A generalized mobile automaton is a generalization of the mobile automaton in which the automaton may have more than one active cell. Generalized mobile automata allow for more change in a single update, so interesting behavior can develop more rapidly. Like cellular automata, the generalized mobile automata can involve parallel computing. During an updating event, every active cell is updated based on the value of that cell and its neighbors. The update determines the new color for the active cell, and specifies which if any of it and its neighbors become active cells. A cell becomes active if any of the previous step's events determined that it should become active. An example is shown above.

cellular automaton | mobile automaton | Turing machine