Projects:2014S1-44 Cracking the Voynich Manuscript Code - Revision history

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‎More Project Information

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A1210982 at 23:18, 29 October 2014

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A1210982: /* Future Pathways */

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‎Future Pathways

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‎End results

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‎End results

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 === Deliverables and Progress ===
-* Proposal seminar
+To see the other deliverables (Please follow link at the bottom of the page ''''More Project Information'''')
 * Progress report
 * Final seminar
 * [https://www.eleceng.adelaide.edu.au/personal/dabbott/wiki/index.php/Semester_B_Final_Report_2014_-_Cracking_the_Voynich_code Final Report (Online)]
 * Poster
 * Project exhibition 'expo'
 * YouTube video
 * [https://www.eleceng.adelaide.edu.au/personal/dabbott/wiki/index.php/Cracking_the_Voynich_code_2014 Weekly Progress (Follow this link for current progress)]

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 In the early planning stages, we looked at our goals (concrete and flexible) and decided to divide our work into five stages. Each stage was dependent on areas from the previous stages and allowed continuous developments and improvements as our understanding of the manuscript progressed. Early stages involved basic characterisation of the manuscript, and later stages involved text classifications algorithms and research-based strategies. The stages themselves were split evenly between team members (detailed in the section of Project Management) and was designed to take advantage of the unique skills of each team member. The five stages are listed below:
-===Phase 1===
+====Phase 1====
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 To draw relevant conclusions from this data, tests will also be performed on known language texts, including the UN Universal Declaration of Human Rights
-===Phase 2===
+====Phase 2====
 Look through the manuscript and find pages with similar illustrations, and then find words that seem relevant to those illustrations. This will include the words unique to pages with a given illustration type as well as words which suddenly increase in frequency (‘burst’) on those pages.
-===Phase 3===
+====Phase 3====
 Experiment with the Word Recurrence Interval (WRI) analytical method and apply it to the Voynich Manuscript.
-===Phase 4===
+====Phase 4====
 Investigate current theories further or look into areas of interest which develop during the course of the project.
-===Phase 5===
+====Phase 5====
 Run supervised learning algorithms such as  Support Vector Machines (SVM) and Machine Discriminant Analysis (MDA) to compare the Voynich against other languages in the Declaration of Human Rights.
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 As such, a project similar to this is never truly finished, each time fresh and inquisitive minds building upon what others have found to continually make progress, eventually one day finally unveiling the mystery surrounding the manuscript. This project has taught us concepts and techniques with approaching large unknown data set, improved upon our coding skills for both Python and Matlab and allowed us to develop skills into data interpretation, data mining and mathematical and linguistics analysis. These are important skills to have as data analysis is now an integral part of Engineering with designing of networks, simulations and development plans.
 ===Future Pathways===

← Older revision		Revision as of 23:40, 29 October 2014
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	==More Project Information==		==More Project Information==
−	* [https://www.eleceng.adelaide.edu.au/personal/dabbott/wiki/index.php/Cracking_the_Voynich_code\|Cracking the Voynich Code 2014]	+	* [https://www.eleceng.adelaide.edu.au/personal/dabbott/wiki/index.php/Cracking_the_Voynich_code Cracking the Voynich Code 2014]

← Older revision		Revision as of 23:39, 29 October 2014
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	==More Project Information==		==More Project Information==
−	* [[https://www.eleceng.adelaide.edu.au/personal/dabbott/wiki/index.php/Cracking_the_Voynich_code\|Cracking the Voynich Code 2014]]	+	* [https://www.eleceng.adelaide.edu.au/personal/dabbott/wiki/index.php/Cracking_the_Voynich_code\|Cracking the Voynich Code 2014]

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 ===Background===
-The Voynich Manuscript is a mysterious book written in an unknown alphabet. So little is known about the nature and origins of the manuscript that it has been named after Wifred Michael Voynich, the collector who purchased it in 1912 from a castle in Italy. The manuscript has been verified by radiocarbon dating (at the University of Arizona) as belonging to the early 15th century<ref name=ARIZ />, and appears to be a herbal (or medicinal) manual from this time period in Europe. However, despite a great deal of research into the text and illustrations of the manuscript, no one has ever conclusively deciphered a single word. The mysterious nature of the manuscript has attracted linguists and cryptographers over the course of the last hundred years, each attempting to "crack the Voynich code".
+The Voynich Manuscript is a mysterious book written in an unknown alphabet. So little is known about the nature and origins of the manuscript that it has been named after Wifred Michael Voynich, the collector who purchased it in 1912 from a castle in Italy. The manuscript has been verified by radiocarbon dating (at the University of Arizona) as belonging to the early 15th century, and appears to be a herbal (or medicinal) manual from this time period in Europe. However, despite a great deal of research into the text and illustrations of the manuscript, no one has ever conclusively deciphered a single word. The mysterious nature of the manuscript has attracted linguists and cryptographers over the course of the last hundred years, each attempting to "crack the Voynich code".
-The manuscript itself is made up of several folios, numbered from f1 to f116. Each folio consists of two pages (labelled r and v), with the exception of ten foldouts of up to six pages. Although the page numbering was clearly added after the manuscript was written, there are gaps in the numbering which indicate missing folios, and indications that some folios have been reordered long after their completion. These oddities have led scholars to believe that the manuscript may have had several owners. Certain pages also contain a "key-like" sequence of characters, which is why many leading cryptographers of the time (and indeed, today) believe it to be a key cipher. <ref name=Zandbergen1/>
+The manuscript itself is made up of several folios, numbered from f1 to f116. Each folio consists of two pages (labelled r and v), with the exception of ten foldouts of up to six pages. Although the page numbering was clearly added after the manuscript was written, there are gaps in the numbering which indicate missing folios, and indications that some folios have been reordered long after their completion. These oddities have led scholars to believe that the manuscript may have had several owners. Certain pages also contain a "key-like" sequence of characters, which is why many leading cryptographers of the time (and indeed, today) believe it to be a key cipher.
-Between 1996 and 1998, several academics began work on what they hoped to be a complete database of Voynich transcriptions. This database was known as the “Interlinear Archive of Electronic Transcriptions in EVA” (referred to as the Interlinear Archive), and came to include several partial transcriptions such as those developed by Currier and Friedman, along with a complete transcription by Takeshi Takahashi. <ref name=Stolfi1 /> All the transcriptions in this file were converted to a newly developed alphabet, called EVA, that attempted to correct the errors of previous alphabets (which often oversimplified the characters in the manuscript and ignored rare characters) by using ligature analysis on the handwriting. <ref name=Zandbergen3 />
+Between 1996 and 1998, several academics began work on what they hoped to be a complete database of Voynich transcriptions. This database was known as the “Interlinear Archive of Electronic Transcriptions in EVA” (referred to as the Interlinear Archive), and came to include several partial transcriptions such as those developed by Currier and Friedman, along with a complete transcription by Takeshi Takahashi.  All the transcriptions in this file were converted to a newly developed alphabet, called EVA, that attempted to correct the errors of previous alphabets (which often oversimplified the characters in the manuscript and ignored rare characters) by using ligature analysis on the handwriting.
-The author of the manuscript has been heavily disputed. Some popular candidates are Roger Bacon, John Dee, and Leonardo da Vinci.<ref name=AUTH/>
+The author of the manuscript has been heavily disputed. Some popular candidates are Roger Bacon, John Dee, and Leonardo da Vinci.
 ===Technical Background===
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 * Takahashi EVT file
 * English and foreign texts

← Older revision		Revision as of 23:18, 29 October 2014
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	This project expands upon past research into the linguistic features of the manuscript. Computational analysis techniques such as Word Recurrence Intervals and N-gram relationships, along with supervised learning algorithms such as Support Vector Machines (SVM) and Multiple Discriminant Analysis (MDA) are applied to an electronic transcription of the text. The team evaluates the use of these classification methods, and also develops new ways to identify grammar and syntax in the Voynich language.		This project expands upon past research into the linguistic features of the manuscript. Computational analysis techniques such as Word Recurrence Intervals and N-gram relationships, along with supervised learning algorithms such as Support Vector Machines (SVM) and Multiple Discriminant Analysis (MDA) are applied to an electronic transcription of the text. The team evaluates the use of these classification methods, and also develops new ways to identify grammar and syntax in the Voynich language.

−	For a report on our work decoding the manuscript, follow this *[https://www.eleceng.adelaide.edu.au/personal/dabbott/wiki/index.php/Semester_B_Final_Report_2014_-_Cracking_the_Voynich_code this link]. Otherwise, this work is summarised below.	+	For a report on our work decoding the manuscript, follow this [https://www.eleceng.adelaide.edu.au/personal/dabbott/wiki/index.php/Semester_B_Final_Report_2014_-_Cracking_the_Voynich_code this link]. Otherwise, this work is summarised below.

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 ===Future Pathways===
-:Test these characteristics against transcriptions of known 15th century codes to develop cipher theories.
+*Test these characteristics against transcriptions of known 15th century codes to develop cipher theories.
-:Expand research into word/illustration relationship with better burst metrics, and Hidden Markov Model clustering algorithms
-:Test the effect of modified alphabets on the statistics like word length distribution and line break characteristics
+*Expand research into word/illustration relationship with better burst metrics, and Hidden Markov Model clustering algorithms
-:Expand research into authorship if possible
-:Develop a rule-based grammar for the the Manuscript
+*Test the effect of modified alphabets on the statistics like word length distribution and line break characteristics
 == Team ==

← Older revision		Revision as of 23:15, 29 October 2014
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	As such, a project similar to this is never truly finished, each time fresh and inquisitive minds building upon what others have found to continually make progress, eventually one day finally unveiling the mystery surrounding the manuscript. This project has taught us concepts and techniques with approaching large unknown data set, improved upon our coding skills for both Python and Matlab and allowed us to develop skills into data interpretation, data mining and mathematical and linguistics analysis. These are important skills to have as data analysis is now an integral part of Engineering with designing of networks, simulations and development plans.		As such, a project similar to this is never truly finished, each time fresh and inquisitive minds building upon what others have found to continually make progress, eventually one day finally unveiling the mystery surrounding the manuscript. This project has taught us concepts and techniques with approaching large unknown data set, improved upon our coding skills for both Python and Matlab and allowed us to develop skills into data interpretation, data mining and mathematical and linguistics analysis. These are important skills to have as data analysis is now an integral part of Engineering with designing of networks, simulations and development plans.
		+
		+
		+	===Future Pathways===
		+
		+	:Test these characteristics against transcriptions of known 15th century codes to develop cipher theories.
		+	:Expand research into word/illustration relationship with better burst metrics, and Hidden Markov Model clustering algorithms
		+	:Test the effect of modified alphabets on the statistics like word length distribution and line break characteristics
		+	:Expand research into authorship if possible
		+	:Develop a rule-based grammar for the the Manuscript

	== Team ==		== Team ==

← Older revision		Revision as of 23:14, 29 October 2014
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		+	With this type of research project, it can be very difficult to come up with a concrete conclusion, especially with a case that has been unsolved for centuries now. The aim of the project was to develop a base of research (and code) that could be used for future analysis. However, we are confident enough with our findings that we can safely conclude with these final few points:
		+
		+	# There is a relationship between the language and sections themselves, but this may not have anything to do with illustrations presented in that section.
		+	# Based on characteristics such as word length distribution and WRI, the text appears similar to languages such as Hebrew and Latin.
		+	# Based on the line characteristics of comparison languages, the manuscript may contain punctuation characters.
		+	# There is a distinctly low word order in comparison to known languages. This might be evidence of a code in the manuscript.
		+	# WRI and Word Length Distribution are not useful statistics for supervised learning algorithm analysis of the manuscript.
		+
		+	As such, a project similar to this is never truly finished, each time fresh and inquisitive minds building upon what others have found to continually make progress, eventually one day finally unveiling the mystery surrounding the manuscript. This project has taught us concepts and techniques with approaching large unknown data set, improved upon our coding skills for both Python and Matlab and allowed us to develop skills into data interpretation, data mining and mathematical and linguistics analysis. These are important skills to have as data analysis is now an integral part of Engineering with designing of networks, simulations and development plans.

	== Team ==		== Team ==

@@ Line 8: / Line 8: @@
 This project expands upon past research into the linguistic features of the manuscript.  Computational analysis techniques such as Word Recurrence Intervals and N-gram relationships, along with supervised learning algorithms such as Support Vector Machines (SVM) and Multiple Discriminant Analysis (MDA) are applied to an electronic transcription of the text. The team evaluates the use of these classification methods, and also develops new ways to identify grammar and syntax in the Voynich language.
@@ Line 47: / Line 49: @@
-Phase 1 is primarily concerned with basic textual information about the manuscript. The desired information at the conclusion of this phase includes:
+Compile basic textual information about the manuscript, including:
 :The number of word types in the manuscript
@@ Line 63: / Line 65: @@
 ===Phase 2===
-The goal of this phase is to look through the manuscript and find pages with similar illustrations, and then find words that seem relevant to those illustrations. This will include the words unique to pages with a given illustration type as well as words which suddenly increase in frequency (‘burst’) on those pages.
+Look through the manuscript and find pages with similar illustrations, and then find words that seem relevant to those illustrations. This will include the words unique to pages with a given illustration type as well as words which suddenly increase in frequency (‘burst’) on those pages.
 ===Phase 3===
-The goal of Phase 3 is to experiment with the Word Recurrence Interval (WRI) analytical method and apply it to the Voynich Manuscript.
+Experiment with the Word Recurrence Interval (WRI) analytical method and apply it to the Voynich Manuscript.
 ===Phase 4===
-Phase 4 is set up to provide timo to investigate current theories further or look into areas of interest which develop during the course of the project.
+Investigate current theories further or look into areas of interest which develop during the course of the project.
 ===Phase 5===