Hi all,
In ANALOG Computing issues 24-26 (Nov.84-Jan.85) the following announced appeared:
Here's a little contest that should keep all the code-crackers out there occupied.
The numbers below, when decoded, are a message in standard Atari ASCII. The numbers are in the proper sequence, and have been encrypted using a simple algorithm.
145 211 145 185 255 186 112 88
183 174 224 34 145 126 226 178
51 207 191 129 188 234 4 191
199 175 178 243 197 16 118 43
210 198 166 241 237 194 211 94
213 171 252 246 233 178 12 218
210 203 172 129 133 219 23 186
206 170 203 141 126 246 117 203
190 250 212 206 22 160 197 161
182 183 246 20 53 141
The prize offered to the first five correct entries was a free one-year cassette or disk subscription.
The deadline for submitting a solution was January 1 and yet the correct answer was not published in the forthcoming issues. Only when a reader inquired about the matter did the magazine respond, half a year later in issue 32 (July 85):
The answer to the code cracker contest is
SpoilerDon't feel too bad; no one figured it out.
Interestingly the magazine never explained what the encryption scheme was. Can anybody figure it out?