Home * People * Mark Lefler

		Mark Lefler, an American computer games and chess programmer. He is author of the computer chess program Now and with Jeff Mallett co-author of the general game playing program Zillions of Games [1] as well a co-founder of the Zillions Development Corporation [2]. In October 2013, Don Dailey introduced Mark Lefler as new member of the Komodo team [3]. Mark graduated in 1981 with a BS degree in Engineering Science and Mechanics from Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University. His non-computer interests include performing magic, music, and gaming [4] . Mark served as member of the Secretariat of ICGA Investigations in 2011, and superseded Rémi Coulom as Programmers Representative of the ICGA in November 2011. Mark founded this Chess Programming Wiki on October 26, 2007 [5] .
Mark Lefler

Photos

WCCC 1999

Munjong & Muntsin Kolss and Mark Lefler, WCCC 1999: Ikarus - Now [6]

[Event "WCCC 1999"]
[Site "Paderborn, Germany"]
[Date "1999.06.19"]
[Round "7"]
[White "Ikarus"]
[Black "Now"]
[Result "0-1"]
 
1. e4 Nc6 2. d4 e6 3. Nf3 Nf6 4. e5 Nd5 5. c4 Nb6 6. Nc3 d6 7. exd6 cxd6 
8. Bd3 e5 9. O-O exd4 10. Ne2 Bg4 11. Qe1 Ne5 12. Nexd4 Qe7 13. Qc3 Na4 
14. Qc2 Nxd3 15. Qxd3 Nc5 16. Qa3 Qd7 17. h3 Bh5 18. b4 Ne6 19. Bb2 Be7 
20. g4 Nxd4 21. Nxd4 Bg6 22. f4 f6 23. Rae1 O-O 24. Qe3 Rfe8 25. Qe6+ Qxe6 
26. Nxe6 Rac8 27. f5 Bf7 28. Re4 b5 29. cxb5 Rc2 30. Rf2 Rxf2 31. Kxf2 d5 
32. Re2 Bxb4 33. Bd4 Ra8 34. Nc7 Rc8 35. Na6 Bc3 36. Bxa7 Rc4 37. b6 Bd4+ 
38. Kf3 Rc3+ 39. Kg2 h5 40. Rb2 g5 41. a4 Ra3 42. Rb4 Ra2+ 43. Kf1 Be3
44. Nc7 hxg4 45. hxg4 Kf8 46. Bb8 d4 47. Ne6+ Bxe6 48. Bd6+ Kg7 49. fxe6 Rf2+ 
50. Kg1 d3 51. b7 Rc2+ 52. Kf1 d2 53. Rd4 Bxd4 54. Ke2 Ba7 55. b8=R Bxb8 
56. Bxb8 Kf8 57. a5 Ke7 58. Ba7 Kxe6 59. Be3 Ke5 60. a6 Ra2 61. a7 Ke4 
62. Bf2 Kf4 63. Bd4 Kxg4 64. Bxf6 Rxa7 65. Kxd2 Rf7 0-1

Team Anand 2010

World Chess Championship 2010

Front row: GM Peter Heine Nielsen, Eric van Reem, GM Rustam Kasimdzhanov, Hans-Walter Schmitt, Vishy Anand, Aruna Anand, GM Surya Ganguly, GM Radoslaw Wojtaszek. Second row on the left: Christian Bossert, Mark Lefler [7]

WCCC 2016

WCCC 2016, Komodo team Erdogan Günes and Mark Lefler with the Shannon Trophy [8]

Forum Posts

1990 ...

• Computer Chess Feature You Want by Mark Lefler, rgc, November 13, 1994
• Hyatt Phrase Maker by Mark Lefler, rgc, June 11, 1995
• Autoplay Interface? by Mark Lefler, rgcc, May 21, 1996
• Shannon A, Shannon B by Mark Lefler, rgcc, July 16, 1996

2000 ...

• Simple NULL move enhancement, checks in qsearch by mjlef, Winboard Forum, April 14, 2006 » Null Move Pruning
• PV based decisions by mjlef, Winboard Forum, April 27, 2006 » Principal Variation
• Extension - Reductions and threats by mjlef, Winboard Forum, May 17, 2006 » Selectivity
• Worthless extension ideas... by mjlef, Winboard Forum, June 06, 2006
• Search Inconsistencies by mjlef, Winboard Forum, June 23, 2006 » Search Instability
• CPU usage at 505 in Winboard Engine by mjlef, Winboard Forum, July 19, 2006 » WinBoard
• Re: Idea for opening book by mjlef, Winboard Forum, August 02, 2006 » Persistent Hash Table
• Piece Cooperation and Penalties by mjlef, Winboard Forum, August 14, 2006 » Material Tables

2007

• Reducing King Moves? by mjlef, Winboard Forum, January 03, 2007 » Reductions
• Castling legality check by mjlef, Winboard Forum, January 04, 2007 » Castling
• How good is your SEE? by mjlef, Winboard Forum, April 24, 2007 » Static Exchange Evaluation
• Revisiting Check Extensions by Mark Lefler, CCC, June 07, 2007 » Check Extensions
• Help Finding X by Mark Lefler, CCC, June 08, 2007
• Is this rule safe (how has K&Ps vs K&Ps databases? ...) by Mark Lefler, CCC, June 20, 2007 » KPK, Now, Pawn Endgame
• Delaying Extensions Idea (does anyone do this)? by Mark Lefler, CCC, July 03, 2007 » Extensions
• LMR other conditions by Mark Lefler, CCC, July 23, 2007 » Late Move Reductions
• If You Were Starting From Scratch by Mark Lefler, CCC, August 22, 2007
• Re: community test result web page? by Mark Lefler, CCC, October 26, 2007 ^[9]

2008

• Backward Pawns by Mark Lefler, CCC, March 24, 2008 » Backward Pawn

2009

• Relative Piece Values by Mark Lefler, CCC, April 09, 2009 » Point Value
• Testing of Kaufman Material Values by Mark Lefler, CCC, April 25, 2009 » Point Value, Material
• Rook Pair Penalty, Knight Pair Penalty, Having a Pawn Bonus by Mark Lefler, CCC, May 11, 2009 » Material
• Side to Move Bonus - does it help? by Mark Lefler, CCC, May 29, 2009 » Tempo
• No PVS at low depths? by Mark Lefler, CCC, June 05, 2009 » Principal Variation Search
• Singular Extensions revisited by Mark Lefler, CCC, October 19, 2009 » Singular Extensions
• Knowing your opponents by Mark Lefler, CCC, December 17, 2009

2010 ...

• SEE Improvement Idea by Mark Lefler, CCC, January 04, 2010 » Static Exchange Evaluation
• Correcting Evaluation with the hash table by Mark Lefler, CCC, February 05, 2010 » Evaluation
• Futility Idea based on total score by Mark Lefler, CCC, February 06, 2010 » Futility Pruning
• FIDE's new rules for chess by Mark Lefler, CCC, July 20, 2014

2015 ...

• Looking for PGN file tools by Mark Lefler, CCC, September 04, 2015 » PGN Utilities
• Moore's Law by Mark Lefler, CCC, March 16, 2016 ^[10]
• Position Legally Reachable? by Mark Lefler, CCC, March 21, 2017 » Retrograde Analysis
• Scientific American article on Computer Chess by Mark Lefler, CCC, June 03, 2017 ^[11] » Murray Campbell, Artificial Intelligence, Kasparov versus Deep Blue 1997

External Links

• Mark Lefler's ICGA Tournaments
• Die universelle Spiel-Engine Alle Brettspiele der Welt auf einer CD, Computerschach und Spiele from zillions.de (German)
• Zillions of Games
• Komodo 8: about the authors, ChessBase News, September 19, 2014
• BBC - Future - The cyborg chess players that can’t be beaten by Chris Baraniuk, December 04, 2015 » David Levy, Boris Alterman, Shay Bushinsky, Mark Lefler
• Interview with Robert Houdart, Mark Lefler and GM Larry Kaufman by Nelson Hernandez, Chessdom, November 23, 2017 » TCEC Season 10

References

1. ^ Zillions of Games from Wikipedia
2. ^ Zillions Development Corporation
3. ^ Who is Don/Larry's new partner!? by Don Dailey, CCC, October 08, 2013
4. ^ Who Are We? - About the founders Mark Lefler and Jeff Mallett & others working for Zillions Development Corporation
5. ^ Re: community test result web page? by Mark Lefler, CCC, October 26, 2007
6. ^ Photo from the no longer available ChessBase site
7. ^ Anand in Playchess – on chess clusters and prep wars, ChessBase news, May, 17, 2010
8. ^ ICGA Events 2016: Photos Day 7 by Jan Krabbenbos
9. ^ community test result web page? by Sam Hamilton, CCC, October 25, 2007
10. ^ Moore's law from Wikipedia
11. ^ 20 Years after Deep Blue: How AI Has Advanced Since Conquering Chess by Larry Greenemeier, Scientific American, June 2, 2017

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