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.