Language: C

Write a function that produces the next generation of cellular automata

Background:

Function signature:

Function description:

We compactly represent a generation as a 64-bit unsigned long, one bit for each cell. A 1 bit indicates the cell is live, 0 if not. Using this bit-packed representation, the code to read or update a cell is implemented as a bitwise operation Let's trace how one generation advances to the next. A cell and its two neighbors form a "neighborhood". A neighborhood is effectively a 3-bit number, a value from 0 to 7 Consider a live cell with a live left neighbor and an empty right neighbor. The cell's neighborhood in binary is 110, which is the 3-bit number 6. The ruleset dictates whether a cell with neighborhood 6 will be live or empty in the next generation. A ruleset is represented as an 8-bit number, one bit for each of the 8 possible neighborhood configurations. Let's say the ruleset is 93. The number 93 expressed in binary is 01011101. Because the bit at position 6 (note: position 0-> least significant) of the ruleset is 1, this cell will be live in the next generation. Are you getting the sense there will be much binary data to practice your bitwise ops on for this