Pupils crack winners’ code

TURING competition winners (from left) Ayrton Massey, Alastair Ross, Jack Maiden and Andrew Hynes

BLUE Coat pupils have won a national competition to celebrate the centenary of the birth of wartime Manchester codebreaker Alan Turing - the father of modern computer science.

They beat some of the UK’s top schools in the challenge to write a computer program which simulates a “Turing Machine” - a simple simulation, using paper and symbols, of the logic behind computer operation. Turing did some of the greatest post-war work at Manchester University, helping to establish the fundamentals of modern computers.

Blue Coat sixth-formers Ayrton Massey, Alastair Ross, Jack Maiden and Andrew Hynes entered the competition organised by Edinburgh’s Heriot-Watt University.

Ayrton explained: “A Turing Machine is a sort of prototype computer you model using pencil and paper.

“Alan Turing designed it to get people to think about the sort of problems you could solve using machines. Remember, this was before computers were actually invented.”

Alastair added: “We programmed our simulation using Java, a computer language we learned as part of our A-level computing course.”

Each of the quartet worked on a different part of the problem.

“I was up until one in the morning writing the manual,” added Andrew.

Assistant head teacher Tony Ballantyne said: “We’re very proud of the work that our students have put into this project. It’s a great feeling, given this area’s great computing heritage, that the prize has been won by a Greater Manchester school.”

The team will travel to Edinburgh on June 22 to collect its prize - a trophy and £200 in Amazon vouchers.




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