Hexagon

Hexagon is a command line tool to simulate the game of life. With this cellular automaton, complex rules can be defined and the process over time displayed.

Version: 0.11.24

For command documentation, start the program for the first time. hexagon.macro is created with a complete list of commands.

This program is owned by Heiko Stark. It can be used free of charge for non-commercial use. For the common citations in publications, please use the following entry “Hexagon software (Heiko Stark, Jena, Germany, URL: https://starkrats.de)”.

An installer for Windows and Linux can be found here: Software

▸ Download

hexagon 64bit (Windows & Wine/Darwine)
hexagon 32bit (Windows, ReactOS & Wine/Darwine)

hexagon 64bit (MacOS X & Darling)
hexagon 32bit (MacOS X & Darling)

hexagon 64bit (Linux)
hexagon 32bit (Linux)
hexagon aarch64 (Linux)
hexagon arm (Linux)

hexagon 64bit (FreeBSD)
hexagon 32bit (FreeBSD)

hexagon 64bit (Solaris)
hexagon 32bit (Solaris)

Note: Intel 32bit runs also on 64bit systems, but only with 4 GB memory!

▸ Example

// https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conway%27s_Game_of_Life

// The Game of Life, also known simply as Life, is a cellular automaton devised by the British mathematician John Horton Conway in 1970.
// It is a zero-player game, meaning that its evolution is determined by its initial state, requiring no further input.
// One interacts with the Game of Life by creating an initial configuration and observing how it evolves.
// It is Turing complete and can simulate a universal constructor or any other Turing machine.

// 1. Any live cell with fewer than two live neighbours dies, as if by underpopulation.
// 2. Any live cell with two or three live neighbours lives on to the next generation.
// 3. Any live cell with more than three live neighbours dies, as if by overpopulation.
// 4. Any dead cell with exactly three live neighbours becomes a live cell, as if by reproduction.

color.map.special 1 10

world.new 100 200
world.fill.random 1 0.1

rules.insert neighbors < 2 set 0 // 1.
rules.insert neighbors = 2 set 1 // 2. & 4.
rules.insert neighbors > 2 set 0 // 3.

image.rgb
image.new 400 400
world.setborder 1

for 200
    world.render.colormap <25,50> <75,150>
    id #= -3 for.count
    name := “test_i” id “.png”
    image.save name
    rules.step
end

execute convert “-delay 50 -loop 0 test_i*.png animated_2.gif”

io.file.delete test_i*.png

If you want to send me a bug report or have some suggestions about what future versions of ‘hexagon’ should support, you can contact me either by email (bugs[@]starkrats[dot]de).