[r-t] Easter Challenge

[ted.steele at tesco.net]

RAS wrote:

"All of Philip's examples were consistently applying a rule 
throughout.  Seriously, if you want what you would probably 
consider to be a sensible example, you'll need to give us a 
definition of what you consider to be a 'Dixonoid' or 
rule-based touch".  


I am having to think hard after sitting up too late to watch some rather good golf and then getting up at some ungodly hour to get to an early shift at work. Still, I think I have got this right.

Yes, Philip’s examples do all follow rules but the application is not without variation. The rule “Make 2nds when the treble leads” is varied by “unless the 5th is in 5ths”. I realise that can be written as a single rule but I was trying to avoid such variation within rules. But this is not really the issue as I suspect we know that Philip was enjoying a bit of fun. He is right of course in pointing out that just about every method and principle can be described by a series of rules but I imagine that he must also have realised that I had in mind the description of Dixonoids on his own website, which can be found here. <http://www.cantabgold.net/users/pje24/dixonoids.html>. The link in the first paragraph is to a full explanation of the approach. 

The full article mentions the difficulty of getting the extent on lower numbers but Philip points out that Dixon’s minor adapts readily to doubles where the simple rules: “Plain Hunt; except that when treble leads 2nds and 5ths places are made and when 2nd or 4th lead, 1st and 4th places are made”, give a plain course of 84 changes.

I have attempted to find a set of rules for doubles that will give the extent in the plain course, or as I said originally, the 60 in-course changes. Ideally this would be achieved with rules that do not require any qualification of the kind described above and which fit Philip’s own description of a Dixonoid as a method “Where the work of a bell depends upon the relative positions of certain other bells”. Note that the reference is to other “bells”, not solely the treble, but even Philip has fallen into the trap of leaving that statement open enough to include twin hunt methods such as Grandsire, which I am sure was no more his intention than it is mine. 

Ted