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 Forum index » Diversions » TimeWasters
Break my code
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Author Message
Agent Lex
Entrenched


Joined: 11 May 2006
Posts: 1188
Location: No longer London, still in England

 		Break my code
Codemaking test
In a shameless copy of Omega's puzzle experiment threads, I'm trying something myself. But instead of being in an ARG situation, I just wanted to see how long my homebrew code takes to break. So I'm going to post one ciphertext per day in my code, and first to break it gets a stroopwafel.

Here is the tempting stroopwafel:
Stroopwafel

The first ciphertext is here. If you don't want to keep coming back to the thread, I'll be adding them to the same directory each day, so you can just go straight to each day's ciphertext easily.

By the way, an indented line simply means that it carries directly on from the previous line, as if there was no line break.

Quick ref:
Text 1
Text 2

PostPosted: Fri Jun 13, 2008 7:38 pm
Last edited by Agent Lex on Sat Jun 14, 2008 8:29 pm; edited 1 time in total
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alexbutterfield
Boot


Joined: 08 May 2008
Posts: 37

 		okay I've given this some work and I'm getting stuck. So I'm hoping that some smartie is gonna come along and help me out

So far I've figured:

Spoiler (Rollover to View):
the symbols derive from a noughts and crosses (tic tac toe for the Americans) board. Or 3 to be precise. To see what I mean draw 3 ttt boards. The first leave blank. The second, draw diagonal lines from each corner in the same direction, in all 9 sections. With the third draw opposite diagonal lines. Now if you ignore the central squares you will have 24 sections. These can be separated into 24 symbols (by using common borders in both areas) --there are two more symbols with an X through them.

This is repeated for red and green. At first I thought that there would be one red symbol per letter ofthe alphabet. And one (though different) green symbol for each letter. Meaning that each letter had two possible symbols that the coder could substitute. One green one red. But on line 4 of the cypher there is a 2 symbol "word" where both symbols are the same shape and color. I dont know any two letter words that have a double letter. This makes me worry that this is a cypher where the same symbol can mean different letters depending on the position.

Also. I reckon that this is a poem or song. As it has what looks like a title and 3 four line verses.


PostPosted: Sat Jun 14, 2008 12:24 am
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Omega
Unfettered


Joined: 07 Mar 2008
Posts: 430
Location: Utah

 		My initial guess is substitution, with the red symbols being one substitution set, the green another. Working on that still, not sure if it will pan out. Will update in a minute.

ETA: Definitely appears to be substitution. Both the Red and Green have 26 unique symbols. Here's a symbol key, for reference:
symbols.gif
 Description   
 Filesize   2.73KB
 Viewed   712 Time(s)

symbols.gif
_________________
Puzzle Experiments: #3, #4, #6

PostPosted: Sat Jun 14, 2008 12:52 am
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chulo333
Decorated


Joined: 28 Jul 2004
Posts: 263
Location: Long Beach, CA

 		some notes on what I've found so far (assuming that it translates to english):

Spoiler (Rollover to View):
there are only 2 words in the english language with 1-letter: "A" and "I". However, there's actually 3 green 1-letter characters. So I'm guessing that either the characters actually can rotate (possibly in 90 degree increments or 180 degree increments) or the characters use some kind of poly-alphabetic substitution.

Since the majority of the 1 letter characters are the same shape (1st character on 2nd line or 180 degree rotated version of it) I'm guessing that it can be rotated. But what's stumping me is that the other 1-letter word is the character the looks like Г and comes in both green and red...so being that there's only 2 1-letter words, i can only guess that the red and green don't necessarily mean different letters...either way, it's not just a simple substitution with 1 symbol equaling 1 letter

don't know if this helps at all, but I'll keep looking at this.

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Team OCARG - Orange County Axon Relay Group

PostPosted: Sat Jun 14, 2008 1:27 am
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Omega
Unfettered


Joined: 07 Mar 2008
Posts: 430
Location: Utah
chulo333 wrote:
there are only 2 words in the english language with 1-letter: "A" and "I". However, there's actually 3 green 1-letter characters.

I'm thinking the third single character might be a typo, that or there's an accidental space in there. Otherwise, with two intertwining alphabets, this could quickly become a very difficult puzzle.

Currently, I'm taking all the words out that are composed only of green and red symbols, and trying to solve as substitution using just those.
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Puzzle Experiments: #3, #4, #6

PostPosted: Sat Jun 14, 2008 1:34 am
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alexbutterfield
Boot


Joined: 08 May 2008
Posts: 37

 		interesting thoughts.

Omega: any chance you could photoshop the layout I tried to describe. I'm posting on my phone- in the middle of a roadtrip

Spoiler (Rollover to View):
once the symbols are organized as a tic tac toe board they look very deliberate. Certainly not random shapes. This makes me wonder if the letters somehow correspond to the position in the ttt board with some logic.

Eg.

A | b | c
__|__|__
d |. |e
__|__|__
f. | g | h
. |. |

That kinda thing. Its hard to explain in words. But harder to draw with slashes and underscores. Smile

Chulo any thoughts on the 2 letter word made up of a double symbol?



Are you guys in chat anywhere? I in the holomove, bolsid and node rooms.

PostPosted: Sat Jun 14, 2008 1:45 am
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chulo333
Decorated


Joined: 28 Jul 2004
Posts: 263
Location: Long Beach, CA
alexbutterfield wrote:
interesting thoughts.

Omega: any chance you could photoshop the layout I tried to describe. I'm posting on my phone- in the middle of a roadtrip

Spoiler (Rollover to View):
once the symbols are organized as a tic tac toe board they look very deliberate. Certainly not random shapes. This makes me wonder if the letters somehow correspond to the position in the ttt board with some logic.

Eg.

A | b | c
__|__|__
d |. |e
__|__|__
f. | g | h
. |. |

That kinda thing. Its hard to explain in words. But harder to draw with slashes and underscores. Smile

Chulo any thoughts on the 2 letter word made up of a double symbol?



Are you guys in chat anywhere? I in the holomove, bolsid and node rooms.


i get what you're trying to explain...laid out similar to a pig-pen cipher http://www.simonsingh.net/The_Black_Chamber/pigpenWithMenu.html

as far as the 2 character word, my first thoughts on it were either a poly-alphabetic cipher or a language other than english.
_________________
AKA Major Sena! A "trusted" crew member
Team OCARG - Orange County Axon Relay Group

PostPosted: Sat Jun 14, 2008 2:00 am
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alexbutterfield
Boot


Joined: 08 May 2008
Posts: 37

 		hahaha

it better not be in another language.

A pig pen, interesting. I'm new to this stuff so thanks for the link. But exactly like that yes. Omega is mocking it up anyway.

PostPosted: Sat Jun 14, 2008 2:16 am
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Omega
Unfettered


Joined: 07 Mar 2008
Posts: 430
Location: Utah
alexbutterfield wrote:
Omega: any chance you could photoshop the layout I tried to describe.

I see what you're saying now. Here's a mock-up, showing how a few of the symbols could have been derived, according to alex's tic-tac-toe observation:
tic-tac-toe.gif
 Description   
 Filesize   8.13KB
 Viewed   621 Time(s)

tic-tac-toe.gif
_________________
Puzzle Experiments: #3, #4, #6

PostPosted: Sat Jun 14, 2008 2:23 am
Last edited by Omega on Sat Jun 14, 2008 2:28 am; edited 1 time in total
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chulo333
Decorated


Joined: 28 Jul 2004
Posts: 263
Location: Long Beach, CA

 		you gave me an idea on a method for us to refer to characters

we can number the tic tac toe squares and use the numbers to refer to specific characters if we need to point something out to each other

regular ttt:

1|2|3
_|_|_
4|_|5
_|_|_
6|7|8

\ ttt:

_9|10|11
__|__|__
12|__|13
__|__|__
14|15|16

/ ttt:

17|18|19
__|__|__
20|__|21
__|__|__
22|23|24


so for example, if you'd like to talk about the symbol that is the 1st character on the first line, it'd be the 21r symbol (r for red). Maybe this'll help us communicate with each other...

hopefully i'm not just confusing everyone Smile
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AKA Major Sena! A "trusted" crew member
Team OCARG - Orange County Axon Relay Group

PostPosted: Sat Jun 14, 2008 2:25 am
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Omega
Unfettered


Joined: 07 Mar 2008
Posts: 430
Location: Utah
chulo333 wrote:
hopefully i'm not just confusing everyone Smile

I follow. Good system! Unfortunately, I am incredibly tired, so I'm gonna sleep on this one for now, continue in the morning. Night!
_________________
Puzzle Experiments: #3, #4, #6

PostPosted: Sat Jun 14, 2008 2:37 am
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alexbutterfield
Boot


Joined: 08 May 2008
Posts: 37

 		nice idea.

I can't do it now but it would ne good to translate the whole text into number code.

Edit:

I really think changing the symbols to numbers is the way to go. Of course we need a consistent method. So I'll second chulo's. With one adition.

The symbols that are a box containing an X.

Where the box is open at the top it is 25
where the box is open at the bottom it is 26

The first text is as follows:

21r1g. 24g8r2g16g. 18g15r11g19g. 11r22g16r. 3g8r12r20g8r8r4r. 3g3r3g11g21g.

---------------

10g. 20g15g13r9r. 3g15r11r. 3r22r14g11r17r. 1g8r4g. 15g. 2r8r8g8r3r14r. 21g15g16g.

21r6r22r. 3r14r19g16g9r. 3r16r6g14r19r9g16r17g. 2r8r1g14r. 5g9g1g20g.

14g22g8g11g. 23r22g9r8g. 8g. 24g15g9g21g. 23r1r21r13r. 10g1g. 23r10g11r19r. 8r8r. 15r11g11g20g. 6g10r11g11r20g. 23g1g10r17r11r

8g1r5r. 8r. 16g3r19r1g4g. 11r19g10r1r14r. 10r8g. 21r3r19r9g. 24g1r7g16r.

------------------------

20r6r19g. 14r9r11g. 24g2g9r22r1g14r. 1r8g4g. 20g1g22g. 18g1r8g8g1r. 7g20g21g20r. 22g7g. 14r3g22r14g22g.

20g6r22g. 1r6r11g15r2r16r. 14g22r1g14g. 6g19g14r11g. 18r8g24g. 24r11r22r24g24g16g4g.

5g9r9g7r. 15g1r. 14g19g16g. 18r9g1g1r17g. 24g22g9g17g. 18g9g8g9r10r1r11r.

10r26r. 19g6r3g13r16r5g. 8g8g4r. 15g. 7r1r1r11g. 24g11g6r2g. 24r11r1r16r10g1g14r.

----------------

6r19r. 6g1r6g9r. 10g. 23r1r1r1g8g. 14r16g11g. 18r15g11g19g. 20r1g.

1r8r4g. 11g1g9r9r. 21r3g22r16g. 2r9r16r11r. 14r20g. 2r15g2g11r22r16g16r

25g20g. 19r6r25g9g6g3r20r24g. 11g16r15g9g4r. 11r6g. 23g1r9r1g. 25r16r.

6g19g11r. 14g22g8g14g. 6r22g11r11r. 20g6g22g. 14r3g11r. 25g1r12g16r24r. 26r16g. 17r3r. 22g3r9r8g21r.

PostPosted: Sat Jun 14, 2008 2:41 am
Last edited by alexbutterfield on Sat Jun 14, 2008 3:31 pm; edited 3 times in total
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Agent Lex
Entrenched


Joined: 11 May 2006
Posts: 1188
Location: No longer London, still in England

 		A quick confirmation, since I wasn't clear - yes, this is in English, and all other ciphertexts will be in English.

PostPosted: Sat Jun 14, 2008 5:57 am
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alexbutterfield
Boot


Joined: 08 May 2008
Posts: 37

 		I thought I'd explain what I'm thinking.

First I'm still expecting a 3 verse song or poem. With the first lone being a title. Maybe even title and artist. ( needless to say if we could decipher that we could just google the lyrics)

Also we have the 3 ttt grids - if the letters are assigned position in the grids by some logical system then we could be able to figure out which letters are in which grid if not the exact symbol for each letter. We could try some frequency analysis for this. Eg. Add the frequencies of each ttt grid's symbols. Then see if it correlates to the cumulative frequency of the first/second/third eight letters in the alphabet. (theres a wikipedia of letter freq) - thats a bit hard to do in the car tho Smile

However that would mean that y and z would be the odd two symbols. Which seems a bit too predicatble. But maybe by analysing different strings of 8 letters from the alphabet we could hit somethng.

I did a tally of frequency I'll publish that here using the número systemfrom above.

ttt
1r - 20
2r - 5
3r - 9
4r - 4
5r - 1
6r - 9
7r - 2
8r - 13

\ttt
9r - 13
10r- 6
11r- 17
12r- 1
13r- 3
14r- 13
15r- 4
16r- 12

/ttt
17r- 3
18r- 3
19r- 6
20r- 4
21r- 6
22r- 8
23r- 4
24r- 3

25r- 1
26r- 2
ttt
1g - 15
2g - 4
3g - 8
4g - 5
5g - 3
6g - 10
7g - 3
8g - 16

\ttt
9g - 10
10g- 4
11g- 15
12g- 1
13g- 0
14g- 8
15g- 9
16g- 10

/ttt
17g- 3
18g- 3
19g- 9
20g- 11
21g- 4
22g- 12
23g- 2
24g- 10

25g- 3
26g- 0
Total of red 172
total of green 178
overall total 350

( the totals are accurate but the tally is slightly off I'll correct it later)
Another idea would be to match frequencies so take most frequent red and green and combine them - assuming they are E. Etc on down the letters then sub them in. If it is a straight sub, but with 2 symbols per letter it should work.

PostPosted: Sat Jun 14, 2008 4:34 pm
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Agent Lex
Entrenched


Joined: 11 May 2006
Posts: 1188
Location: No longer London, still in England

 		Today's ciphertext is complete and uploaded. Check it out here.

PostPosted: Sat Jun 14, 2008 8:29 pm
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