Re: What's The Name Of This Gaming Thing?

Good one, Kerneels. :)

On Fri, Feb 18, 2011 at 4:11 PM, Homme, James <james.homme@xxxxxxxxxxxx>wrote:

> Hi Kerneels,
>
> Do you mean you want to try it out, help plan and write it, evaluate my
> stumbling as I try to learn it, or something else?
>
>
>
> Thanks.
>
>
>
> Jim
>
>
>
> Jim Homme,
>
> Usability Services,
>
> Phone: 412-544-1810. Skype: jim.homme
>
> Internal recipients,  Read my accessibility 
> blog<http://mysites.highmark.com/personal/lidikki/Blog/default.aspx>.
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>
>
> *From:* programmingblind-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:
> programmingblind-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] *On Behalf Of *Kerneels Roos
> *Sent:* Friday, February 18, 2011 8:57 AM
>
> *To:* programmingblind@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
> *Subject:* Re: What's The Name Of This Gaming Thing?
>
>
>
> Hi list,
>
> Sorry, it was a bit of a "whoo, look at me, look what I know" kind of
> answer to Jim's question -- don't take it too seriously. Had I only paid
> more attention in class, worked that bit harder I might just have been busy
> with this kind of stuff on a daily basis. Just imagine... Job satisfaction
> here we come! But then again, perhaps one would go mad, grow serious facial
> hair and hardly ever go out into the real world if your job was that
> interesting and nice -- not to mention the pizza / coka cola / beer belly!
> Ha ha!
>
> Would welcome any books on such topics now that my hard copy books requires
> significant processing before it's in a digital format fit for audio
> consumption.
>
> Jim, I thinnk a Java project to produce a PNG reader / validator for chess
> games is an excellent idea! Count me in on that project please! Even if
> there are PNG APIs for Java it would be an excellent excersise to build one
> with good OO principals during the design. Would also be nice if it one day
> could incorporate a chess diagram recognition component that could describe
> chess diagrams -- like an OCR for chess board diagrams if you like.
>
> Jim all that AI and CI jargon is more bark than bite really. Doesn't it
> sound impressive hey? The truth is, as with most things, it is finite
> meaning you can grasp it if you put your mind to it.
>
> The real beauty for me of AI and CI and any science that looks to the
> natural world for ideas and inspiration is that, for me, it keeps on
> astounding me as to how complex, clever and majestic this world we live in
> really is. See also [1].
> How can this be a product of chance I ask you?
>
> The illustration of Socrates, probably penned by Plato fits well in here.
> It is of a group of people tied down facing the inside wall of a shallow
> cave. Outside the mouth of the cave a huge fire is blazing, and between the
> fire and the cave a procession of every kind of animal is underway. The cave
> captives marvel at the shadows being cast against the cave walls. With a
> fair bit of interest they ooh and aah over the dancing shadows on the wall.
>
> Then, the unthinkable happens. One cave captive is freed from his bounds.
> He jumps up, looks around and behold, he sees the prosession of real
> animals, the fire, the shadows....
>
> In one sense, as far as I understand it, this was the thesis of Socrates --
> this world is but a shadow of something even more real and wonderful.
>
> Socrates considered himself the freed cave captive -- as far as I have it.
> Any philosophy student  it's like that hey?
>
> Why does a linux fanatic try so hard to convince that it's the better
> system? In his mind he's that freed captive, to put it in OS terms if you
> like. The question is, is he right. In landing, just thought I'd throw that
> in there, so no one can say the post was off topic ha ha!
>
> [1] The flip side of all of this is of course, how crewel  harsh and
> mercyless this world also is, but for my take on this please contact me off
> list should you be interested.
>
> Kerneels
>
>
>
>
> On 2/18/2011 2:33 PM, Ken Perry wrote:
>
> Kerneels,
>
>
>
> This is one of the best answers of this question I have seen outside of a
> class room.  I have nothing to add except if you’re looking for books on
> this sort of thing do a google search on “game intelligence book”
>
>
>
> ken
>
>
>
> *From:* programmingblind-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx [
> mailto:programmingblind-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx<programmingblind-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]
> *On Behalf Of *Kerneels Roos
> *Sent:* Friday, February 18, 2011 3:18 AM
> *To:* programmingblind@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
> *Subject:* Re: What's The Name Of This Gaming Thing?
>
>
>
> Hi Jim,
>
> Nice question!
>
> The problem of solving strategy games such as chess and tic tac toe and
> drafts involves generating a search tree that represents as many
> possibilities for each move at each level as you have resources for, and
> then, by searching finding the best possible next move with an eventual
> favourable end in mind. In essense, the program looks ahead into the future
> to avoid being duped by sub optimal moves which might yeald short term
> benefits but eventual damnation!
>
> A big part of this is searching the tree or graph of possibilities
> efficiently, representing the structures efficiently and employing huristics
> (rules of thumb) to keep things from exploding into too large to handle data
> sets.
>
> It's part of the field of classic AI and it has been studied for decades
> now. It's sometimes also referred to as symbolic AI as it deals with
> discrete values and usually involves a type of math called discrete math (as
> aposed to calculas for example, that deals with continuous systems, values
> approaching 0, values approaching infinity and fractions).
>
> All this might sound fairly complicated but I can assure you it's actually
> not, and many of these classic AI problems have been solved sufficiently.
> For example, there are chess systems that can't be beaten. Yes, the machines
> can beat us at very narrowly defined games such as chess, and it can only
> beat the world champions with significant effort on the machine designer's
> part, to such an extent that it's debatable if the contest is even fair or
> not.
>
> For example, in the whole Deep Blue saga, IBM programmed their system to
> beat Gary Kasparov in particular. Had another world champion shown up for
> the tournament it might have had different results -- an indication of what
> an amazing game chess is and how hard it is to beat the best mind on earth.
>
> Moving on from classic AI, there is a very interesting field which have
> been termed CI (Computational Intelligence) which concerns it'itself with
> some of the same goals as classic AI, but it does this with things like
> artificial neural networks (symulation of how a brain functions), particle
> swarm optimisation (modelling how swarms of living insects operate to find
> solutions to complex problems) and many other models of real life living
> systems that exhibit intelligent behaviour.
>
> Wow, where has the time gone!
>
> Cheers,
> Kerneels
>
>
> On 2/17/2011 11:17 PM, qubit wrote:
>
> So did your coffee working yield the answer? *smile*
>
> --le
>
>
>
> ----- Original Message -----
>
> *From:* Homme, James <james.homme@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
>
> *To:* programmingblind@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
>
> *Sent:* Thursday, February 17, 2011 2:43 PM
>
> *Subject:* RE: What's The Name Of This Gaming Thing?
>
>
>
> Hay Laura,
>
> I asked the question before my coffee started working this morning.
>
>
>
> Jim
>
>
>
> Jim Homme,
>
> Usability Services,
>
> Phone: 412-544-1810. Skype: jim.homme
>
> Internal recipients,  Read my accessibility 
> blog<http://mysites.highmark.com/personal/lidikki/Blog/default.aspx>.
> Discuss accessibility 
> here<http://collaborate.highmark.com/COP/technical/accessibility/default.aspx>.
> Accessibility Wiki: Breaking news and accessibility 
> advice<http://collaborate.highmark.com/COP/technical/accessibility/Accessibility%20Wiki/Forms/AllPages.aspx>
>
>
>
> *From:* programmingblind-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx [
> mailto:programmingblind-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx<programmingblind-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]
> *On Behalf Of *qubit
> *Sent:* Thursday, February 17, 2011 3:35 PM
> *To:* programmingblind@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
> *Subject:* Re: What's The Name Of This Gaming Thing?
>
>
>
> heuristics are just educated guesses.  I suppose it can be useful in
> developing strategies, but it's not the only part of the science... Hey Jim,
> this must have been a good question with all the attention it has
> received...*smile*
>
> --le
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> ----- Original Message -----
>
> *From:* Christopher <ccoale427@xxxxxxxxx>
>
> *To:* programmingblind@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
>
> *Sent:* Thursday, February 17, 2011 2:29 PM
>
> *Subject:* Re: What's The Name Of This Gaming Thing?
>
>
>
> Heuristics, perhaps?
>
> On 2/17/2011 12:25 PM, Haden Pike wrote:
>
> Artificial Intelligence?  Logic, perhaps?  Just tossing ideas out there.
> Haden
>
> On 2/17/2011 7:58 AM, Homme, James wrote:
>
> Hi,
>
> I'm not sure how to ask this question since I don't have the background
> yet. When you have a program that is playing a game, let's say a simple
> game, like TicTacToe, and it tries to figure out what the best move is, what
> is that whole subject called? Or when you have a game where you are moving
> two people around and you don't want them to run into one-another, is that
> the same subject?
>
> Thanks.
>
> Jim
>
> Jim Homme,
>
> Usability Services,
>
> Phone: 412-544-1810. Skype: jim.homme
>
> Internal recipients,  Read my accessibility 
> blog<http://mysites.highmark.com/personal/lidikki/Blog/default.aspx>.
> Discuss accessibility 
> here<http://collaborate.highmark.com/COP/technical/accessibility/default.aspx>.
> Accessibility Wiki: Breaking news and accessibility 
> advice<http://collaborate.highmark.com/COP/technical/accessibility/Accessibility%20Wiki/Forms/AllPages.aspx>
>
>
>
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>
>
>
>
>
> --
>
> Kerneels Roos
>
> Cell: +27 (0)82 309 1998
>
> Skype: cornelis.roos
>
>
>
> "There are only two kinds of programming languages in the world; those 
> everyone complains about, and those nobody uses."
>
>
>
> --
>
> Kerneels Roos
>
> Cell: +27 (0)82 309 1998
>
> Skype: cornelis.roos
>
>
>
> "There are only two kinds of programming languages in the world; those 
> everyone complains about, and those nobody uses."
>
>


-- 

Jacques Bosch

Software Architecture and Development
Independent Contractor
Cell: +27 824711807 Fax: +27 86 504 4726
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