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SECTION 1
NEW TOOLS
Throughout this project it has been necessary to design and develop our own tools: our own computer software, our own computer languages and, in some cases, our own prototype computer hardware. When we started there was a shortage of software, computer power, and even books on computer graphic techniques. Since then, the sophistication and range of commerc ially available software has increased dramatically, and computing power has expanded beyond the most extravagant predictions - whi le conveniently dropping in cost Books on computer graphics techniques are readily available, and there are now also disks which prov ide an accessible introduction to this area. Valuable lessons were learned from having to start from first principles. The initial shortage of computer power meant that a particular economy of computer code was required. In turn this need for economy led to a fundamental rethink of the coding and datastructures, resulting In a solution peculiarly appropriate to the nature of our analogy. In addition, although commercial software is now easier to find, it never quite seems to do what one wants in the way that one wants. By starting from first principles, we were able to lay down working procedures which seemed natural to the processes that we were considering . We also gained a fundamental understanding of computer proc esses and languages. The development of our own languages and machine codes for their interpretation required a careful understand ing of the structure of language and the coding of information. By designing and building our own logic circuits, we learned to think clearly and economically at the micro-level of individual logical operations. All computation can be reduced to simple log ical statements such as 'and' or 'nor'. These in turn can be represented by logic gates which are made in silicon out of transistor-equiva lent electronics. By building up the logic gates into computational elements it is possible to form any logical function. Again parallels can be seen between the generative methods of nature and the way in wh ich the apparent complexity of computing, in both hardware and software, is built up hierarchically from the simplest functions.