This option likely has very low meaning for playing strength and style,
so I see no need to keep this configurable
No functional change
Signed-off-by: Marco Costalba <mcostalba@gmail.com>
We had an overflow due to use an integer for hash size,
now we use a size_t as we should, so we can increase to
an higher limit.
No functional change.
Signed-off-by: Marco Costalba <mcostalba@gmail.com>
Normally it's up to the GUI to check for option's limits,
but we could receive the new value directly from the user
by teminal window. So let's check the bounds anyway.
No functional change.
Signed-off-by: Marco Costalba <mcostalba@gmail.com>
After deep tests Louis Zulli found on his OCTAL machine that
best setup for an 8 core CPU is as following
"Threads" = 8
"Minimum Split Depth" = 6 or 7 (mSD)
"Maximum Number of Threads per Split Point" = not important (MNTpSP)
Here are testing results:
mSD7 (8 threads) vs mSD4 (8 threads): 291 - 120 - 589
mSD6 vs mSD7: 168 - 188 - 644
mSD6-MNTpSP5 vs mSD6-MNTpSP6: 172 - 172 - 656
SF-7threads vs SF-8threads: 179 - 204 - 617
Signed-off-by: Marco Costalba <mcostalba@gmail.com>
Because that's the correct meaning. Note that also the
corresponding UCI option has been renamed.
No functional change.
Signed-off-by: Marco Costalba <mcostalba@gmail.com>
Problem is that
istream& operator>> (istream& is, char* str );
according to C++ documentation "Ends extraction when the
next character is either a valid whitespace or a null character,
or if the End-Of-File is reached."
So if the parameter value is a string with spaces the currently
used instruction 'ss >> ret;' copies the chars only up to the first
white space and not the whole string.
Use a specialization of get_option_value() to fix this corner case.
Bug reported by xiaozhi
Signed-off-by: Marco Costalba <mcostalba@gmail.com>
Unfortunatly std::stable_sort() implementation in gcc is
horrendously slow. We have a big performance regression on
Linux systems (-20% !)
So revert the commit and wait to fix the issue in a different
way, perhaps with an our home grown sorting, that should be
comparable in speed with std::sort()
Signed-off-by: Marco Costalba <mcostalba@gmail.com>
Standard does not mandate std::sort() to be stable, so we
can have, and actually do have different node count on
different platforms.
So use the platform independent std::stable_sort() and gain
same functionality on any platform (Windows, Unix, Mac OS)
and with any compiler (MSVC, gcc or Intel C++).
This sort is teoretically slower, but profiling shows only a very
minimal drop in performance, probably due to the fact that
the set to sort is very small, mainly only captures and with
less frequency non-captures, anyhow we are talking of 30-40 moves
in the worst average case. Sorting alghortims are build to work on
thousands or even milions of elements. With such small sets
performance difference seems not noticable.
After 999 games at 1+0
Mod vs Orig +234 =523 -242 -3 ELO
Signed-off-by: Marco Costalba <mcostalba@gmail.com>
After 934 games at 1+0
Mod vs Orig +228 =493 -213 50.80% 474.5/934 +6 ELO
So it seems not negative and there is also the added
benefit to unify LMRPVMoves use in search_pv() and in
root list.
Signed-off-by: Marco Costalba <mcostalba@gmail.com>
Currently minimum split depth is set automatically to 6
when number of CPUs is more than 4. I believe this is a bad
idea since for example my quad (4CPU with hyperthreading) is
detected as 8CPU computer. I've manually lowered down the number
of Threads, but so far I have played all games with Minimum
Split Depth set to 6!
Since 4CPU computers with hyperthreading are quite common and
8 CPU computers extremely rear (I expect we can get a direct
jump to 16 or 32 cores), this automatic adjusting is likely
to do more harm than good. Add a note in Readme.txt, so that
those rear 8CPU owners can manually tweak the "Minimum Split
Depth" parameter
Signed-off-by: Marco Costalba <mcostalba@gmail.com>
Added the UCI_LimitStrength and the UCI_Elo options, with an Elo
range of 2100-2900. When UCI_LimitStrength is enabled, the number
of threads is set to 1, and the search speed is slowed down according
to the chosen Elo level.
Todo:
1. Implement Elo levels below 2100 by blundering on purpose and/or
crippling the evaluation.
2. Automatically calibrate the maximum Elo by measuring the CPU speed
during program initialization, perhaps by doing some bitboard
computations and measuring the time taken.
No functional change when UCI_LimitStrength is false (the default).
This feature makes sense during development, but
It doesn't seem to make sense for normal users.
Also fix a possible race where the GUI adjudicates
the game a fraction of second before the engine sets
looseOnTime flag so that it will bogusly waits until
it ran out of time at the beginning of the next new game.
The fix is to always reset looseOnTime at the beginning
of a new game.
Race condition spotted by Tord.
Signed-off-by: Marco Costalba <mcostalba@gmail.com>
They are always true anyway and are heavy used file scope
variables where there could be SMP contention. Although read only.
No functional change.
Signed-off-by: Marco Costalba <mcostalba@gmail.com>
After proof testing on 3 different engines these
are the results:
Stockfish - Toga II 1.4.1SE +130 -132 =132 49.75%
Stockfish - Deep Sieng 3.0 +145 -110 =150 54.45%
Stockfish - HIARCS 12 MP +94 -149 =150 43.00%
So it seems no regressions occurs, although also no
improvment. But anyhow this patch increases Stockfish
strenght against itself, so merge it.
Note that this patch not only adds back razoring at depth
one, but also increases razor depth limit from 3 to 4
because hard coded depth 4 limit is no more overwritten
by UCI parameter that otherwise defaults to 3.
Because futility margins array has a fixed size we cannot
arbitrarly choose or change the SelectiveDepth parameter,
otherwise we have a crash for values bigger then array size.
On the other hand tweaking of this parameter requires some
modification to the hardcoded margins, so makes sense to hard
code also this very bounded one.
Who wants to experiment is of course free to change the sources.
No functional change.
Signed-off-by: Marco Costalba <mcostalba@gmail.com>
When testing at 1'+0" time control results are still
reasonably good. We have made two sessions on two
different PC.
After 840 games Mod - Orig: +221 -194 =425 +10 ELO (two CPU)
After 935 games Mod - Orig: +246 -222 =467 +9 ELO (single CPU)
So it seems that with fast CPU and/or longer time controls
benefits of the patch are a bit reduced. This could be due
to the fact that only 3% of nodes are pruned by razoring at
depth one and these nodes are very swallow ones, mostly get
pruned anyway with only a slightly additional cost, even
without performing any do_move() call.
Another reason is that sometime (0,3%% of cases) a possible
good move is missed typically in positions when moving side
gives check, as example in the following one
3r2k1/pbpp1nbp/1p6/3P3q/6RP/1P4P1/P4Pb1/3Q2K1 w - -
The winning move Rxg7+ is missed.
Bottom line is that patch seems good for blitz times, perhaps
also for longer times. We should test against a third engine
(Toga ?) to have a final answer regarding this new setup.
Signed-off-by: Marco Costalba <mcostalba@gmail.com>
Restructure RazorMargins and FutilityMargins arrays so that their
values can be more easily tuned.
Add RazorApprMargins array which replaces razorAtDepthOne concept,
because setting RazorApprMargin very high value at ply one is
same as not razoring there at all.
Comment out setting razoring and futility margins through uci to
avoid errors while tuning.
Signed-off-by: Marco Costalba <mcostalba@gmail.com>
If a variable will be populated reading an UCI option
then do not hard code its default values.
This avoids misleadings when reading the sources.
No functional change.
Signed-off-by: Marco Costalba <mcostalba@gmail.com>
Sometimes C++ can be really bad!
In this case an hard coded c string selects Option c'tor
with int argument instead of the std::string one becuase
it is considered a better matching by the compiler.
Fix the bug changing the argument type from std::string to
const char* so to be a better match then the int one.
Signed-off-by: Marco Costalba <mcostalba@gmail.com>
Store boolean values as "1" and "0" instead of "true" and "false"
and convert back to UCI protocol convention when needed.
This is simpler then the other way around.
Signed-off-by: Marco Costalba <mcostalba@gmail.com>
Apart from the teoretical speed increase, the main reason
of this patch is a good amount of code cleanup.
Note that now UCI options are printed in alphabetical
order and not in insertion order as before. Next patch
will take care of restoring old behaviour.
Signed-off-by: Marco Costalba <mcostalba@gmail.com>
It does not seem to clearly improve things and
in any case is disabled by default, so retire for now.
Signed-off-by: Marco Costalba <mcostalba@gmail.com>
Add also the possibility to razor at ply one.
It is disable dby default but it seems stronger
against Stockfish itself. It is still not clear if
is stronger against other engines. By now leave
disabled.
Signed-off-by: Marco Costalba <mcostalba@gmail.com>
Is a new evaluation rule that gives bonus in midgame
to the side that has more space behind pawns for its
minor pieces.
Signed-off-by: Marco Costalba <mcostalba@gmail.com>
When an engine is in deep trouble at few
seconds from time limit then giveup without
fighting anymore.
This is used to reduce "lucky draws" and time pressure
blunders noises that can obfuscate results during tests
blitz games (typical one minute games).
Goal of this technique is to reduce number of matches
needed to reliably prove then an engine A is stronger
then an opponent B.
Signed-off-by: Marco Costalba <mcostalba@gmail.com>
After testing and comparing output with standard Glaurung
a couple of issues arised.
A default value was wrong and init_uci_options() missed a couple
of stringify() calls. Also storing bool values as "false" and "true"
needs some care.
Signed-off-by: Marco Costalba <mcostalba@gmail.com>
Instead of old-style C string functions use standard
library to greatly streamline the implementation.
No functional change.
Signed-off-by: Marco Costalba <mcostalba@gmail.com>
Joona Kiiski