Salis is an a-life simulation, based on Tom Ray's Tierra.

[paultoliver]

Hi everyone. I'm Paul, first time forum poster!

Following a suggestion by a friend on Reddit, I am happy to share with you, cellular-automaton fans, my own artificial life system. Salis is mainly a re-take on Tom Ray's Tierra, but with my very own set of tweaks. Having a grasp on Tierra will make understanding this simulation a lot easier.

• video about Tierra

For those that already know Tierra, the main differences between it and Salis are:

• the replacement of templates with key-lock instruction pairs
• the addition of a SEEKER POINTER to all organisms

The seeker pointer is an attempt to bring extra spatial and temporal coherence to the simulation. Allocation, reads and writes will take more time when done between addresses that are far away, as a consequence of the SP having to travel those distances at a speed of 1 byte per update. In other words, in Salis information can't travel faster than 1 byte per update (Salis' speed of light, if you will).

• introductory video playlist about Salis
• Salis discussion on Reddit
• Salis on GitHub
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I'd be very excited to see some of you tinkering with it, maybe writing your own ancestor organisms and sharing your results. However, I'll admit running Salis might not be so straightforward for non-programmers. Therefore, please, feel free to message me with any questions (about building it, running it, etc.). I'll be more than happy to answer.