• Voynich text as Base20
  • Voynich text as Base20

    RobGea > 30-03-2022, 11:10 PM

    Voynich text as Base20
    EMS suggested to report failed experiments.
    After 5 days of work, this fell on its face, so here it is.

    Decoding vms text as Base20 ran into a leading zeroes problem.

    Idea as follows:
    :: Decode text as Base20
    -eva has 26 chars (TT only uses 22-Fail 1)
    -assume 6 lowest frequency eva chars represent something else, like planets, constellations, stars, whatever
    -leaves 20 letters, map those letters onto the 'symbols' for a Base20 number system (vigesimal)
    -convert newly created Base20 num into a decimal number
        Now you have a nice set of decimal numbers that you can do what you want with ( indices in a look-up table == unnecessary-Fail 2).

    Code:
    Vord     Base20     Decimal
    dain      647d       49753
    qokeedy   e081163    897288523
    okey      0813       3223

    :: Encode text as Base20
    -take some normal text, strip puntuation etc
    -allocate each unique word a random number in decimal ( this step is for easy computation (and i had an indexing idea but...)
    -convert that number to base20
    -convert the base20 number into eva
      ie map Base20 symbols onto the commonest 20 eva symbols

    :: Result
    Courtesy of project gutenberg : A Scandal in Bohemia by A.conan-doyle

    plaintext:
    to sherlock holmes she is always the woman i have
    seldom heard him mention her under any other name in
    his eyes she eclipses and predominates the whole of her
    sex it was not that he felt any emotion akin
    to love for irene adler all emotions and that one
    particularly were abhorrent to his cold precise but admirably balanced
    mind he was i take it the most perfect reasoning
    and observing machine that the world has seen but as

    encoded:
    ap oqsgcki oinflyx oie ook frn aled aktkcr esk hhy
    adq as rypp tdkg triqya oe hod i omm hy
    ha iednsk oie yc olxc odt aled dshg oq triqya
    e yets yoci ar ce fm qm hod ydglhy parfgm
    ap dhtn ony aye ocr ykl ond olxc ce nkaspk
    oysf osc tok ap ha hfcn ya oqc hr gnl
    hm fm yoci esk yf yets aled hr eoyh n
    olxc rmi hkii ce aled he ohtpxhe hg oqc ae

    Conclusion::
    idk.  Undecided
  • RE: Voynich text as Base20

    ReneZ > 31-03-2022, 08:15 AM

    The leading zeroes problem occurs when mapping letters to digits, but this can be circumvented by not using 0 to 9 but 1 to T where T stands for 10.
    So you get:  6 , 7 , 8 , 9 , T , 11 , 12
    and :  98 , 99 , 9T , T1 , T2
    and :  T9 , TT , 111
    This is of course a rather cumbersome system.

    However, you are increasing entropy while converting the plaintext, so this won't work.
  • RE: Voynich text as Base20

    Koen G > 31-03-2022, 08:22 AM

    Do I understand correctly that the main drive behind this approach is to reduce the character set to 20? And that there is nothing inherent to the mechanism that would create the positional rigidity we see in Voynichese? 

    I think if there is any converting words to numbers involved, the solution is probably closer to Roman numerals.
  • RE: Voynich text as Base20

    RobGea > 31-03-2022, 07:12 PM

    Regarding the entropy, yes, i didn't / don't understand it well and had not properly taken it into account - lesson learnt.

    The main drive was to create numbers,

    Base20 is just more common than >Base20 and with 20 chars there are only 6 chars to ignore.

    Regarding the positional rigidity, i was naively ( lazily? ) hoping some would pop out when converting.

    I took a 'do it and see philosophy' rather than a 'think about it first' approach. Smile  More thinking required in future Big Grin 

    Thank you for your comments.
  • RE: Voynich text as Base20

    Koen G > 31-03-2022, 07:53 PM

    (31-03-2022, 07:12 PM)RobGea Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.I took a 'do it and see philosophy' rather than a 'think about it first' approach. Smile  More thinking required in future Big Grin 

    There is nothing wrong with that of course, it is quite possible that the eventual solution to the VM will be born out of such an experiment. Smile And I do appreciate the intentional sharing of failed experiments, you never know if it might inspire someone else.
  • RE: Voynich text as Base20

    Juan_Sali > 31-03-2022, 11:20 PM

    (31-03-2022, 07:12 PM)RobGea Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.Base20 is just more common than >Base20 and with 20 chars there are only 6 chars to ignore.
    You can get an alphabet with even less than 20 chars, first assign 1 char to 1 letter, when all chars are assigned do the same with groups of 2 chars along with a way to distinguish when a char form a letter by itself and when it takes part of a group of 2 that conform a letter.
  • RE: Voynich text as Base20

    davidjackson > 01-04-2022, 06:12 AM

    Rob, are you sure you didn't post this a day early?
    Tongue