Colossus

Category: Bletchley

Status: Registered and callable in the CyberChef 11.3.0 compatibility inventory.

Input / output: string → JSON

Background: https://wikipedia.org/wiki/Colossus_computer

What it does

Colossus is the name of the world’s first electronic computer. Ten Colossi were designed by Tommy Flowers and built at the Post Office Research Labs at Dollis Hill in 1943 during World War 2. They assisted with the breaking of the German Lorenz cipher attachment, a machine created to encipher communications between Hitler and his generals on the front lines. To learn more, Virtual Colossus, an online, browser based simulation of a Colossus computer is available at virtualcolossus.co.uk. A more detailed description of this operation can be found here.

Note

Status here means the operation name is implemented and callable. It does not by itself promise byte-for-byte parity for every upstream option. See Compatibility and current status for the verified scope and known boundaries.

Arguments and options

Arguments are positional. Keep their order when using bake() or Pipeline.then().

Index	Name	UI type	PyChef default	Accepted values / format
0	Input	label	None	Any value supported by this argument type
1	Pattern	option	'KH Pattern'	'KH Pattern', 'ZMUG Pattern', 'BREAM Pattern'
2	QBusZ	option	''	'', 'Z', 'ΔZ'
3	QBusΧ	option	''	'', 'Χ', 'ΔΧ'
4	QBusΨ	option	''	'', 'Ψ', 'ΔΨ'
5	Limitation	option	'None'	'None', 'Χ2', 'Χ2 + P5', 'X2 + Ψ1', 'X2 + Ψ1 + P5'
6	K Rack Option	argSelector	'Select Program'	'Select Program', 'Top Section - Conditional', 'Bottom Section - Addition', 'Advanced'
7	Program to run	option	''	'', 'Letter Count', '1+2=. (1+2 Break In, Find X1,X2)', '4=5=/1=2 (Given X1,X2 find X4,X5)', '/,5,U (Count chars to find X3)'
8	K Rack: Conditional	label	None	Any value supported by this argument type
9	R1-Q1	editableOptionShort	'SWITCHES'	'.', '', 'x'
10	R1-Q2	editableOptionShort	'SWITCHES'	'.', '', 'x'
11	R1-Q3	editableOptionShort	'SWITCHES'	'.', '', 'x'
12	R1-Q4	editableOptionShort	'SWITCHES'	'.', '', 'x'
13	R1-Q5	editableOptionShort	'SWITCHES'	'.', '', 'x'
14	R1-Negate	boolean	False	True or False
15	R1-Counter	option	''	'', '1', '2', '3', '4', '5'
16	R2-Q1	editableOptionShort	'SWITCHES'	'.', '', 'x'
17	R2-Q2	editableOptionShort	'SWITCHES'	'.', '', 'x'
18	R2-Q3	editableOptionShort	'SWITCHES'	'.', '', 'x'
19	R2-Q4	editableOptionShort	'SWITCHES'	'.', '', 'x'
20	R2-Q5	editableOptionShort	'SWITCHES'	'.', '', 'x'
21	R2-Negate	boolean	False	True or False
22	R2-Counter	option	''	'', '1', '2', '3', '4', '5'
23	R3-Q1	editableOptionShort	'SWITCHES'	'.', '', 'x'
24	R3-Q2	editableOptionShort	'SWITCHES'	'.', '', 'x'
25	R3-Q3	editableOptionShort	'SWITCHES'	'.', '', 'x'
26	R3-Q4	editableOptionShort	'SWITCHES'	'.', '', 'x'
27	R3-Q5	editableOptionShort	'SWITCHES'	'.', '', 'x'
28	R3-Negate	boolean	False	True or False
29	R3-Counter	option	''	'', '1', '2', '3', '4', '5'
30	Negate All	boolean	False	True or False
31	K Rack: Addition	label	None	Any value supported by this argument type
32	Add-Q1	boolean	False	True or False
33	Add-Q2	boolean	False	True or False
34	Add-Q3	boolean	False	True or False
35	Add-Q4	boolean	False	True or False
36	Add-Q5	boolean	False	True or False
37	Add-Equals	editableOptionShort	'SWITCHES'	'.', '', 'x'
38	Add-Counter1	boolean	False	True or False
39	Add Negate All	boolean	False	True or False
40	Total Motor	editableOptionShort	'SWITCHES'	'.', '', 'x'
41	Master Control Panel	label	None	Any value supported by this argument type
42	Set Total	number	0	A Python integer or floating-point value
43	Fast Step	option	''	'', 'X1', 'X2', 'X3', 'X4', 'X5', 'M37', 'M61', 'S1', 'S2', 'S3', 'S4', 'S5'
44	Slow Step	option	''	'', 'X1', 'X2', 'X3', 'X4', 'X5', 'M37', 'M61', 'S1', 'S2', 'S3', 'S4', 'S5'
45	Start Χ1	number	1	A Python integer or floating-point value
46	Start Χ2	number	1	A Python integer or floating-point value
47	Start Χ3	number	1	A Python integer or floating-point value
48	Start Χ4	number	1	A Python integer or floating-point value
49	Start Χ5	number	1	A Python integer or floating-point value
50	Start M61	number	1	A Python integer or floating-point value
51	Start M37	number	1	A Python integer or floating-point value
52	Start Ψ1	number	1	A Python integer or floating-point value
53	Start Ψ2	number	1	A Python integer or floating-point value
54	Start Ψ3	number	1	A Python integer or floating-point value
55	Start Ψ4	number	1	A Python integer or floating-point value
56	Start Ψ5	number	1	A Python integer or floating-point value

Recipe template

Important

This is a call template built from the documented defaults. Replace placeholder values such as empty keys, paths, patterns, or lookup data before running it.

from pychef import bake

input_value = "example"
args = ['', 'KH Pattern', '', '', '', 'None', 'Select Program', '', '', 'SWITCHES', 'SWITCHES', 'SWITCHES', 'SWITCHES', 'SWITCHES', False, '', 'SWITCHES', 'SWITCHES', 'SWITCHES', 'SWITCHES', 'SWITCHES', False, '', 'SWITCHES', 'SWITCHES', 'SWITCHES', 'SWITCHES', 'SWITCHES', False, '', False, '', False, False, False, False, False, 'SWITCHES', False, False, 'SWITCHES', '', 0, '', '', 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1]
result = bake(input_value, [{"op": 'Colossus', "args": args}])
print(result)

Pipeline example

from pychef import Pipeline

args = ['', 'KH Pattern', '', '', '', 'None', 'Select Program', '', '', 'SWITCHES', 'SWITCHES', 'SWITCHES', 'SWITCHES', 'SWITCHES', False, '', 'SWITCHES', 'SWITCHES', 'SWITCHES', 'SWITCHES', 'SWITCHES', False, '', 'SWITCHES', 'SWITCHES', 'SWITCHES', 'SWITCHES', 'SWITCHES', False, '', False, '', False, False, False, False, False, 'SWITCHES', False, False, 'SWITCHES', '', 0, '', '', 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1]
transform = Pipeline().then('Colossus', *args)
result = transform("example")

Dedicated operation module

The registered entry point lives in pychef.operations.by_operation.colossus. Direct calls receive the input value and a positional argument tuple:

from pychef.operations.by_operation.colossus import run

result = run("example", tuple(['', 'KH Pattern', '', '', '', 'None', 'Select Program', '', '', 'SWITCHES', 'SWITCHES', 'SWITCHES', 'SWITCHES', 'SWITCHES', False, '', 'SWITCHES', 'SWITCHES', 'SWITCHES', 'SWITCHES', 'SWITCHES', False, '', 'SWITCHES', 'SWITCHES', 'SWITCHES', 'SWITCHES', 'SWITCHES', False, '', False, '', False, False, False, False, False, 'SWITCHES', False, False, 'SWITCHES', '', 0, '', '', 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1]))

pychef.operations.by_operation.colossus.run(value, args)

Run this operation using its shared internal implementation.

Parameters:

• value (str | bytes)

• args (Sequence[Any])

Return type:

str | bytes