Post Your Methods Used For Fenn's Coded Words (SPOILERS)

[mcb]

Jan 5, 2019 20:06:23 GMT -5 zaphod73491 said:

Okay, I confirmed Jenny used standard Vigenere encryption for the first Medallion challenge: key comes in on the left, ciphertext found on that line, plaintext found at the top of the column.

ZAP, did you find the solution to the 16 pieces of the puzzle? Is it a sequence of letters that does not seem to mean anything?

If I can help...

I found the same pattern used in FFGMTH#1 and in FF Coded Words.
In FFGMTH#1, Jenny uses sequential blocks also to form the phrase.

01,02,03,04 - 05,06 - 07,08,09 - 10,11,12

The difference is that here she counts from right to left.

In FF Coded Words, it is from left to right.

[zaphod73491]

McB: I'm not sure I understand your question. The first stage of the problem is to convert the 80 XXX-Y codes on the 16 puzzle pieces into letters. That's quite straightforward if you have the book. The next stage (I believe) is correctly arranging the 16 puzzle pieces, which again is straightforward if you have the book.

What is not yet obvious to me is the correct process for converting the letters from stage 1/2 into the correct letters (possibly via Vigenere decryption). Depending on how you read out the letters from stage 1/2, there are indications of key lengths of either 16, 19 or 20. There are some obvious choices of possible keys for length 16 or 19. Assuming Vigenere is involved, based on the one example she has provided in Medallion #1, the key length is likely to be a divisor of 80, so this would make the length 19 key improbable.

Of course, it matters whether you perform Vig decryption before or after arranging the puzzle pieces. I had assumed the pieces had to be correctly arranged first, but that may be a bad assumption.

[mcb]

Jan 5, 2019 21:57:46 GMT -5 zaphod73491 said:

McB: I'm not sure I understand your question. The first stage of the problem is to convert the 80 XXX-Y codes on the 16 puzzle pieces into letters. That's quite straightforward if you have the book. The next stage (I believe) is correctly arranging the 16 puzzle pieces, which again is straightforward if you have the book.

What is not yet obvious to me is the correct process for converting the letters from stage 1/2 into the correct letters (possibly via Vigenere decryption). Depending on how you read out the letters from stage 1/2, there are indications of key lengths of either 16, 19 or 20. There are some obvious choices of possible keys for length 16 or 19. Assuming Vigenere is involved, based on the one example she has provided in Medallion #1, the key length is likely to be a divisor of 80, so this would make the length 19 key improbable.

Of course, it matters whether you perform Vig decryption before or after arranging the puzzle pieces. I had assumed the pieces had to be correctly arranged first, but that may be a bad assumption.

I can not have the book. I am studying the structure of the code only and the first piece of the puzzle. Have you ever been able to convert all xxx-y numbers to letters?

[mcb]

T Z U A U

Does it make any sense?

[zaphod73491]

"I am studying the structure of the code only and the first piece of the puzzle. Have you ever been able to convert all xxx-y numbers to letters?"

Yes. That's comparatively easy. But the resulting distribution of letters is not at all like English -- for instance there is only 1 E, 3 T's, 5 A's, 3 O's, 4 I's and zero N's. And there are far too many L's (9 of them) for an 80-letter message. It's not simple substitution, either (e.g. L=E) -- the letter distribution is too flat. Ordinary English should have an incidence of coincidence (IOC) of about 6.7%. Jenny's letters score less than 4.3%. This is what tells the cryptanalyst that the message has likely undergone polyalphabetic substitution -- most likely simple Vigenere, based on the Medallion example.

[zaphod73491]

Jan 5, 2019 22:22:23 GMT -5 mcb said:

T Z U A U

Does it make any sense?

That is very close to what the first puzzle piece decodes to (should be AZUAU), so someone must have provided you pictures of the puzzle pieces and the associated text from the book for decryption...

[mcb]

Jan 5, 2019 22:30:44 GMT -5 zaphod73491 said:

Jan 5, 2019 22:22:23 GMT -5 mcb said:

TZUAU

Faz algum sentido?

Isso é muito parecido com o que a primeira peça do quebra-cabeça decodifica para (deve ser AZUAU), então alguém deve ter fornecido a você imagens das peças do quebra-cabeça e o texto associado do livro para descriptografia ...

Eu vi a primeira parte e o texto no site de venda do livro (https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/172234430X/ref=dbs_a_def_rf_bibl_vppi_i3). Então eu tenho apenas a primeira peça com texto e a segunda peça sem texto. (Infelizmente a visão do site foi removida. Eu imagino que alguém esteja seguindo a nossa conversa e decidiu não facilitar as coisas.)

Eu acho que seria improvável que Jenny tivesse usado Vigenere neste quebra-cabeça com códigos "80", pois faria a resolução quase impossível. Eu posso ajudá-lo a estudar todas as letras se você concordar em me enviar as cartas que você encontrou nas peças do quebra-cabeça. [e-mail]

Só para notar: já resolvi "todas as linhas" do poema do FF. Eu estou neste código apenas pelo desafio.

[mcb]

Jan 6, 2019 6:44:45 GMT -5 mcb said:

Jan 5, 2019 22:30:44 GMT -5 zaphod73491 said:

Isso é muito parecido com o que a primeira peça do quebra-cabeça decodifica para (deve ser AZUAU), então alguém deve ter fornecido a você imagens das peças do quebra-cabeça e o texto associado do livro para descriptografia ...

Eu vi a primeira parte e o texto no site de venda do livro (https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/172234430X/ref=dbs_a_def_rf_bibl_vppi_i3). Então eu tenho apenas a primeira peça com texto e a segunda peça sem texto. (Infelizmente a visão do site foi removida. Eu imagino que alguém esteja seguindo a nossa conversa e decidiu não facilitar as coisas.)

Eu acho que seria improvável que Jenny tivesse usado Vigenere neste quebra-cabeça com códigos "80", pois faria a resolução quase impossível. Eu posso ajudá-lo a estudar todas as letras se você concordar em me enviar as cartas que você encontrou nas peças do quebra-cabeça. [e-mail]

Só para notar: já resolvi "todas as linhas" do poema do FF. Eu estou neste código apenas pelo desafio.

I saw the first piece and the text on the book's selling site (https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/172234430X/ref=dbs_a_def_rf_bibl_vppi_i3). So I have only the first piece with text and the second piece without text. (Unfortunately the site's view has been removed. I imagine someone is following our conversation and decided not to make things easy.)

I think it would be unlikely Jenny would have used Vigenere in this puzzle with "80" codes as it would make resolution almost impossible. I can help you study all the letters if you agree to send me the letters you found in the puzzle pieces. [e-mail]

Just to note: I have already solved the poem. I'm in this code just for the challenge.

[mcb]

Second piece LMYPJ, maybe?

[mcb]

Dec 17, 2018 11:19:49 GMT -5 GeneticBlend said:

There's always tomorrow.

184-8=W?

[mcb]

Jan 5, 2019 22:26:55 GMT -5 zaphod73491 said:

"I am studying the structure of the code only and the first piece of the puzzle. Have you ever been able to convert all xxx-y numbers to letters?"

Yes. That's comparatively easy. But the resulting distribution of letters is not at all like English -- for instance there is only 1 E, 3 T's, 5 A's, 3 O's, 4 I's and zero N's. And there are far too many L's (9 of them) for an 80-letter message. It's not simple substitution, either (e.g. L=E) -- the letter distribution is too flat. Ordinary English should have an incidence of coincidence (IOC) of about 6.7%. Jenny's letters score less than 4.3%. This is what tells the cryptanalyst that the message has likely undergone polyalphabetic substitution -- most likely simple Vigenere, based on the Medallion example.

Well ... if I understood correctly, after finding the letters (xxx-y) it is necessary to put them in the correct order. This should depend on some list of 16 random letters found in the book. Result: letters in the correct order but no possibility of use or concrete meaning.



Now substitute these letters for others that can be used with the end-of-book code.

Perhaps the Vigenere table solves this, but you need a key word or key letter that is probably indicated in the book.

[zaphod73491]

Jan 6, 2019 7:15:48 GMT -5 mcb said:

Second piece LMYPJ, maybe?

You're one word off on the first letter -- should be JMYPJ. Just to be clear, I'm not going to continue this for the other 14 pieces. ;-) That's not fair to the others who have worked hard to solve the first stage.

[mcb]

Jan 6, 2019 16:24:28 GMT -5 zaphod73491 said:

Jan 6, 2019 7:15:48 GMT -5 mcb said:

Second piece LMYPJ, maybe?

You're one word off on the first letter -- should be JMYPJ. Just to be clear, I'm not going to continue this for the other 14 pieces. ;-) That's not fair to the others who have worked hard to solve the first stage.

From now on I can not do anything without help, because I do not have the book. But I understood the process to get to the FF phrase. If you want me to help you, send me an email.

[zaphod73491]

Hi McB -- thanks for the offer, but I'm not looking for help. I want the challenge of solving this myself, which is why I haven't asked Jenny for any hints or confirmation of my early stage answers.

[mcb]

Ok!