Difference between revisions of "Opening Book"

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[[FILE:380px-Modern_Chess_Openings_Second_Edition.jpg|border|right|thumb|link=https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Modern_Chess_Openings_Second_Edition.jpg|[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modern_Chess_Openings Modern Chess Openings] <ref>Worn copy of second edition of Modern Chess Openings (1913) by [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Griffith_%28chess_player%29 Richard Clewin Griffith] (1872–1955) and [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Herbert_White John Herbert White] (1880–1920), with an introduction by [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henry_Ernest_Atkins Henry Ernest Atkins] (1872–1955), [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modern_Chess_Openings Modern Chess Openings from Wikipedia]</ref> ]]
 
[[FILE:380px-Modern_Chess_Openings_Second_Edition.jpg|border|right|thumb|link=https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Modern_Chess_Openings_Second_Edition.jpg|[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modern_Chess_Openings Modern Chess Openings] <ref>Worn copy of second edition of Modern Chess Openings (1913) by [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Griffith_%28chess_player%29 Richard Clewin Griffith] (1872–1955) and [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Herbert_White John Herbert White] (1880–1920), with an introduction by [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henry_Ernest_Atkins Henry Ernest Atkins] (1872–1955), [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modern_Chess_Openings Modern Chess Openings from Wikipedia]</ref> ]]
  
Chess programs often look up the positions at the [[Opening|beginning of the game]] in an '''Opening Book'''. Chess programs could use [[Search|search]] from the beginning and look through all possible continuations in detail to find the best next move, but as this is quite time-consuming and there already exists a lot of [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chess_opening_book_%28literature%29 literature] about different opening lines, opening books save time and provide higher quality of play. Another reason that opening books are used commonly is to provide variety, as book moves are usually chosen [[Pseudorandom Number Generator|randomly]], whereas searches are more or less deterministic.
+
Chess programs often look up the positions at the [[Opening|beginning of the game]] in an '''Opening Book'''. The opening database can then be used as long as the opponent plays a new move from the database, so usually more common opening lines will be stored to a much higher depth than the uncommon ones. As soon as the program is "out of book" it has to continue using the normal search routines.  
  
This opening database can then be used as long as the opponent plays a new move from the database, so usually more common opening lines will be stored to a much higher depth than the uncommon ones. As soon as the program is "out of book" it has to continue using the normal search routines.  
+
=Purposes=
 +
* Save time: Chess programs could use [[Search|search]] from the beginning and look through all possible continuations in detail to find the best next move, but as this is quite time-consuming. In contrast, opening books can play opening moves almost instantly without searching nor heavy computing and help to save time.
 +
* Provide a higher quality of play: Searching even with large depths can't see deep tactics, strategy, compensation. It may lose temporarily material for long term advantage.
 +
* Provide variety: there already exists a lot of [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chess_opening_book_%28literature%29 literature] about different opening lines. As book moves are usually chosen [[Pseudorandom Number Generator|randomly]], whereas searches are more or less deterministic.
  
=Types=  
+
=Types=
There are two ways to store an opening database:
+
Opening books are typically stored in two main formats:
* Opening lines
+
==Text==
* Positions
+
The most advantage by using text form is that they are readable, understandable, and editable by humans and can be viewed, edited with normal text editors. However, the main disadvantage is that they may take too much space as well as time for searching since an item may take from 50 bytes (for FEN strings) to hundreds of bytes (for PGN text). If we store openings "continuously" (all possible opening positions) both data size and searching time become too huge and unacceptable for playing. They are usually missing weight values (to compare between items to know which ones are better) either. In practice, those opening books are usually very small with some lines or positions only, they are hard to be used for real game playing but for testing.
  
Some [[Databases|databases]] use a list of common opening lines, while others hold a list of positions that arise in common openings. The first option is probably easier to implement, while the second has some important advantages.
+
They are stored in typical ways for games and positions:
 +
* [[EPD]]: They are the last positions of opening lines
 +
* [[PGN]]: Opening lines are stored as individual games
 +
<span id="BookBuilder"></span>
 +
* Special text formats: In 1999, [[Marc-Philippe Huget]] published a '''Book Builder''' <ref>[https://www.stmintz.com/ccc/index.php?id=44407 Web site updated and new program Book Builder] by [[Marc-Philippe Huget]], [[CCC]], February 24, 1999</ref> in conjunction with his engine [[La Dame Blanche]], a standalone open source program <ref>[http://www.quarkchess.de/ladameblanche/ Book Bilder of La Dame Blanche] by [[Marc-Philippe Huget]], hosted by [[Thomas Mayer]]</ref> to convert a [[Portable Game Notation|PGN file]] into an opening book of the format proposed by [[Kathe Spracklen]] <ref>[[Kathe Spracklen]] ('''1983'''). ''Tutorial: Representation of an Opening Tree''. [[ICGA Journal#6_1|ICCA Newsletter, Vol. 6, No. 1]]</ref>:
 +
<pre>
 +
(e4(e5)(c5))(d4d5)) etc.
 +
</pre>
  
Opening databases built on positions are usually more space efficient and overcome the problem of [[Transposition|transpositions]]. Often these positions are stored as hash value to allow fast access. Some opening database formats store with each positions as well some information about it. (e.g. number of times occurred, number of games won by white/black / drawn with this position, average/maximum Elo of players playing to this opening position, chess program's success with the position) So when a chess program has to decide on a move, it will look up all positions that could arise after moving in the database and then make a decision upon the information given with each position.
+
==Binary==
 +
Binary books have some important advantages, especially for computer chess engines: space-efficient, fast on accessing and searching, more useful information. At the most simple form, they are just a conversion of above text-opening books into binary, in the ready form for software and save text-binary converting steps. However, the major number of top books is built and worked with hash values from [[Transposition|transpositions]]. Often each position is stored as a hash value (8 bytes) and some extra information such as the number of times occurred, number of games won by white/black / drawn with this position, average/maximum Elo of players playing to this opening position, chess program's success with the position. To save space those extra information typically about 2-8 bytes. For example, [[PolyGlot]] uses 16 bytes for each item, including hash, move, weight, learning values. Items of a book should be sorted by their hash. So when a chess program has to decide on a move, it will look up (by using binary-search) using the hash value of the current position to collect all information come with that hash value and then make a decision upon it.
 +
 
 +
To build and/or edit those opening books, users need to use special software.
 +
 
 +
The most popular format is [[PolyGlot]].
  
 
=Generation=  
 
=Generation=  
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==Handcrafted==  
 
==Handcrafted==  
If the opening database designer has some special preference of a certain opening line, he might create it fully manually. This is often the case if a chess program is about to play an important game against a grandmaster. Then the opening style will probably be chosen to be difficult and dangerous for the opponent. Another option is to first automatically generate a database and then fine tune it manually.
+
If the opening database designer has some special preference of a certain opening line, he might create it fully manually. This is often the case if a chess program is about to play an important game against a grandmaster. Then the opening style will probably be chosen to be difficult and dangerous for the opponent. Another option is to first automatically generate a database and then fine-tune it manually.
  
==Automated==  
+
==From game collection==  
Another option is to select a number of games (the type of which will effect the openings played: e.g. drawn games only, GM games only, etc) and then up to a certain depth store all positions in the opening database. It is true that by using this way of database generation some severe errors might by copied as well, but usually the chess programs are set to stop playing according from the book if a position occurred less than a certain number times before.  
+
Another option is to select a number of games (the type of which will affect the openings played: e.g. drawn games only, GM games only, etc) and then up to a certain depth store all positions in the opening database. It is true that by using this way of database generation some severe errors might by copied as well, but usually the chess programs are set to stop playing according to the book if a position occurred less than a certain number times before.
  
==Book Building Tools==
+
==By computing==
 +
Chess [[engines]] can be used to evaluate positions in a book opening tree to rank them, and/or decide to stop or expand.
 +
 
 +
=Book Building Tools=
 
* [[Bookbuilder]]
 
* [[Bookbuilder]]
 
* [[Bookup]]
 
* [[Bookup]]
 
* [[Chess Opening Wizard]] (COW)
 
* [[Chess Opening Wizard]] (COW)
<span id="BookBuilder"></span>
+
* [[Banksia GUI]]
==Book Builder==
+
 
In 1999, [[Marc-Philippe Huget]] published a '''Book Builder''' <ref>[https://www.stmintz.com/ccc/index.php?id=44407 Web site updated and new program Book Builder] by [[Marc-Philippe Huget]], [[CCC]], February 24, 1999</ref> in conjunction with his engine [[La Dame Blanche]], a standalone open source program <ref>[http://www.quarkchess.de/ladameblanche/ Book Bilder of La Dame Blanche] by [[Marc-Philippe Huget]], hosted by [[Thomas Mayer]]</ref> to convert a [[Portable Game Notation|PGN file]] into an opening book of the format proposed by [[Kathe Spracklen]] <ref>[[Kathe Spracklen]] ('''1983'''). ''Tutorial: Representation of an Opening Tree''. [[ICGA Journal#6_1|ICCA Newsletter, Vol. 6, No. 1]]</ref>:
+
=Book Playing=
<pre>
+
* [[Engines]]: They can directly use opening books to make move. Some engines use external books, some others integrate books inside their codes. Those engines need both opening book code and book data to run
(e4(e5)(c5))(d4d5)) etc.
+
* [[GUI|Chess GUI]]: They can play opening books thus engines don't need to deal with and start computing from the middle period only. This way is quite popular because of some advantages: simplifier for chess engines, save space and easier to manage opening books, more various ways to select openings, more fair-play to compare engines...
</pre>
 
  
 
=Quotes=  
 
=Quotes=  
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  To solve the opening problems of his chess machine, [[Belle]], [[Ken Thompson]] typed in opening lines from the ''[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Encyclopaedia_of_Chess_Openings Encyclopedia of Chess Openings]'' (in five thick volumes). Religiously, he dedicated one hour a day for almost three years (!) to the tedious pursuit of entering lines of play from the books and having his Belle computer verify them. The result was an opening library of roughly three-hundred thousand moves. The results were immediate and obvious: Belle became a much stronger chess program, and Ken probably aged prematurely. Later Ken developed a program to automatically read the ''Encyclopedia'', allowing him to do in a few days what had taken him three years to do manually. <ref>[[Mathematician#HSBaird|Henry S. Baird]], [[Ken Thompson]] ('''1990'''). ''[http://doc.cat-v.org/bell_labs/reading_chess/ Reading Chess]''. [[IEEE#TPAMI|IEEE Transactions on Pattern Analysis and Machine Intelligence]], Vol. 12, No. 6, [http://doc.cat-v.org/bell_labs/reading_chess/reading_chess.pdf pdf]</ref>  
 
  To solve the opening problems of his chess machine, [[Belle]], [[Ken Thompson]] typed in opening lines from the ''[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Encyclopaedia_of_Chess_Openings Encyclopedia of Chess Openings]'' (in five thick volumes). Religiously, he dedicated one hour a day for almost three years (!) to the tedious pursuit of entering lines of play from the books and having his Belle computer verify them. The result was an opening library of roughly three-hundred thousand moves. The results were immediate and obvious: Belle became a much stronger chess program, and Ken probably aged prematurely. Later Ken developed a program to automatically read the ''Encyclopedia'', allowing him to do in a few days what had taken him three years to do manually. <ref>[[Mathematician#HSBaird|Henry S. Baird]], [[Ken Thompson]] ('''1990'''). ''[http://doc.cat-v.org/bell_labs/reading_chess/ Reading Chess]''. [[IEEE#TPAMI|IEEE Transactions on Pattern Analysis and Machine Intelligence]], Vol. 12, No. 6, [http://doc.cat-v.org/bell_labs/reading_chess/reading_chess.pdf pdf]</ref>  
 
<span id="Formats"></span>
 
<span id="Formats"></span>
 +
 
=Formats=  
 
=Formats=  
 
* [[ABK]] - [[Arena|Arena's]] book format  
 
* [[ABK]] - [[Arena|Arena's]] book format  
 
* [[PolyGlot|BIN]] - [[PolyGlot]] book fomat
 
* [[PolyGlot|BIN]] - [[PolyGlot]] book fomat
* [[CTG]] - [[ChessBase]] book format  
+
* [[CTG]] - [[ChessBase]] book format
  
 
=Classification of Chess Openings=
 
=Classification of Chess Openings=
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=Selected Publications=  
 
=Selected Publications=  
 +
==1974 ...==
 +
* [http://www.mathnet.ru/php/person.phtml?option_lang=eng&personid=96114 Ya. Yu. Gol'fand], [[Aaron L. Futer]] ('''1974'''). ''Implementation of the opening book for the chess program.'' in Problems of Cybernetic, No. 29 , pp. 201-210
 +
: Я.Ю. Гольфанд, [[Aaron L. Futer|А.Л. Футер]] ('''1974'''). ''Реализация дебютной справочной для шахматной программы.''/ Сб. Проблемы кибернетики №29, стр. 201-210
 
==1980 ...==  
 
==1980 ...==  
 
* [[John F. White]] ('''1982'''). ''[http://yourcomputeronline.wordpress.com/2011/01/19/chess-book-openings/ Chess-Book Openings]''. [[Your Computer]], [http://yourcomputeronline.wordpress.com/2011/01/15/february-1982-contents-and-editorial/ February 1982]
 
* [[John F. White]] ('''1982'''). ''[http://yourcomputeronline.wordpress.com/2011/01/19/chess-book-openings/ Chess-Book Openings]''. [[Your Computer]], [http://yourcomputeronline.wordpress.com/2011/01/15/february-1982-contents-and-editorial/ February 1982]
 
* [[Kathe Spracklen]] ('''1983'''). ''Tutorial: Representation of an Opening Tree''. [[ICGA Journal#6_1|ICCA Newsletter, Vol. 6, No. 1]]
 
* [[Kathe Spracklen]] ('''1983'''). ''Tutorial: Representation of an Opening Tree''. [[ICGA Journal#6_1|ICCA Newsletter, Vol. 6, No. 1]]
* [[Joe Condon]] and [[Ken Thompson]] ('''1983'''). ''BELLE''. [[Chess Skill in Man and Machine]]
+
* [[Joe Condon]], [[Ken Thompson]] ('''1983'''). ''BELLE''. [[Chess Skill in Man and Machine]]
 
==1990 ...==  
 
==1990 ...==  
 
* [[John F. White]] ('''1990'''). ''The Amateur's Book-Opening Routine''. [[ICGA Journal#13_1|ICCA Journal, Vol. 13, No. 1]]
 
* [[John F. White]] ('''1990'''). ''The Amateur's Book-Opening Routine''. [[ICGA Journal#13_1|ICCA Journal, Vol. 13, No. 1]]
Line 86: Line 107:
 
* [[Chrilly Donninger]], [[Ulf Lorenz]] ('''2005'''). ''[http://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/11922155_1 Innovative Opening-Book Handling]''. [[Advances in Computer Games 11]], [http://www2.cs.uni-paderborn.de/cs/ag-monien/PERSONAL/FLULO/publications/icga_open_springer.pdf pdf]
 
* [[Chrilly Donninger]], [[Ulf Lorenz]] ('''2005'''). ''[http://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/11922155_1 Innovative Opening-Book Handling]''. [[Advances in Computer Games 11]], [http://www2.cs.uni-paderborn.de/cs/ag-monien/PERSONAL/FLULO/publications/icga_open_springer.pdf pdf]
 
* [[Jeff Rollason]] ('''2006'''). ''[http://www.aifactory.co.uk/newsletter/2006_01_fuzzy_books.htm Fuzzy books - Approximate opening knowledge]''. [[AI Factory]], Spring 2006
 
* [[Jeff Rollason]] ('''2006'''). ''[http://www.aifactory.co.uk/newsletter/2006_01_fuzzy_books.htm Fuzzy books - Approximate opening knowledge]''. [[AI Factory]], Spring 2006
 +
* [[Mark Levene]], [[Judit Bar-Ilan]] ('''2006'''). ''Comparing Typical Opening Move Choices Made by Humans and Chess Engines''. [https://arxiv.org/abs/cs/0610060 arXiv:cs/0610060]
 +
* [[Mark Levene]], [[Judit Bar-Ilan]] ('''2007'''). ''Comparing Typical Opening Move Choices Made by Humans and Chess Engines''. [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Computer_Journal The Computer Journal], Vol. 50, No. 5
 
* [[Jeff Rollason]] ('''2007'''). ''[http://www.aifactory.co.uk/newsletter/2007_03_creating_book.htm Creating Book Knowledge]''. [[AI Factory]], Autumn 2007
 
* [[Jeff Rollason]] ('''2007'''). ''[http://www.aifactory.co.uk/newsletter/2007_03_creating_book.htm Creating Book Knowledge]''. [[AI Factory]], Autumn 2007
* [[Mark Levene]], [[Judit Bar-Ilan]] ('''2007'''). ''[http://arxiv.org/abs/cs.AI/0610060 Comparing Typical Opening Move Choices Made by Humans and Chess Engines]''. [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Computer_Journal Computer Journal], 50, [http://arxiv.org/PS_cache/cs/pdf/0610/0610060v1.pdf pdf]
 
 
* [http://gobase.org/information/players/?pp=Pierre%20Audouard Pierre Audouard], [[Guillaume Chaslot]], [[Jean-Baptiste Hoock]], [[Arpad Rimmel]], [[Julien Pérez]], [[Olivier Teytaud]] ('''2009'''). ''Grid co-evolution for adaptive simulations; application to the building of opening books in the game of Go''. [http://www.lri.fr/~rimmel/publi/ouvertures.pdf pdf]
 
* [http://gobase.org/information/players/?pp=Pierre%20Audouard Pierre Audouard], [[Guillaume Chaslot]], [[Jean-Baptiste Hoock]], [[Arpad Rimmel]], [[Julien Pérez]], [[Olivier Teytaud]] ('''2009'''). ''Grid co-evolution for adaptive simulations; application to the building of opening books in the game of Go''. [http://www.lri.fr/~rimmel/publi/ouvertures.pdf pdf]
 
* [[Guillaume Chaslot]], [[Jean-Baptiste Hoock]], [[Julien Pérez]], [[Arpad Rimmel]], [[Olivier Teytaud]], [[Mark Winands]] ('''2009'''). ''Meta Monte-Carlo Tree Search for Automatic Opening Book Generation''. [http://www.personeel.unimaas.nl/m-winands/documents/ouvertures9x9.pdf pdf]
 
* [[Guillaume Chaslot]], [[Jean-Baptiste Hoock]], [[Julien Pérez]], [[Arpad Rimmel]], [[Olivier Teytaud]], [[Mark Winands]] ('''2009'''). ''Meta Monte-Carlo Tree Search for Automatic Opening Book Generation''. [http://www.personeel.unimaas.nl/m-winands/documents/ouvertures9x9.pdf pdf]
Line 104: Line 126:
 
* [http://groups.google.com/group/gnu.chess/browse_frm/thread/329b9401059f679b gnuchess.book in Lisp] by [[Steven Edwards]], [[GNU Chess#NewsGroup|gnu.chess]], January 23, 1990
 
* [http://groups.google.com/group/gnu.chess/browse_frm/thread/329b9401059f679b gnuchess.book in Lisp] by [[Steven Edwards]], [[GNU Chess#NewsGroup|gnu.chess]], January 23, 1990
 
==1995 ...==  
 
==1995 ...==  
 +
* [https://groups.google.com/d/msg/rec.games.chess.computer/twuuIKTUqRw/bCN6Jn9zGOcJ Opening taxonomy] by [[Hugh S. Myers]], [[Computer Chess Forums|rgcc]], September 12, 1995
 
* [http://groups.google.com/group/rec.games.chess.computer/browse_frm/thread/656439670bd7c7fb The MCHESS5 computer killer book...] by [[Ed Schroder|Ed Schröder]], [[Computer Chess Forums|rgcc]], October 14, 1996
 
* [http://groups.google.com/group/rec.games.chess.computer/browse_frm/thread/656439670bd7c7fb The MCHESS5 computer killer book...] by [[Ed Schroder|Ed Schröder]], [[Computer Chess Forums|rgcc]], October 14, 1996
 
* [http://groups.google.com/group/rec.games.chess.computer/browse_frm/thread/f14614c6bdebff95 Killer Books] by [[Andreas Mader]], [[Computer Chess Forums|rgcc]], October 29, 1996
 
* [http://groups.google.com/group/rec.games.chess.computer/browse_frm/thread/f14614c6bdebff95 Killer Books] by [[Andreas Mader]], [[Computer Chess Forums|rgcc]], October 29, 1996
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* [https://www.stmintz.com/ccc/index.php?id=226258 question about book and learning] by [[Uri Blass]], [[CCC]], April 26, 2002
 
* [https://www.stmintz.com/ccc/index.php?id=226258 question about book and learning] by [[Uri Blass]], [[CCC]], April 26, 2002
 
* [https://www.stmintz.com/ccc/index.php?id=267805 Book design] by [[Sune Fischer]], [[CCC]], November 28, 2002
 
* [https://www.stmintz.com/ccc/index.php?id=267805 Book design] by [[Sune Fischer]], [[CCC]], November 28, 2002
 +
* [http://www.open-aurec.com/wbforum/viewtopic.php?f=18&t=42820 Opening Bug in Nejmet and Pharaon] by Mainflame, [[Computer Chess Forums|Winboard Forum]], May 31, 2003 » [[Nejmet]], [[Pharaon]]
 
* [https://www.stmintz.com/ccc/index.php?id=330362 Why use opening books in machine-machine competitions?] by [[Mig Greengard]], [[CCC]], November 25, 2003
 
* [https://www.stmintz.com/ccc/index.php?id=330362 Why use opening books in machine-machine competitions?] by [[Mig Greengard]], [[CCC]], November 25, 2003
 
* [https://www.stmintz.com/ccc/index.php?id=368697 Performance rating calculation] by [[Dan Wulff]], [[CCC]], June 02, 2004
 
* [https://www.stmintz.com/ccc/index.php?id=368697 Performance rating calculation] by [[Dan Wulff]], [[CCC]], June 02, 2004
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* [http://www.talkchess.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=66680 Is there a program to build opening books based on engines?] by [[Uri Blass]], [[CCC]], February 23, 2018
 
* [http://www.talkchess.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=66680 Is there a program to build opening books based on engines?] by [[Uri Blass]], [[CCC]], February 23, 2018
 
* [http://www.talkchess.com/forum3/viewtopic.php?f=7&t=68558 Rebel Book Draw?] by [[John Merlino]], [[CCC]], October 03, 2018 » [[Draw]]
 
* [http://www.talkchess.com/forum3/viewtopic.php?f=7&t=68558 Rebel Book Draw?] by [[John Merlino]], [[CCC]], October 03, 2018 » [[Draw]]
 +
'''2019'''
 +
* [http://www.talkchess.com/forum3/viewtopic.php?f=7&t=70518 Book creation papers] by [[Robert Pope]], [[CCC]], April 18, 2019
 +
* [http://www.talkchess.com/forum3/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=71386 Database snapshot] by  [[Bojun Guo|noobpwnftw]], [[CCC]], July 27, 2019
 +
* [http://www.talkchess.com/forum3/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=71764 ChessDBCN] by [[Bojun Guo|noobpwnftw]], [[CCC]], September 09, 2019
 +
* [http://www.talkchess.com/forum3/viewtopic.php?f=7&t=72432 Polyglot FRC/960 Opening Book] by [[Dennis Sceviour]], [[CCC]], November 27, 2019 » [[PolyGlot]], [[Chess960]]
 +
==2020 ...==
 +
* [http://www.talkchess.com/forum3/viewtopic.php?f=7&t=75205 How many Elo points is a book?] by [[Chris Whittington]], [[CCC]], September 25, 2020 » [[Playing Strength]]
 +
* [http://www.talkchess.com/forum3/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=75878 Chess opening database with names] by Peperoni, [[CCC]], November 20, 2020 » [[ECO]]
 +
'''2021'''
 +
* [http://www.talkchess.com/forum3/viewtopic.php?f=7&t=77507 Opening book implementation questions] by Pedro Duran, [[CCC]], June 18, 2021
  
 
=External Links=  
 
=External Links=  
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* [https://www.game-ai-forum.org/icga-tournaments/news_item.php?id=35 The use of openings books] by the [[ICGA]], September 15, 2008
 
* [https://www.game-ai-forum.org/icga-tournaments/news_item.php?id=35 The use of openings books] by the [[ICGA]], September 15, 2008
 
==Engine Books==
 
==Engine Books==
* [http://www.top-5000.nl/tools.htm Source code Pro Deo Book] by [[Ed Schroder|Ed Schröder]] » [[ProDeo]]
 
* [http://www.top-5000.nl/eoc.htm Source code ProDeo EOC database] by [[Ed Schroder|Ed Schröder]]
 
 
* [http://chessbase.com/newsdetail.asp?newsid=7069 HIARCS 13 – the Professional Openings Book] by [[Mark Uniacke]], [[ChessBase|ChessBase News]], March 10, 2011 » [[HIARCS]] <ref>[http://www.open-chess.org/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=1073#p11368 Re: Opening Books Battle..] by BB+ ([[Mark Watkins]]), [[Computer Chess Forums|OpenChess Forum]], March 12, 2011</ref>
 
* [http://chessbase.com/newsdetail.asp?newsid=7069 HIARCS 13 – the Professional Openings Book] by [[Mark Uniacke]], [[ChessBase|ChessBase News]], March 10, 2011 » [[HIARCS]] <ref>[http://www.open-chess.org/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=1073#p11368 Re: Opening Books Battle..] by BB+ ([[Mark Watkins]]), [[Computer Chess Forums|OpenChess Forum]], March 12, 2011</ref>
 
* [http://hardy.uhasselt.be/Toga/book_format.html Polyglot book format]
 
* [http://hardy.uhasselt.be/Toga/book_format.html Polyglot book format]
Line 213: Line 245:
 
* [http://www.g-sei.org/wp-content/Users/Fauzi/fauzi.html Fauzi's Opening Books] by [[Fauzi Akram Dabat]], [[G 6]] site
 
* [http://www.g-sei.org/wp-content/Users/Fauzi/fauzi.html Fauzi's Opening Books] by [[Fauzi Akram Dabat]], [[G 6]] site
 
==Online Opening Tree==
 
==Online Opening Tree==
 +
* [https://www.chessdb.cn/queryc_en/ Chess Cloud Database Query Interface] by [[Bojun Guo|noobpwnftw]] <ref>[https://github.com/noobpwnftw/chessdb GitHub - noobpwnftw/chessdb: ChessDB]</ref>
 +
* [https://fsmosca.github.io/ChessDB-Online-Book/ ChessDB Online Opening Book] by [[Ferdinand Mosca]]
 
* [https://database.chessbase.com/?lang=en/ Chess database with eight million games. Openings, players, tournaments - Online] - [[ChessBase (Database)|ChessBase]]
 
* [https://database.chessbase.com/?lang=en/ Chess database with eight million games. Openings, players, tournaments - Online] - [[ChessBase (Database)|ChessBase]]
 
* [http://www.chessgames.com/perl/explorer Chess Opening Explorer] from [http://www.chessgames.com/index.html chessgames.com]
 
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Revision as of 07:53, 30 July 2021

Home * Knowledge * Opening Book

Chess programs often look up the positions at the beginning of the game in an Opening Book. The opening database can then be used as long as the opponent plays a new move from the database, so usually more common opening lines will be stored to a much higher depth than the uncommon ones. As soon as the program is "out of book" it has to continue using the normal search routines.

Purposes

  • Save time: Chess programs could use search from the beginning and look through all possible continuations in detail to find the best next move, but as this is quite time-consuming. In contrast, opening books can play opening moves almost instantly without searching nor heavy computing and help to save time.
  • Provide a higher quality of play: Searching even with large depths can't see deep tactics, strategy, compensation. It may lose temporarily material for long term advantage.
  • Provide variety: there already exists a lot of literature about different opening lines. As book moves are usually chosen randomly, whereas searches are more or less deterministic.

Types

Opening books are typically stored in two main formats:

Text

The most advantage by using text form is that they are readable, understandable, and editable by humans and can be viewed, edited with normal text editors. However, the main disadvantage is that they may take too much space as well as time for searching since an item may take from 50 bytes (for FEN strings) to hundreds of bytes (for PGN text). If we store openings "continuously" (all possible opening positions) both data size and searching time become too huge and unacceptable for playing. They are usually missing weight values (to compare between items to know which ones are better) either. In practice, those opening books are usually very small with some lines or positions only, they are hard to be used for real game playing but for testing.

They are stored in typical ways for games and positions:

  • EPD: They are the last positions of opening lines
  • PGN: Opening lines are stored as individual games

(e4(e5)(c5))(d4d5)) etc.

Binary

Binary books have some important advantages, especially for computer chess engines: space-efficient, fast on accessing and searching, more useful information. At the most simple form, they are just a conversion of above text-opening books into binary, in the ready form for software and save text-binary converting steps. However, the major number of top books is built and worked with hash values from transpositions. Often each position is stored as a hash value (8 bytes) and some extra information such as the number of times occurred, number of games won by white/black / drawn with this position, average/maximum Elo of players playing to this opening position, chess program's success with the position. To save space those extra information typically about 2-8 bytes. For example, PolyGlot uses 16 bytes for each item, including hash, move, weight, learning values. Items of a book should be sorted by their hash. So when a chess program has to decide on a move, it will look up (by using binary-search) using the hash value of the current position to collect all information come with that hash value and then make a decision upon it.

To build and/or edit those opening books, users need to use special software.

The most popular format is PolyGlot.

Generation

All in all the information stored in an opening database should guide the chess game into a type of middle game in which the chess program proves itself most successful. But to achieve this there are two main ways.

Handcrafted

If the opening database designer has some special preference of a certain opening line, he might create it fully manually. This is often the case if a chess program is about to play an important game against a grandmaster. Then the opening style will probably be chosen to be difficult and dangerous for the opponent. Another option is to first automatically generate a database and then fine-tune it manually.

From game collection

Another option is to select a number of games (the type of which will affect the openings played: e.g. drawn games only, GM games only, etc) and then up to a certain depth store all positions in the opening database. It is true that by using this way of database generation some severe errors might by copied as well, but usually the chess programs are set to stop playing according to the book if a position occurred less than a certain number times before.

By computing

Chess engines can be used to evaluate positions in a book opening tree to rank them, and/or decide to stop or expand.

Book Building Tools

Book Playing

  • Engines: They can directly use opening books to make move. Some engines use external books, some others integrate books inside their codes. Those engines need both opening book code and book data to run
  • Chess GUI: They can play opening books thus engines don't need to deal with and start computing from the middle period only. This way is quite popular because of some advantages: simplifier for chess engines, save space and easier to manage opening books, more various ways to select openings, more fair-play to compare engines...

Quotes

Jonathan Schaeffer in One Jump Ahead [5] :

To solve the opening problems of his chess machine, Belle, Ken Thompson typed in opening lines from the Encyclopedia of Chess Openings (in five thick volumes). Religiously, he dedicated one hour a day for almost three years (!) to the tedious pursuit of entering lines of play from the books and having his Belle computer verify them. The result was an opening library of roughly three-hundred thousand moves. The results were immediate and obvious: Belle became a much stronger chess program, and Ken probably aged prematurely. Later Ken developed a program to automatically read the Encyclopedia, allowing him to do in a few days what had taken him three years to do manually. [6] 

Formats

Classification of Chess Openings

Book Issues

See also

Selected Publications

1974 ...

Я.Ю. Гольфанд, А.Л. Футер (1974). Реализация дебютной справочной для шахматной программы./ Сб. Проблемы кибернетики №29, стр. 201-210

1980 ...

1990 ...

2000 ...

2005 ...

2010 ...

2015 ...

Forum Posts

1990 ...

1995 ...

2000 ...

2005 ...

Re: Opening books format by Jury Osipov, CCC, April 15, 2008 » ABK
Re: Opening books format by Richard Pijl, CCC, April 15, 2008
Re: Opening books format by Dann Corbit, CCC, April 15, 2008

2010 ...

2013

Re: 2 Moves Engine Book by Miguel A. Ballicora, CCC, December 08, 2013 » Ruby

2014

2015 ...

2016

2017

2018

2019

2020 ...

2021

External Links

Engine Books

Online Opening Tree

Misc

References

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