May 14, 2015 by mchouza

Universality with only two NOT gates

In a previous post we have asked how many NOTs are needed to compute an arbitrary Boolean function. In this post we will see that only two NOT gates are enough.

Building 3 NOT gates starting from 2

If we call the inputs $X$ , $Y$ and $Z$ , we can make a function detecting when no more than one input is active using a single NOT gate:

$\displaystyle f(X, Y, Z) = \overline{XY + YZ + XZ}$ .

Detects when no more than one input is active.

By selecting only the cases where at least one input is present, adding a term to detect when all the inputs are active and using an additional NOT gate, we can detect when exactly zero or two inputs are active:

$\displaystyle g(X, Y, Z) = \overline{f(X, Y, Z)(X + Y + Z) + XYZ}$

$\displaystyle = \overline{\overline{XY + YZ + XZ}(X + Y + Z) + XYZ}$ .

Detects when zero or two inputs are active.

Now we know that if $X$ is not present, we either have:

0 inputs present: we can check that by simultaneously ensuring that we don’t have more than one input present and that we have either zero or two inputs present, $f(X, Y, Z)\cdot g(X, Y, Z)$ .
1 input present: we should have no more than one input present and $Y$ or $Z$ should be present, $f(X, Y, Z)\cdot(Y + Z)$ .
2 inputs present: we can check that by simultaneously ensuring that either zero or two inputs are present and that $Y$ and $Z$ are present, $g(X, Y, Z)\cdot YZ$ .

Putting all together and adding the symmetrical cases:

$\displaystyle \overline{X} = f(X, Y, Z) \cdot (Y + Z) + (f(X, Y, Z) + YZ)\cdot g(X, Y, Z)$

$\displaystyle \overline{Y} = f(X, Y, Z) \cdot (X + Z) + (f(X, Y, Z) + XZ)\cdot g(X, Y, Z)$

$\displaystyle \overline{Z} = f(X, Y, Z) \cdot (X + Y) + (f(X, Y, Z) + XY)\cdot g(X, Y, Z)$ .

Computing NOT X (the other cases are symmetrical).

Checking the solution

To get independent confirmation, let’s check the truth tables with a simple Python script:

from itertools import product

for x, y, z in product((False, True), repeat=3):
	f_xyz = not (x and y or x and z or y and z)
	g_xyz = not (f_xyz and (x or y or z) or x and y and z)
	not_x = f_xyz and (y or z) or (f_xyz or y and z) and g_xyz
	not_y = f_xyz and (x or z) or (f_xyz or x and z) and g_xyz
	not_z = f_xyz and (x or y) or (f_xyz or x and y) and g_xyz
	assert (not x == not_x) and (not y == not_y) and (not z == not_z)

Conclusion

As this technique allows us to expand two NOT gates to three and it can be applied repeatedly, we can compute an arbitrary Boolean function with a circuit containing only two NOT gates.

In a following post we will see how I arrived to the solution by using brute force.

May 2, 2015 by mchouza

How many NOTs are needed?

It’s relatively easy to see that we cannot compute an arbitrary Boolean function using only AND and OR gates. For example, even the NOT function cannot be computed using only those gates (why?).

Can we build a circuit to compute an arbitrary Boolean function using a constant number of NOT gates?

Solution to the “42 code golf” problem

This was my best result:

n=1e6,m,c,d;main(){while(c+=d==42,d=0,m=--n)while(d+=m%10,m/=10);printf("%d\n",c);}

It would have been nice to find a solution under 80 bytes but, after one hour of trying, that was the best I could manage…

April 29, 2015 by mchouza

Hilbert matrices are positive definite

(Argument stolen from Yahoo Answers)

It can be seen by using its integral form:

$\displaystyle H_{ij} = \int_0^1 dx\,x^{i+j-2}$

Then we can express the positive definite condition as

$\displaystyle \sum_{i,j} x_i H_{ij} x_j > 0$

for $\mathbf{x} \ne 0$ .

Replacing and operating:

$\displaystyle \sum_{i,j} x_i \int_0^1 du\,u^{i+j-2} x_j = \int_0^1 du \sum_{i,j} x_i u^{i+j-2} x_j$

$\displaystyle = \int_0^1 du \sum_{i,j} x_i u^{i-1} x_j u^{j-1}$

$\displaystyle = \int_0^1 du \sum_i x_i u^{i-1} \sum_j x_j u^{j-1}$

$\displaystyle = \int_0^1 du \left( \sum_i x_i u^{i-1} \right) \left( \sum_j x_j u^{j-1} \right)$

$\displaystyle = \int_0^1 du \left( \sum_i x_i u^{i-1} \right)^2$

The term inside the parentheses is just a (polynomial) function of $u$ :

$\displaystyle = \int_0^1 du\,p(u)^2$

The only way the integral can be zero is if $p(u)$ is identically zero:

$\displaystyle \sum_i x_i u^{i-1} = 0 \implies \forall i: x_i = 0$ .

QED

April 17, 2015 by mchouza

Solving the viral Singaporean math problem

The following problem has become very popular in social media:

In this blog we have solved similar problems before, but this is one that can be easily solved by hand. We only need to be careful not to confuse our knowledge state with the one of Albert & Bernard.

Albert and Bernard just became friends with Cheryl, and they want to know when her birthday is. Cheryl gives them a list of 10 possible dates.

May 15 May 16 May 19

June 17 June 18

July 14 July 16

August 14 August 15 August 17

Cheryl then tells Albert and Bernard separately the month and the day of her birthday, respectively.

We will describe a list of the possible knowledge states of Albert and Bernard after being given that information:

Albert

May 15 or May or May 19
June 17 or June 18
July 14 or July 16
August 14 or August 15 or August 17

Bernard

July 14 or August 14
May 15 or August 15
May 16 or July 16
June 17 or August 17
June 18
May 19

Albert: I don’t know when Cheryl’s birthday is, but I know that Bernard does not know, too.

We already knew that Albert wouldn’t know the day based just on being given the month, but he is giving us additional information by telling us that he knows that Bernard doesn’t know. Bernard would know the date if the day were 18 or 19, so Albert knows that those days could not be the right ones. That excludes options 1 and 2 from our knowledge of Albert knowledge:

Albert

July 14 or July 16
August 14 or August 15 or August 17

Bernard can do the same deductions we have and eliminate the options that are not possible from his state of knowledge (all the options with months different from July and August).

Bernard

July 14 or August 14
August 15
July 16
August 17

Bernard: At first, I didn’t know when Cheryl’s birthday is, but I know now.

Updating our knowledge of Bernard knowledge:

Bernard

August 15
July 16
August 17

As Albert also knows what we know about Bernard knowledge…

Albert

July 16
August 15 or August 17

Albert: Then I also know when Cheryl’s birthday is.

Now we know the right date:

Albert

July 16

Bernard

July 16

April 12, 2015 by mchouza

42 code golf

A nice and easy interview problem (link not posted to avoid giving good answers) is the following:

Print the number of integers below one million whose decimal digits sum to 42.

It can be solved with some simple Python code like the following:

print sum(1 if sum(int(c) for c in '%d' % n) == 42 else 0
          for n in range(1000000))

A more interesting problem is to try to write the smallest C program that solves the problem, where C program is defined as something that can be compiled & executed by Ideone in “C” mode. I know it can be done in 83 bytes, but can it be done using less?

February 3, 2015 by mchouza

Inverse kinematics and the Jacobian transpose

Generalities

This is a relatively technical post. Its purpose is mainly to teach myself why the Jacobian transpose is so useful when doing inverse kinematics.

We are going to solve the following problem:

We have a mechanism with effectors applying forces whose components are given by $f_i$ , with $i$ going from 1 to $N$ . The required power is provided by a series of torques, whose components are called $\tau_j$ , where $j$ goes from 1 to $M$ . Get the required values of $\tau_j$ as a function of $f_i$ .

Jacobian

Let’s call $\theta_j$ the angular coordinate associated with the torque components $\tau_j$ and $x_i$ the normal (“linear”) coordinate of the effector associated with the force component $f_i$ . In most useful cases, the positions of the effectors can be expressed as a function of the angular coordinates, $x_i(\theta_j)$ . The Jacobian will be the linearization of this relationship around some point $\theta_j^0$ ,

$\displaystyle J_{ij}(\theta_j^0) = \left. \frac{\partial x_i}{\partial \theta_j} \right|_{\theta_j=\theta_j^0}$ .

Virtual work

If we can ignore inertia forces (either because we are dealing with a purely static problem or because inertia is negligible), we can get

$\displaystyle \sum_{i=1}^N f_i \delta x_i = \sum_{j=1}^M \tau_j \delta \theta_j$ ,

where $\delta x_i$ is the infinitesimal linear displacement associated with the force component $f_i$ and $\delta \theta_j$ is the infinitesimal angular displacement associated with the torque component $\tau_j$ .

Putting things together

As the previous expression uses infinitesimal movements, we can use the Jacobian to relate the linear displacements to the angular ones:

$\displaystyle \delta x_i = \sum_{j=1}^M J_{ij} \delta \theta_j$ .

If we replace that result in the virtual work equation,

$\displaystyle \sum_{i=1}^N f_i \left(\sum_{j=1}^M J_{ij} \delta \theta_j\right) = \sum_{j=1}^M \tau_j \delta \theta_j$ ,

and we do some rearrangements, we get an expression with infinitesimal angular displacements in both sides:

$\displaystyle \sum_{j=1}^M \left(\sum_{i=1}^N f_i J_{ij}\right) \delta \theta_j = \sum_{j=1}^M \tau_j \delta \theta_j$ .

As the infinitesimal angular displacements $\delta \theta_j$ are arbitrary, their factors should match:

$\displaystyle \sum_{i=1}^N f_i J_{ij} = \tau_j$ .

By representing this equation in matrix form,

$\displaystyle \boldsymbol{\tau} = \mathbf{J}^T \mathbf{f}$ ,

we see how we arrive naturally to the Jacobian transpose.

January 7, 2015 by mchouza

Force over a dipole

In an arbitrary field

The easiest way to get the force over a dipole is to consider it as the limit of two oppositely charged monopoles that are closely spaced. If the dipole has moment $\mathbf{m}$ and is at position $\mathbf{r_0}$ , it can be considered as the limit of two monopoles, one with charge $-\epsilon^{-1}$ at position $\mathbf{r_0} - (\epsilon / 2) \mathbf{m}$ and the other with charge $\epsilon^{-1}$ at position $\mathbf{r_0} + (\epsilon / 2) \mathbf{m}$ , when $\epsilon$ goes to zero.

If we consider the finite size dipole immersed in a (let’s say magnetic) field $\mathbf{B}(\mathbf{r})$ , the total force will be

$\displaystyle \mathbf{F} = -\epsilon^{-1}\mathbf{B}(\mathbf{r_0} - (\epsilon / 2) \mathbf{m}) +\epsilon^{-1}\mathbf{B}(\mathbf{r_0} + (\epsilon / 2) \mathbf{m})$

$\displaystyle \mathbf{F} = \frac{\mathbf{B}(\mathbf{r_0} + (\epsilon / 2) \mathbf{m}) - \mathbf{B}(\mathbf{r_0} - (\epsilon / 2) \mathbf{m})}{\epsilon}$ .

We can get the force for the infinitesimal dipole by taking the limit when $\epsilon$ goes to zero

$\displaystyle \mathbf{F} = \lim_{\epsilon \to 0}\frac{\mathbf{B}(\mathbf{r_0} + (\epsilon / 2) \mathbf{m}) - \mathbf{B}(\mathbf{r_0} - (\epsilon / 2) \mathbf{m})}{\epsilon}$

$\displaystyle \mathbf{F} = \mathbf{m} \cdot (\mathbf{\nabla B})(\mathbf{r_0})$ ,

where $\mathbf{\nabla B}$ is the (tensor) derivative of the magnetic field.

Between two antialigned dipoles

The general field of a magnetic dipole of moment $\mathbf{m}$ at position $\mathbf{r_0}$ is

$\displaystyle \mathbf{B}_d(\mathbf{r}) = \frac{\mu_0}{4\pi}\left(\frac{3\mathbf{m}\cdot(\mathbf{r}-\mathbf{r_0})(\mathbf{r}-\mathbf{r_0})-\mathbf{m}|\mathbf{r}-\mathbf{r_0}|^2}{|\mathbf{r}-\mathbf{r_0}|^5}\right)$ .

If we assume we have one dipole at $x = 0$ with its moment $+m\mathbf{\hat{x}}$ and the other at $x = +R$ with its moment $-m\mathbf{\hat{x}}$ , we get a field at $x = +R$ of

$\displaystyle \mathbf{B}(+R\mathbf{\hat{x}}) = \frac{\mu_0}{4\pi}\left(\frac{3m\mathbf{\hat{x}}\cdot(+R\mathbf{\hat{x}})(+R\mathbf{\hat{x}})-m\mathbf{\hat{x}}|+R\mathbf{\hat{x}}|^2}{|+R\mathbf{\hat{x}}|^5}\right)$

$\displaystyle \mathbf{B}(+R\mathbf{\hat{x}}) = \frac{\mu_0}{4\pi}\left(\frac{3mR^2-mR^2}{R^5}\right)\mathbf{\hat{x}}$

$\displaystyle \mathbf{B}(+R\mathbf{\hat{x}}) = \frac{\mu_0 m}{2\pi R^3}\mathbf{\hat{x}}$ .

By symmetry, we are only interested in the x-component of the x-derivative of the field,

$\displaystyle \left(\frac{\partial\mathbf{B}}{\partial x}\right)_x = -\frac{3\mu_0 m}{2\pi R^4}$ .

And the force on the dipole at $x = +R$ will be

$\displaystyle \mathbf{F} = -m\mathbf{\hat{x}} \cdot (\mathbf{\nabla B})(+R\mathbf{\hat{x}})$

$\displaystyle \mathbf{F} = -m \left(-\frac{3\mu_0 m}{2\pi R^4}\right)\mathbf{\hat{x}}$

$\displaystyle \mathbf{F} = \frac{3\mu_0 m^2}{2\pi R^4}\mathbf{\hat{x}}$ ,

a repulsive force as expected of antialigned dipoles.

January 4, 2015 by mchouza

Yet another FizzBuzz without conditional branches

A branch-free FizzBuzz in assembly was posted in Hacker News. In this post I will try to do another implementation, for a Linux environment, without using function pointers.

C implementation

We can start by writing a C implementation:

#define _GNU_SOURCE
#include <unistd.h>
#include <sys/syscall.h>

int main( void )
{
	int i = 1;
	const char fizz[] = "Fizz";
	const char buzz[] = "Buzz";
	const char nl[] = "\n";
	char digits[ 2 ];
	while( 1 )
	{
		char *p = digits;
		*p = i / 10 + '0';
		p += ( i >= 10 );
		*p = i % 10 + '0';
		p++;
		syscall( SYS_exit * ( i > 100 ) + SYS_write * ( i <= 100 ), i <= 100,
		         digits, ( i % 3 != 0 && i % 5 != 0 ) * ( p - digits ) );
		syscall( SYS_write, 1, fizz, ( i % 3 == 0 ) * ( sizeof( fizz ) - 1 )  );
		syscall( SYS_write, 1, buzz, ( i % 5 == 0 ) * ( sizeof( buzz ) - 1 )  );
		syscall( SYS_write, 1, nl, sizeof( nl ) - 1 );
		i++;
	}
	/* NOT REACHED */
	return 0;
}

(Check the output in Ideone.)

The basic idea is to calculate the syscall number arithmetically and using the fact that a zero-length write is essentially a no-op.

In at least one associated assembly listing (obtained with Godbolt’s Interactive compiler) there are no conditional branches:

main:                                   # @main
	pushq	%rbp
	movq	%rsp, %rbp
	pushq	%r15
	pushq	%r14
	pushq	%r13
	pushq	%r12
	pushq	%rbx
	pushq	%rax
	movl	$1, %r15d
	leaq	-42(%rbp), %r14
.LBB0_1:                                # %._crit_edge
	cmpl	$100, %r15d
	movl	$0, %edi
	movl	$60, %eax
	cmovgl	%eax, %edi
	movslq	%r15d, %r15
	cmpl	$101, %r15d
	setl	%al
	movzbl	%al, %esi
	orl	%esi, %edi
	imulq	$1431655766, %r15, %rcx # imm = 0x55555556
	imulq	$1717986919, %r15, %rax # imm = 0x66666667
	movq	%rax, %r10
	shrq	$63, %r10
	shrq	$32, %rax
	movl	%eax, %edx
	sarl	$2, %edx
	leal	(%rdx,%r10), %ebx
	movq	%rcx, %r11
	shrq	$63, %r11
	cmpl	$9, %r15d
	setg	%r8b
	imull	$10, %ebx, %ebx
	negl	%ebx
	leal	48(%rdx,%r10), %edx
	movb	%dl, -42(%rbp)
	leal	48(%r15,%rbx), %r9d
	shrq	$32, %rcx
	addl	%r11d, %ecx
	leal	(%rcx,%rcx,2), %ecx
	movl	%r15d, %edx
	subl	%ecx, %edx
	sete	%r12b
	movzbl	%r8b, %ecx
	movb	%r9b, -42(%rbp,%rcx)
	setne	%bl
	sarl	%eax
	addl	%r10d, %eax
	leal	(%rax,%rax,4), %eax
	movl	%r15d, %edx
	subl	%eax, %edx
	sete	%r13b
	setne	%al
	andb	%bl, %al
	movzbl	%al, %eax
	shlq	$63, %rax
	sarq	$63, %rax
	incq	%rcx
	andq	%rax, %rcx
	movq	%r14, %rdx
	xorb	%al, %al
	callq	syscall
	movzbl	%r12b, %ecx
	shlq	$2, %rcx
	movl	$1, %edi
	movl	$1, %esi
	movl	main::fizz, %edx
	xorb	%al, %al
	callq	syscall
	movzbl	%r13b, %ecx
	shlq	$2, %rcx
	movl	$1, %edi
	movl	$1, %esi
	movl	main::buzz, %edx
	xorb	%al, %al
	callq	syscall
	movl	$1, %edi
	movl	$1, %esi
	movl	main::nl, %edx
	movl	$1, %ecx
	xorb	%al, %al
	callq	syscall
	incl	%r15d
	jmp	.LBB0_1

main::fizz:
	.asciz	 "Fizz"

main::buzz:
	.asciz	 "Buzz"

main::nl:
	.asciz	 "\n"

But there still are comparisons and conditional sets and moves.

x86-64 assembly implementation

We can write a cleaner implementation if we do it directly in assembly:

;; FizzBuzz in x86-64 ASM without conditional branches

section .data
fizz: db 'Fizz'
buzz: db 'Buzz'
nl:   db 10

section .bss
digits: resb 2

section .text

global _start
_start:
	mov rbx, 1

main_loop:

	; if ( rbx > 100 )
	;   exit( 0 )
	; else
	;   write( 1, digits, 0 )
	mov rax, rbx
	neg rax
	add rax, 100
	sar rax, 63
	mov rdi, rax
	and rax, 59
	inc rax
	neg rdi
	mov rsi, digits
	xor rdx, rdx
	syscall

	; r8 <- rbx % 3 != 0 ? -1 : 0
	; r9 <- rbx % 5 != 0 ? -1 : 0
	mov rax, rbx
	mov rcx, 3
	div rcx
	mov r8, rdx
	neg r8
	sar r8, 63
	mov rax, rbx
	mov rcx, 5
	xor rdx, rdx
	div rcx
	mov r9, rdx
	neg r9
	sar r9, 63

	; rcx <- digits
	; *rcx = rbx / 10 + '0'
	; rcx += ( rbx >= 10 )
	; *rcx = rbx % 10 + '0'
	; rcx++
	mov rcx, digits
	mov rax, rbx
	xor rdx, rdx
	mov rdi, 10
	div rdi
	mov rsi, rax
	add rax, '0'
	mov [rcx], rax
	neg rsi
	sar rsi, 63
	neg rsi
	add rcx, rsi
	add rdx, '0'
	mov [rcx], rdx
	inc rcx

	; write( 1, digits, ( rbx % 3 != 0 && rbx % 5 != 0 ) ? rcx - digits : 0 )
	mov rax, 1
	mov rdi, 1
	mov rsi, digits
	mov rdx, rcx
	sub rdx, digits
	and rdx, r8
	and rdx, r9
	syscall

	; write( 1, fizz, rbx % 3 == 0 ? 4 : 0 )
	mov rax, 1
	mov rdi, 1
	mov rsi, fizz
	mov rdx, r8
	not rdx
	and rdx, 4
	syscall

	; write( 1, buzz, rbx % 5 == 0 ? 4 : 0 )
	mov rax, 1
	mov rdi, 1
	mov rsi, buzz
	mov rdx, r9
	not rdx
	and rdx, 4
	syscall

	; write( 1, nl, 1 )
	mov rax, 1
	mov rdi, 1
	mov rsi, nl
	mov rdx, 1
	syscall	

	inc rbx

	jmp main_loop

If the source file is named fizzbuzz.s, it can be compiled with the following command line:

nasm -f elf64 -o fizzbuzz.o fizzbuzz.s; ld -o fizzbuzz fizzbuzz.o

January 16, 2014 by mchouza

No increasing functions in the long line

For our purposes, let’s define the “long line” as the set $L = (0, 1) \times [0, 1)$ together with a lexicographic ordering:

$\displaystyle (a, b) \prec (c, d) \Leftrightarrow (a < c) \vee (a = c) \wedge (b < d)$ .

We want to prove that we cannot have a strictly increasing real-valued function in $L$ , meaning that there is no function $f: L \to \mathbb{R}$ such that

$\displaystyle f((a, b)) < f((c, d)) \Leftrightarrow (a, b) \prec (c, d)$ .

To start with the proof we are going to require a lemma.

Between two different real numbers there is at least one rational number

The basic idea (lifted from this math.SE answer) is to define “a grid” of rationals that is thick enough to be sure we have at least one rational between the two reals. So, if $a < b$ are the two real numbers, we can use as denominator

$\displaystyle n = \left\lceil \frac{2}{b - a}\right\rceil$

and as numerator

$\displaystyle m = \lfloor n a + 1 \rfloor$ .

Now we need to prove that $m/n$ is always strictly between $a$ and $b$ .

It’s easy to see that is bigger than $a$ ,

$\displaystyle \frac{m}{n} = \frac{\lfloor n a + 1 \rfloor}{n} > \frac{n a}{n} = a$ ,

and that $(m-1)/n$ is less than or equal to $a$ :

$\displaystyle \frac{m-1}{n} = \frac{\lfloor n a + 1 \rfloor - 1}{n} \le \frac{n a + 1 - 1}{n} = a$ .

As we know that $1/n$ is smaller than $b - a$ because

$\displaystyle \frac{b - a}{1 / n} = n(b - a) = \left\lceil \frac{2}{b - a}\right\rceil (b - a) > \frac{2}{b - a}(b - a) = 2$ ,

we have

$\displaystyle \frac{m}{n} = \frac{m-1}{n} + \frac{1}{n} < a + (b - a) = b$ .

Building an impossible one-to-one function

Using $g$ as a name for the previously defined function that takes a pair of reals and returns a rational between them and $f$ for an increasing function in $L$ , we can define $h: (0, 1) \to \mathbb{Q}$ by the following expression:

$\displaystyle h(x) = g(f((x, 0)), f((x, 0.5)))$ .

We know that is one-to-one because if $x \ne y$ , assuming WLOG that $x < y$ ,

$\displaystyle h(x) = g(f((x, 0)), f((x, 0.5)))$
$\displaystyle < f((x, 0.5))$
$\displaystyle < f((y, 0))$
$\displaystyle < g(f((y, 0)), f((y, 0.5))) = h(y)$ .

But this result would imply that the cardinality of $(0, 1)$ is smaller than the cardinality of a subset of $\mathbb{Q}$ and that is absurd.

Conclusions

This result would seem a random trivia, but it has an important consequence for microeconomics: lexicographic preferences cannot be described by (real-valued) utility functions.

August 25, 2013 by mchouza

Kaufman decimals

Ben Orlin posted an interesting extension of the normal repeating decimals called “Kaufman decimals” (because they were developed jointly with Jeff Kaufman). In this post I will try to define them more precisely and show they can be totally ordered.

Introduction

The Kaufman digit sequences (the decimals without the initial “0.” prefix) are formed by starting from single digit sequences (“0”, “1”, …, “9”) and applying the following operations a finite number of times:

Concatenation: taking two digit sequences and putting one after the other.
Repetition: taking a digit sequence and repeating it an infinite number of times.

As it’s difficult to start directly with the infinite case, let’s start by defining formally a more simple case.

Finite repetitions

If we replace the infinite repetition by repeating the sequence $K$ times, it’s easy to analyze the resulting sequences. For example, if $K = 3$ ,

$\displaystyle \overline{\overline{\strut 9}\,1}\,2 = 9991999199912$ .

So now we can define concatenation in the following way:

$\displaystyle \mathcal{C}(a_{i<n}, b_{j<m})_{k<n+m} = \begin{cases}a_k & \text{if }k < n \\ b_{k-n} & \text{otherwise}\end{cases}$ .

Repetition is also quite easy:

$\displaystyle \mathcal{R}_K(a_{i<n})_{j < n \cdot K} = a_{k \bmod n}$ .

We can check the definition with the following Python code:

def l(a):
    from itertools import count
    for i in count():
        if a(i) is None:
            return i
 
def r(k, a):
    l_a = l(a)
    return lambda i: a(i % l_a) if i < l_a * k else None
 
def c(a, b):
    l_a, l_b = l(a), l(b)
    return lambda i: a(i) if i < l_a else b(i - l_a) if i < l_a + l_b else None
 
def s(c):
    assert len(c) == 1
    return lambda i: c if i == 0 else None
 
def p(a):
    print ''.join(a(i) for i in range(l(a)))
 
if __name__ == '__main__':
    p(c(r(3,c(r(3,s('9')),s('1'))),s('2')))

that gives us the expected output:

9991999199912

Infinite repetitions

For the real Kaufman digit sequences we can promote the ordinary digit sequences to transfinite ones (we use a slightly non-standard definition, allowing sequences of any length), using ordinal indices. Then the concatenation and repetition operations can be defined in essentially the same way:

Concatenation: $\mathcal{C}(a_{\alpha < \delta}, b_{\beta < \zeta})_{\gamma < \delta + \zeta} = \begin{cases}a_\gamma & \text{if }\gamma < \delta \\ b_{\gamma - \delta} & \text{otherwise}\end{cases}$
Repetition: $\mathcal{R}(a_{\alpha < \gamma})_{\beta < \gamma \cdot \omega} = a_{\beta \bmod \gamma}$ .

Ordinal modulus is easily defined by using the division theorem for ordinals.

We can construct the set containing all the Kaufman sequences by starting with the one digit “sequences”,

$\displaystyle K_0 = \{"0", "1", ..., "9"\}$ (where “0” is the length 1 sequence having the single digit 0),

and defining the next step based on the previous one,

$\displaystyle K_{n+1} = K_n \cup \{\mathcal{C}(a_{\alpha < \delta}, b_{\beta < \zeta}) | a_{\alpha < \delta}, b_{\beta < \zeta} \in K_n\} \cup \{\mathcal{R}(a_{\alpha < \delta}) | a_{\alpha < \delta} \in K_n\}$ .

As we have defined $K_n$ for all integer $n$ , now we can define $K_\omega$ , the set of Kaufman sequences, as

$\displaystyle K_\omega = \bigcup_{n < \omega} K_n$ .

Total order

It’s easy to see that this sequences can be totally ordered. Let’s define the extension operation for the Kaufman digit sequences:

$\displaystyle \mathcal{E}(a_{\alpha < \gamma})_{\beta \in \mathrm{On}} = \begin{cases}a_\beta & \text{if }\beta < \gamma \\ 0 & \text{otherwise}\end{cases}$

Then we define two sequences are equal if their extensions match:

$\displaystyle a_{\alpha < \delta} = b_{\beta < \zeta} \Leftrightarrow \forall \gamma \in \mathrm{On} : \mathcal{E}(a_{\alpha < \delta})_\gamma = \mathcal{E}(b_{\beta < \zeta})_\gamma$ .

If they don't match, they must differ in some digit and we can order them based on that digit:

$\displaystyle a_{\alpha < \delta} < b_{\beta < \zeta} \Leftrightarrow \exists \gamma \in \mathrm{On} : \left(\mathcal{E}(a_{\alpha < \delta})_\gamma < \mathcal{E}(b_{\beta < \zeta})_\gamma \right)\wedge \left(\forall \lambda < \gamma : \mathcal{E}(a_{\alpha < \delta})_\lambda < \mathcal{E}(b_{\beta < \zeta})_\lambda\right)$ .

Conclusions

The Kaufman decimals can be formally defined and totally ordered by using transfinite sequences. It wouldn’t be too hard to adapt the previous Python code to accept ordinal indices in Cantor normal form, but I’m still not sure if there is an efficient procedure to order Kaufman decimals.

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