LifeWiki:Life links

This page contains a comprehensive list of links to important sites about Conway's Game of Life and related cellular automata.

Introductory Articles

• Conway's Game of Life at Wikipedia
• Conway's Game of Life at LifeWiki
• What is the Game of Life? at Math.com
• The fantastic combinations of John Conway's new solitaire game "life" - The original article describing Conway's Game of Life. Written by Martin Gardner and published in the October 1970 issue of Scientific American.

Research Papers

• Searching for Spaceships - A paper by David Eppstein describing spaceship search software and the discovery of the weekender
• The still-Life density problem and its generalizations - A paper by Noam Elkies that proves the still life conjecture that no infinite still life can have density more than 1/2

Glossaries and Encyclopediae

• The Life Lexicon by Stephen Silver (see also this version by Edwin Martin)
• A Brief Illustrated Glossary of Terms in Conway's Game of Life by Alan Hensel
• Conway’s Game of Life - An Illustrated Guide by Michael Hogg
• Treasure Trove of the Life Cellular Automaton by Eric Weisstein

Online Pattern Catalogs

• Alien life - Pattern collections focusing on Life-like cellular automata other than Conway's Game of Life itself
• Game of Life Object Catalogs at Pentadecathlon - contains most small still lifes, oscillators and spaceships
• Mark D. Niemiec's Life Page - patterns sorted by name, glider synthesis, size, or type; use "Search for pattern" to see if a small object is already known
• Catagolue census pages - objects found by testing symmetric and asymmetric "random soup" starting conditions

Downloadable Pattern Catalogs

• Jason Summers' pattern collections
• Pattern collections by Alan Hensel: lifebc.zip (basic collection), lifep.zip (larger collection), and lifepw.zip (collection including other rules)
• Pattern collections by Stephen Silver: ships.zip (small spaceships) and ssguns.zip (non-glider guns)

Blogs and News Sites

• Game of Life News at Pentadecathlon
• Conway's Life: Work in Progress - a blog by Dave Greene

Other Personal Life Pages

• David Bell - for spaceship enthusiasts
• Paul Callahan - various articles and patterns
• David Eppstein - Gliders in Life-like cellular automata
• Achim Flammenkamp - Gardens of Eden, frequency of naturally-occurring patterns
• Nick Gotts - Game of Life Patterns with Eventful Histories
• Dean Hickerson - complex patterns such as sawtooths
• Mark Niemiec - glider synthesis and object counts
• Gabriel Nivasch - a variety of articles and code
• Andrzej Okrasinski (via archive.org; the original site is down)
• Stephen Silver
• Jason Summers - Various search programs and pattern catalogs (see above), also contains a "Status of Life" page recording what is currently known about Life.

Downloadable Simulation Software

• Golly - Linux, Mac, Windows (LifeWiki article)
• Life32 - Windows (LifeWiki article)
• LifeLab - Mac
• Mirek's Cellebration - Linux, Mac, Windows
• WinLife (direct FTP link) - Windows 3.1
• Minetest mod for exploring 1D, 2D and 3D CA and importing from collections
• JaGol - Java-based implementation of the Game of Life
• Square Cell - a powerful CA simulator by Brian Prentice([1])
  • Square Cell documentation
  • Square Cell pattern collection

Other CAs

• Hexagonal Cell - hexagonal cell simulator by Brian Prentice ([2])
• Triangular Cell - triangular cell simulator by Brian Prentice ([3])
• Java CA Programs - an archive of Java simulators including Billards, Square Cell, Hexagonal Cell, Triangular Cell, Square Cell 1D and simulators for several special square cell rules together with a large pattern collection by Brian Prentice
• Tiled CA - by Brian Prentice; runs cellular automata simulations on a large number of grids which can be constructed from various shaped tiles ([4])

Web Browser Based Life Simulations

• andersonvom.github.com/game-of-life - A Javascript / Processing.js open source implementation of the Game of Life
• www.bitstorm.org/gameoflife - Java applet with a simulator of the Game of Life
• www.ibiblio.org/lifepatterns - Java pop up applet with a fast simulator of the Game of Life
• copy.sh/life/ - Javascript/canvas implementation of the Game of Life by Fabian Hemmer using the HashLife algorithm, capable of handling large patterns
• gwylim.net/hexcell - hexagonal cellular automaton
• www.co.nz/gameoflife/ - Javascript/canvas implementation of the Game of Life
• Twitch Plays Conway's Game of Life - Enter commands by chat on Twitch. Support for RLEs (!RLE command). Multiplayer Battle Royale mode (!PLAY command).
• Game of Life editor/simulator/browser, using Javascript Angular framework - draw patterns or load from a large library.

Downloadable Computation and/or Search Software

• apgsearch for Catagolue - Downloadable distributed soup search script, written in Python for Golly
• Bellman by Mike Playle - Program for searching stable catalysts in Conway's Game of Life. Written in C.
• Catalyst v1.0 by Gabriel Nivasch - Finds ways of modifying the evolution of an input pattern by placing catalysts that react with it, by a backtracking search. Written in C++.
• CatForce by Michael Simkin - fast brute-force testing of arrangements of potential catalysts for signal-processing reactions. Written in C, based on the LifeAPI library.
• CollisionsSearch v0.1a by Sergei Petrov (Guam) - finds arrangements usually of small Spartan or near-Spartan objects, with various constraints. Similar to CatForce, but with a GUI.
• dr/drifter by Dean Hickerson - Finds patterns consisting of a a small perturbation "drifting" across a still-life background. Takes as input the perturbation and part of the background. Depth-first; simulates the evolution of the perturbation, making a choice whenever it needs the value of an unknown background cell, and backtracking whenever it finds an inconsistency in the background or the perturbation grows too large. Useful for finding high-period billiard-table oscillators, circuitry consisting of signals moving through static wires and components, and custom eaters. The 'knownrotors' file is a list of previously discovered drifters, to avoid duplicated searches. Written in C.
• gencols by Paul Callahan - Enumerates collisions between patterns (e.g. gliders and still lifes). Includes output filters to detect oscillators, spaceships, or successful eating of one pattern by another. Life evolution rule is hardcoded as a sequence of bit-parallel integer operations (so it's possible to change but not easy). Written in C.
• gfind v4.8 by David Eppstein - Search program for low-period spaceships. Extends partial patterns a row at a time, keeping track of rows in all phases of the pattern. Includes modes for finding symmetric patterns. Written in C.
• gsearch by David Eppstein - Performs a brute force search of all patterns fitting within a small rectangle. Evolves each pattern for a specified number of generations or until it repeats, grows too large, or matches a previously seen pattern. Recognizes spaceships, oscillators, unstable oscillators (such as queen bee and p90), replicators, and some puffers. Includes modes for finding symmetric patterns. Written in C.
• Hersrch by Karel Suhajda (via archive.org - the original site is down) - Searches for open or closed Herschel tracks in Conway's Game of Life, using a database of known static and periodic track components. Written in C++.
• lifesrc v3.8 by David Bell - Search program for oscillators. Written in C.
• ofind v0.9 by David Eppstein - Searches for low-period oscillators. Similar to gfind, but extends patterns in all phases simultaneously rather than a single phase at a time, and includes special handling of stator cells. User can specify what spark the oscillator should produce, or how it should interact with neighboring patterns of other periods. Written in C.
• Random Agar v1.1 by Gabriel Navasch - Looks for new Life oscillators, wicks, and agars. Generates random spatially periodic patterns, and runs them until they oscillate. Includes complete support for all possible symmetry types. Written in C++.
• Scripts forum at ConwayLife.com
• Seeds of Destruction Game v0.5 by Paul Chapman - Manual search assistant for self-destruct circuitry, efficient glider-construction cleanups, reburnable fuses, etc. Java application.
• WLS 0.71 (WinLifeSearch) - a Windows port of lifesrc, with a GUI to help with setup. Windows executables are included in the zip files; source code is on github.
• zfind - a spaceship search program by zdr.
• life-soup - an FPGA soup searcher written by Rob Liston in Verilog, running on the Xilinx EK-U1-VCU118-G evaluation board.

Chats

• Conwaylife Lounge on Discord

Other Links Pages

• dmoz: Open Directory Project
• Golly Help: References