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- Creators: Computer Science and Engineering Program
- Creators: Economics Program in CLAS
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To facilitate rapid, correct, efficient, and intuitive development of graph based solutions we propose a new programming language construct - the search statement. Given a supra-root node, a procedure which determines the children of a given parent node, and optional definitions of the fail-fast acceptance or rejection of a solution, the search statement can conduct a search over any graph or network. Structurally, this statement is modelled after the common switch statement and is put into a largely imperative/procedural context to allow for immediate and intuitive development by most programmers. The Go programming language has been used as a foundation and proof-of-concept of the search statement. A Go compiler is provided which implements this construct.
This paper explores the inner workings of algorithms that computers may use to play Chess. First, we discuss the classical Alpha-Beta algorithm and several improvements, including Quiescence Search, Transposition Tables, and more. Next, we examine the state-of-the-art Monte Carlo Tree Search algorithm and relevant optimizations. After that, we consider a recent algorithm that transforms Alpha-Beta into a “Rollout” search, blending it with Monte Carlo Tree Search under the rollout paradigm. We then discuss our C++ Chess Engine, Homura, and explain its implementation of a hybrid algorithm combining Alpha-Beta with MCTS. Finally, we show that Homura can play master-level Chess at a strength currently exceeding that of our backtracking Alpha-Beta.