- one tape passes through N nodes as instructions, and M nodes as data.
- various configurations are possible, not just grids. It's network topology 101.
BF has 8 instructions, meaning 3 bits are needed - octal. I could add a ninth instruction 'X', that switches the input and instruction streams. This would mean using 4 bits - hexadecimal nibbles - with another 7 instructions free.
Each node would need to wait & notify based on input, instruction availability. The whole thing would be visualised fairly easily.
BF operates like a Turing machine, and has:
- one random-access storage medium - the tape
- one standard input
- one standard output
- one instruction stream
That's 5 in total. If we limit the alphabet, the input and outputs could also be composed of BF glyphs, meaning the tape would be glyphs also.
But would it make any sense? Why do this?
- There's already a Conway's Game of Life Turing machine.
- Why not a BF interpreter constructed using a cellular automaton?
- Would the rules underlying this cellular automaton run on top of a nanoscale substrate?
- Could we have nodes etched/sketched in substrate and then layered (for redundancy?)
This would give us a very large cluster of very stupid computers that are almost impossible to program, but might exhibit interesting emergent behaviour.
Problems:
- when (if) we switch data and execution inputs, what happens to the stack?
- If we add an X instruction, can we wire the output to the input and generate our own code?
- How do we program this thing? BF is a pain to begin with:
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- should we find a nicer, yet equally small syntax?
- should we compile a macro language?
- What happens when two nodes modify the same glyph on the tape?
- How do we get the thing started? can we make a pseudo-random code generator in BF?
Etc. A potentially cool hack with near-zero real-world applications, short of sci-fi equiv. imaginings.
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