Langton's ant is an automata devised by 'Chris Langton'. It is a two-dimensional Turing machine, with simple rules, but with surprising visual results.
The rules for the operation of this automata are as follows:
- The ant is given a set of colors.
- Each color has a 'rule' that says whether the ant should go right or left.
- Every time the ant passes through a square, it changes to the next color in the set.
Example of a set:
The purpose of this experiment is to visualize the pattern formed by the ant's path. It is also a great way to study and improve some progamming concepts.
If you dont have the python libriries 'pygame' and 'numpy', first install it.
You can install using pip command on terminal:
-
pygame
pip install pygame -
numpy
pip install numpy
The code already comes with a color pattern and predefined rules, if you want to see different pattern try changing the 'graf' variable.
graf = Grafs.create_graf('lllrrr')
The function parameter 'lllrrr' (l - left, r - right) of "Grafs.create_graf()" means that the ant when passin through the same block, goes to the left 3 times and then to the right 3 times.
Try changing the parameter and see the results.
| Parameter | pattern |
|---|---|
| 'rlr' | Chaos |
| 'llrr' | Symmetrical |
| 'lrrrrrllr' | Square |
| 'llrrrlrlrllr' | Concoluted |
