Charlie Heath
From The Othello Wiki Book Project
Charlie Heath learned how to play a decent game of Othello while developing Master Reversi, an Othello(tm) program for the TRS-80 computer, around 1980.
He drove to many tournaments with his publisher-liason, Paul Weiner. Eventually, both Heath and his program, Master Reversi, got pretty good, with Heath's best finish a fourth place finish in the US Nationals. Heath thinks he might have helped Brian Rose learn how to "see" pieces flipped, when he loaned his computer to Brian after Brian won his first US Nationals. Master Reversi had many learning aides, including a game library and ability to quickly zoom to different board positions.
Master Reversi, running on something like a 2 mhZ Trs-80 with 64K RAM, searched in early game to a depth of about six plies, then to about 8 in late midgame, and up to 15 plies search for a win on tournament time, with perfect score either on ply 13 or 14. The program beat a strong contender from Carnegie-Mellon twice - but gave the win back on the last move the first time, in a tournament in Santa Cruz, and had to seek (and get) revenge the next year in Chicago. Master Reversi was also inspired by Peter Frey's competitive efforts; Master Reversi got the upper hand, but it sounds like Peter's program has more in common with modern Othello programs than Master Reversi had. Master Reversi's main advantages at the time were an insanely tuned assembly language alpha-beta search, and Jonathan Cerf's advice about mobility.
Aldaron, the player inside the TRS-80, clued Heath in to what is now called the " Heath opening". The opening played to Heath's primary strength (and weakness), the willingness to grab every edge piece available if it looked like it might run the opponent out of moves; but Heath was too scared to use the opening in tournaments, because better players would beat him ruthlessly if he did, and he preferred to stick with something safer with lesser players.
Heath has not seen Paul Weiner in 20 years, but did learn to like Indian food while discussing Master Reversi with Paul at the India House in Cambridge. Paul was last heard from somewhere outside LA.
