Monday, 05 January, 2004
Well, not much has happened in the last few days so there hasn't been anything really to comment on.. 
Well that's not entirely true.. Site wise, i'm still converting to XHTML 1.0 Strict and changing the backend database from Access to SQL Server but this doesn't change the appearance of the site and therefore isn't all that interesting to non-geeks! 
Since this is a purely geeky post, I discovered another simple maths conjecture that isn't proven.. It's called the Collatz conjecture.. Take the following algorithm:
- Take any positive integer, n
- If n is even, divide it by two. If n is odd, times it by three and add 1. Let the result of this step become the new value of n.
- If n=1, Stop the algorithm. If n is not 1 then go back to step 2.
So starting with the value 6 we get the sequence: 6, 3, 10, 5, 16, 8, 4, 2, 1. The Collatz conjecture is that this algorithm always terminates for any postive integer.
This is what I like about mathematics. A year 7 highschool pupil can understand what the Collatz conjecture is yet it is an extremely difficult problem.
And with that insight, hehe, I will leave yah..
Simon.