[computer-go] Making Java much faster

[David Doshay]

I have been *so* tempted to either ignore this thread or rename it ...

On 30, Nov 2006, at 10:36 AM, Wodzu wrote:

> i think speed is one of most important things beacuse it affects  
> strength of the program ;) (if the time for move is restricted)
> anyway, chosing a proper (fastest) algorithm has crucial meaning  
> and other things like language, used data structures and so on,  
> have less meaning in improving speed.
> thats my opinion, regards.

This is not my experience at all.

SlugGo was first written by a graduate student with data structures  
that made sense to them, but not to me. I rewrote it to use  
completely different data structures but with exactly the same  
algorithm. It took less than half the time to run, and play was at  
exactly the same level because it was move for move identical. Data  
structures can have tremendous effect upon speed.

Also, my data shows that if I doubled the time allowed for playing,  
thus "using" the time gained from faster execution for doing deeper  
lookahead, the results did not improve, but actually got worse.

Cheers,
David