Possibly the coolest piece of news I've received this year is that Paul Reuvers has released a RISC OS Enigma emulator! Not only does it produce output correct to the original machines, it's a multi-machine emulator capable of emulating army, airforce, naval and even Japanese varients!

For those of you who've been under a rock for the past decade, the Enigma was the supposedly uncrackable German encryption machines used by most of their armed forces during World War II. Safe in the knowledge that their radio traffic was thus unreadable by the Allies, they never did find out why, for instance, Allied merchant shipping kept detouring around U-boat wolf packs...

The Bletchley Park hacks into the Axis communications traffic is the stuff of legend, kept secret until 1973 and only really coming to popular attention in the late 1990's. Apart from (arguably) inventing the computer and shortening the War by at least two years, it's also a bloody good story and one which has been woven into a novel by Robert Harris. The film of this book, Enigma, was recently shown in Edinburgh and receives its Royal Première on September 24th.

In not-very-related news Bletchley Park are holding a festival on September 9th to celebrate the release of the film. Coinciding with the annual reunion of ex-BP workers, there'll be props from the film (including the extremely impressive conning tower section of a submarine), period music and clothing, and appearances by such luminaries as Robert Harris (who will be signing copies of his book), Simon Singh (The Code Book/Science of Secrecy) and Michael Smith (Station X/The Emporers Codes) - the latter two giving crypto talks in the house. And will "Rolling Stone" Mick Jagger, the producer of the film and War World II history nut, make an appearance? Plus all the usual tours, computer games, code breaking demonstrations etc. Well worth a visit, although rail travel might be difficult that day due to maintenance work near Milton Keynes.

Paul's Enigma emulator page.
Bletchley Park website