Properties of finite codes as foretold by Restivo, Černý, Biskup & Plandowski, and Perrin

Abstract
If you are a theoretical computer scientist, a code is a set of finite words such that no word can be obtained as a concatenation of codewords in two different ways. If you are a mathematician, a code is a basis of a free submonoid of a finitely generated free monoid. If you are stuck in between, a code is a very interesting object to study.

Our culture is much more fragile than we like to think. As a countermeasure, instead of advertising my own recent results, in this talk I will make a humble attempt at the ambitious goal of bringing more attention to several beautiful and mostly forgotten old open problems about finite codes. I will try to illustrate what makes them beautiful, but will give no hints to why they are forgotten, for I am puzzled about that myself.

Speaker
Dr Andrew Ryzhikov (Department of Computer Science, University of Oxford)