An \(n_3\)-configuration in the real projective plane is a configuration consisting of \(n\) points and \(n\) lines such that every point is on three lines and every line contains three points. Determining sets are used to construct drawings of arbitrary \(n_3\)-configurations in the plane, such that one line is represented as a circle. It is proved that the required determining set always exists, and that such a drawing is always possible. This is applied to the problem of deciding when a particular configuration is coordinatizable.

For a given graph \(G\), we fix \(s\), and partition the vertex set into \(s\) classes, so that any given class contains few edges. The result gives a partition \((U_1, U_2, \ldots, U_s)\), where \(e(U_i) \leq \frac{e(G)}{s^2} + 4s\sqrt{e(G)}\) for each \(1 \leq i \leq s\). The error term is compared to previous results for \(s = 2^P\) \({[6]}\), and to a result by Bollobás and Scott \({[1]}\).

We associate codes with \(C(n,n,1)\) designs. The perfect \(C(n,n,1)\) designs obtained from perfect one-factorizations of \(K_n\) yield codes of dimension \(n-2\) over \(\mathbb{F}_2\) and \(n-1\) over \(\mathbb{F}_p\), for \(p\neq 2\). We also demonstrate a method of obtaining another \(C(n,n,1)\) design from a pair of isomorphic perfect \(C(n,n,1)\) designs and determine the dimensions of the resulting codes.

In a previous work “Skolem labelled graphs” \({[4]}\) we defined the Skolem labelling of graphs, here we prove that the necessary conditions are sufficient for a Skolem or minimum hooked Skolem labelling of all \(k\)-windmills. A \(k\)-windmill is a tree with \(k\) leaves each lying on an edge-disjoint path of length \(m\) to the centre. These paths are called the vanes.

Let \(v\), \(k\),\(\lambda\) and \(n\) be positive integers. \((x_1, x_2, \ldots, x_k)\) is defined to be \(\{(x_1, x_2), (x_2, x_3), \ldots, (x_k-1, x_k), (x_k, x_1)\}\), and is called a cyclically ordered \(k\)-subset of \(\{x_1, x_2, \ldots, x_1\}\). An incomplete perfect Mendelsohn design, denoted by \((v, n, 4, \lambda)\)-IPMD, is a triple \((X, Y, \mathcal{B})\), where \(X\) is a \(v\)-set (of points), \(Y\) is an \(n\)-subset of \(X\), and \(\mathcal{B}\) is a collection of cyclically ordered \(k\)-subsets of \(X\) (called blocks) such that every ordered pair \((a, b) \in X \times X \setminus Y \times Y\) appears \(t\)-apart in exactly \(\lambda\) blocks of \(\mathcal{B}\) and no ordered pair \((x, y) \in Y \times Y\) appears in any block of \(\mathcal{B}\) for any \(t\), where \(1 \leq t \leq (k – 1)\). In this paper, the necessary condition for the existence of a \((v, n, 4, \lambda)\)-IPMD for even \(\lambda\), namely \(v \geq (3n + 1)\), is shown to be sufficient.

Generalized Steiner Systems, \(\text{GS}(2, 3, n, g)\), are equivalent to maximum constant weight codes over an alphabet of size \(g+1\) with distance \(3\) and weight \(3\) in which each codeword has length \(n\). We construct Generalized Steiner Triple Systems, \(\text{GS}(2,3,n,g)\), when \(g=4\).

Using a computer implementation, we show that two more of the Steiner triple systems on \(15\) elements are perfect, i.e., that there are binary perfect codes of length \(15\), generating \(STS\) which have rank \(15\). This answers partially a question posed by Hergert in \({[3]}\).

We also briefly study the inverse problem of generating a perfect code from a Steiner triple system using a greedy algorithm. We obtain codes that were not previously known to be generated by such procedures.

We study \(F(n,m)\), the number of compositions of \(n\) in which repetition of parts is allowed, but exactly \(m\) distinct parts are used. We obtain explicit formulas, recurrence relations, and generating functions for \(F(n,m)\) and for auxiliary functions related to \(F\). We also consider the analogous functions for partitions.