astronomy

Victor Allis

Victor Allis is a astronomy topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand Victor Allis rather than just read about it. In short: Louis Victor Allis (born 19 May 1965) is a Dutch computer scientist and co-founder of the election information technology firm Activote. In his graduate work, he revealed AI solutions for Connect Four, Qubic, and Gomoku.

Key takeaways

Victor Allis belongs to astronomy; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect Victor Allis to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of Victor Allis from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

Louis Victor Allis (born 19 May 1965) is a Dutch computer scientist and co-founder of the election information technology firm Activote. In his graduate work, he revealed AI solutions for Connect Four, Qubic, and Gomoku. His dissertation introduced two new game search techniques: proof-number search and dependency-based search. Proof-number search has seen further successful application in computer Go tactical search and many other games.

Career Allis holds a Ph.D. in Artificial Intelligence from Maastricht University, The Netherlands, and graduated cum laude with a M. Sc. in Computer Science from the Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam. He has more than 30 publications to his name. The majority of his published work reports on research in search technologies. He started his career in 1987 as a freelance teacher, course developer and mentor of various AMBI courses for NOVI. Allis has lectured at the Vrije Universiteit in Amsterdam as an assistant professor in artificial intelligence. In 1992, his program Victoria won the 4th Computer Olympiad in the game of Gomoku without losing a single game. His programs had also won first places at the Computer Olympiad in games of Connect Four (1989), Awari (1990, 1991, 1992), and Qubic (1991), thus making him winner of all four early Computer Olympiads. He co-authored a solution of 4×4×4 Qubic game using his proof-number search technique. In 1995 he joined Bolesian (a knowledge technology firm in the Netherlands which is a daughter company of Capgemini and specialized in developing advanced systems based on artificial intelligence) as a senior consultant and manager. In 1997 he co-founded Quintiq and was appointed as the company's CEO. Allis relocated to the Philadelphia office Quintiq in 2010, remaining CEO and a co-owner. Quintiq was acquired by Dassault Systèmes in July 2014. In 2019, Allis and Sara Gifford co-founded Activote, a Boston-based election information technology company.

Notes

External links Allis's home page (archived) Quintiq company site Victor Allis at Chess Programming Wiki. Activote

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with Victor Allis

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what Victor Allis claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In astronomy, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to Victor Allis before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about Victor Allis ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of Victor Allis

In research: Victor Allis appears in astronomy research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses Victor Allis in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: Victor Allis is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics 1965 births, Artificial intelligence researchers, Computer scientist stubs, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for Victor Allis outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

Ask Teacher Smith questions about this articleOpens your AI tutor with a question about “Victor Allis” →

Affiliate

Preply — study more efficiently by working with a personal tutor. 50% off.

How to study Victor Allis in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what Victor Allis means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain Victor Allis out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is Victor Allis in simple terms?

Why does Victor Allis matter?

Because it connects several astronomy ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study Victor Allis?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on Victor Allis.