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Topics - Beanspoon

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Hi guys,
I noticed that a Zerobot Mode had been added to the settings a few releases ago but I can't really find any documentation on how it works or what it does.  I get the impression it does something towards automating zerobot evolution, but I was hoping someone could explain what its methods were etc.

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Bugs and fixes / Overflow error
« on: March 15, 2013, 10:24:39 AM »
Hi,
I've recently evolved a few bots able to reproduce sustainably, so I extracted their DNA and started a new sim with just those.  After about 10-20 mins the simulation crashes, giving and overflow error.  When I re-open the error.sim file however, I can carry on running the sim for another 10-20 mins before it gives the same error again.  Does anyone know what might be causing this?

This is run using 2.45.01.  When I tried with 2.45.02 the overflow error happens immediately on reloading error.sim.

The file is attached.

Thanks!

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Evolution and Internet Sharing Sims / Randombot evolution sim
« on: March 28, 2012, 11:10:29 AM »
The original post from this topic was modified by a moderator (not naming any names! ;) ), and I can't be bothered to re-write the whole essay so here's the gist.

I set up an evo sim with 100 1024bit randombots (1024 random integers between 1 and 1000), set as autotroph and left to mutate the ability to reproduce.

I used random integers instead of zeros because I noticed that point mutation only mutates numbers by small amounts, meaning that 1) even if luck was on our side and the number mutated only in the right direction, it would take a long time to reach 300, and 2) behaviour evolved would most likely only use the low array areas, as it becomes exponentally less likely for the higher array areas to be reached.  Using random integers means that the chances of any array location being used are equal.

After a surprisingly short number of cycles, the command .repro inc appeared, causing a cancerous reproduction pattern.  Please see further on for the next step.

4
Darwinbots3 / Multi-core support?
« on: March 28, 2012, 10:35:45 AM »
Hey guys,
I'm hoping DB3 is still in the works!  I would offer to help out, but currently university degree must take precedence.  Also I hear that it is currently a little difficult for people to just jump in at present.

My question was just regarding whether DB3 would feature multi-core processor support.  While my i7 runs sims a lot faster than any of the single-core PCs I've been using, I notice that DB2 is still only utilising one core's worth (16%) of the available processing power.

I know that coding for multi-core processors is a lot more difficult, as jobs have to be divided between available cores, but each bot script can be thought of as a job in itself, and I would have thought that if you were able to specify somewhere in the settings the number of cores you would like to utilise, it shouldn't be too difficult to get to program to divide running of the scripts evenly across the processors.

Seeing as future technology seems to be moving towards more and more cores, this seems like a sensible avenue to explore.

If you're feeling really adventurous, DB doesn't really need a lot of graphics processing, so you could look into GPU support too.  That would really give sims a turbo boost!

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