2. Computer Science – The Imitation Game 2014
Stumped! Help! Christopher – Alan Turing’s [Benedict Cumberbatch] machine – has cracked Enigma. How exactly does he do that?
The machine is a simulation of Enigma’s actions, except that it is built to scale down those scrambling letters. The settings should be determined first, otherwise you can’t adjust Christopher to make him do his job. In this case, it’s the weather report.
Enigma has three rotors. Let’s call them rings made of redundant letters. Notice that Alan turns over the left-ring first. That’s the most critical one of all, as it is wired to the other two rings. Now to decode.
When the left-ring is turned, the other two rings double step it with two notches. The right ring result is then directed to Christopher to decode it by reducing irrelevant letters until the remaining ones form a word that makes sense. Until the entire message is finally revealed.
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