Gull 3 for Android: Rev 5 JA qualifies for Rapidroid

Updated versions of the engines already ported to Android is not enough for us, ELO gourmets, hungry for engine battles. That's why it's extremely exciting to see Gull 3 knocking on the door toward cellphones and tablets arena.

It's to remember that Jim Ablett's first attempts to compile it had failed and he had given up. Recently after a few months, the revenge is done, although it was not easy.

We have seen five builds as per user feedback based firstly on nodes per second display (still missing) and Jim has added Syzygy support on the go with rev3, something i personally don't need for Rapidroid. I skipped the second build which i consider not very significant. 

Assuming that a sixth build will not come soon, i've conducted a closed tournament between the builds i've stored just to see which one performs better, without caring about the functionality of the features. I've simply said "Be the strongest survive!".

Using the first 10 openings of TCEC-7 and a quick time control of 180+1, the tournament didn't take too much time. I guess the result is representative for 900+2 time control of Rapoidroid, though i can never be totally sure. However, time matters...

It's hard to distinguish the revisions as the names don't give enough details, so here's the brief summary:

1) Gull 3 rev1 42.5 / 60
2) Gull 3 rev5 42.0 / 60
3) Gull 3 rev3 35.5 / 60
4) Gull 3 rev4  0.0 / 60

Rev 4 seems to have a serious bug which makes it a whipping boy. Arithmetically rev1 is the winner here but i insisted on rev5 as the best choice for Rapidroid because:

* It won against rev1,

* It's supposed to support tablebases,

* It's the latest one...

Now i'll be waiting for the end of current gauntlets which will finalize the release of February list and then i'll take care of Gull and also Fritz 14.

I hope that next months will bring more competition to the Top-20 of Rapidroid.

Three deeee printed

3D printing is the technology of tomorrow, spreading wide and quickly. It can produce almost anything from a 3D CAD file.

While a regular chess set is not a big deal for these printers, i suppose complex ones like the following must be a little bit time consuming to finish.

Droidfish 1.61 featuring Stockfish 7

Another update of Droidfish bringing small improvements such as:

- Permission handling for Android 6.

- Show usage hints on first start.

In fact, you won't need this update unless you are using Android 6.

So, Marshmallowers may install it via Google Play HERE.

Alternatively, it's possible to download and install via the backup copy i've uploaded to my repository HERE.

Please note that the Stockfish builds embedded into Droidfish are exactly the same as v1.60.

Running Deep Fritz 14 under Chess for Android

"Bonjour" means Hello in French usually. But the reason i'm saying this to myself today refers exactly to an alternative usage when you meet someone who has just waken up in the morning.

Yes, i just woke up to the fact that Fritz 14 engine bundled with Chessbase Online for Android can be used under CfA and Droidfish. It can even play tournament games under CfA. And besides, it plays Fischer clock games too. Quite impressing!

I'd purchased Chessbase a few weeks ago. After a little practice it was clear to me that the app is handy for loading and analyzing games but it disappointed with missing clocks. Chessbase does not use any timing and runs the UCI engines until a user interruption. Only infinite analysis mode.

Somehow, i didn't notice any OEX engine added to the engine list of CfA. What triggered my attention lately was a user comment published here in this blog. It suggested that Deep Fritz is working with CfA. What? Really? How?

I checked my engine list in CfA again. Nothing...

But the addicted mind can't give up easily. I've navigated into to the root of my tablet to find a folder dedicated to Chessbase app. Here it is! And a lib folder disclosed what i was looking for, as seen in below screenshot:

The two underlined files are the engine binaries. Usually it's possible to copy them to the home folder, rename them and install as new engine from CfA. I did so and the practice met the theory.

The engine can use up to 8 threads and 2GB hash. I choose 4 threads and 256MB hash. Done! A quick test of 1 minute thinking shows 500+ knps and all 4 cores are running. Perfecto!

Next step is a timed game using 180+1 vs a single thread engine strong enough to cope with Fritz. Robbolitto is a good option.

And finally, the happy end shown below is quite attractive for Rapidroid. I just can't wait to push Fritz forward into the burning arena of the mobile engines.

Repeating the whole thing with Droidfish requires similar steps. You just have to place the binary in UCI folder of Droidfish and select it through the "manage engines" menu.

Finally, i can't not upload any binary to the repository since the engine is not freely distributable. I don't even know whether it would work that way, without the app installed. The simplest way to run Fritz under Android is to buy the Chessbase app HERE.

Android XB engine update: Crafty 25.0.1.JA

Crafty 25.0 is updated to 25.0.1 due to a bug in memory management issue according to Robert Hyatt.

He says: "I've released version 25.0.1... Some NUMA additions, but the main reason for the release is Jon Dart found a glitch in the "memory" command that was caused by an accidental 32 bit math operation that limits memory to 2gb or less. This version fixes that...

No measurable strength improvement unless you run on a larger NUMA box where the new memory management will help modestly."

I think the correction will have no impact on Android. The new one can replace 25.0 like a silent update. I won't replace my 25.0 games in my Rapidroid database and i'll simply switch to 25.0.1

Download Crafty 25.0.1.JA for arm5: HERE
Download Crafty 25.0.1.JA for arm7: HERE

Stockfish 7 DF 1.60 qualifies vs 7.JA and 121215.JA

Since stockfishchess.org still lacks of an official SF7 compile, it was necessary for me to decide which alternative should be used in Rapidroid, among 3 candidates:
1) Stockfish 7 bundled with Droidfish 1.60, compiled by Peter Österlund
2) Stockfish 7 compiled by Jim Ablett
3) Stockfish 121215 compiled by Jim Ablett, leader of the last Rapidroid release.

I don't like to simulate rapid games with blitz time controls but we need to choose between more samples of quicker games and less samples with usual time controls. And blitz is barely supportable.

As my Exynos devices were continously running for other Rapidroid tourneys, i moved the duels to a quad core Rockchip 3188 tablet which requires a downclocking to avoid freezing. First duel ran at 1.0GHz instead of 1.4 without any issues while the second ran at 1.2GHz with a lot of freezing and restarting. RK3188 really needs 1.0GHz to keep running alive with quad cores.

Time control was 180+2 for all duels and the openings were taken from TCEC-7, a total of 306 positions.

The first duel has been played between two SF7 compiles and SF7.DF160 won:

Program               Elo   +  - gam win dra los score oppo draws
1 Stockfish 7 DF160   3307 13 13 612  79 480  53 52.1% 3293 78.4%
2 Stockfish 7 JA      3293 13 13 612  53 480  79 47.9% 3307 78.4%

The second duel has been played between SF7.DF160 and SF 121215.JA. Suprisingly it was almost drawn:

Program               Elo   +  - gam win dra los score oppo draws
1 Stockfish 7 DF160   3301 12 12 612  64 488  60 50.3% 3299 79.7%
2 Stockfish 121215.JA 3299 12 12 612  60 488  64 49.7% 3301 79.7%

The error margins are still higher than the ELO gaps. This is a typical case of "no verdict". The statistics rules tell that more games are necessary to judge.

Then which one is the winner? My sixth sense definitely...

I decide to use DF.160 in Rapidroid even though nothing is proven statistically, bearing in mind that:

* This build is referred in Stockfish official site via a third party app

* It never fell behind other builds during both duels and led until the end.

The games, a summary and CfA snaphots can be downloaded: HERE

Android UCI engine update: Ivanhoe 9.47c Beta

The second nice surprise which came in the engine package sent by Valery Kotelnikov is an alternative build of Ivanhoe that i've been searching all over the web without success since long ago.

It wouldn't be a crucial requirement if the build 9.46h could perform as expected, precisely said, if it could use hash memory. Although the engine runs okay, it has issues related to the way it was compiled:
* Uses no hash memory at all regardless of the setting
* Uses all available cores or crashes if the user sets another value

Given that Rapidroid ELO of Ivanhoe is only ~2700 vs 2900+ expected, any other alternative is welcome. Now that 9.47c Beta is in the pocket, i can check whether this build works better than 9.46h.

And interested users can choose to give a try before me: HERE