Category Archives: algorithms

Counting coins

Posted on 2015-04-26 by

This afternoon, Matt Locke tweeted the following problem from his nine-year-old daughter’s maths homework:

Posted in algorithms, Mathematics | 14 Comments

Revisiting “On editing text”

Posted on 2014-06-19 by

This document is an incomplete draft. About two years ago I wrote about a category-theoretic treatment of collaborative text editing. That post is unique in the history of Bosker Blog in having been cited – twice so far that I know … Continue reading →

Posted in algorithms, category theory, Mathematics | 2 Comments

The bicycle lock problem

Posted on 2014-02-18 by

Don’t lock your bicycle with a combination lock. Someone will steal it: I learnt this the hard way. It’s quite easy to open a combination lock by feel, without knowing the combination. Try it: with a bit of practice, you … Continue reading →

Posted in algorithms, Mathematics | 4 Comments

Beyond Bézier curves

Posted on 2013-11-13 by

There is a new feature of Pages and Keynote, not mentioned in any of Apple’s publicity nor in any press coverage I’ve seen, that is really very interesting. Perhaps it will even one day prove to have been revolutionary, in … Continue reading →

Posted in algorithms, Mathematics | Tagged , , | 9 Comments

“Venn diagram” partitioning

Posted on 2013-07-10 by

Paddy3118 wrote about partitioning elements in the same way a Venn diagram does. So, if we have sets A, B and C, the partitions are

Posted in algorithms, chatter | Leave a comment

On editing text

Posted on 2012-05-10 by

Editing text is the opposite of handling exceptions; or, to put it another way, editing text is like exception handling but backwards in time. I realise this is an unexpected claim, so I hope you will permit me to explain. … Continue reading →

Posted in algorithms, category theory | 17 Comments

Something I don’t understand about homomorphic encryption

Posted on 2011-07-31 by

Added later: In retrospect, now I know a little more about cryptography, I can see that my confusion here is caused entirely by the fact that I didn’t know the meaning of the technical term “semantic security”. Ever since Craig … Continue reading →

Posted in algorithms, chatter | 6 Comments