Re: [Bug-gnubg] Is it time for Gnubg 0.15? Re-rolling the position database.

[Joseph Heled]

On 7/18/06, Ian Shaw <address@hidden> wrote:
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: Joseph Heled [mailto:address@hidden
> > Sent: 17 July 2006 16:05
> > To: Ian Shaw
> > Cc: address@hidden
> > Subject: Re: [Bug-gnubg] Is it time for Gnubg 0.15?
> > Re-rolling the position database.
> >
> > Hi Ian,
> >
> > Yes, it would be great to improve the playing level of gnubg
> > once more. Here are (yet again) my thoughts and comments.
> >
> > The net was not trained from the rollout results, but by
> > using 2 ply evaluations. The best I could come up with
> > resulted from the choice which positions to include in the
> > training set. And for my particular training method, more was
> > frequently not better.
> >
> I've just been reading old archive posts, e.g.
> http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/bug-gnubg/2003-11/msg00104.html, and
> realised that my description was incorrect. I guess I'm a victim of
> wanting to have a simple explanation to a question, but the reality is
> much more complex.
>
> So how exactly were the rollout results used? Are they just used as a
> benchmark for trying out new neural nets. As such, can we safely assume
> that they are still accurate enough, three years on, to be the gold
> standard? If so, I would be wasting my time re-rolling them. Should I
> just drop the idea?

While originally I thought they would make a good training base, that
turned out not to be the case. And yes, there were used as (a very
valuable) benchmark. I did some selective re-rolls at the time, and
for the purpose of a benchmark there is very little reason to re-roll
them.
> > My personal view is that to move past the next step we need a
> > new method to generate an evaluation net. this requires some
> > thought and research by someone other than me, as I am set in my ways.
> >
>
> I have some ideas, but that's another thread. It's by far the most
> radical approach, but quite likely the most rewarding, both in terms of
> playing strength and enjoyable design and implementation.

By far that would be the best use of your time and energy.

-Joseph

> -- Ian