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<html>
<title>Golly Help: Control Menu</title>
<body bgcolor="#FFFFCE">
<p>
<font size=+1><b>Start</b>/<b>Stop Generating</b></font>
<p>
Starts or stops generating the current pattern.
This item can also be used to stop a running script, but it's
much easier to hit escape or click the tool bar's stop button.
<p>
<font size=+1><b>Next Generation</b></font>
<p>
Advances the pattern to the next generation.
Note that you can hit control-space to advance only the current selection,
or shift-space to advance everything outside the selection (in both cases
the generation count will not change).
<p>
<font size=+1><b>Next Step</b></font>
<p>
Advances the pattern to the next step. The current step size is displayed
in the status bar as a number of the form "b^e" where b is the base step
and e is the exponent. The base step can be changed by the Set Base Step
dialog (see below), and the exponent can be changed by the Faster/Slower
items (see below).
<p>
<font size=+1><b>Reset</b></font>
<p>
Restores the starting pattern and generation count.
It also resets the algorithm, rule, scale, location, step size, selection
and layer name to the values they had at the starting generation.
The starting generation is typically zero, but it can be larger after
loading an RLE/macrocell file that stores a non-zero generation count.
<p>
<font size=+1><b>Set Generation...</b></font>
<p>
Opens a dialog to change the generation count. You can enter
readable numbers like "1,234,567", or include a leading +/- sign
to specify a number relative to the current generation count.
<p>
<font size=+1><b>Faster</b></font>
<p>
Increases the step exponent in the status bar by 1.
This increases the speed by displaying fewer generations.
The step exponent is reset to 0 when you create a new pattern,
load a pattern file, or switch to a different algorithm.
<p>
<font size=+1><b>Slower</b></font>
<p>
Decreases the step exponent in the status bar by 1.
This decreases the speed by displaying more generations.
The step exponent is reset to 0 when you create a new pattern,
load a pattern file, or switch to a different algorithm.
If the exponent is 0 when you select this item then a small delay
will occur between each generation.
Further slowing will double the delay until a maximum value is reached.
Use <a href="prefs:control">Preferences > Control</a> to set the
minimum and maximum delay times.
<p>
<font size=+1><b>Set Base Step...</b></font>
<p>
Opens a dialog to change the current base step, but only temporarily.
Golly will restore the default base step
(set in <a href="prefs:control">Preferences > Control</a>) when you create
a new pattern, load a pattern file, or switch to a different algorithm.
The base step can be any number from 2 to 10,000 (but be aware that
Golly's hashing algorithms are most efficient when the base step is a
power of 2).
<p>
<font size=+1><b>Auto Fit</b></font>
<p>
If ticked then Golly will automatically fit a generating pattern inside
the view if any part of the pattern moves out of view.
This option is only used when doing many generations via Start or Next Step
(that's why it's in the Control menu rather than the View menu).
<p>
Note that if you are generating a pattern and decide to change scale or
do any sort of scrolling then the Auto Fit option is automatically
turned off (the assumption being that you now want manual control
over the scale and/or location).
<p>
TIP: If you find the Auto Fit option too confusing then leave it off
and hit "f" to manually fit the pattern inside the view whenever you like.
<p>
<font size=+1><b>Hyperspeed</b></font>
<p>
If ticked, and the current algorithm uses hashing, then Golly will
automatically increase the step exponent at regular intervals (every 64 steps).
Hyperspeed mode is a convenient way to run a complex pattern as far as possible.
(For very chaotic patterns, using QuickLife may actually run it further.)
For highly regular patterns, hyperspeed mode quickly "runs away", generating
exponentially fast.
<p>
<font size=+1><b>Show Hash Info</b></font>
<p>
Tick this option to turn on status messages that inform you when a
hashing algorithm is doing garbage collection, resizing its internal
hash table, or changing the step size (which can involve walking the
entire hash). The garbage collection messages say which garbage
collection it is overall, and if it is a subsequent garbage collection
for the same step (the count will be in parentheses), and the
percentage of memory reclaimed.
<p>
Interpreting these numbers is more an art than a science because some
patterns exhibit odd behavior, but in general, if a garbage collection
is reclaiming less than 70% of the total memory, or more than ten
garbage collections occur for a single step, you can be fairly certain
that the algorithm is effectively stalled and further progress will be
extremely slow. Reducing the step size may help, but it may need to
be reduced substantially in order to have an impact. Increasing the
maximum memory that the algorithm can use may also help.
<p>
<font size=+1><b>Set Algorithm</b></font>
<p>
This submenu lets you switch algorithms.
Note that changing the current algorithm can change the current rule.
If the new algorithm doesn't support the current rule then Golly
will switch to the new algorithm's default rule. If a pattern exists
then some cell states might have to be modified if the new universe
has fewer states than the old universe.
<p>
Golly assigns a different status bar color to each algorithm to give
you some feedback about which algorithm is currently in use.
You can use <a href="prefs:color">Preferences > Color</a> to change
these colors.
<p>
Most of Golly's algorithms (all except QuickLife) use a hashing technique
to generate patterns.
This method performs brilliantly on patterns that have a lot of regularity
in time or space. Conversely, it can perform very poorly on chaotic patterns.
A hashing algorithm may initially appear to be slow, but as the hash table
fills up with knowledge about the pattern, it will run faster and faster,
so be patient.
<p>
Use <a href="prefs:control">Preferences > Control</a> to set the maximum
amount of hash memory for each algorithm. The initial setting is 300MB.
The higher you set the memory limit, the larger patterns you can run
and the farther and faster you can run them.
However, setting this limit high also increases the amount of time
required to change the step size (both manually and in hyperspeed mode)
and increases the length of the garbage collection pauses.
Nonetheless, it is generally best to set this quite high — typically
80% of the amount of physical memory in your computer. Setting this number
high enough often makes more than a difference of 1000 in performance.
How high is high enough depends greatly on the pattern and the step size,
however, in unpredictable ways.
<p>
<font size=+1><b>Set Rule...</b></font>
<p>
Opens a dialog to change the current rule. Note that the current rule
is always displayed inside square brackets in the main window's title bar.
The dialog also allows you to change the current algorithm — if the
current rule is not valid in the new algorithm then the algorithm's
default rule will be used.
<p>
A help button can be used to expand the dialog and display information
about the current algorithm along with examples of the rules it supports.
If you click on one of the special rule links then the rule string is
automatically pasted into the new rule box.
Another way to enter a new rule is to choose one from the list of
named rules. You can add your own names to this list.
</body>
</html>
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