[Newark] Life (Conway's Game of)

[Steve Caddy]

Chris Hayes wrote:
> ... the only thing that I can't quite get my head around regarding life is
> what order to calculate the cells in. I mean; if you work left to right, top
> to bottom you'll get a different outcome than if you - say, do the opposite.

I'm under the impression that each generation is calculated from the state of
its parent, but the new state isn't written to the grid until the entire next
generation has been calculated. It's unimportant which order you consider the
cells in, because all the neighbours are static during the calculation of the
next generation. What is interesting to consider, is what happens at the edge
of the playing area... should it wrap around, or should you consider the edge
to be composed of permanently dead cells?

Steve

-- 
Steven M Caddy, MEng ------------------------------------------------------
Email: steve.m.caddy at ntlworld.com