Ship

Ship
x = 3, y = 3, rule = B3/S23 b2o$obo$2o! #C [[ THUMBSIZE 2 THEME 6 GRID GRIDMAJOR 0 SUPPRESS THUMBLAUNCH ]] #C Still life
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Pattern type	Strict still life
Number of cells	6
Bounding box	3×3
Frequency class	3.3
Discovered by	JHC group
Year of discovery	1970
Rules Outer-totalistic rules B/S23 – B34578/S012345678 Important rules Conway Life, Maze # of rules 212 = 4096 Isotropic rules B/S2e3n – B1e2-ae3456-n78/S012345678
Glider synthesis Fewest gliders 3 Catagolue-generated RLE ship_synth.rle Uploaded synthesis RLE ship_synth.rle
Pattern files Plaintext ship.cells RLE ship.rle
Identifiers apgcode xs6_356 Pentadecathlon ID 6.2

For the class of patterns sometimes called ships, see spaceship.

Ship is a 6-cell still life. It was discovered by the JHC group in 1970.

Adding one cell to the corner of the ship will turn it into a fleet. Removing one of the corner cells results in a boat, while removing both results in a tub. Like the tub and the boat, it is infinitely extensible (see long ship).

Ship can act as an eater, eating one half of a traffic light like in p32 blinker hassler 2.

Commonness

Ship is the fifth most common still life on Adam P. Goucher's Catagolue, being less common than boat but more common than tub. Among all still lifes with 6 cells, it is the second most common, being less common than beehive but more common than barge. It is also the seventh most common object on Catagolue, and the most common object for which there is no 2-glider synthesis.

The ship was also the seventh most common still life in Achim Flammenkamp's census, being less common than pond and more common than long boat.

The ship is about 4.5 times as common in Catagolue than in Achim Flammenkamp's census; it is more common than the tub and the pond in the former but not the latter. The reason for this huge discrepancy is because Catagolue's soups are 16×16 with empty space surrounding it, and a Herschel leaving the active region and going into the empty space produces a ship. In comparison, Achim Flammenkamp's census is on a large torus, which is effectively an infinite region, so there is no empty space for a Herschel to complete its sequence, and it is likely to crash into something first.

Occurrence

As mentioned previously, the ship is a notable component of Herschel (and, by extension, B-heptomino) ash, along with two escaping gliders and some blocks.

Glider synthesis

A ship can be synthesized from 3 gliders in many ways. In particular, crashing a glider into either a pond or a blinker, both of which cost two gliders, creates a ship.

In other rules

It is the smallest pattern that is a still life under the standard Life rules but not in HighLife.

Extensibility

Ship can be infinitely extended, as illustrated by the following:

Long ship	Very long ship	Long^3 ship

See also

• Tub
• Boat
• Ship-tie

External links

• Ship at the Life Lexicon

• Ship at Adam P. Goucher's Catagolue

• The 5 six-bit still-lifes at Mark D. Niemiec's Life Page