I've considered this, I was planning on reimplementing `bc' or something on those lines. Perhaps some kind of crypto suite or physics sandbox would work for me?

I've considered this, I was planning on reimplementing `bc' or something on those lines. Perhaps some kind of crypto suite or physics sandbox would work for me? What sort of programs did you write, I'd love to hear more! What I'm looking for is theoretical knowledge, and that's something else I struggle with. Can I still get that with more hands on experience? For instance, something I find fascinating are One Time Pads. They're perfectly secure, given len(k) >= len(m); so the key must be the same length as the message. As far as I understand, it's because each possible key may produce any possible message which I think is expressed: Pr(x) = 1/|U| Where U is the universe of all possible messages: {0, 1}^n where n = len(k) I probably wrote some mistakes there. I was able to pick this concept up, I think as it just made sense to me; maybe I was able to visualize it or I could just think it through and realize the conclusion made sense.