segment intersection search

Here's a simple method I learned from Gareth Rees for finding the intersection (or parallel / collinear status) of two line segments. Rees credits Ronald Goldman, though I'd imagine the technique goes further back.

today in oblique approaches

If your standard library offers complex numbers and you're not in any hurry, you can't ask for much simpler (or more obscure!) ways to compute Π than this.

ikeda map

Continuing the theme of strange attractors, here's the well-known one embedded in the Ikeda map. The thumbnail at left shows the central 'vortex' of the attractor, and links to a larger viewport.

In these images, I've plotted the real and imaginary components along the x and y axes respectively. But the more popular way to visualize this attractor adds an extra parameter to the system and is expressed in trigonometric functions. Such adaptation of the code below yields these results.

hénon attractor

French astronomer Michel Hénon reported on this strange, fractal attractor in 1976. Since then, it has been among the most studied examples of chaotic dynamical systems.

langton's ant

For a round of code golf, I wrote this spare implementation of Chris Langton's remarkably simple universal computer. If you want amenities like pause, random starting pattern or even quit, check out this more complete version.