Shura-Bura's Program

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Shura-Bura's Program, an early Soviet chess program developed by a group of scientists at the Steklov Institute of Mathematics headed by Mikhail R. Shura-Bura. A brief description of the program was given in an interview with Shura-Bura on computer chess by V. Tomanov, published as part in the 8th Bulletin of the Botvinnik Tal 1961 revenge-match for the world chess championship - entitled "The best move in 58 seconds", cited in Jaap van den Herik's Ph.D. thesis Computerschaak, Schaakwereld en Kunstmatige Intelligentie. Further, two games of the program were published. Hardware was not mentioned, presumably Shura-Bura's Program ran on a Strela or M-20 computer.

=Description= The program is reported without any search to select the best move with the help of a static evaluation function, which had seven distinct components:
 * 1) Material (Pawn 1; Knight, Bishop 3.5; Rook 5; Queen 9.5; King 109)
 * 2) Mobility
 * 3) Static Exchange Evaluation
 * 4) Pawn Structure
 * 5) Center Control
 * 6) King Safety - Patterns
 * 7) King Safety - Pawn Shield

=Publications=
 * V. Tomanov (1961). The best move in 58 seconds. in the 8th Bulletin of the Botvinnik Tal 1961 revenge-match (Russian)
 * Jaap van den Herik (1983). Computerschaak, Schaakwereld en Kunstmatige Intelligentie. Ph.D. thesis, Delft University of Technology. Academic Service, The Hague. ISBN 90 62 33 093 2 (Dutch), 2.2.9. Sjoera-Boera

=External Links=
 * Schachcomputer - Geschichte - 6 by Karsten Bauermeister (German)
 * Computerschach - ein Überblick von Mathias Grontzki (German)

=References=

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