29/06/15

29/06/15

Plan for my EPQ:

Over the Summer holidays I need to research my topic in depth and record what I do in this blog.  By Friday 11th September, I should have completed the bulk of my research and met with my supervisor to discuss my work.

To-do list:
Read 'The Code Book' by Simon Singh
Read 'Alan Turing: The Enigma' by Andrew Hodges
Read 'The Universal History of Numbers' by Georges Ifrah
Participate in UNIQ Summer School, Maths: Numbers and Codes
Read 'The Mathematics of Cryptography' by Paul E. Gunnells
Watch 'Codebreaking in Everyday Life' by John D. Barrow
GCHQ website - attempt to contact
Check newspapers for political referencing to cryptography
Research Alan Turing (BBC iWonder)
Bletchley Park / museum, if possible
Find information from the internet
Check town library / university libraries
Contact lecturers / researchers in the field
Podcasts (Radio 4)
Research further into anything interesting or relevant that comes up
Criticise all sources of information

Key dates:
Friday 2nd October - have essay plan completed
Wednesday 9th December - submit essay draft
Friday 4th March - presentation must have been given
Friday 11th March - final deadline for essay and project blog

Work done today:

I have completed weeks three through to eight of the Future Learn course for 'Developing Your Research Project' by the University of Southampton, so as to prepare myself for the necessary actions needed to carry out a research project with detailed and structured information from a reliable source.  This way, I can be more prepared for when I start my project.

Week three gave may different resources for informations, such as journals, online newspapers and websites that hold statistics, which will benefit my project if I want easily accessable primary and secondary research.  It has also prompted my to change my research question to something more specific; originally my question was going to be about codes, but that topic covers an extremely broad range of sub-topics, such as DNA and computer programming in relation to building websites and apps, which is not necessarily what I would like to research as I'm much more interested in the mathematics and problem-solving aspects of the topic.  I also feel that my original question was unnecessarily long considering that the second part of the question is naturally inferred from the first part and can be elaboratied in my introduction and my abstract.  It is for these reasons that I have changed my research question from 'What method of cryptography has the most advanced level of complexity?  Will there ever be a code that, in theory, could never be broken?' To 'Which method of encryption has the most advanced level of complexity?'  This way I can suggest ways that the encryptions can be improved and consequently suggest whether they could ever be unbreakable.  It also means that I will not have to look into all aspects of cryptography in my project, as it would take ages to look at all of the different types - encryption, decryption, ciphers, keys, steganography - which would take more time and words than I have. (Wooledge.org/~greg/crypto/node1.html, Greg Wooledge, October 2000)

Week four gave the basics of methodology, week five advice on reading techniques, week six information on referencing, week seven instruction on how to possible prepare to write your essay and structure it and week eight helped prepare for a presentation.

Overall, I feel much more confident about starting my EPQ.

20/11/15

20/11/15

I've finished the improvements that were suggested by my supervisor and I believe that my essay is much more clear and less fragmented than before.  It is now slightly over the word limit, but I believe that, when I have feedback form my supervisor, I will be able to cut down the less relevant information, such as historical context, of the essay.

13/11/15

13/11/15

I've written the first draft of my essay and I haven't really needed to do much more research apart from skim reading further into the books I already had started reading.  I may have skipped some information, but it either wasn't relevant or wasn't as important as other pieces of information that I'd rather include considering the word limit.  I've been given feedback on my essay, but it's mainly small things like elaborating and explaining further some things that I've written.  I've also filled out the End-of-Project review with my EPQ supervisor and my project seems to be on track.

28/09/15

28/09/15

Instead of running the risk of still being researching as my deadline approaches, I'm going to start writing my essay now, according to my plan, and then I'll research what I need to know as I go along.  I'll be carrying on working my way through source materials as I write the first draft of my essay.

1/10/15

01/10/15

I've been reading 'The Code Book' in increments over the past few weeks, making selective notes, and am now half-way through.  I've learned about various important events in history have played a part in the development of cryptography, as well as many different types of ciphers, such as the Vigenere cipher and other polyalphabetic ciphers and homophonic substitution ciphers.  I also listened the first of a podcast series on Radio 4 about the history of coding, however, it, unfortunately, seems to be more about computer coding rather than cryptography, so far.
I've been filling out the relevant forms for my EPQ as I go along and I've written the first draft of my introductory paragraph of my essay, though it doesn't contain much technical content, and is more of an explanation of the rest of the essay.  I'm meeting my EPQ officer tomorrow for another meeting, so I'll see what she thinks of it then.

07/09/15

07/09/15

On Monday 7th September,  I watched a BBC2 documentary on Bletchley Park.  Whilst there were a few mentions of cryptography, the main focus was Gordan Welchman and his contribution to WWII traffic analysis and the development of the internet and, consequently, his later downfall when, like Alan Turing, Welchman was deemed a security risk and was discredited by the government.  Interesting to watch, but not entirely relevant to my EPQ.

26/08/15

26/08/15

From the 18th to the 24th August, I went to the UNIQ summer school at the University of Oxford with my subject being Maths: Numbers, Proofs and Codes.  The coding section of the lectures was very interesting an has given me a more modern understanding of the encryptions used in credit cards and the importance of extremely large prime numbers.  The lectures were given by Richard Earl, a professor in the Mathematical Institute in the university and as such the information is verified and relatively recent.
On the 26th August, I visited Bletchley Park and explored the museums, experienced a demonstration of the reconstructed Bombe machine as well as saw the exhibits of the film The Imitation Game which was based and filmed in Bletchley Park as it is about the decryption of the Enigma code during WWII.  The site is very authentic despite the renovations that are planned and as such the information that I gathered is valid.  I now have a more solidified understanding of cryptography during WWII and I feel that this is something I can include in my essay.  The film The Imitation Game is not entirely accurate and has been romanticized quite a lot, but the basics of the code breaking are still there, despite the Wrens' involvement being downplayed slightly.