A Little Help, Please

Discussion in 'Software' started by Paxton007, Oct 26, 2012.

  1. Paxton007

    Paxton007 MajorGeek

    I've been looking at this for nearly a year now trying to figure out what it is. I think it's some kind of primitive computer language, but I can't decipher it. Any help would be great!

    Thank you.
     

    Attached Files:

    Paxton007, Oct 26, 2012
    #1
  2. GermanOne

    GermanOne Guest

    Last edited by a moderator: Oct 26, 2012
    GermanOne, Oct 26, 2012
    #2
  3. GermanOne

    GermanOne Guest

    Edit: Looks like 5bit Baudot Code. In that case your example begins with "BEHIND TUBBIES".
    Doesn't sound like programming ;)
     
    GermanOne, Oct 26, 2012
    #3
  4. pwillener

    pwillener MajorGeek

    Punch tape was rarely used for programming; mostly for storing / transferring data.

    Telex also used punch tape; messages were entered onto the tape, then the tape was used to transmit the message.

    In the 60's and 70's, before computer terminals and PCs became common, punch cards were used for data entry, including programming.
     

    Attached Files:

    pwillener, Oct 29, 2012
    #4
  5. pwillener

    pwillener MajorGeek

    P.S. this is how punch tape looked like.
     

    Attached Files:

    pwillener, Oct 29, 2012
    #5
  6. Paxton007

    Paxton007 MajorGeek

    Thank you for your help. You're right about it not being "programming" but I was thinking that it was written in a computer language I couldn't find a cipher for. It was part of a geocache (geocaching.com) puzzle, and with your start I was able to decode the rest.

    Thank you!

    By the way, is there a simulator online? I'd like to make one of these puzzles now as well, haha.
     
    Paxton007, Oct 29, 2012
    #6
  7. GermanOne

    GermanOne Guest

    You're welcome.

    Of course I already knew where to find the film can but I thought it was not fair to fully solve your puzzle ;)

    It seems there is no online converter that can provide any image format. That's the best I was able to find:
    http://ff-solutions.lu/text-converter/#text-ita2
     
    GermanOne, Oct 29, 2012
    #7
  8. GermanOne

    GermanOne Guest

    I was kinda bored today (cold and rainy in Germany :(). So I wrote a small example that uses the (HTML5) canvas and its toDataURL() method to get an image from the canvas element.

    Save as *.HTML :-
    PHP:
    <!DOCTYPE html>
    <    html dir="ltr" lang="en-US">
      <    head>
        <    meta charset="utf-8">
        <    title>Text to Baudot-Murray</title>
        <    script type="text/javascript">
          <!--
              "use strict";
          var     bFig = false, arr = [], x = 0, dim = 12;
          var     aPatterns = [
            [    1, 1, 8, 0, 0, 0] /* A - */, [1, 0, 8, 0, 1, 1] /* B ? */, [0, 1, 8, 1, 1, 0] /* C : */, [1, 0, 8, 0, 1, 0] /* D */,   [1, 0, 8, 0, 0, 0] /* E 3 */,
            [    1, 0, 8, 1, 1, 0] /* F ! */, [0, 1, 8, 0, 1, 1] /* G */,   [0, 0, 8, 1, 0, 1] /* H */,   [0, 1, 8, 1, 0, 0] /* I 8 */, [1, 1, 8, 0, 1, 0] /* J */,
            [    1, 1, 8, 1, 1, 0] /* K */,   [0, 1, 8, 0, 0, 1] /* L ) */, [0, 0, 8, 1, 1, 1] /* M . */, [0, 0, 8, 1, 1, 0] /* N , */, [0, 0, 8, 0, 1, 1] /* O 9 */,
            [    0, 1, 8, 1, 0, 1] /* O 9 */, [1, 1, 8, 1, 0, 1] /* Q 1 */, [0, 1, 8, 0, 1, 0] /* R 4 */, [1, 0, 8, 1, 0, 0] /* S */,   [0, 0, 8, 0, 0, 1] /* T 5 */,
            [    1, 1, 8, 1, 0, 0] /* U 7 */, [0, 1, 8, 1, 1, 1] /* V */,   [1, 1, 8, 0, 0, 1] /* W 2 */, [1, 0, 8, 1, 1, 1] /* X / */, [1, 0, 8, 1, 0, 1] /* Y 6 */,
            [    1, 0, 8, 0, 0, 1] /* Z " */, [0, 0, 8, 1, 0, 0] /* space */, [1, 1, 8, 1, 1, 1] /* shift letters */, [1, 1, 8, 0, 1, 1] /* shift figures */];
          var     sPool = 'ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ -?:3!8().,9014572/6"';
          var     aIndex = [0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 0, 1, 2, 4, 5, 8, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 19, 20, 22, 23, 24, 25];

          function     drawrect(ctx, w) {
                ctx.fillStyle = '#FFFBBB';
                ctx.fillRect(0, 0, (w + 1) * dim, 7 * dim);
          }

          function     drawcirc(ctx, iX, iY, r) {
                ctx.beginPath();
                ctx.arc((iX + 1) * dim, (iY + 1) * dim, r, 0, 2 * Math.PI, false);
                ctx.fillStyle = 'black';
                ctx.fill();
          }

          function     addArray(arrPattern, bIsFig) {
            if (    bFig!==bIsFig) {
              if (    bFig) {
                    arr[x] = aPatterns[27];
              } else {
                    arr[x] = aPatterns[28];
              }
                  bFig = !bFig;
              ++    x;
            }
                arr[x] = arrPattern;
            ++    x;
          }

          function     convert() {
            var     c, i, j;
            var     str = document.getElementById('txt').value.toUpperCase();
            var     len = str.length;
            var     cac = document.getElementById('canvascontainer');
            var     imc = document.getElementById('imgcontainer');
                cac.innerHTML = '';
                imc.innerHTML = '';
            if (    len) {
              for (    i = 0; i<len; i++) {
                    c = str.charAt(i);
                    j = sPool.indexOf(c);
                if (    j<0) {
                      alert('Character "' + c + '" is not supported!');
                      arr.length = 0;
                  break;
                } else if (    j<26) {
                      addArray(aPatterns[aIndex[j]], false);
                } else if (    j===26) {
                      addArray(aPatterns[aIndex[j]], bFig);
                } else {
                      addArray(aPatterns[aIndex[j]], true);
                }
              }
            }
                len = arr.length;
            if (    len) {
              var     ca = document.createElement('canvas');
                  ca.setAttribute('id', 'canvrect');
                  ca.setAttribute('width', ((len + 1) * dim).toString());
                  ca.setAttribute('height', (7 * dim).toString());
                  cac.appendChild(ca);
              var     ctx = ca.getContext('2d');
                  drawrect(ctx, len);
              for (    i = 0; i<6; i++) {
                for (    j = 0; j<len; j++) {
                  if (    i===2) {
                        drawcirc(ctx, j, i, 2);
                  } else {
                    if (    arr[j][i]===1) {
                          drawcirc(ctx, j, i, 4);
                    }
                  }
                }
              }
              var     im = document.createElement('img');
                  im.setAttribute('src', ca.toDataURL("image/png"));
                  im.setAttribute('alt', 'PNG image');
                  imc.appendChild(im);
            }
                bFig = false;
                arr.length = 0;
                x = 0;
          }

          function     focustxt() {
                document.getElementById('txt').focus();
          }

          function     enter(evt) {
            var     charCode;
            if (    evt && evt.which) {
                    charCode = evt.which;
            } else if (    window.event) {
                    evt = window.event;
                    charCode = evt.keyCode;
            }
            if (    charCode===13) {
                    convert();
            }
          }
              // -->
            </script>

        <    style type="text/css">
          <!--
              body {
                color : black;
                background-color : #1188FF;
                font-family : Tahoma, sans-serif;
                font-size : 10pt;
                margin : 10px 20px 10px 20px;
          }
              div {
                height : 100px;
          }
              #canvascontainer {
                visibility : hidden;
                position : absolute;
          }
              h2 {
                text-align : center;
          }
              input {
                color : black;
                font-family : Tahoma, sans-serif;
                font-size : 10pt;
                padding-left : 10px;
                padding-right : 10px;
          }
              #run {
                background-color : #CCCCEE;
                font-weight : bold;
          }
          -->
        </    style>

      </    head>
      <    body onload="focustxt()">
        <    div id="canvascontainer"></div>
        <    h2>Text to Baudot-Murray</h2><hr>
        <    h4>Enter your text:</h4>
        <    p><input type="text" id="txt" size="150" onkeypress="enter(event)"></p>
        <    p><input type="button" id="run" value="Convert" onclick="convert()"></p><hr>
        <    h4>Baudot-Murray punched tape:</h4>
        <    div id="imgcontainer"></div><hr>
      </    body>
    </    html>
     
    GermanOne, Nov 3, 2012
    #8

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