Houdini, Komodo, Stockfish

In a recent post, Overcoming the Operators, I noted how difficult it can be to play a correspondence game against an opponent who is simply relaying the best move suggested by his engine.

What techniques, if any, can be used against the operators? Over the next weeks I'll devote a few posts to look at this question.

A few years ago, in Sources of Inspiration, I flagged the blog 'Tartajubow On Chess' as a source for ideas on both correspondence play and engines. Last month, in Even Engines Need Time to Think, Tartajubow listed some telltale signs of an operator.

33 running games. That's how many my opponent had going and quite often he replied to my move within a few minutes so he was effectively playing at a blitz pace in most of his games. He eventually got into a position where even the engine needed some time to sort things out and 2-3 minutes simply were not enough.

He went on to discuss the three most popular engines in use today.

Houdini, Komodo and Stockfish differ in their search and evaluation functions. Stockfish aggressively prunes the analysis tree and while it searches deeply, its search is more narrow than Komodo or Houdini. Sometimes this is an advantage, sometimes it's not. Komodo is the most positionally accurate of the three and it is slower in its search than either Stockfish or Houdini. It's initial evaluation can be more accurate, but it's usually a good idea to let it think a little longer just to make sure.

Since about a year ago, I'm also using those three engines in practical play. Thanks to a series of blog posts from two years ago -- Engine Evaluation through a summary Practical Evaluation -- I understand how the engines evaluate and am always looking for new approaches to understand better their internal mechanisms. The 'Evaluation' series relied on work done by GM Larry Kaufman, and I was happy to find a subsequent interview where he discussed their strengths: Q&A with Larry Kaufman (qualitychess.co.uk; December 2013).

Q: What are the different properties of Komodo, Stockfish, Houdini, Rybka and Fritz and how would the person who wants to improve their chess use these differences to his advantage?

A: Komodo is best at evaluating middlegame positions accurately once the tactics are resolved. Stockfish seems to be best in the endgame and in seeing very deep tactics. Houdini is the best at blitz and at seeing tactics quickly. Rybka is just obsolete; I like to think of Komodo as its spiritual descendant, since I worked on the evaluation for both, although the rest of the engines are not similar. Fritz is just too far below these top engines to be useful.

Stockfish appears to be the engine of choice for many operators. Its apparent speed and tactical accuracy are impressive indeed and make it a particularly difficult opponent to overcome.

This Knight Is 'Grimm'

In this fortnightly series on Top eBay Chess Items by Price, I see a fair number of chess sets, artwork, and philatelic items, like the Fischer - Spassky 1992 covers on the previous post. Once in a while I discover an item that defies classification. See, for example, Anton Chotka (18??-19??) and Red and Yellow Speed Wheels Included.

When you look at the image below, you probably have no idea that the auction was for 'The Black Night Chess Piece from Grimm Episode 319'. It sold for US $740.15, after receiving 39 bids from 16 bidders.

The description explained,

This "Grimm" memorabilia appears when Theresa "Trubel" Rubel appears in Season 3 of the show. Trubel is a Grimm that grew up with a troubled past and never benefited from a guide to explain the implications of the Grimm status to her. She carries around a black knight chess piece because she likes the way it moves differently than any other piece. You can own this chess piece for yourself, which will be displayed in a shadowbox, along with a certificate of authenticity.

The producers of NBC's hit TV series Grimm have donated an incredible collection of authentic, screen-used props to be auctioned off for the Grimmster Endowment benefiting OHSU Doernbecher Children's Hospital. Each production item was used on set.

Living outside of the USA, I had never heard of 'NBC's hit TV series Grimm' and the first paragraph in the description might as well have been written in Greek. Then I consulted Grimm (TV series) [Wikipedia]; 'Grimm is an American police procedural fantasy television drama series'. Now I know.

Bundi, Rajasthan, ca.1700

For this edition of Flickr Friday I had a good selection of chess images to choose from. See, for example, the photo set on Open Tradewise de Ajedrez de Gibraltar 2015, with some great shots of chess players both famous and not-so-famous. Since I had already featured the 2014 event a year ago in Gibraltar's Tradewise Chess, I chose another image.

Women Playing a Game of Chess © Flickr user Ashley Van Haeften under Creative Commons.

The title was further qualified with the identifier 'LACMA M.79.191.15', meaning 'Los Angeles County Museum of Art something, something, something', plus the description,

India, Rajasthan, Bundi, circa 1700
Drawings
Ink and opaque watercolor on paper
5 5/8 x 8 in. (14.29 x 20.32 cm)
Gift of Paul F. Walter (M.79.191.15)

where the last line mentions those 'somethings' again. What caught my attention here was the question, 'Are we sure these players are all women?' See, for example, File: Krishna welcomes Sudama, Bhagavata Purana, 17th century, India.jpg on Wikipedia, where the women all look similar. Whatever the truth with the LACMA piece, it's an attractive drawing either way.

Titled Players and Their Continents

After looking at Titled Players and Their Ratings, based on the January 2015 FIDE rating list, I decided to look at where the players are from. The following chart shows a count of titled players by continent (where untitled players are counted in the first 'blank' row), using the FIDE system of numbering continents: 1: Europe (representing 54 federations), 2: Americas (34), 3: Asia (48), 4: Africa (39). The numbers in the 'Total' column match the numbers in the 'Players / Rating' post, so my numbers are consistent.

A few weeks ago I featured a news video, Africa’s First Grandmaster, which mentioned,

[Kenny Solomon has] become South Africa and the continent's first ever grandmaster and it all started with a game of marbles.

At the time I was sceptical about the claim to 'the continent's first ever grandmaster'. Since my chart shows nine other GMs from Africa, my instinct was right. Digging further in the data, I found four GMs from Egypt, two each from Algeria & Tunisia, and one from Zambia. Solomon was still listed on the January list as an IM, so Africa will soon have ten GMs.

Another anomaly is the column under continent '0'; what's that all about? It turns out those 64 players are all listed against federation 'FID'. The highest rated player on the list has a FIDE card, Gonzalez Perez, Arian - FIDE Chess Profile, confirming 'Federation: FIDE'. Going back to the January 2013 list, Gonzalez Perez was listed under federation 'CUB', a fact confirmed by his FIDE ID, which starts with '35' (see my post Structure of the FIDE ID from July 2008 for more info).

Of the 64 players with 'Federation: FIDE', 60 have FIDE IDs tied to three countries: 'CUB', 'ECU', and 'SRB'. There is undoubtedly a story or two in these statistics, but I have no idea what.

I have one more observation to make on the chart: the preponderance of players from Europe. Five federations currently have more than 10.000 players listed, with four of them from Europe (the second column indicates the continent):-

RUS, 1, 19396
GER, 1, 18871
IND, 3, 16726
ESP, 1, 15788
FRA, 1, 14072

There are other stories in the numbers -- why so few WCMs from Europe? -- but that's all the time I have today.

February 1965 'On the Cover'

This month's 'On the Cover' marks a full year since the first post in the series, March 1964 'On the Cover'.

Left: 'A New Title'
Right: '50 Years Ago: Chess Hoax of the Century?'

Chess Life

Reshevsky Wins National Open • A bright new tournament made a stylish debut on the American chess scene at the Stardust Hotel in Las Vegas, Nevada. Signed up for a one-week engagement in the first National Open Chess Championship were 138 players, headed by four international grandmasters. All had a chance for a share of a record breaking prize fund of $4500. [...] Our Cover • Samuel Reshevsky, first National Open Champion, is awarded his trophy by Mark Swain, Director of Sales at the Stardust Hotel. USCF President Ed Edmondson is on the left, Tournament Director Koltanowski on right.

This would be a good place to mention something about 'the shortest and the tallest' chess players, but I'm not sure where to start. How tall was Reshevsky?

Chess Review

In 1915, with the Great War on, chess activities were necessarily somewhat limited. But, under that date, an astounding game appeared. Both sides advanced Pawns, Black taking a piece in the process. Queens appeared, to the number of five, all on the board at one time. Black snatched another piece, and White announced a mate in five!

Alas! Research has indicated, notably that of Dr. Buschke who wrote a volume on the subject, that the winner, the great Alekhine, must have concocted the game, or at least the finish, much as he did his brilliant "win" against Oscar Tenner. But the game long flourished in books and may well rate the title, "Chess Hoax of the Century".

Albrecht Buschke's research was published in Chess Life as a column titled 'Alekhine's Early Chess Career', starting December 1949. For more about both the 'Gregorieff' game (the name given to Black on the CR cover) and the Tenner game, see Meine Besten Gefälschten Partien, on Chessgames.com.

Overcoming the Operators

A few years ago, in a post titled Operators and Things (February 2010), I put together the following table 'Success Factors in Correspondence Chess'.

Although the meaning of the different categories and cells is nearly self-explanatory, there is further discussion of them in the 'Operators' post. I concluded with the thought,

As stronger chess engines become commercially available, the playing strength of operators is constantly on the rise. Will they eventually occupy the highest tier? This would mean that chess knowledge and work capacity will ultimately count for little to nothing.

In the five years since writing the post, the engines have become noticeably stronger and the engine operators have achieved a corresponding success. While it was once true that

Operators currently fall in the band between Master/Expert and Average Player, overlapping both. This means that it is possible to defeat them with good chess knowledge and some concentrated work on that specific game.

the boundary has shifted. The operators now occupy the band between Titled Player and Master/Expert (where I am). In other words, they are capable of playing equally with very good players and sometimes capable of defeating them.

What techniques, if any, can be used against the operators? Over the next weeks I'll devote a few posts to look at this question.

The Cognitive Training Swamp

I ended the previous post in this 'Chess in School' series, Chess and Cognitive Training, with a question: 'One of the mantras is 'Chess Makes You Smarter'. Does it really?' Before I tackle that crucial point I need to backtrack to another question, this one from the ScientificAmerican.com Q&A that was the heart of the post,

Q: What in the world compelled you to jump into the swamp that is the cognitive training literature?

The word 'swamp' carries decidedly negative baggage. The associated link leads to another SciAm.com article, New Cognitive Training Study Takes on the Critics by Scott Barry Kaufman, the same author responsible for that first SciAm.com Q&A article. While I can't pretend to understand all of the subtleties around far transfer and fluid intelligence, the debate is still interesting.

Some studies have reported absolutely no effect of working memory training on fluid intelligence, whereas others have found an effect. The results are mixed and inconclusive. Various critics have rightfully listed a number of methodological flaws and alternative explanations that could explain the far transfer effects.

The second SciAm.com article goes on to describe a months-long experiment designed to eliminate the weaknesses of previous studies.

The Results: Even after addressing the major criticisms of their past work, [Susanne] Jaeggi and colleagues still found far transfer. In particular, they found far transfer to visuospatial reasoning when people engaged in working memory training. In contrast, no effects were found when people were trained on trivia knowledge (the active control group).

But there are a couple of kickers here. The first is an observation.

In terms of the long-term effectiveness of their training, they found no significant effect at a three-month follow-up.

The second is a hypothesis that the individual matters more than the training.

First, they found that people who have a growth mindset about intelligence (believe that intelligence is malleable) showed greater improvement on the visuospatial reasoning tests than those who have a fixed mindset about intelligence (believe intelligence can’t change). [...] Second, the researchers found that intrinsic motivation mattered.

What impact does this have on the 'Chess in School' movement? It's far too early to say, but it's something to keep in mind as we continue to investigate the idea that 'Chess Makes You Smarter'.