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Puzzlehunt 2012

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Fixed Point

Map

14 21 15 5 2 22 25 15 11 19

Solution

Author

Matvey Soloviev (ms900)

Description

A simple warmup problem. Random experimentation or inspecting the JavaScript source quickly reveals that the text box and the daunting "Map" link simply maps lowercase characters to other lowercase characters. Moreover, the map just barely fails to be injective, resulting in it having a single fixed point (value x for which map(x)=x).

Further experimentation may reveal that if the map is applied repeatedly, the fixed point will eventually be reached no matter the starting character. Counting the number of iterations required for each starting character gives a unique integer between 0 and 25; using this substitution backwards on the list of numbers given yields the answer.

Solution

functional

Correct submissions

The 5th Element 2012-06-15 18:31:49.807204
pae8Eerai9 2012-06-15 22:37:18.679497
The Gastronomers 2012-06-16 02:18:04.393594
'; DROP *.*; SELECT ' 2012-06-16 03:48:07.108984
rm -rf / 2012-06-16 11:57:56.697626