Cellular automata
Cellular Automata
(before we start with the automata stuff, this is the small example that we built at the beginning of the class).First of all some references on cellular automata:
- Cellular Automata: Digital Worlds. A very good introduction to the concepts of cellular automata. You really should take a bit of time and read (or skim) through it.
- Alife.org, lots of interesting stuff
- Rules of the Game... (life and death). A look at the ruls of the "Game of Life".
- Some interesting example programs you'll find in
/usr/ccrma/web/html/courses/220b/topics/cellularautomata/examples/xtoys
xtoys
Some topics:
- the basic building block: a cell (remembers its own state)
- a lattice of cells
- rules: define the next state of the cells (generations)
- neighbourhood: defines the scope of the rules
Unidimensional automata
Here's the example I developed over last class. It implements a one-dimensional automata. Each cell of the automata is a small state machine with just two states. The transition between states is determined by the state of its two adjoining neighbors...
A detailed tutorial on that example.
Another example, by Matt Wright, in which each cell is interpreted as a rhythmic position within a "bar".
Bidimensional automata
xlife is installed in all machines, just type "man xlife" for the instructions on how to run it and "xlife" to run the program itself. Most probably the most interesting part is loading up interesting patterns that other folks have discovered. There are tons of those in /usr/lib/xlife/ (check out the PATTERNS readme in that directory).
Example lisp code by Scott Wilson that creates two dimensional cellular automata. And an addition by me that can read ".l" files with patterns for xlife. You can find patterns in /usr/lib/xlife/.
