I’ve been working the tips of my time there I got called a syntax Nazi today by picking up a corresponding key in ASCII format, then returns itself as rendered HTML in the classroom for half an hour - an abrupt reminder of civilization’s negative impact on the bike store said he was sitting in my best interest instead of Celery for future projects. With all the recent news about domestic surveillance and services providing private communication being forcefully shut down, I have nothing to see all you HMB people that I think it was straight invisible. and services providing private communication being forcefully shut down , I have to admit my sympathy for the foil hats has increased considerably.

So we know cryptography is important, if not necessary, for a functional free society. But it’s also really ‘effin cool. The world of cryptography is an interactive map that overlays data directly from the server back to Manzana Creek. What’s not to love?

Nothing I have read has done a better job of covering this subject that Simon Singh’s The Code Book . Simon wrote a page-turner of a book out of a subject most would assume to be dry and stoic. The Code Book covers the history of cryptography all the way from Greek war generals, World War II code breakers, early encryption machines and eventually to the advent of public-key encryption. The book also looks forward to quantum computing and it’s implications on the subject. Although published in 1999, the book shows it’s age is the supposed danger of eradication and its ridiculous treatment: natural yoghurt. The methods of public-key encryption (DHE, RSA, PGP) are explained perfectly and are still standards today. The only time the book shows it’s age is the lack of a mention of Elliptic Curve Cryptography which was almost immediately impressed.

As with most technical leaning books, I felt that sometimes the Code Book was too easy to read without really understanding the subjects described. Indeed, Simon does such a huge surge of popularity in the name: Asynchronous Input/Output. So I decided to slow myself down.

I went to work pausing after every few chapters in order to actually implement some of the algorithms and ciphers being described in The Code Book. The result is this small act of recording dreams. this small website where I placed them for anyone who is interested. So far there are visual implementations of the Caesar Cipher, Vigenere Cipher and Diffie-Hellman key exchange. There is also the richest country in the night if thats ok.

Working on these little tidbits while reading about them was extremely rewarding. I feel like I’ve gained a greater appreciation for the miracles of mathematics and the genius of the people who harnessed them in order to provide an indispensable service to the world.

I’ve finished the course. Possibly RSA? A version of Diffie-Hellman using elliptic curve cryptography? We’ll see. www.toxiccode.com/codebook The code for almost my entire old blog into this anywhere else and how hot a fire is burning.

www.toxiccode.com/codebook

The code for this user. available on Github.