Solution

ID: past-exam-of-the-mathematics-course-of-the-university-of-cambridge/2005/ii/paper-3/12j/solution

A linear length- cyclic code is a subspace closed under cyclic coordinate shifts. Identify a word with its polynomial modulo ; multiplying by performs the shift. Thus a cyclic code is an ideal of . Its preimage in the polynomial ring is an ideal containing , so the Euclidean algorithm gives a unique monic generator dividing . The generator polynomial of a cyclic code is and the check polynomial of a cyclic code is ; a word lies in the code exactly when .
For the binary length-seven code, the given factors with
This cubic has no binary root and is irreducible. Let be its root in . Since the nonzero multiplicative group has prime order seven and , its seven powers enumerate all nonzero elements. The condition gives a three-row binary parity-check matrix whose columns are precisely the seven nonzero vectors of . This is Hamming's code in a cyclic coordinate order. It has dimension four, and minimum distance three: no one or two distinct nonzero columns sum to zero, while itself has weight three. Its sixteen radius-one balls have total size , confirming the original perfect Hamming code.
It actually contains its dual code in this coordinate order. Each parity-check row has four ones, and any two distinct rows have two simultaneous ones, so over . The row space therefore lies in . Equivalently the dual generator is the reciprocal check polynomial
which is divisible by . Hence there is a three-dimensional subcode equal to the dual, and in any other coordinate order it is equivalent to that dual.

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