The Nordstrom-Robinson, Kerdock, and (slightly modified) Pre\- parata codes
are shown to be linear over \ZZ_4, the integers mod4. The Kerdock and
Preparata codes are duals over \ZZ_4, and the Nordstrom-Robinson code is
self-dual. All these codes are just extended cyclic codes over \ZZ_4. This
provides a simple definition for these codes and explains why their Hamming
weight distributions are dual to each other. First- and second-order
Reed-Muller codes are also linear codes over \ZZ_4, but Hamming codes in
general are not, nor is the Golay code.Comment: 5 page