[Rule]Investigator support in Golly

[rowett]

I've added [Rule]Investigator support to Golly. It will appear in the next release.

I've added basic documentation to the relevant Help page but would welcome enhancements to this! The relevant file is: Help/Algorithms/Super.html.

If you don't have access to SourceForge where Golly lives then feel free to send me any updates and I'll add them.

Finally, I'd also welcome any good example [Rule]Investigator patterns.

[b3s23love]

Finally, I'd also welcome any good example [Rule]Investigator patterns.

Maybe add the official RLE for explaining the cell states?

[rowett]

Finally, I'd also welcome any good example [Rule]Investigator patterns.

Maybe add the official RLE for explaining the cell states?

I've pretty much copied that into a table in the Help - but nice idea.

Any good patterns that show off the features?

[b3s23love]

Any good patterns that show off the features?

I sent a PM to Entity Valkyrie about this. EDIT: They said that they'll prepare some patterns.

[muzik]

"aglo" should be changed to "algo". I'll give everything a more thorough read through soon.

Here's a 2-cell glider gun predecessor:

Code: Select all

x = 4, y = 4, rule = B3/S23Investigator
I3$3.C!

Also, in LifeViewer, drawing this exact configuration from a blank board doesn't seem to work all the time - sometimes the cells just flicker in and out of existence when you press play. At other times (seems to happen more often if you use state 8 instead of 9), the state 3 cell disappears at T=1 but reappear afterwards, and in other cases it doesn't reappear afterwards. It's inconsistent and weird. No idea what's going on or if it's just on my end.

Code: Select all

x = 1, y = 1, rule = B3/S23Investigator
b!

[rowett]

"aglo" should be changed to "algo". I'll give everything a more thorough read through soon.

Thanks.

Also, in LifeViewer, drawing this exact configuration from a blank board doesn't seem to work all the time - sometimes the cells just flicker in and out of existence when you press play.

Fixed, thanks.

[muzik]

Here's an example starting paragraph you may wish to adapt:

Investigator mode

[Rule]Investigator rules implement a series of functional states on top of the original two states, which see use in areas such as theoretical circuitry, permitting far more compact solutions in a given target rule than [Rule]Standard would allow.

Investigator rules are a superset of the "Extended Life" rule, devised in 2011 by Martin "Extrementhusiast" Grant, which implemented six new states on top of regular 2-state Life which permitted nonstandard behaviour. One of these cells functions identically to the state-6 cell present in [Rule]History and later [Rule]Super.

An initial version of the rule, titled StateInvestigator, was devised by conwaylife.com forum user "Entity Valkyrie" in April 2018. Unlike what is the case for [Rule]History and [Rule]Super, patterns in Extended Life do not use the same state numbers as are present in [Rule]Investigator and therefore patterns from Extended Life will need manual conversion to function identically in [Rule]Investigator. In addition, odd states are not necessarily "alive" nor are even states "dead" in this rulespace.

This is making me think that a bundled conversion script to convert legacy ExtendedLife patterns (and those in related rules) to [R]Investigator might be a worthwhile thing to include with Golly from now on... anyone want to give it a shot? I can provide what ExtendedLife states should map to each Investigator state, as well as a list of known legacy rules to support.

[dvgrn]

This is making me think that a bundled conversion script to convert legacy ExtendedLife patterns (and those in related rules) to [R]Investigator might be a worthwhile thing to include with Golly from now on... anyone want to give it a shot? I can provide what ExtendedLife states should map to each Investigator state, as well as a list of known legacy rules to support.

It's a good idea. My specific suggestion would be to have the script work on clipboard contents. Instead of hitting Ctrl+Shift+O to open a clipboard pattern in a new Golly universe, a shortcut like Alt+O could call the script and pre-process clipboard contents appropriately, replacing rule names and states to build a new Golly 4.3-compatible pattern.

I'd almost suggest that that pre-processing should really become Golly native functionality, but I'm not sure -- quite possibly some people might still want to run native ExtendedLife and other such patterns. (?)

A pre-processor script like that could also end up being something I use a lot (since it would just do normal Ctrl+Shift+O behavior if it doesn't see anything that needs converting.) It could address a separate usability flaw that's been bugging me in Golly for a long time:

When I have a pattern in my clipboard, and I know that the rule string isn't compatible with any rule tables that I have installed, but I want to open it anyway ... well, I can't, directly -- the system currently gives the huge and horrible concatenated error from trying and failing with all possible algos, and then doesn't show me the pattern.

What I want it to do instead is just open the pattern in some default rule that won't break anything, like 256-state B/S012345678 -- so that I can then go to Edit > Set Rule and get the pattern into the rule I want. If this Alt+O conversion script did that, I'd use it all the time instead of Ctrl+Shift+O.

[Disaster16439]

I was wondering, when will Ipad golly support this? Also, when I update Ipad golly, will my saved patterns get lost?
My 91thn post!
91=7x13

[unname4798]

I want [R]Investigator to be supported in mobile Golly for Android & iOS (together with [R]Super).

[KittyTac]

I was wondering, when will Ipad golly support this? Also, when I update Ipad golly, will my saved patterns get lost?
My 91thn post!
91=7x13

They might be, but you can dig through the local files and copy the folder somewhere else.