Talk:Matchbox Educable Noughts and Crosses Engine

Did you know nomination

The following is an archived discussion of the DYK nomination of the article below. Please do not modify this page. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as this nomination's talk page, the article's talk page or Wikipedia talk:Did you know), unless there is consensus to re-open the discussion at this page. No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was: promoted by Yoninah (talk) 12:16, 24 July 2020 (UTC)

(

• Comment or view
• Article history

)

• ... that in 1960, British AI researcher Donald Michie made a Noughts and Crosses-playing algorithm out of matchboxes? Source: Michie's essay on MENACE and the BOXES algorithm.

Created by WikiMacaroons (talk) and FinnberlyRobin (talk). Nominated by WikiMacaroons (talk) at 10:15, 9 July 2020 (UTC).

• @WikiMacaroons and FinnberlyRobin: Welcome to DYK! Moved into mainspace in a timely manner (7 days prior) and long enough. Neither contributor has ever had a DYK, so you are QPQ-exempt. No close paraphrasing or copyvio issues. I do, however, worry about some of the source quality, especially WikiHow, [1], and an AI class. There are also some paragraphs whose final sentences do not contain an inline citation, which needs to be addressed. Are there any higher-quality sources to use? This could be a great hook if we can get the sourcing straightened out. Raymie (t • c) 18:47, 10 July 2020 (UTC)

Thanks for your response, Raymie. I added some of those refs back when I didn't super understand referencing, but I expect I could find some more sources, as well as some of the existing sources addressing the unreferenced material. WikiMacaroons (talk) 19:00, 10 July 2020 (UTC)

@WikiMacaroons: Just ping me when you think you have the reference issues fixed. Raymie (t • c) 19:01, 10 July 2020 (UTC)

@Raymie:, I think I've fixed the referencing. I added references to some broad unsourced statements, as well as removing less credible sources. WikiMacaroons (talk) 16:30, 14 July 2020 (UTC)

Great work WikiMacaroons. Can you get inline citations to end the paragraphs that end in "matchboxes and beads" and "computational thinking"? Also a note for the future: citations go after punctuation, not before. Raymie (t • c) 17:23, 14 July 2020 (UTC)

@Raymie: Ok, I think I've cleared it up, ping me if you want me to change anything else :) WikiMacaroons^Cinnamon? 14:25, 17 July 2020 (UTC)

It's good to go then! Raymie (t • c) 16:28, 17 July 2020 (UTC)

• Hi, I came by to promote this, and added a few "citation needed" tags per Rule D2. Yoninah (talk) 00:39, 24 July 2020 (UTC)

• Courtesy ping of WikiMacaroons. Raymie (t • c) 03:32, 24 July 2020 (UTC)

Right, I think I've fixed everything @Yoninah:... please let me know if there's anything else WikiMacaroons^Cinnamon? 07:26, 24 July 2020 (UTC)

• Thank you. Restoring tick per Raymie's review. Yoninah (talk) 12:06, 24 July 2020 (UTC)

Finishing a game

In this section, it is not specified what the consequence is for MENACE if the game ends in a draw. This is significant in understanding how the machine learns, as the article indicates that draws are common. One might assume that a draw means that the beads are simply returned to their drawers, but if so this should be stated clearly. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 64.30.93.144 (talk) 04:04, 30 July 2020 (UTC)

Computer simulation

The article said that Michie wrote a program for an IBM Personal Computer. This is very unlikey, as Michie's work was done in the 1960s, but the IBM PC did not appear until 1981. The cited source simply refers to an IBM computer. I have therefore removed the word Personal.

I also used the opportunity to add link to the Pegasus computer mentioned in the same paragraph.

A very interesting article, by the way. -- Mike Marchmont (talk) 09:51, 30 July 2020 (UTC)

Thanks, @Mike Marchmont, and thanks for fixing that WikiMacaroons^Cinnamon? 15:17, 31 July 2020 (UTC)

Mscroggs

Hey @JuPitEer, I noticed you've added a couple of citations from Matthew Scroggs' Blog. It contains a lot of useful things, but I was wondering if it would be considered reliable as per WP:CITE, because it is a blog. Thanks :) WikiMacaroons^Cinnamon? 10:44, 1 August 2020 (UTC)

Maybe not. I'm pretty sure the information about how the machine works is also in the Martin Gardner and Donald Michie articles that the blog post cites, so I'll dig those out and update the citations. ―JuPitEer (talk) 11:07, 1 August 2020 (UTC)