TLDR: I developed a couple of new way of transmitting multiple signals over the same redstone wire. The decoders could definitely be used for other things.


So, I was working on method of transmitting multiple signals over a few wires that i thought would work well for a storage system (it didn't) and I wanted to post it here because I think it could be useful for certain situations. I also think there's a lot of room for improvement but I'm tired of working on it so I'm releasing what I've done with it so far. There are a few different versions, they all turn different pulses into separate outputs and they transmit data at 2x the binary sum of the number of transmission lines. So, for example, 2 lines can handle 6 different signals (2x (1+2)) and 4 lines can handle 30 signals
(2x (1+2+4+8)). The first three versions I designed are all modified versions of Ammorth's binary adder. All of the repeaters on red wool have had their delay extended for the sake of having the A and B outputs output their signal at the same time.

The first version (lime green) sends signals in one, or two, pulses and separates them into one of two outputs at the receiving end. It's two wide A/B tileable on the encoding end and two wide tileable on the decoding end. It honestly is way too slow to be worth using for data transmission. The only reason I even included it is because I thought the ability to separate two pulses into different outputs could have other uses. The encoding time is 9 ticks (that's the minimum time between two different signals, more time is needed if the incoming signals are for the same decoder) and the decoding time is 11 ticks.

I immediately designed a second version (blue) because the first version was way too slow. This time, instead of using two pulses, I used a short pulse vs a long pulse to get two different outputs. This shortened the encoding time to 5 ticks (again, minimum time between two signals and more time is needed between signals going to the same decoder) and decoding time to 10 ticks. The encoding end is still two wide A/B tileable and decoding end is two wide tileable.

For the third version (orange) I figured out how to differentiate the two signals without using two xor gates. This makes the decoder more compact and reduces decoding time to 7 ticks but requires the decoder to be two wide A/B tiled. Encoding is unchanged.

The last version (black) simplifies the decoding process and reduces the decoding time to 5 ticks. This design is one wide non tileable. Encoding is still unchanged.

After the work I've done so far, I'm convinced that, with some more tweaking, both encoding and decoding could be done faster. And, I think pulse coding could be really useful if it were a bit faster. I still think these decoders could have some uses, even at their current speed. I don't know if anyone else will be interested in working on these (or using them) but I thought it was a pretty cool way to encode and decode so I wanted to share it.

In case I screwed up setting the world spawn the build is at /tp 69 69 69