To Bill Raymond:
<<Raymond: All 'A's play home immediately, an 'N' plays home if the
same-suit
'N-1', both 'N-2's of the opposite color, and the other same-color 'N-3' are
already home.>>
By golly, I think you have something there. The Raymond rule is valid, if
not grammatically
correct. "the other same-color 'N-3' are already home." should read Note:
should read "is
already home." I should know because I are an engineer.
Let me be the last to congratulate you.
So, now then, do you consider it an advantage in a solver design to assume
the Raymond
rule will apply? I. e., is the idea that by taking advantage of it, you
avoid exploring
a certain number of positions which shouldn't really exist if the Raymond
rule were to
be in effect?
<<Information theory may show that fewer bytes are necessary, but the
smallest practical representation I've worked out is 36 bytes. >>
Care to let us in on how you can do that? With 6-bit packing, 312 bits
would be needed, or 39 bytes. I can see that 52! might be less that 2^288,
but how would one take advantage of that in a "practical" scheme.
Best regards, -----------Adrian
Received on Tue Dec 11 2001 - 20:50:08 IST