HAL9000

HAL9000
"It just isn't conceivable that you can design a program strong enough to beat players like me."

November 28, 2017

Android UCI engine update: Cfish 2017.11.27.ACH

This time, it's shared on time! The build is still hot and don't get your fingers burned. Thanks to Alexei..

GET Cfish 2017.11.27.ACH for arm7 and arm8

In case of trouble downloading from PC, use your mobile or refer to THIS POST.

Android UCI engine update: Stockfish dev't 2017.11.26.ACH

An experimental Stockfish build with dynamic contempt (contempt default = 40!). It's hardcoded, so you don't need to set anything to obtain the fish who hates draws.

GET Stockfish 8.0.2017.11.26.ACH for arm7 and arm8

In case of trouble downloading from PC, use your mobile or refer to THIS POST.

Android UCI engine update: SugaR Xpro 2017.11.25.ACH

Some new SugaR?

GET SugaR XPro.201711245.ACH for arm7 and arm8

In case of trouble downloading from PC, use your mobile or refer to THIS POST.

Lichess 5.2.1

GET latest Lichess for Android at GOOGLE PLAY.

WHAT'S NEW (25-Nov-2017):
v5.2.1:
- Fix game freeze bug when in check (bug in v5.2.0)
- Fix puzzle retry (bug in v5.2.0)
v5.2.0:
- new home page with featured tournaments
- OTB game clock
- new piece set 'riohacha'
- keep puzzle state when going backfrom analysis
- remove premove alerts
- fix stockfish skill much too strong for low levels
- fix loading language based on device settings
- put back notes access in analysis

Chess Free AI 2.552

Another minor update for the fans of this average engine. It's in Chesstroid because it has true time controls instead of childish "Easy, Medium, Hard".

WHAT'S NEW (22-Nov-17):
v2.551: Updates/fixes to intro screen

Download latest version from GOOGLE PLAY.

Android UCI engine update: Vajolet2 2.4.ACH

Vajolet2 is a 3000+ ELO engine according to last release of Rapidroid and it works perfect technically with CfA. The new 2.4 version compiled by Alexei and shared below, replaces now Aprijal's 2.3.1 build.

Although i had expectations about this new Vajolet, its performance during 8 first Rapidroid rounds out of 20 is below 3000. This issue remains to follow...

GET Vajolet2 2.4.ACH for arm7 and arm8

In case of trouble downloading from PC, use your mobile or refer to THIS POST

November 27, 2017

Android UCI engine update: Cfish 2017.11.15.ACH

The Cfishes of November started with some headaches, related to weak first "out of book" moves, played instantly by the builds. The bug appeared not only with all GUIs, mainly Chess Tournament was impacted.

Ronald de Man has later corrected the code and things have become normal. Enjoy and thank Alexei Chernakoff for compiling!

GET Cfish 2017.11.15.ACH for arm7 and arm8

Previous buggy versions of November:
GET Cfish 2017.11.05.ACH for arm7 and arm8
GET Cfish 2017.11.03.ACH for arm7 and arm8

In case of trouble dowloading from PC, use your mobile or refer to THIS POST.

Fritz 15 for Android ft Ginkgo engine

Once there was Chessbase Online for Android which featured Fritz 14 build based on Pandix engine. The app was useful for analysis but it didn't include the option to play a real game. If i bought it, that was just to strip the engine out and plug it to Chess for Android, which worked flawlessly so far.

ChessBase apps are always costly than other commercial programs but they are still marketed, presented and sold in a level that no other company can compete. There's no other company dedicated to sell chess progs by the way. ChessBase is unique.

But when it comes to Android, their apps are not necessarily on par with the expectations: Sometimes buggy, mostly voluminous and more expensive than, let's say Komodo or Chiron (Don't mention Stockfish which comes free!).

When i first heard about Fritz, the new option to play chess vs the engine didn't attract me at all. I just bought the app in pursuit of the engine, thinking that whatever it comes out, will be strong enough.
To my biggest surprise, they've embedded Ginkgo 2.0 by Frank Schneider instead of Vasik Rajlich's Rybka. Well, okay, as long as it works with CfA for my tournaments, i'll be good.

Ginkgo 2.0 is strong enough to surpass Chiron, slightly behind Andscacs which will soon become the new #3 of Android. I guess ir plays around 3150 ELO. So, if you wanna get this engine you can buy Fritz. Otherwise, it fully depends on your wallet.

Please note that on arm7 i wasn't able to trigger more than 4 threads and on arm8 it seems 6 threads is the maximum. I don't know why...

BUY Fritz 15 from Google Play

Android UCI engine update: Texel 1.08a4 by Peter Österlund

Shortly after 1.07, here comes Texel 1.08 alpha versions.

WHAT'S NEW (13-Nov-2017):
- Updated Texel to version 1.08a4.
- New option MaxNPS as an alternative way to reduce playing strength by limiting the search speed.

Let me notify that the Android versions, starting with 1.07 looked more competitive than ever to me. I expect Texel to be in TOP-10 of next Rapidroid list.

GET Texel installer app in Google Play)
GET Texel 1.08a4.PO for arm7, arm8 and x86 (Standalone builds)

In case of trouble downloading from PC, use your mobile or refer to THIS POST.

Android UCI engine update: Ethereal 8.37

Andy Grant keeps releasing Android builds with each update of his engine. Ethereal is on the way to 3000 ELO in CCRL and it already broke trough 2800 in blitz list. You may expect 2650-2700 in Android devices.

WHAT'S NEW (v8.37):
-Major cleanup of code; Working torwards a uniform style. No functional change.
Main change if that eval is broken into many functions, with the aid of an EvalInfo struct. Working with the one massive eval function was a pain. Also, this new way nets a 2.0% to 3.0% speedup in my test positions.
Managed to remove ~725 LOC Tuned values for all evaluation features except Castling / Safety

GET Ethereal 8.37.AG for arm7 32-bit pie

In case of trouble downloading from your PC, use your mobile device or refer to THIS POST.

Android UCI engine update: Cichess 1.8.20171107.ACH

Cichess is a Stockfish derivative i'm not interested to test but i respect the dedicated fans of it, so i keep sharing wherever i can, no matter how quickly (...how lately).

GET Cichess 1.8.20171107.ACH for arm7 and arm8

In case of trouble dowloading from PC, use your mobile or refer to THIS POST.

Android UCI engine update: Brainfish 2017.11.10.ACH with Cerebellum book

It had been a while since Alexei compiled Brainfish for Android. After nearly three months, the brain is ON again, with a new Cerebellum book.

Here's what Alexei recommends for book setup:
"To use the book Cerebellum_Light_Poly.bin (download the latest version of this book from the official site in polyglot format), create a book folder in the phone's memory and put a book in it. The path should look like this: /sdcard/book/Cerebellum_Light_Poly.bin, when the engine starts the book connects automatically."

Hopefully, i'm not afraid of eating 45MB of storage to host a big book. So, you can download Cerebellum from Chesstroid repository:
GET Cerebellum Light 2017.11.01

And before i forget, the engine, of course:
GET Brainfish 2017.11.10.ACH for arm7 and arm8

In case of trouble downloading from PC, use your mobile or refer to THIS POST.

Android UCI engine update: armFish 2017.11.08

armFish builds are made by Lyudmil Antonov for arm8 64-bit devices only, using direct cpu instructions via assembly language. This method is the most native but a little bit unhuman too. One would only bear this to obtain the fastest build.

GET armFish 2017.11.08.LA for arm8

In case of trouble dowloading from PC, use your mobile or refer to THIS POST.

Android UCI engine update: armFish 2017.11.06

armFish builds are made by Lyudmil Antonov for arm8 64-bit devices only, using direct cpu instructions via assembly language. This method is the most native but a little bit unhuman too. One would bear this to obtain the fastest build.

Below build is not the most recent. It's placed here just for collectors, the way i often proceed when i'm late sharing what's in hand.
GET armFish 2017.11.06.LA for arm8

In case of trouble dowloading from PC, use your mobile or refer to THIS POST.

November 6, 2017

New Android UCI engine: Andscacs 0.921 TCEC

Andscacs is today one of the Top-10 engines, among the strongest "followers" placed just behind Stockfish, Komodo & Houdini.

Andscacs is developed and programmed by Daniel José Queraltó from Andorra. It currently plays in TCEC-10 Round-1 undefeated and will qualify for Round-2.

Daniel Jose describes Andscacs in his HOMEPAGE like: "It's born in September 2013. It has approximately 3240 elo. The new versions will be published in this website. Andscacs means "And" for Andorra, the country where I live, and scacs for "escacs", chess in catalan."

CCRL 40/4 rates Andscacs 0.92 about 3270 ELO for Windows, which makes it #7 of the list. Therefore, to honor the TCEC event (i guess), the author has decided last week to provide the source code of the version playing there. It was an unexpected but a nice gift indeed because the engine used to be closed source until today.

I didn't wait too long to notify Alexei Chernakoff who kindly sweated a lot to port the code to Android. The result seems very satisfying after a little rework for arm8 version.

I'll be highly glad to rate Andscacs in Rapidroid, which i hope to update before December comes.

GET Andscacs 0.921.ACH for arm7 and arm8

In case of trouble dowloading from PC, use your mobile or refer to THIS POST.

Android UCI engine update: armFish 2017.11.05

armFish builds are made by Lyudmil Antonov for arm8 64-bit devices only, using direct cpu instructions via assembly language. It's native and should deliver the fastest builds by definition.

GET armFish 2017.11.05.LA for arm8

In case of trouble dowloading from PC, use your mobile or refer to THIS POST.

Android UCI engine update: Stockfish dev't 2017.10.31.ACH

Stockfish by the end October! The ninth version is not too far.

GET Stockfish 8.0.2017.10.31.ACH for arm7 and arm8

In case of trouble dowloading from PC, use your mobile or refer to THIS POST.

Android UCI engine update: Cichess 1.8.20171031.ACH

Cichess is a Stockfish derivative i'm not interested to test but i respect the dedicated fans of it, so i keep sharing wherever i can, no matter how quickly.

GET Cichess 1.8.20171031.ACH for arm7 and arm8

In case of trouble dowloading from PC, use your mobile or refer to THIS POST.

Android XB engine update: Scorpio 2.7.8.ACH

After two updates on the source code, a third modification comes with a version update to 2.7.8. Do not forget to can modify scorpio.ini before installation to alter the settings to your taste. Thanks to Alexei for porting Scorpio to Android.

GET Scorpio 2.7.8.ACH for arm7 and arm8

In case of trouble dowloading from PC, use your mobile or refer to THIS POST.

Chess Online 11.2.3 by Miroslav Kisly

WHAT'S NEW (30-Oct-2017)
v11.2.3:
* Added Nigeria and Ghana
* Online chat black list
* Other fixes

Download Chess Online from GOOGLE PLAY.

Aurora Chess Clock v1.4

A free chess clock very comparable to the official DGT.

WHAT'S NEW (28-Oct-2017):
- Larger digital screen
- Settings page optimized for low resolution screens
- An easter egg for time cheating in paid version.
Download the latest version from GOOGLE PLAY.