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zaifrun's Blog


    • Cool endgame study - test your engines!

                    I like this cool endgame study - white to move and win. In all variations there is only 1 winning move for white (black can have several options). I tried with Fritz 10 to analyze it - it could not find the first corr... | Read More

      • zaifrun
      • | Jan 10, 2012
      • | 1056 views
      • | 12 comments
    • Android Chess Endings App

      One aspect of chess that I think is the most overlooked area is endgames. If you just look on the amount of chess books available on amazon you will find that the number of chess books/dvds on openings stand at more than 2500 items will chess en... | Read More

      • zaifrun
      • | Jan 7, 2012
      • | 1136 views
      • | 0 comments
    • Android Chess Openings App

      So it's been 4 months since my last blog post here. As you may have read from my previous blog post I am interested in chess and computers. My last blog post was on the topic of chess apps for Android. I was complaining about the lack of usef... | Read More

      • zaifrun
      • | Nov 16, 2011
      • | 3070 views
      • | 4 comments
    • Chess apps for Android

      Hi all chess lovers. As you may have read from my previous blogs on how to program a computer chess engine from scratch you will know I interested in computers and chess. Recently I got a smartphone and the first thing I did was to go to market a... | Read More

      • zaifrun
      • | Jul 4, 2011
      • | 1702 views
      • | 1 comment
    • Creating a chess engine (part 6: final thoughts and a game)

        This will be my final part (so far I think) of this small series concerning chess engines. I started this project about a month ago and in that time I have managed to create a fairly strong chess engine (and still do the day-job - need money ... | Read More

      • zaifrun
      • | May 13, 2010
      • | 1612 views
      • | 2 comments
    • Creating a chess engine (part 5: Endgames)

      This part will focus on the most difficult part in modern engine design today in my opinion - endgames. While openings are covered by having opening books and the middle game is dealt with by the large search depth of engine (20-25 ply  - or 10-... | Read More

      • zaifrun
      • | May 11, 2010
      • | 1614 views
      • | 0 comments
    • Creating a chess engine (Part 4 - position evaluation)

        I have finally started working a bit more on the position evaluation part of the engine. This part will focus on how a computer evaluates a chess board position. The evaluation in my engine was quite primitive at first, now it is better - stil... | Read More

      • zaifrun
      • | May 5, 2010
      • | 2808 views
      • | 0 comments
    • Creating a chess engine (part 3: Opening Book)

      Ok, I have not done much work on the evaluation code yet, so that will wait for another part. This part will instead focus how an engine can understand opening theory and how it chooses which openings to play. Several issues arise when crea... | Read More

      • zaifrun
      • | Apr 25, 2010
      • | 2860 views
      • | 0 comments
    • Test your chess engine.

      Here is a funny constructed chess position that is very difficult solve even for engines.  White to move - mate in 15. For your information the white pawn is at h2. I have only found 1 engine that could solve this (I will not say which one!). ... | Read More

      • zaifrun
      • | Apr 23, 2010
      • | 5933 views
      • | 23 comments
    • Creating a chess engine (Part 2: Move search)

      So in the first part we looked at the components of a chess engine. After 10 days of coding I now have a working chess engine. Its not fast enough yet and the evaluation function is still primitive, but it works and it does not make obvious blunde... | Read More

      • zaifrun
      • | Apr 18, 2010
      • | 1852 views
      • | 1 comment