explain xkcd - User contributions [en]

2913: Periodic Table Regions

2024-03-29T20:31:21Z

108.162.245.44: /* Table Sections */

{{comic
| number = 2913
| date = March 29, 2024
| title = Periodic Table Regions
| image = periodic_table_regions_2x.png
| imagesize = 740x501px
| noexpand = true
| titletext = Cesium-133, let it be. Cesium-134, let it be even more.
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Created by a LAWFUL NEUTRAL MURDER WEAPON COMMONLY USED TO MAKE PEOPLE'S VOICES SQUEAKY- Please change this comment when editing this page. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}

=== Table Sections ===

{| class=wikitable
! scope="col" | Section
! scope="col" | Real table
! scope="col" | Elements contained
! scope="col" | Explanation
|-
| Slightly fancy protons || Hydrogen || Hydrogen || Hydrogen atoms are a proton and an electron. Since the electron can be removed and you can call that a Hydrogen+ ion, hydrogen is a slightly fancy proton.
|-
| Weird dirt || Group 1 and 2 metals || Lithium, Beryllium ||
|-
| Regular dirt || Group 1 and 2 metals || Sodium, Magnesium, Potassium, Calcium
|-
| Ends in a number, let it slumber. Ends in a letter, not much better. || Group 1 and 2 metals || Rubidium, Strontium, C(a)esium , Barium, Francium, Radium || Highly reactive metals, some of which are commonly used as radioactive isotopes (which are known by a number).
|-
| $$$ || The platinum group || Ruthenium, Rhodium, Palladium, Rhenium, Osmium, Iridium ||
|-
| Lawful Neutral || Noble Gases || Helium, Neon, Argon, Krypton || These elements are mostly unreactive. UwU
|-
| You are here || Mixed | Oxygen, Carbon, Nitrogen || Elements involved in biological processes
|-
| Safety Goggles required || Halogens || Fluorine, Chlorine || These elements are highly reactive. OwO
|}

==Transcript==
{{incomplete transcript|Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}

:[A periodic table with regions labeled.]

:[Hydrogen:]
:Slightly fancy protons
:[Lithium and beryllium:]
:Weird dirt
:[4 elements below:]
:Regular dirt
:[6 elements further below:]
:Ends in a number, let it slumber
:ends in a letter, not much better
:[Left side of the d-block:]
:Boring alloy metals
:Probably critical to the spark plug industry or something
:(but one of them is radioactive so stay on your toes)
:[Most of the top row of the d-block + aluminium:]
:Regular metals
:[Between "boring" and "weird metals":]
:$$$$
:[Boron:]
:Boron (fool's carbon)
:[Top-center of p-block:]
:You are here
:[Top-right of p-block, excluding the rightmost column:]
:Safety goggles required
:[5 uppermost elements of the rightmost column:]
:Lawful neutral
:[Iodine and radon:]
:Very specific health problems
:[Below and to the right of "weird metals":]
:Murder weapons
:[Bottom row of d- and p-blocks:]
:Don't bother learning their names - they're not staying long
:[f-block below the rest of the table, arrow pointing to a gap in the third column:]
:Whoever figures out a better way to fit these up there gets the next Nobel Prize

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Chemistry]]

664: Academia vs. Business

2021-01-18T18:57:49Z

108.162.245.44: The original phrasing missed the "as" in "as fast as possible" and just sounded awkward. Personally I would remove the i.e. entirely but I didn't want to muck with it too much.

{{comic
| number = 664
| date = November 18, 2009
| title = Academia vs. Business
| image = academia_vs_business.png
| titletext = Some engineer out there has solved P=NP and it's locked up in an electric eggbeater calibration routine. For every 0x5f375a86 we learn about, there are thousands we never see.
}}

== Explanation ==
[[Cueball]] has solved some tricky and very important problem in computer science, related to {{w|queueing theory}}.

The comic splits into two timelines. Showing the brilliant computer code he'd written to somebody who actually knows computer code allows the academic to see the programmer's true brilliance and get him much-earned plaudits from the academic community.

In the alternate timeline – implied to be what ''actually'' happens – the boss, not possessing that knowledge, simply sees the results and not the means Cueball used to attain them. He then gives Cueball another assignment. This, sadly, is the usual course of events in bureaucracy, which only seems to care about your results, not how you came about them. To drive in the point, the boss asks Cueball to do something as simple as setting up email on the office phones, a stark contrast to the skill and creativity Cueball would have needed to write his code in the first panel.

The references in the title text are to the {{w|P versus NP problem}}, a famous unsolved problem in computer science, and the "magical constant" (0x5f375a86) used in finding the {{w|fast inverse square root}}, i.e. solving y=1/√x as fast as possible through a program – no-one knows quite who came up this very useful bit of code (Now believed to be devised by Greg Walsh at Ardent Computer in consultation with Cleve Moler, the creator of MATLAB. see wikipedia), but it was discovered hiding in the graphics code of the video game {{w|Quake III Arena}}. Note that the actual constant used in the Quake III source code is 0x5f375'''9df''', but the constant in the title text works also, and is actually slightly more accurate as shown in this paper: [http://www.lomont.org/Math/Papers/2003/InvSqrt.pdf Fast inverse square root by CHRIS LOMONT (Purdue university, 2003)].

The title text may be a reference to {{w|Stephen Jay Gould}}'s quotation: “I am, somehow, less interested in the weight and convolutions of Einstein’s brain than in the near certainty that people of equal talent have lived and died in cotton fields and sweatshops.” about how great minds may be exploited by the commercial world and their genius go unknown.

==Transcript==
:[Cueball sits at a desk in front of a computer, leaning back in his chair with both hands down to his side. There are cans on the desk and more crushed ones on the floor.]
:Cueball: I just wrote the most beautiful code of my life.

:[Zoom in on Cueball and top half of desk.]
:Cueball: They casually handed me an impossible problem. In 48 hours and 200 lines, I ''solved'' it.

:[Curved lines with arrows divide the comic into two possible end panels, labeled "Academia" and "Business."]

:Academia:
:Professor: My god... this will mean a half-dozen papers, a thesis or two, and a paragraph in every textbook on queuing theory!

:Business:
:Boss: You got the program to stop jamming up? Great. While you're fixing stuff, can you get Outlook to sync with our new phones?

{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Programming]]
[[Category:Multiple Cueballs]]

Talk:548: Kindle

2016-11-12T13:20:50Z

108.162.245.44:

I changed the explanation so that it refers to the device actually being the fictional, encyclopedic ''Guide'', not the novel. For one thing, the novel describes the ''Guide'' as essentially an e-book (despite being published in 1979). Mainly, having the novel on hand while traveling would not be of much use in the ways described, while access to the fictional encyclopedia would match the description exactly, just as it is used in the fictional franchise. [[User:Jerodast|- jerodast]] ([[User talk:Jerodast|talk]]) 23:53, 3 December 2012 (UTC) Where is the transcript? [[Special:Contributions/121.54.48.38|121.54.48.38]] 04:09, 12 May 2013 (UTC)

this was before. Wikipedia offline for android. {{unsigned ip|108.168.13.84}}

There's no transcript. Someone fix please? [[Special:Contributions/108.162.216.45|108.162.216.45]] 04:50, 9 November 2013 (UTC)

The transcript is done. --[[User:Dgbrt|Dgbrt]] ([[User talk:Dgbrt|talk]]) 19:45, 9 November 2013 (UTC)

Alternative explanation: Cueball hid his copy of the Guide in a Kindle shell.
[[Special:Contributions/108.162.245.44|108.162.245.44]] 13:20, 12 November 2016 (UTC)

Talk:277: Long Light

2016-11-10T20:15:06Z

108.162.245.44:

The driver seems to know that the light always takes forever and yet there he is. Sometimes people get what they deserve. {{unsigned|99.234.144.69}}

when I'm at a long light like this, I don't blame the engineer of that light, I blame the city planner who decided to put that light at that intersection when a different system would have worked better (one that adjusts to time of day and/or uses sensors to notice that someone's waiting and there's no traffic). just sayin' [[Special:Contributions/70.72.16.171|70.72.16.171]] 13:42, 25 April 2013 (UTC)

:Not that 70.72.16.171 will necessarily see this, but there are traffic engineers, who design intersections (not only the types, number, and arrangement of individual signal assemblies and sensors in a given intersection, but also any timing or sensor-based relationship with other intersections and several other things not signal-related). I think the engineer in the comic is one of these traffic engineers (maybe that's what ...16.171 is calling a city planner?). It's not the one that designed the actual assembly of bulbs, lenses, circuits and housing that makes up a given "signal" - which would also no doubt be an engineer (somewhere in the civil/electrical area I might venture to guess)[[User:Brettpeirce|Brettpeirce]] ([[User talk:Brettpeirce|talk]]) 18:28, 18 February 2014 (UTC

:I am a traffic engineer, and there are lots of reasons why intersections are designed as they are, and lots of reasons why they don't live up to expectations. Aside from the inherent difficulty of predicting traffic, there are issues centring around when the intersection was designed and when the user experiences it (this can be decades), the availability of data on the subject (in all but the densest/busiest areas most people would be surprised how little data there is, I think), and just the sheer expense of some "simple" solutions. For example, ...16.171's jurisdiction may not consider worth ~$100 000 to put in a sensor just so the occasional driver who wants to turn left from a low-volume approach only waits 20 seconds instead of 60.[[Special:Contributions/108.162.219.102|108.162.219.102]] 22:27, 26 May 2015 (UTC)

[[Special:Contributions/108.162.250.203|108.162.250.203]] 06:44, 27 April 2014 (UTC)Doesn't mean Cueball can't reverse away to get the engineer off his . Unless it's a one-way street.
:Or there's another behind him that we can't see because of reasons of artistic brevity. -Pennpenn [[Special:Contributions/108.162.249.221|108.162.249.221]] 04:50, 6 February 2015 (UTC)

The punchline gets funnier based on how far away you are from the forthcoming Tuesday. Only share this comic on Wednesdays. {{unsigned ip|108.162.216.71}}

: LOLing right now as it's monday and I scrolled down to see when it was posted (Friday) [[Special:Contributions/162.158.69.142|162.158.69.142]] 19:04, 24 October 2016 (UTC)

It looks like the engineer comes out of the bumper :)[[Special:Contributions/108.162.245.44|108.162.245.44]] 20:15, 10 November 2016 (UTC)