vb4 wrote:Hi Josh,
You have been a very helpful individual since we have been speaking and I want to thank you for all you have done in trying to keep this field going. Whats more important at the moment is education and you have made a good decision with ordering your priorities. Take care and good luck.
Les Fernandez
*blush* thank you very much. That's very inspiring actually and makes me feel good
I may not have done a lot but I do try. If only I had a T3 connection at home and 2TB to share the entire set I would (maybe someday).
Anyway, this is my love below my fiance, but I do try to be loyal
lol.
I just wish I had the time and talent. So many ideas go threw my head I truly wish I could write in code. Despite the horrid programming market in the US, I'm still going to stick it out and get a degree in computer science/engineering.
I'm about 0.5-1 year away from a degree, and hope to go to graduate school. My big problem now, is that I went to college a couple years ago, hit financial hardship, and going back to school now. Since I went over a year w/o a job, my student loans have gone haywire. So no I'm only taking 1 class and paying my student loans while working 80+ hours a week to pay for tuition and my previous student loans. However there is a light at the end of the tunnel. After December, I'll be "up to date" on my student loans and can then defer them till after graduation. Also due to my low-income I can get various grants to pay for the rest of my education.
So right now it's really tough, but once I get things settled circa Jan. I'll be able to go back to school full time, work part time at only 1 job, and keep my head a float
Anyway sorry for the mind dump... the school I'm going to transfer to has a couple nice AI profs. So I'm hoping to go to grad school, and use chess and Go as my masters thesis
It's kinda funny though, getting a BS/BA is really expensive, but in the US once you get past that hurdle you can more or less go into grad school for free. I already have a "free ride" setup for a teaching position upon graduation.(Guess the ACM world champship helped) So hopefully my grad years will be a lot easier which is ironic.
So at the end of 07, early 08 I should be able to donate a nice amount of my free time back into chess.
Among the things I *really* want to explore is parallel algorithms in respect to decision tree's (chess)... and in structure analysis (Go).
Before Go though, I really want to write my own egtb generator. I have some friends in the Ohio and Pittsburgh supercomputing centers, and have a modest yet small cluster of my own (you'd be amazed at how much CPU power you can get from dumpster diving after graduation, and local donations). So I'd like to utilize all of those resources to generate some 7-8 men egtb's. *prob 1-2 years away*
Anyway, I've rambled enough. I'm heading to bed... I have my first Friday off in 5 months and going to a hallowen fright farm tomorrow with my fiance
Peace be with you all, and good luck in whatever you're doing.
-Josh
P.S. I'm never away from email, so feel free to email me at jshriver <at> gmail.com
