WBEC-Ridderkerk, information and rules to participate.

Info and most important rules.

Before a division starts there will be an "stability" test tournament played, 1RR at 40/3min.

The deadline for new entrees edition 20 is canceled, no edition 20!

Old inactive(?) and buggy engines can be replaced by new entrees!

To keep place for new entrees in wbec I will remove "old" (inactive?) engines 
from the lower divisions, the definition of a "old engine" in this case:
A engine playing 5 editions without update and playing in the 3rd, 4th or 5th division.

Exception will be made when the author of such an oldie tell me that he is still 
interrested to see it playing in next edition or an updated version is available 
or send, in both cases _before_ the deadline.
The deadline for edition 19: about Februari 2011.

Next engines will stay "for ever" as reference point for new entrees:
Gerbil 
Bestia
RDChess
TSCP
Ruffian
Pro Deo
Resp
BigLion

Startdate for edition 20:
No edition 20, edition 19 is the last one!

General rules:

Each participating chess engine must be the original work of the developer(s).

Authors whose code is derived from or including code written by others must name all other authors, or the source of such code, in their application details (e.g. the Readme.txt which comes with the program, and the homepage from where the engine can be downloaded).

Programs which are discovered to be close derivatives of others (e.g., by playing 56% or more of all moves the same as the other engine), may be declared invalid by the Tournament Director after seeking expert advice.

For this purpose the Tournament Director can ask for the compilable source of the participating version of the engine to let it examine by an expert, when the author of such an suspicious engine refuse to do so the engine will not (longer) participate in the WBEC Ridderkerk competitions.

New engines must be sent to me (in case it is private) or if free available, released before the given "deadline" to participate at the next edition, this deadline date will be set one month before the "deadline" expires, a "new engine" is a engine which is not in the participants list!
The only (eventual) exception (late entry) can be made for new engines at 5th division strenght!

Time controle for the Premier division is 40 moves/40 minutes, 1st division 40/30, for all other divisions 40/20 and ponder=ON.
More info about the used hardware and used interfaces a bit lower at this page!

In case of a Tie in a Round Robin tourney:

S-B!
In cases where the S-B system does not resolve a tie, further tie splits in the following order are used :
Winner of the individual game/match between tied players

Greatest number of wins

Best result with Black

In case of a Tie in promotion match:

No promotion (the engine from the lower division needs to win to promote!)

Rules for engines to participate:
=================================
1. compatiblety:
The engine must play under winboard without problems!
UCI engines will run using the UCI2WB adapter "PolyGlot_W" by Fabien Letouzey/Fonzy Bluemers!

2. Stability:
When an engine in the "Test" tournament:
A] 'hangs' in the background, crashes or plays "illegal" moves in 2 or more games it will not start in the 'official' tournament!!(or there must be a bugfix available)

When the 'official' Division tournament is started:
Each engine which 'hangs' 2x during the tournament will be taken out immediately!!
Exception: I have an older "stable" version of the engine or an "bugfix" is available! (in that case it will be replaced)

Each engine that loses 10% of it's games during one tournament because of 'lost on time, illegal moves and/or crashes' will be taken out immediately or not start in the next edition!
Exception: When a "bugfix" is available!

3. Time control:
The engine must be compatible to the used time control, 40 moves in 40 minutes/40 moves in 20 minutes.

4. drawclaim: (force draw result to Winboard)
The engines should claim draw due to 50-move rule, 3-fold-repetition, insufficient material!!
For UCI engines the UCI2WB adapter "PolyGlot" by Fabien Letouzey will do this!

5. The tournament is open for all Winboard and UCI chessengines which comply to the rules!

6. Only 1 engine by an author is allowed.

7. All authors of a "private" WB/UCI engine who would like to see their engine playing in the WBEC Ridderkerk,
feel free to send me a message or a (beta) version of the engine to test if it complies to the tournament rules. (it will NOT be sent to others!)

8. All new engines (to WBEC Ridderkerk) that comply with the tournament rules will start in the "New engine Qualify" matches. (the next edition after I get the engine)

Request to all authors (as far they not have done it already):
Please add the resign option to your engine, because of the used time controle it can save a lot of time which is necessary to keep the tournament running in a reasonable time!

Game rules:
===========
1. Lost on time - game is lost - exception: Opponent has insufficient material to mate - then draw.

2. wrong mate claiming - game is lost - same exception as 1.

3. wrong draw claiming - game is lost - same exception as 1.

4. illegal move - game is lost - same exception as 1.

5. crash - game is lost - same exception as 1.

In the event of any rule disputes, or changes necessitated by circumstances at the time, the Tournament Director's decision shall be final.

Hardware & Interfaces used to run WBEC Ridderkerk.
Crafty benchmarks on the used hardware can be found here.

Used chess interface:
WinBoard and Jori's WBTM.
PolyGlot is used for UCI chess engines.
all 3, 4 and 5 man Nalimove egtbs and Daniel Shawhul bitbases installed.

Hardware for the Premier and 1st Division:
System: Intel Core 2 Quad cpu Q9550 with 4GB RAM, OS: Windows Vista-x64.
Allowed memory usage for each engine: 512MB for hashtables and up to 64MB for egtb cache.

Hardware for the 2nd, 3rd and 4th Division:
AMD Phenom II X4 955 (4x 3200mhz) and 4GB memory, Windows Vista-x64.
Allowed memory usage for each engine: 512MB for hashtables and up to 64MB for egtb cache.

Hardware for the 5th Division:
System: AMD Phenom II X2 550 BE 3100MHz with 4GB RAM, OS: WindowsXP Pro-x64.
Allowed memory usage for each engine: 512MB for hashtables and up to 32MB for egtb cache.

TD:
Leo Dijksman,
Leo@wbec-ridderkerk.nl
Ridderkerk,
Netherlands.