About contributions, participation and personal investment in Conway Life

[Tawal]

Hello,

Reading this :

Here’s a toolkit for G-to-Xs for constructing stable signal converters and what not...
I don’t know where else this might go

If this stamp collection gets made a bit more consistent, it could perfectly well go into its own thread called something like "G-to-X collection thread".

In its current form, the stamp collection sometimes has state-2 cells showing the envelope, and sometimes doesn't.
Sometimes it has the output object marked in red, and sometimes it doesn't.
Sometimes a version of the input object is marked in red instead, and sometimes it isn't.

For the 0-degree and 180-degree G-to-Gs, it would be nice to have the lane offsets labeled.
For 90-degree and 180-degree G-to-Gs, it would be good to know what the mod-8 rating of the reflector is (relative to a Snark for 90 degrees, maybe -- not sure what to measure against for 180 degrees, but as long as it's self-consistent it will probably be fine. For zero-degree shifters there's at least one obvious zero through seven rating with reference to the input glider, represented by "T0" through "T7" in the table here.

For the various named patterns some kind of labels would also be great, of course -- either LifeViewer labels or the usual old-fashioned in-pattern labels, maybe in state-4 red.

I guess these are all elementary G-to-X, but it would be good to have a gathering place for simple composite G-to-Xes too, especially if output timing and lane information can be collected and labeled. For example, for the stated purpose of "constructing stable signal converters and what not", these two-part-composite 180-degree reflectors based on the old Callahan receiver might come in very handy here and there.

(Not saying it's incumbent on anyone -- except maybe me -- to do any of this; it's just kind of a wish-list for a stamp collection that's optimized for solving the kinds of synchronization problems that came up recently in the new 2c/3 signal receivers. EDIT: Maybe a large part of what I was wishing for has just been improved by Tawal -- a stamp collection of 180-degree stable reflectors, classified by lane offset. There aren't really enough of them yet to classify them by relative output timing.)

I think it would be interesting to have collection maintainers.
I propose to maintain the H-to-H and H-to-Gn collections with all the necessary information (displacement, timing, repeat time, etc.).
For that, I need to be informed of any news ... the best would be by mail.

I also propose a thread to list maintained collections (with maintainer names and link to the collection) and unmaintained collections.

What do you think ?

[confocaloid]

I think it would be interesting to have collection maintainers.

From past experience on this forum, I think one of best known so far ways to collect something is to make a dedicated forum thread, where the first post says something to the effect "This is a collection thread for such-and-such objects/patterns/components/ideas/..."
And then the first post proceeds to explain what are the rules for that collection. (Scope, i.e. what belongs and what doesn't belong. Recommended format for posting; what additional information should be included. Any other suggestions / guidelines / rules for the specific collection.)
That thread might be maintained, if you periodically read through the posts and update the first post with new additions.

I also propose a thread to list maintained collections (with maintainer names and link to the collection) and unmaintained collections.

Would that thread be a maintained collection (of links), or an unmaintained collection?
What would be differences from Game of Life Links, for example?
(Might become useful. Might become more or less a duplicate of an existing thread. Hard to say.)

[Tawal]

Yes, I think there should be a thread for each collection (with its own specific rules).
But, if we're no longer talking about an "official maintainer", each contribution (update, contribution ...) must respect the rules of the collection, provide an updated collection and update the link leading to this updated collection.
But doesn't this require special rights on the forum ? aren't we going back to the idea of an "official maintainer" ?

In addition, another thread listing all the most up-to-date collections (via links or otherwise) would be welcome in my opinion.

Edit: Research is important, and so is the classified compilation of results.

[confocaloid]

(note: discussion partially happened and scattered in other places)

Yes, I think there should be a thread for each collection (with its own specific rules).
But, if we're no longer talking about an "official maintainer", each contribution (update, contribution ...) must respect the rules of the collection, provide an updated collection and update the link leading to this updated collection.
But doesn't this require special rights on the forum ? aren't we going back to the idea of an "official maintainer" ? [...]

That doesn't necessarily require "special rights". That does require some nontrivial and nonobvious approach, common understanding of that approach, and willingness to follow that approach consistently over time.

If a collection is [supposed to be] maintained, one needs to know the scope and the guidelines/rules for that collection. Things that do not fall in the scope of a collection might belong elsewhere. (Maybe another collection. Maybe simply "Unsure discoveries"/"Useless discoveries".)

As soon as there are thread-specific rules, there will be some level of disagreement with those rules. Some people might want to maintain alternative collections, with overlapping scope, but with different preferences/guidelines/rules. There can be valid good reasons to keep two or more overlapping collections separately, without attempting to somehow combine/merge them. It would be counterproductive to prevent such alternative solutions of a problem, just because someone already "claimed the territory". Different people explore/research in different ways, and have differing needs.

As soon as there are thread-specific rules, there will be "noisy" posts that do not follow those rules. For things to work in a meaningful way, it should be easy for anyone to see whether or not a post falls within the scope of the thread, and it should be possible to report offtopic posts so that they are moved. Unless forum moderators understand and acknowledge the idea (both in theory and in practice), collection threads will get cluttered over time, and will die prematurely.

The First Post™ needs to state the thread scope and explain thread-specific guidelines/rules, sufficiently clearly and unambiguously for other people to be able to contribute. Existing alternative Maintained Collections™ and suggested "default places to post" (e.g. "Thread for unsure discoveries") also can be linked from the First Post™.

All of that adds up to some amount of necessary complexity and unavoidable headaches.

It may be unnecessary to "update the link leading to this updated collection" if the link remains the same (e.g. a GitHub repository). The maintainer could take contributions from the forum posts and add them to the repository.

[...] I also propose a thread to list maintained collections (with maintainer names and link to the collection) and unmaintained collections. [...]

I think focusing on Maintained Collections™ leads to an incomplete picture. There should be a meaningful way to contribute some one-time effort that you did once and would like to share now, but are not planning to maintain/keep updated.
There is a need for middle ground, between the two extremes "not contribute anything at all" and "commit to a big project".

It would be overkill to create a separate thread for every one-time effort. (Too many unnecessary threads with a couple of posts in each.)
It would be waste to post a nontrivial one-time effort in "Unsure discoveries". ("Collect-and-share" posts will be quickly scattered and lost in a stream of "discover-and-share" posts.)
Some, but not all, one-time efforts in principle belong to more specific existing threads. (E.g. an oscillator collection may get posted in the oscillator discussion thread.) Even then, I think having a single dedicated place to (cross)post such one-time efforts would be helpful.

I think creating a "half-maintained collection thread" for "collect-and-share" posts has a chance to work well. It would be "half-maintained".
On one hand, there would be no single dedicated maintainer person (hence, people would simply post their one-time effort collections, without any further "structured integration" of those posts).
On the other hand, there would still be specific scope and thread-specific guidelines/rules to be followed (hence, off-topic posts would get reported and should be moved). Without scope/rules/guidelines, any such thread will die prematurely, by becoming "random posts".