after North America. North American blastomycosis see North American blastomycosis. North American cattle tick see boophilusannulatus. computer chess championship (SN: 10/26/85, p.260) and this tournament. But after the offending lines were removed, CRAY BLITZ started playing like a world champion again. "The difference in its play was striking," says Hyatt. The program swept through its next two games and seemed ready for its climactic match with favored Hitech, developed by Hans Berliner and his colleagues at Carnegie-Mellon University (CMU CMU - Carnegie Mellon University ) in Pittsburgh. The match took more than six hours. After about 60 moves, Hitech finally resigned. "We could feel it slowly slipping away," says CMU's Murray Campbell. But, he adds, "we're looking for Looking for In the context of general equities, this describing a buy interest in which a dealer is asked to offer stock, often involving a capital commitment. Antithesis of in touch with. our revenge in Dallas." That's where the North American computer chess championship will be decided in November. |
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