A very bad idea

[Matthias Gemuh]

Can we not find some place where to dump all our free engines ?
Then everybody could have access to all free engines and people would play tournaments like crazy ! A sort of heaven on earth.

Space needed may be 3...10 GB.


Matthias.

[Tony Mokonen]

Can we not find some place where to dump all our free engines ?
Then everybody could have access to all free engines and people would play tournaments like crazy ! A sort of heaven on earth.

Space needed may be 3...10 GB.


Matthias.

Well, as a guy who likes collecting old WB/UCI freebies, I think it's a great idea. Unfortunately, copyright prevents people from just setting up a web site that's a free-for-all download mart. Some authors don't even want their engines available for download at all. Even if an author doesn't mind having old versions of his engine available, you'd still have to get the author's permission to host the engine, like Guenther Simon had to with the engines on his excellent download page at RWBC.

I know I've chased folks around in circles via email to find old engines, and spent hours poking around in the Wayback Machine to see if I can find download links that aren't dead, and it is a hassle. I always felt like a beggar asking for old versions in a forum like this, too. I'm not sure what the most elegant solution is.

Tony

[Matthias Gemuh]

Well, as a guy who likes collecting old WB/UCI freebies, I think it's a great idea. Unfortunately, copyright prevents people from just setting up a web site that's a free-for-all download mart. Some authors don't even want their engines available for download at all. Even if an author doesn't mind having old versions of his engine available, you'd still have to get the author's permission to host the engine, like Guenther Simon had to with the engines on his excellent download page at RWBC.

I know I've chased folks around in circles via email to find old engines, and spent hours poking around in the Wayback Machine to see if I can find download links that aren't dead, and it is a hassle. I always felt like a beggar asking for old versions in a forum like this, too. I'm not sure what the most elegant solution is.

Tony

If all elegant solutions fail but hosting is possible, we could ask all willing engine authors to send in their free engines or issue public permission for other people to do so.

I know that many engine authors don't host old versions of their engines only because they lack enough easily manageable webspace or hate the extra work needed to keep their website up-to-date.

I personally permit anybody to host any free versions of all my engines anywhere allowed.

Matthias.

[Roger Brown]

Well, as a guy who likes collecting old WB/UCI freebies, I think it's a great idea. Unfortunately, copyright prevents people from just setting up a web site that's a free-for-all download mart. Some authors don't even want their engines available for download at all. Even if an author doesn't mind having old versions of his engine available, you'd still have to get the author's permission to host the engine, like Guenther Simon had to with the engines on his excellent download page at RWBC.

I know I've chased folks around in circles via email to find old engines, and spent hours poking around in the Wayback Machine to see if I can find download links that aren't dead, and it is a hassle. I always felt like a beggar asking for old versions in a forum like this, too. I'm not sure what the most elegant solution is.

Tony

Hello Tony,

You are not alone but no-one ought to feel like a beggar (literally or otherwise!) here. This is is a great forum in my not so humble opinion and the folks will help you out if they can.

Personally, I may have older versions of engines that I found interesting for various reasons - Crafty, Yace and the Baron to name a few - but I did not (regrettably) keep a collection of older versions of other engines.

I actually had a machine on which hard drive space was a concern and no dvd burner at the time. All right, snicker but it ran Winboard, the TM and my engines just fine so there!





I might have an odd ancient version here or there but the rights would still belong to the owners.

Then there are the way out betas that never made it to the public....

Later.

[Yannik Snoeckx]

Hello Tony,

You are not alone but no-one ought to feel like a beggar (literally or otherwise!) here. This is is a great forum in my not so humble opinion and the folks will help you out if they can. [...]

Indeed !

I have found many helpful people here everytime I have asked something sensible.

For those old free engines, they're almost all there, in the HD of the members, it seems.

Now, if someone had TCB 0035 and a working version for XP of Arasan 4.1, both from 1997, then it would truly be heaven !

Best wishes.
YS

[Michael Yee]

Nice idea.

Dann Corbit already has many engines on his FTP site. Maybe Dann wouldn't mind hosting more free engines (with author permission). And perhaps someone could make a website of links to the engines to make finding them easier.

Michael

[Tony Mokonen]

Indeed !

I have found many helpful people here everytime I have asked something sensible.

For those old free engines, they're almost all there, in the HD of the members, it seems.

Now, if someone had TCB 0035 and a working version for XP of Arasan 4.1, both from 1997, then it would truly be heaven !

Best wishes.
YS

I've downloaded version 4.1 from various places, and the engine never seemed to work for me, it just crashed, but the GUI was fine. I have the 4.0 version, if you're interested, the engine works ok with this version.

Tony

[Yannik Snoeckx]

I've downloaded version 4.1 from various places, and the engine never seemed to work for me, it just crashed, but the GUI was fine. I have the 4.0 version, if you're interested, the engine works ok with this version.

Tony

Hello Tony,

Yes, it would be great !

Many thanks !
YS