Programming

The earliest memory I have of ‘programming’ is in the early/mid 90s when my father brought home a computer from work. We could play games on it … so of course I took the spreadsheet program he used (LOTUS 123, did I date myself with that?) and tried to modify it to print out a helpful message for him. It … halfway worked? At least I could undo it so he could get back to work…

After that, I picked up programming for real in QBASIC (I still have a few of those programs lying around), got my own (junky) Linux desktop from my cousin, tried to learn VBasic (without a Windows machine), and eventually made it to high school… In college, I studied computer science and mathematics, mostly programming in Java/.NET, although with a bit of everything in the mix. A few of my oldest programming posts on this blog are from that time.

After that, on to grad school! Originally, I was going to study computational linguistics, but that fell through. Then programming languages (the school’s specialty). And finally I ended up studying censorship and computer security… before taking a hard turn into the private sector to follow my PhD advisor.

Since then, I’ve worked in the computer security space at a couple of different companies. Some don’t exist any more, some you’ve probably heard of. I still program for fun too, and not just in security.

But really, I still have a habit of doing a little bit of everything. Whatever seems interesting at the time!

Recent posts (Page 34 of 74)

Advent of Code 2016

2018-01-03 in Programming

As I did last year, I’m going to solve the Advent of Code problems again this year.

Or that was the plan. It turns out that instead I put down my blog for almost a year and a half and never quite got around to doing these problems. So I’m actually backdating these posts from the early days of 2018 to where they would have been had I solved them on time. They’re still interesting problems, so give them a read.

read more...

AoC 2017 Day 25: Turing

2017-12-25 in Programming

Source: The Halting Problem

Part 1: Implement a Turing machine defined as such:

Begin in state A. Perform a diagnostic checksum after 6 steps.

In state A: If the current value is 0: - Write the value 1. - Move one slot to the right. - Continue with state B. If the current value is 1: - Write the value 0. - Move one slot to the left. - Continue with state B.

…



> What is the final number of `1s` on the tape?





Most of this problem actually came down to reading the input:

```python
# Map of (current state, current value, key) -> value
# key is one of value, offset, state
transitions = {}
breakpoint = 0
state = None
pointer = 0
one_bits = set()

for line in lib.input():
    line = line.strip('- ')
    arg = line.split()[-1][:-1]

    if arg == 'steps':
        arg = line.split()[-2]

    try:
        arg = int(arg)
    except:
        pass

    # Store values based on that argument
    if line.startswith('Begin'):
        state = arg
    elif line.startswith('Perform'):
        breakpoint = arg
    elif line.startswith('In'):
        current_state = arg
    elif line.startswith('If'):
        current_value = arg
    elif line.startswith('Write'):
        transitions[current_state, current_value, 'value'] = arg == 1
    elif line.startswith('Move'):
        transitions[current_state, current_value, 'offset'] = 1 if arg == 'right' else -1
    elif line.startswith('Continue'):
        transitions[current_state, current_value, 'state'] = arg

As we did in part 1 of day 22, we’ll use a set to store the current state (store 1, if an index is not in the set, it’s 0). That gives us the ability to grow unbounded (so long as we have enough RAM).

read more...

AoC 2017 Day 24: Maker Of Bridges

2017-12-24 in Programming

Source: Electromagnetic Moat

Part 1: Given a series of reversible components of the form 3/4 (can connect a 3 on one end to a 4 on the other), form a bridge of components. The bridge’s strength is equal to the sum of component values. So 0/3, 3/7, and 7/4 has a strength of 0+3 + 3+7 + 7+4 = 24.

What is the strongest possible bridge?

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AoC 2017 Day 21: Fractal Expander

AoC 2017 Day 21: Fractal Expander

2017-12-21 in Programming

Source: Fractal Art

Part 1: Start with an input image made of . and # pixels. For n iterations, break the image into blocks:

  • If the current size is even, break the image into 2x2 chunks and replace each with a 3x3 chunk
  • If the current size is odd, break the image into 3x3 chunks and replace each with a 4x4 chunk

The replacement rules will be specified in the following format (example is a 3x3 -> 4x4 rule):

.#./..#/### => #..#/..../..../#..#

In that example, replace this:

.#.
..#
###

With this:

#..#
....
....
#..#

Any rotation or reflection of a chunk can be used to match the input of a replacement rule.

After n = 18 iterations, how many # pixels are there?

read more...

AoC 2017 Day 19: Networkout

2017-12-19 in Programming

Source: A Series of Tubes

Part 1: Take a network diagram of the following form:

|          
|  +--+    
A  |  C

F—|–|-E—+ | | | D +B-+ +–+


> Starting at the single node at the top and following the lines, what order would the nodes be visited in?





First, load the entire network:

```python
data = {}
points = {}
entry = None

def is_point(c):
    return re.match('[A-Z]', c)

for y, line in enumerate(lib.input()):
    for x, c in enumerate(line):
        if c.strip():
            data[x, y] = c

        if is_point(c):
            points[c] = (x, y)

        if y == 0 and c == '|':
            entry = (x, y)

Then, calculate the path:

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AoC 2017 Day 18: Duetvm

AoC 2017 Day 18: Duetvm

2017-12-18 in Programming

Source: Duet

Part 1: Create a virtual machine with the following instruction set:

  • snd X plays a sound with a frequency equal to the value of X
  • set X Y sets register X to Y
  • add X Y set register X to X + Y
  • mul X Y sets register X to X * Y
  • mod X Y sets register X to X mod Y
  • rcv X recovers the frequency of the last sound played, if X is not zero
  • jgz X Y jumps with an offset of the value of Y, iff X is greater than zero

In most cases, X and Y can be either an integer value or a register.

What is the value recovered by rcv the first time X is non-zero?

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