Return-Path: Received: from GLINDA.OZ.CS.CMU.EDU by A.GP.CS.CMU.EDU id aa27448; 1 Jun 94 22:46:11 EDT Received: from LINC.CIS.UPENN.EDU by GLINDA.OZ.CS.CMU.EDU id aa01851; 1 Jun 94 22:45:50 EDT Received: from home.seas.upenn.edu (mengwong@HOME.SEAS.UPENN.EDU [130.91.7.82]) by linc.cis.upenn.edu (8.6.8/UPenn 1.4) with ESMTP id WAA29561 for ; Wed, 1 Jun 1994 22:05:39 -0400 Received: by home.seas.upenn.edu id WAA07689; Wed, 1 Jun 1994 22:05:38 -0400 Date: Wed, 1 Jun 1994 22:05:38 -0400 Posted-Date: Wed, 1 Jun 1994 22:05:38 -0400 Message-Id: <199406020205.WAA07689@home.seas.upenn.edu> From: ThesisNet Server Subject: Complex Systems Information Apparently-To: Mark.Kantrowitz@GLINDA.OZ.CS.CMU.EDU Complex Adaptive Systems Information ____________________________________ "Life is if it dies when you stomp on it." Ok, for the past few months I've been looking for stuff that deals with Complex Adaptive Systems and one thing has emerged : some order to the information out there still needs to emerge ! This document represents the resources I've found so far, and while not exhaustive, still represents a fair slice of what is out there in terms of easily-accesible information. Hope it makes life a little easier for someone ! o To retrieve via email, send mail to thesisnet-request@eniac.seas.upenn.edu with the subject 'cplxsys'. o Access via Mosaic : point your URL at http://www.seas.upenn.edu/~ale/cplxsys.html This version is to be preferred, since it also has links to WWW sites in it. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- FTP SITES The following are some ftp sites which I've come across here and there while wandering around blindly trying to find stuff on the Net. The hyperlinks get you to the appropriate top-level directories, since for sites like life.anu.edu.au and funic.funet.fi, there are quite a few potentially interesting sub-directories. o The ftp site at , in /pub/complex_systems which is further subdivided into stuff like Alife, CA, Neural Nets etc. This also has an ftp site containing papers presented at Complex Systems '92, held in Australia, in the directory pub/complex_systems/anu92. o The UCLA ftp site at in /pub/alife with a fairly extensive Alife bibliography, some source code and a few papers. o The ftp site at , in pub/sci, which, it's maintainers claim, is the largest ftp site in the world in all subjects ... it has stuff on Neural Nets, Neurophysiology, Artificial Intelligence and lots of other such subjects. A really useful file to look at before anything else is the file '00INDEX' in the directory pub/sci/neural. o The Neuroprose Archives at Ohio State University : , in pub/neuroprose. Has _lots_ of stuff on connectionism. Look at INDEX file for overview. o The ftp site at , in /pub/reports/csrp : a whole bunch of PostScript files containing god-knows-what. o The ftp site at , in /pub/corewar, contains some information on Core Wars, concerned with evolving competing programs in machine code. There is a tutorial on Core War, at the same site, in pub/corewar/documents/tutorial.1.Z and pub/corewar/documents.2.Z. See also the 'Newsgroups and Mailing Lists' and 'FAQs' sections. o The Los Alamos National Laboratory ftp site at in /nlin-sys: this contains preprints of various papers under the same headings as given later on in this document for the *Nonlinear Science Bulletin Board*. (Seeing as they are at the same address, this is probably not surprising :-) ) o There is an archive for the Genetic Algorithm Digest at ,in pub/galist. o The Xerox PARC site at , in /pub/dynamics,has some papers on the evolution of cooperative behaviour. o The Santa Fe Institute, which is pretty much the place where all the alife and complex systems stuff started, also has an ftp site, at ftp.santafe.edu. The pub/Users/mm subdirectory has some interesting papers on GA/CA. The ENCORE (Santa Fe Institute Evolutionary Computation Repository) has an excellent collection of papers/programs, at in /pub/USER-AREA/EC. Look at the OVERVIEW and README files first. o The TIERRA ftp site, which is the official site for all things Tierra-related : ftp to or to . These sites have up-to-date source code, documentation and manuscripts. o There is an ftp site for nonlinear systems, with both code and papers, at , in /pub. Check out the file pub/README for a list of everything that is there. o The archives of the Cellular Automata Mailing List are available via anonymous ftp at , in the directory /mail, in the files 'ca.archive*' ie 'ca.archive-1987.Z' holds the compressed version of the 1987 correspondence. The current years' archive is not compressed and is in the file 'ca.archive'. o The Illinois Genetic Algorithms Laboratory (IlliGAL) has an ftp site with some of its' technical reports, a GA bibliography and some reprints at , in the directory /pub/papers/IlliGALs. The source code in C for Messy GA is also available there, in pub/src. The file README in pub/papers/IlliGALs has a list of all the papers currently available on the server. o An archive of genetic programming is at , in /pub/genetic-programming. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- SPECIFIC PROGRAMS/PAPERS The following list is, of course, nowhere near exhaustive; these are just programs/papers I've seen/read and that are mentioned fairly frequently. In most cases, the hyperlinks just get you to the relevant directory, and it's up to you to retrieve the appropriate files; I've included the names of the 'non-obvious' ones. (Unix source code is mostly archived in a file called *.tar.Z ... this needs to be uncompressed and 'untarred'). (the addresses come first, followed by a short description in most cases) o or . These sites have source code (runs on both UNIX and DOS platforms) and documentation for TIERRA, Thomas Ray's way cool digital ecology simulation. There are also some manuscripts on Tierra at this site, in the /doc subdirectory. See also the Tierra mailing list below. o in /pub/polyworld. POLYWORLD , another neat simulator, complete with C++ source code written to run on a SILICON GRAPHICS machine and technical paper describing polyworld. README file has more info. o , in /pub/sci/neural/genesis. GENESIS : this is a program for Neural Network simulation, runs on X11 platforms and is supposed to have rather good graphics. o , in /pub/SOFTWARE/Cellsim. CELLSIM, a cellular automata simulator. o To obtain CELLULAR, a programmable CA simulator, send mail to , with the message "get cellular-automata cellular.tar.gz.uu" or "get cellular-automata cellular.zip.uu" in the text body to get the UNIX or DOS versions respectively. (The DOS version should be unzipped with the -d option.) o , in pub/USER-AREA/EC. This is the ENCORE (Santa Fe Institute Evolutionary Computation Repository), which has a _lot_ of papers and programs. The file OVERVIEW is a list of all the stuff. o , in /pub/sci/neural/SNNS. SNNS, a neural network simulator written at the University of Stuttgart, Germany. o , in /pub/corewar/systems. This contains implementations of Core War for various sytems (Mac, PC and Unix/X-Windows). See also the FAQ section. o , in /pub/complex_systems/alife/life. Game of Life: there are various Life forms ( geddit ?), for PCs and UNIX. Files ending in .zip are for PCs. o , in pub/GAs, there is an introduction to Genetic Algorithms for beginners in two parts, as ga_overview1.ps and ga_overview2.ps. o , in /pub/complex_systems/alife. BUGWORLD simulates a bug-ecology, with predators and all. File is called bugworld.tar.Z. o , in /pub/complex_systems/alife. L-systems : Aristid Lindenmayers' L-systems can be used for various neat things, like growing natural-looking plants out of very simple rules. The file is called lsys.tar.Z. o , in /pub/complex_systems/alife. Biomorphs: I have a strong feeling that this is Richard Dawkins' program that simulates evolution of what he calls 'biomorphs'; evolutionary pressure is towards critters that look interesting. It looks like this file is for PCs; it's called biomrf.zip. o , in pub/USER-AREA/EC/EA/src. LEE : Latent Energy Environment, an Alife simulator. There is also a paper on it, available from pub/USER-AREA/EC/EA/papers. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ NEWSGROUPS, JOURNALS AND MAILING LISTS O The Artifical Life Distribution List : for subscriptions, deletions or administrative details, send mail to alife-request@cognet.ucla.edu. All submissions for distribution to alife@cognet.ucla.edu. List maintainers : Liane Gabora and Rob Collins. o The Evolutionary Programming List : send mail to ep-list-request@magenta.me.fau.edu with message body 'subscribe ep-list' o There are 2 mailing lists devoted to Tierra (see under 'Specific Programs and Papers' above): one is devoted to official announcements, updates and bug-fixes (tierra-announce), while the other will carry official postings and is intended for discussion of Tierra by users (tierra-digest). The latter is distributed in digest form when there is enough material. Addresses : tierra-request@life.slhs.udel.edu -> to be added, removed or complain about problems with any of the lists. tierra-digest@life.slhs.udel.edu -> to post to the list. tierra-bug@life.slhs.udel.edu -> for bug-reports or questions about code or installation. o The Genetic Programming List : to subscribe, send mail to , with the message body 'subscribe
'. To send mail to the actual list, send mail to . See also the archive of genetic programming mentioned under FTP sites above; this site has a Genetic Programming FAQ. o The Complex Systems News Distribution List : concerned with all aspects of Complex Systems ie CA, Alife, GA, fractals etc. To subscribe, send mail to with the message body ; to post to the actual list, send mail to . o The Cellular Automata Mailing List : discusses all aspects of CA. Send mail to with the words 'subscribe cellular-automata' or 'unsubscribe cellular-automata' in the text body to subscribe and unsubscribe respectively. For more information on Listserver commands, send the command 'help' and for information on the CA List in general, send 'info cellular-automata'. o The Cellular Neural Networks mailing list : From the announcement for the list: "Cellular Neural Networks are continuous-time dynamical systems consisting of a grid of processing elements connected only to neighbours within a given distance. They are therefore a class of recurrent neural networks [...]" To subscribe, send mail to Marco Balsi at ; to post to the list iself, send the article to . o The Complexity International Journal, which is a refereed journal for scientific papers relating to work in complex systems research. This journal is available via ftp at life.anu.edu.au, in /pub/complex_systems/ci. Email correspondence: Submission of manuscripts to ci-submissions@life.anu.edu.au, editorial correspondence to ci-editor@life.anu.edu.au and subscriptions to ci-subscribe@life.anu.edu.au with message body 'subscribe ci "your name"' o The GEnetic Algorithms Research Students List (GEARS), which caters to research students "being left out in the cold.". To subscribe, send mail to o The Nonlinear Science Preprint Bulletin Board , which provides a fully automated system for archiving and distribution of electronic preprints. This Bulletin Board is divided into several categories, and for information on how to to access and/or subscribe to any of the following divisions, send mail to the appropriate address with the subject 'help' and a blank message body. (All of the addresses are at the Los Alamos Natl. Lab) Dynamical systems/chaos/quantum chaos/topological dynamics/cycle expansions/ turbulence/propagation : mail to chao-dyn@xyz.lanl.gov Pattern formation/coherent structures/Solitons : mail to patt-sol@xyz.lanl.gov Computational methods/time series analysis/signal processing/wavelets/ lattice gases: mail to comp-gas@xyz.lanl.gov Adaptation/interacting particle systems/self-organizing systems/computation theory/machine learning : mail to adap-org@xyz.lanl.gov For all of the above, send mail to nlin-sys@xyz.lanl.gov o Newsgroups: The following newsgroups deal with the various subsets of Complex Systems : comp.theory.cell.automata, comp.theory.self-org-sys, comp.theory.dynamic-sys, sci.nonlinear, comp.ai.genetic, comp.ai.neural-nets, comp.robotics, rec.games.corewar ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- FAQs The newsgroups comp.ai.neural-nets and comp.ai.genetic have FAQs (Frequently Asked Questions) available via anonymous ftp from , in the directories pub/usenet/comp.ai.neural-nets and pub/usenet/comp.ai.genetic. The FAQ for comp.robotics is also available via ftp from , as /pub/usenet/comp.robotics. If you don't have access to ftp, these FAQs may be obtained by sending email to using the following format : to get a list of all the FAQs stored at the above address in the directory pub/usenet/news.answers, and the FAQ for comp.ai.genetic, for example, send the message : send usenet/news.answers/index send usenet/news.answers/ai-faq/genetic/part1 send usenet/news.answers/ai-faq/genetic/part2 send usenet/news.answers/ai-faq/genetic/part3 quit and similarly for other FAQs. The newsgroup comp.theory.cell-automata also has a FAQ which is available via anonymous ftp at , in the directory /incoming as 'ca-faq.tar.Z'; it is supposed to be mirrored at but seems not to have made it there yet. Changes to one/both of the above paths will be announced on comp.theory.cell-automata and (hopefully) reflected here as well. FAQ is way cool, with lots of references and places to get software. A FAQ of Genetic Programming is available from , as pub/genetic-programming/FAQ-GP. There is a FAQ for rec.games.corewar, available from , in /pub/usenet/rec.games.corewar. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- BIBLIOGRAPHIES o There is a collection of bibliographies on the various subsets of complex systems such as Artificial Life, Chaos, Fractals etc available via anonymous ftp from , in the directory /pub/complex_systems/biblio. This is also available via gopher from the same address. o The University of Mainz has a bibliography on Nonlinear Dynamics available via anonymous ftp from , in /pub/chaos/chaosbib. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- o last modified 940421 This file is being maintained by Alex Mallet. Please email ale@seas.upenn.edu with corrections and updates. Disclaimer: This document in no way represents the University of Pennsylvania. All opinions and errors are mine alone.