core war
     
         or more recently, "core wars" a game played between
        assembly code programs running in the core of a simulated
        machine and vicariously by their authors.  the objective is
        to kill your opponents' programs by overwriting them.
     
        the programs are written using an instruction set called
        "redcode" and run on a virtual machine called "mars"
        memory array redcode simulator.
     
        core war was devised by victor vyssotsky, robert morris sr.,
        and dennis ritchie in the early 1960s their original game
        was called "darwin" and ran on a pdp-1 at bell labs.
        it was first described in the "core war guidelines" of march,
        1984 by d. g. jones and a. k. dewdney of the department of
        computer science at the university of western ontario
        canada.
     
        dewdney wrote several "computer recreations" articles in
        "scientific american" which discussed core war, starting with
        the may 1984 article.  those articles are contained in the two
        anthologies cited below.  a.k. dewdney's articles are still
        the most readable introduction to core war, even though the
        redcode dialect described in there is no longer current.
     
        the international core war society icws creates and
        maintains core war standards and the runs core war
        tournaments.  there have been six annual tournaments and two
        standards icws'86 and icws'88.
     
        "the armchair universe: an exploration of computer worlds",
        a. k. dewdney, w. h. freeman, new york, 1988, isbn
        0-7167-1939-8, lccn qa76.6 .d517 1988
     
        "the magic machine: a handbook of computer sorcery",
        a. k. dewdney, w. h. freeman, new york, 1990, isbn
        0-7167-2125-2 hardcover, 0-7167-2144-9 paperback, lccn
        qa76.6 .d5173 1990.
     
        1998-10-30
     
     
see also:
assembly code core instruction set redcode virtual machine mars 
dennis ritchie darwin pdp-1 bell labs