For this task, you need to work as a group to finish this project. First, form the project group. Then discuss frequently inside the group using whatever software you like and divide the work. You must finish the program and the report on time and submit them as a zip file on Canvas. It is challenging to work together online. Be prepared and start early.
Sign up for one group here.
You can only join one group. Each group allows 2 to 5 students. You must sign in one group in order to get the grade. Please also includes all the group member names in the final report (a pdf file). Name your zip file by the group number (Group1.zip, etc.). Each group only need to submit one copy on Canvas. So please communicate well to avoid multiple submissions. This project is due at the end of week 6 and doesn't allow late submission.
In this lab, you will use cellular automata to create a 2D predator–prey simulation in your program. The preys are ants and the predators are doodlebugs.
Ants and doodlebugs live in a 20 * 20 grid of cells. Only one critter may occupy a cell at a time. The grid is enclosed and no critter may move off the grid. Time is simulated in steps. Each critter performs some actions every time step.
The ants behave according to the following model: Move: For every time step, the ants randomly move up, down, left, or right. If the neighboring cell in the selected direction is occupied or would move the ant off the grid, then the ant stays in the current cell. Breed: If an ant survives for three time steps (not been eaten by doodlebugs), at the end of the time step (i.e., after moving) the ant will breed. This is simulated by creating a new ant in an adjacent (up, down, left, or right) cell that is empty randomly. If the cell that is picked is not empty, randomly attempt to pick another one. If there is no empty cell available, no breeding occurs. Once an offspring is produced, an ant cannot produce an offspring again until it has survived three more time steps. The doodlebugs behave according to the following model:
Move: For every time step, the doodlebug will firstly try to move to an adjacent cell containing an ant and eat the ant (you can decide if there are several ants in the adjacent cells, how the doodlebug will choose to move). If there are no ants in adjacent cells, the doodlebug moves according to the same rules as the ant. Note that a doodlebug cannot eat other doodlebugs. Breed: If a doodlebug survives for eight time steps, at the end of the time step, it will spawn off a new doodlebug in the same manner as the ant (the Doodlebug will only breed into an empty cell). Starve: If a doodlebug has not eaten an ant within three time steps, at the end of the third time step it will starve and die. The doodlebug should then be removed from the grid of cells.
Create a class named Critter that contains data and functions common to ants and doodlebugs. This class should have a virtual function named move that is defined in the derived classes of Ant and Doodlebug. Each class will be in its own source file.
Initialize the world with 5 doodlebugs and 100 ants. You will randomly place them on the grid. You will prompt the user to enter the number of time steps to run.
For each time step, do the following in your program: after moves, when breeding, eating, and starving are resolved, display the resulting grid. Draw the world using ASCII characters of “O” for an ant, “X” for a doodlebug and blank space for an empty space (the characters should be arranged to look like a grid). The doodlebugs will move before the ants in each time step. When you reach the time steps entered by the user, ask them to enter another number and start to run the simulation again or to exit the program. You must maintain the state of the current grid while creating the next display.
You should use a dynamic array to represent the grid. Each array element will be a pointer to a Critter. Get your program running and tested. You should see a cyclical pattern between the population of predators and prey, although random perturbations may lead to the elimination of one or both species.
For debugging your program, you should save the random placement until you have everything else working properly. In general, “random” is bad for testing and debugging.
In addition to prompting the user for the number of time steps, ask them to enter the size of the grid rows and columns, the number of ants, and the number of doodlebugs. If you did the extra credit part, you must print a line on the screen at the beginning of your program to inform the grader that you did it.