I think there are two reasons there are not more programs on 19x19 CGOS: 1) The anchor, Gnugo, is quite strong, Many Faces 12 is stronger, and CrazyStone is much stronger. Since the programs playing are so strong, it is demoralizing for a new program to lose so often. Without weaker competition, it is hard to get accurate ratings for new, weaker programs.
2) The rounds take almost an hour, so it takes much too long to get enough games to see how your program is doing. In my local testing, I use 10 or 15 minutes per side. I like to see 50 to 100 test games get any confidence that a new version is stronger. I prefer to get a test run complete in under a day. I propose the following changes: I'll put up 3 weaker versions of Many Faces 12, so there is competition at lower ratings. These versions are quite fast, using only a few seconds for a full game. This will provide some stable opponents for the weaker programs. I think the time limits for CGOS19x19 should be reduced to 10 or 15 minutes per side. This is enough to test programs, and it's still a reasonable time limit for games against people. Since programs that search scale with additional time, the relative ratings of these programs should be similar at 10 minutes per game and 30 minutes per game. -David _______________________________________________ computer-go mailing list computer-go@computer-go.org http://www.computer-go.org/mailman/listinfo/computer-go/
