2021-03-02 22:16:52 +01:00
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2021-03-02 22:21:49 +01:00
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Tables commonly depict the correspondence between the letters of the English
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alphabet and the dots-and-dashes combinations for Morse Code.
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Many times, these are arranged in alphabetical order.
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Alas, that arrangement obscures the logic of the assignments and in turn
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makes it less obvious how one might go about learning them.
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In short, the assignments are made so that the simplest combinations
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represent the most frequently-used letters.
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The English letter E is the most commonly used, so it gets represented by
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the simplest symbol: A single dot.
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Similarly, T is the most common consonant, and the second-most common letter
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overall, so it gets the next simplest symbol: A single dash.
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And so it goes.
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The so-called **dichotomous** key shows these correspondences by building up
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from a single dot or dash by adding either a dot or dash to the end as one
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moves through the table.
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In the way I've drawn them here, moving one column to the right means adding
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one more dot or dash. If one moves to the right and up, one adds a dot. If
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one moves to the right and down, one adds a dash.
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This repository contains four files. The most complete one contains the
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entirety of the English alphabet as well as the Morse Code for each letter.
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The simplest file is an empty grid with the same layout. Then there is one
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file containing letters, but no code. The remaining file contains code, but
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no letters.
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The incomplete files are meant to be used as practice pads: One
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can try filling them out, either by memorizing progressively where letters
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go in the grid (perhaps using various mnemonics) or by following the logic
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of the dichotomous key to build up the Morse Code representations.
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These files are stored in Flat XML spreadsheet format as saved by
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LibreOffice (**.fods**) in the hopes that the files can be put under version
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control in a way that makes any changes at least somewhat human-readable.
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