explain xkcd - User contributions [en]

Talk:3054: Scream Cipher

2025-02-23T10:33:12Z

141.101.99.88: Pronunciation request

What's the American alphabet? [[Special:Contributions/172.68.64.213|172.68.64.213]] 01:16, 22 February 2025 (UTC)AnAussie
Anyone know a good free all-language OCR tool to help with the transcript? [[Special:Contributions/172.69.67.156|172.69.67.156]] 17:30, 21 February 2025 (UTC)
: Found one here: https://www.lexilogos.com/keyboard/diacritics.htm --mezimm [[Special:Contributions/172.68.2.70|172.68.2.70]] 17:52, 21 February 2025 (UTC)

The written cipher is very interesting, but where can I hear recordings of the spoken form? [[Special:Contributions/Rockymountain|Rockymountain]] 17:31, 21 February 2025 (UTC)
: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eL4piuUn5nc Here ya go.] --mezimm [[Special:Contributions/172.68.35.117|172.68.35.117]] 17:54, 21 February 2025 (UTC)

Are Cueball and Megan millenials? Who else would text greetings when they're standing right next to each other? [[User:Barmar|Barmar]] ([[User talk:Barmar|talk]]) 17:38, 21 February 2025 (UTC)
:They could be texting other people. [[User:B_for_brain|B for brain]] ([[User_talk:B_for_brain|talk]]) ([https://www.youtube.com/@bforbrain youtube channel] [https://bforbrain.weebly.com/ wobsite (supposed to be a blag)]) 19:37, 21 February 2025 (UTC)
:Engineers and cyberfolk were text messaging their neighbors rather than talking long before it was <s>cool</s> encouraged for social distancing or quarantine! It's always helpful to get a reminder not to do this. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.159.101|162.158.159.101]] 20:37, 21 February 2025 (UTC)
:They might not be diegetically in the same room. Comics can get weird with physical space. [[User:GreatWyrmGold|GreatWyrmGold]] ([[User talk:GreatWyrmGold|talk]]) 20:34, 21 February 2025 (UTC)

Likely a pun on "stream cipher"

- Related reference: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scream_(cipher) [[Special:Contributions/172.68.26.229|172.68.26.229]] 17:46, 21 February 2025 (UTC)

A̦ÅÄ ẠÂÅȀ, A̓A̅ ȀÅÄĂA̱ ȦÁ ÂÁAĂĂA̦ A̮ÄÂÂA̦ A̓A̮ ȀÁ A̱A̓A̱ A ÀÁÂÃA̓ÅÂ ÅA̮ A̅A̰A̓Ã A̭AA̋Á A̓Â A̅A̰A̓Ã ÃA̅A̦ĂÁ! --mezimm [[Special:Contributions/172.68.3.112|172.68.3.112]] 17:50, 21 February 2025 (UTC)

:The Wikifunction [https://www.wikifunctions.org/view/en/Z22728 from Scream] returns "YOU KNOW, JA̅ WOULD BE NEALLY FUNNY JF WE DJD A VENSJON OF A̅HJS A̭AGE JN A̅HJS SA̅YLE!". Hmmm... [[User:Mwarren|Mwarren]] ([[User talk:Mwarren|talk]]) 19:04, 21 February 2025 (UTC)

::The page you link to came into existence 7 minutes after I had posted this comment ;) I was doing it all manually, using [https://www.lexilogos.com/keyboard/diacritics.htm this page] and best-guess attempts to interpret what Randall's handwritten diacritics were meant to correspond to. --mezimm [[Special:Contributions/172.68.1.158|172.68.1.158]] 19:55, 21 February 2025 (UTC)

::: updated version: "A̦ÅÄ ẠÂÅȀ, ẢĀ ȀÅÄĂA̱ ȦÁ ȂÁAĂĂA̦ A̮ÄÂÂA̦ ẢA̮ ȀÁ A̱ẢA̱ A ÀÁȂÃẢÅÂ ÅA̮ ĀA̰ẢÃ A̯AA̋Á ẢÂ ĀA̰ẢÃ ÃĀA̦ĂÁ!" --mezimm [[Special:Contributions/172.68.3.67|172.68.3.67]] 20:01, 21 February 2025 (UTC)

On Wikifunctions, we implemented the two functions [https://www.wikifunctions.org/view/en/Z22725 to Scream Cipher] and [https://www.wikifunctions.org/view/en/Z22728 from Scream Cipher] --[[Special:Contributions/172.70.38.235|172.70.38.235]] 18:09, 21 February 2025 (UTC)

:It looks like the wikifunctions are using a different character for "D" than [https://scream-cipher.netlify.app/ the github project] linked in the explanation. Seems as though one's using U+0331 and the other's using 0332. [[User:Schiffy|Schiffy]] ([[User_talk:Schiffy|Speak to me]]|[[Special:Contributions/Schiffy|What I've done]]) 20:32, 21 February 2025 (UTC)

Is there a logic behind the choices of the letter? I guess A̧ is for C because of the French ç and Å is pronounced like O in some Nordic languages. Also, is it A̱, A̲ or A̲ ? (or something else). [[Special:Contributions/172.71.126.50|172.71.126.50]] 18:10, 21 February 2025 (UTC)
: Seems to be mostly visual similarity. Å has an actual O shape added to it. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.110.171|172.70.110.171]] 20:19, 21 February 2025 (UTC)

I give it a week for people to make a translator to and from this cipher. [[User:CalibansCreations|'''Caliban''']] ([[User talk:CalibansCreations|talk]]) 18:20, 21 February 2025 (UTC)

- The Wikifunctions translations above were complete at least 11 minutes ''before'' your comment and well within the goal of one week :-) . [[User:Mwarren|Mwarren]] ([[User talk:Mwarren|talk]]) 19:04, 21 February 2025 (UTC)

Numbers should be variations of h and/or g. [[User:Andyd273|Andyd273]] ([[User talk:Andyd273|talk]]) 18:32, 21 February 2025 (UTC)#
:H > g [[User:SqueakSquawk4|SqueakSquawk4]] ([[User talk:SqueakSquawk4|talk]]) 18:59, 21 February 2025 (UTC)

Using ''sed'' you can encode with <code>sed 's/C/A̧/g;s/D/A̱/g;s/F/A̮/g;s/G/A̋/g;s/H/A̰/g;s/J/A̓/g;s/P/A̯/g;s/Q/A̤/g;s/X/A̽/g;s/Y/A̦/g;y/BEIKLMNORSTUVWZ/ȦÁẢẠĂǍÂÅȂÃĀÄÀȀȺ/'</code> and decode with <code>sed 's/A̧/C/g;s/A̱/D/g;s/A̮/F/g;s/A̋/G/g;s/A̰/H/g;s/A̓/J/g;s/A̯/P/g;s/A̤/Q/g;s/A̽/X/g;s/A̦/Y/g;y/ȦÁẢẠĂǍÂÅȂÃĀÄÀȀȺ/BEIKLMNORSTUVWZ/'</code>. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.159.102|162.158.159.102]] 18:41, 21 February 2025 (UTC)
: This is really neat. I suppose `tr` might work too. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.10.242|162.158.10.242]] 16:15, 22 February 2025 (UTC)

It would be really funny if someone added an image of Bill Cipher screaming, with the tag "A screaming cipher". It wouldn't reall fit but it'd be funny [[User:SqueakSquawk4|SqueakSquawk4]] ([[User talk:SqueakSquawk4|talk]]) 18:59, 21 February 2025 (UTC)
:[[File:Screamingcipher.png]] I did. [[User:B_for_brain|B for brain]] ([[User_talk:B_for_brain|talk]]) ([https://www.youtube.com/@bforbrain youtube channel] [https://bforbrain.weebly.com/ wobsite (supposed to be a blag)]) 19:57, 21 February 2025 (UTC) (EDIT: WOW, that thing is MASSIVE! Can someone please downscale it because I have no idea how. You have permission to edit my comment '''''only for that.''''') (DOUBLE EDIT: Nevermind, I did it.)
Someone started a GitHub repo with a web-based encoded/decoder already: https://github.com/Reginald-Gillespie/StreamCipher [[User:Dlech|Dlech]] ([[User talk:Dlech|talk]]) 19:35, 21 February 2025 (UTC)

I'd almost want to edit in my repo instead of the current one because mine is objectively better, but I'm new to this and not sure if that's appropriate or not =P (I don't even know if I am commenting correctly) [[User:WKoA|WKoA]] ([[User talk:WKoA|talk]]) 00:17, 22 February 2025 (UTC)
:Look to the likes of the [[1190: Time]] comic, where several different fanbase compilations may have been given. I would anticipate that you could do a decent job of editing "This thing here does..." into "Ways of experiencing it include this [existing one] and that [yours] [with room to add more, if they add up]. Or just mention your link here, let others decide if your claims of (better?) functionality stand up enough to prompt it to be put up alongside/ahead/instead of the other. I am at least intrigued as to how you did it differently.
:And you certainly had a bit of trouble with the signing. Just add <nowiki>~~~~</nowiki> to the end of Talk comments and it autoreplaces. No need to go back in and edit (I added the original timestamp back in, for you, just for future reference). Unless of course you forgot to do it the first time... ;) [[Special:Contributions/172.71.178.161|172.71.178.161]] 02:41, 22 February 2025 (UTC)

I know you can decode a substitution cipher by counting letters and replacing common ones like 'E' and then filling in the rest by inspection, but what kinds of automated approaches are there? [[Special:Contributions/162.158.159.105|162.158.159.105]] 20:14, 21 February 2025 (UTC)

'''HEADS UP:''' I just changed A̲ (0332 COMBINING LOW LINE) to A̱ (0331 COMBINING MACRON BELOW) as encoding for "D" in the table and the transcript. Rationale: "T" is written with macron, so it's only logical to encode "D" likewise. A "low line" is longer than a macron, and looking at Randall's comic, the line below the "D" is definitely not longer than the one above "T". It would also make no sense to encode "T" with a "combining low line" as well when a single, uncombined character exists. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.114.123|172.70.114.123]] 20:29, 21 February 2025 (UTC)
: These options should all be including as different writing styles! I think the longer line makes it clearer that A̲ represents D because the ink comes nearer to forming into a closed curve. [[Special:Contributions/172.68.54.68|172.68.54.68]] 15:55, 22 February 2025 (UTC)

I expect to win a Turing Award for my proof this cypher is computationally equivalent to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whitespace_(programming_language) [[Special:Contributions/172.71.158.19|172.71.158.19]] 02:57, 22 February 2025 (UTC)

The page technically uses the incorrect characters for (at least) E, M, N, O, R, S, and T based on the title text shown on xkcd.com. The original title text uses two separate characters (ex. A + 0301 COMBINING ACUTE ACCENT for E), whereas the table uses the combined character (ex. 00C1 LATIN CAPITAL LETTER A WITH ACUTE for E). Alternatively, my browser is just doing something weird. Not necessarily worth updating, but something I noticed when implementing the cipher. [[User:Abus|Abus]] ([[User talk:Abus|talk]]) 06:22, 22 February 2025 (UTC)
: I think it's the browser. Firefox->Page Source gives me A+COMBINING WHATEVER, but <code>w3m -dump_source https://xkcd.com/3054/ | zcat | grep 'img.*title='</code> returns single characters. The title text here on explainxkcd was copied by ''TheusafBOT''. I trust ''TheusafBOT'' and ''w3m'' to be so basic and simple that they wouldn't try to do something 'clever' with the characters, whereas I tend to suspect the multi-MB-monster Firefox messed things up. I'm just guessing, though... could maybe someone test with yet another browser - e.g. Edge or Opera? [[Special:Contributions/162.158.159.107|162.158.159.107]] 11:52, 22 February 2025 (UTC)
:: Argh, no, turns out ''w3m'', and also ''wget'' all return A+COMBINING THINGY, but they got merged into the single chars by my ''xterm'' when I copied them to some 'identify unicode' web page. Looking at the raw file dumped by ''wget'' I see A+COMBINING XX - I think... So I think you are right with your observation! Randall uses A+COMBINING XX for the title text on XKCD (though I really doubt that was intentional), then ''TheusafBOT'' merged the characters when it copied the text to create this page. That said, I still think using the merged chars is cleaner. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.159.107|162.158.159.107]] 12:20, 22 February 2025 (UTC)
::: It may be worth noting the difference somewhere, even though the merged chars are cleaner. Someone copying the characters from this page to encipher text would technically be in violation of the "spec" since Randall used the two character version in the title text. If someone wished to decipher the title text from the original XKCD, this characters on this page would fail. [[User:Abus|Abus]] ([[User talk:Abus|talk]]) 18:56, 22 February 2025 (UTC)
: unsure how to indent a sourceblock, see below [[Special:Contributions/172.68.54.167|172.68.54.167]] 16:13, 22 February 2025 (UTC)
<source>$ curl -s https://m.xkcd.com | sed -ne 's/.*id="altText">$[^<]*$<.*/\1/p' | iconv -f utf8 -t wchar_t | hexdump -C
00000000 41 00 00 00 41 00 00 00 41 00 00 00 41 00 00 00 |A...A...A...A...|
00000010 41 00 00 00 41 00 00 00 20 00 00 00 41 00 00 00 |A...A... ...A...|
00000020 20 00 00 00 41 00 00 00 03 03 00 00 41 00 00 00 | ...A.......A...|
00000030 27 03 00 00 41 00 00 00 41 00 00 00 11 03 00 00 |'...A...A.......|
00000040 41 00 00 00 26 03 00 00 20 00 00 00 41 00 00 00 |A...&... ...A...|
00000050 0c 03 00 00 41 00 00 00 0a 03 00 00 41 00 00 00 |....A.......A...|
00000060 02 03 00 00 41 00 00 00 03 03 00 00 41 00 00 00 |....A.......A...|
00000070 04 03 00 00 41 00 00 00 01 03 00 00 41 00 00 00 |....A.......A...|
00000080 11 03 00 00 20 00 00 00 41 00 00 00 41 00 00 00 |.... ...A...A...|
00000090 41 00 00 00 41 00 00 00 41 00 00 00 41 00 00 00 |A...A...A...A...|
000000a0 41 00 00 00 21 00 00 00 0a 00 00 00 |A...!.......|</source>

'''TRIARESIS'''
Does anyone else view the triaresis as a missed opportunity? I'm thinking of Die Aerzte". [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Die_%C3%84rzte#Band_name]. Can someone insert the image of the band's logo? [[Special:Contributions/172.71.102.222|172.71.102.222]] 17:21, 22 February 2025 (UTC)
:I saw that, when following up on the actual A-diaresisand I quite like the idea that they {{tvtropes|HeavyMetalUmlaut|heavy metal umlauted}} an ''actual'' existing umlaut/diaeresis... If it weren't irrelevent to the comic (and skipped the bit at the top that actually translates the name), I might have relinked to that anchor point. But happily boosting the visibility of it here with a small reply⋯ [[Special:Contributions/172.68.205.122|172.68.205.122]] 21:31, 22 February 2025 (UTC)

Yes, should encode all numbers, in binary, using 'g' and 'h' for 0 and 1.[[Special:Contributions/172.70.162.195|172.70.162.195]] 17:56, 22 February 2025 (UTC)
:Why g and h? I saw an early comment saying the same. Why those when letters are A? --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 18:14, 22 February 2025 (UTC)
::I presume for the "AAAAAAAAAGH!" type thing... (Although, given that a number would then be something like GHHHGGH, as a separate word, I'm not sure it'll look "AAAAAAAGH"ish.
::And is it coded as MSF (42=101010), N-bit (e.g. =00101010), BCD per digit (4=0100 2=0010 =01000010) or some other form? Plenty of scope for interpretation.
::Also, might I suggest E and I (or I and E) for it, instead..? IEIEIE EEIEIEIE EIEEEEIE! [[Special:Contributions/172.68.205.178|172.68.205.178]] 19:10, 22 February 2025 (UTC)

Should "Augh" be added to the versions of screaming? Randall uses it alot, e.g. https://xkcd.com/493/, https://xkcd.com/1401/, https://xkcd.com/1388/, https://xkcd.com/1207/, https://xkcd.com/1226/, https://xkcd.com/780/, https://xkcd.com/990/ {{unsigned|Drkaii|18:06, 22 February 2025}}

ÅĂÃÃÀ ÂȦA̮Ⱥ! A̯ ȀA̦ÀȀÀȺĂ A̰ ÂÀÀẠ A̤ÀẢ AA̦ÀȀÅA̮ ǍA̦ÀĀ 2916 AÀ A̰ÄA̮ÀÄĂ A̱ÅÀ A̓A̰Ä ǍA̯ÄẠ A̓ÅA̰A̦A̰A̓AĂA̦Ⱥ ǍÀA̦ ȀȦÄA̓AȦA̰AA̯ÀÄ A̰ÄẠ ÄȦĀẢĂA̦Ⱥ AÀ A̰ẠẠ A̯ÄAÀ AÅĂ A̓A̯ȀÅĂA̦, A̰ÄẠ A̱ÅA̯AĂ ÅA̰A'Ⱥ ÅA̰A AÀ A̰ÄA̮ÀÄĂ A̱ÅÀ A̓A̰Ä ẠĂA̓A̯ȀÅĂA̦ AÅA̯Ⱥ A̯Ä 1 ĀA̯ÄȦAĂ ẢA̮ ÅA̰ÄẠ. (A̰ẢÂĀ: ĀȂA̦ A A̧ẢA̯A̰ÁȂ ĀA̰AĀ ȦÁA̋ẢÂÃ ȀẢĀA̰ ĀA̰Á ȦĂÄÁ, AÂA̱ A̱ÅÁÃ ẢĀÃ ȀÅȂẠ ȦA̦ A̱ÅẢÂA̋ A ĀȂAÂÃĂAĀẢÅÂ.)
(A̰ẢÂĀ ĀÅ ĀA̰Á A̰ẢÂĀ: ĀA̰Á ȦĂÄÁ A̧ÅÀÁȂÃ 70% ÅA̮ ĀA̰Á ȀÅȂĂA̱'Ã ÃÄȂA̮AA̧Á.) [[Special:Contributions/162.158.90.46|162.158.90.46]] 03:57, 23 February 2025 (UTC)

Can anybody provide pronunciation notes or recordings for those 'A's which are actually used in human languages? Can we transcribe the title text and the "Hello", "Hi" from the comic in IPA or something? [[Special:Contributions/141.101.99.88|141.101.99.88]] 10:33, 23 February 2025 (UTC)

1425: Tasks

2025-01-31T08:42:24Z

141.101.99.88: /* Explanation */ Without trying to deal with the basic facts, a smattering of changes to make the long run-on sentence more readable.

{{comic
| number = 1425
| date = September 24, 2014
| title = Tasks
| image = tasks.png
| titletext = In the 60s, Marvin Minsky assigned a couple of undergrads to spend the summer programming a computer to use a camera to identify objects in a scene. He figured they'd have the problem solved by the end of the summer. Half a century later, we're still working on it.
}}

==Explanation==
[[Cueball]] appears to be asking [[Ponytail]] to write an app that determines if a given picture is (1) taken in a national park, and (2) a picture of a bird. The first question is generally harder for a human to answer, but easy for an app that has access to location information and a {{w|geographic information system}} (GIS). The second one is easy for a human but much harder for a computer. This illustrates {{w|Moravec's paradox}} from the 1980s in a modern context. By the 1950s computers were useful for tasks like {{w|trajectory optimization}}, {{w|automated theorem proving|generating novel mathematical proofs}}, and {{w|English_draughts#Computer_players|the game of checkers}}, so such high-level computation and reasoning tasks that were hard for humans turned out to be relatively easy for them. On the other hand, it turns out to be hard to "give them the skills of a one-year-old when it comes to perception", as Moravec wrote.

In order to determine whether the user is in a national park, Ponytail plans to determine the user's location using the mobile device. This location will then be cross checked with a {{w|geographic information system}} (GIS) which will be able to determine whether the coordinates lie within a national park boundary.

Determining whether an image is of a given kind of natural object is far more difficult. This task falls into the area of {{w|computer vision}}. One of the goals in computer vision is to detect and classify objects within an image. This is a very challenging task for a number of reasons.

Firstly, humans use size, edge-assignment, movement, and stereoscopic vision when looking at a scene (not a picture of a thing, but the thing itself) to discern individual objects and then {{w|Figure-ground (perception)|categorize them as foreground or background}}. A photograph, however, is a static, monoscopic image that can only provide size and edge-assignment clues. Humans are only able to discern objects from background in photographs by comparing the photo against all of the things they've seen and everything they've learned about those things over the course of their life and {{w|Visual perception|identifying matching patterns}}.

Secondly, the quality of the photograph will have an impact on a computer's ability to match patterns. For example, the object in the photograph might be partially visible or occluded. In the case of a living bird, additional complications arise from the variations among individual birds of the same species and differences in pose (flying, perching in a tree, etc.). Differentiating between visually similar objects can result in false positives. For example, is it a photo of a [[1792: Bird/Plane/Superman|bird in flight or a plane <s>(or superman!)</s>]]? Ponytail's estimate of 5 years may be overly optimistic (see [[678: Researcher Translation]]).

The state-of-the-art algorithms for solving this kind of task (as of this comic's publishing) use local features (e.g. {{w|Scale-invariant feature transform|SIFT}} or {{w|Speeded up robust features|SURF}} in combination with a {{w|support vector machine}}) or a {{w|convolutional neural network}}.

The subtitle refers to "CS", which is a common abbreviation for "{{w|Computer Science}}", of which {{w|artificial intelligence}} and {{w|computer vision}} are sub-disciplines.

The title text mentions [http://dspace.mit.edu/bitstream/handle/1721.1/6125/AIM-100.pdf The Summer Vision Project] and {{w|Marvin Minsky}} of MIT. In the summer of 1966, he asked his undergraduate student {{w|Gerald Jay Sussman}} to [http://szeliski.org/Book/ "spend the summer linking a camera to a computer and getting the computer to describe what it saw"]. {{w|Seymour Papert}} drafted the plan, and it seems that Sussman was joined by {{w|Bill Gosper}}, {{w|Richard Greenblatt (programmer)|Richard Greenblatt}}, {{w|Leslie Lamport}}, Adolfo Guzman, Michael Speciner, John White, Benjamin, and Henneman - in case the multiple Wikipedia links don't give it away, know that this is a sizable cross-section of the AI researchers of the period. The project schedule allocated one summer for the completion of this task. The required time was obviously significantly underestimated, since dozens of research groups around the world are still working on this topic today.

A month after this comic came out, {{w|Flickr}} [http://code.flickr.net/2014/10/20/introducing-flickr-park-or-bird/ responded] with a [http://parkorbird.flickr.com/ prototype online tool] to do something similar to what the comic describes, using its automated-tagging software. According to them, the bird solution "took us less than 5 years to build, though it's definitely a hard problem, and we've still got room for improvement".

Now, years later, the second problem of detecting birds (or any other objects) in the image has also turned into a relatively easy application of existing technologies. There now exist both open- and closed-source image classification neural networks, after many groups have put in the years of research (with teams of computer scientists) into the problem of computer vision, and thanks to recent breakthroughs in neural net architectures.

==Transcript==
:[Ponytail sitting at a computer with Cueball standing behind her.]
:Cueball: When a user takes a photo, the app should check whether they're in a national park...
:Ponytail: Sure, easy GIS lookup. Gimme a few hours.
:Cueball: ...and check whether the photo is of a bird.
:Ponytail: I'll need a research team and five years.

:[Caption below the panel:]
:In CS, it can be hard to explain the difference between the easy and the virtually impossible.

{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Ponytail]]
[[Category:Artificial Intelligence]]
[[Category:Programming]]
[[Category:Photography]]
[[Category:Comics featuring real people]]

Talk:2983: Monocaster

2024-09-16T14:59:57Z

141.101.99.88:

Unicycles aren't (or at least aren't usually) chain-driven. I might try to fix that if my phone stops being so slow that it feels like I'm using a 90s PC to do this. Maybe a restart will help. Rebooting in 10, 9, 8... [[Special:Contributions/172.70.91.76|172.70.91.76]] 07:46, 10 September 2024 (UTC)
:I just went in and Actual Citation Needed it (seeing lower comment, when editor reloaded this page for me, forcing me to rewrite, that may have changed now).
:*It doesn't look like a chain-drive. Could be hub-geared, but not the same thing.
:*Chain-drive to raise the rider (most of the mass) up higher will ''raise'' the CoG.
:*'Underslung' chain-drive (see 1880s example, [[1673: Timeline of Bicycle Design|here]]?) has problems. Pedals hitting the ground would be one of them, unless your wheel was indeed significantly larger...
:*...and if it is (perhaps for better off-roading?), this intrinsically pushes up the CoG. Perhaps you are trying to lower it slightly, again, then. But you can't bring the saddle (and crotch!) lower than the now higher top of the wheel. ("Timeline of Bicycles" version excepted, assumed assymetric? In [https://digitalcollections.nypl.org/items/510d47de-4b7d-a3d9-e040-e00a18064a99 some manner]?)
:Add to that a few niggles about the bicycle. Not sure if intended to be a Moulton-style one (wheels maybe the classic 17", frame totally wrong) or a roadbike-style-ish one (frame relatively Ok, as drawn by someone not fully adhering to the design, maybe confused by some MTB variations, but clearly not in the ~27" wheel range, give or take). Of course, wheels are neither concentric nor circular, so depends a bit on which bits of the 'circles' are right for the intended arc and which bits ended up more casually doodled. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.91.99|172.70.91.99]] 08:51, 10 September 2024 (UTC)
::There also don't appear to be any pedals on the bicycle, with the rider instead resting their feet on the bottom bracket. Which is... unorthodox.[[Special:Contributions/141.101.99.135|141.101.99.135]] 11:16, 16 September 2024 (UTC)
:::Charitably, the nearside foot (and leg) is positioned at the top-going crank position, with the farside one stretched down to the down-angled crank/pedal, but the chainring is a ''solid'' disc (and a radius to match the crank-lengths), rather than the usual "with many cutout bits" and a few inches smaller in radius than the pedal-extents. [[Special:Contributions/141.101.99.88|141.101.99.88]] 14:59, 16 September 2024 (UTC)
:AFAIK, unicycles aren't GENERALLY chain-driven, but tall ones are (to put the peddles where the rider can reach them, but raise the rider up, often to a second story of a building). That said, I don't see a chain here, but I also don't see one in the description, so obviously sorted out by now. [[User:NiceGuy1|NiceGuy1]] ([[User talk:NiceGuy1|talk]]) 06:13, 15 September 2024 (UTC)

Hmm, Randall missed an opportunity to put a Penny-Farthing in there... though I'm not sure how that would have categorised given that it has two wheels of different sizes. --[[Special:Contributions/172.68.205.178|172.68.205.178]] 08:19, 10 September 2024 (UTC)
:He has a "Big Wheel Trike" (child's low-rider style thing) in there. On the logarithmic scale, and imprecise reference point (bottom/middle(/CoG,where different)/top of wheel/vehicle/rider/whole?), both the big front wheel and the small trailing wheels colpd be in the right place-ish, although having it slightly inclined could put them in the (place Tandall considers to be) ''exactly'' right place. ((Note also where the 10(?)-wheeler truck-and-trailer is placed horizontally vs the possibly relevent "number of wheels".))
:You could do something similar with the Old Ordinary (i.e. "Penny-Farthing"), either make it roughly right or depict going up a ''marginally'' steeper hill. [[Special:Contributions/172.69.194.142|172.69.194.142]] 09:04, 10 September 2024 (UTC)
:I'd say ignore the small wheel (would crowd with similar-sized wheels) and place according to the front wheel, might be easier to find room there. :) Agreed, missed opportunity, that front wheel '''''is''''' particularly large. Also, when talking about number of wheels and large wheels, how could he miss the {{w|BelAZ_75710}}? A lot of people have been introduced to the concept, 2 wheels per corner I think and I think the wheels are like 8 feet tall in diameter! (I guess like 2.5 meters or so, I'm just pretty sure it's well over my own height of 6'2", which I know is around 190cm or nearly 2m). [[User:NiceGuy1|NiceGuy1]] ([[User talk:NiceGuy1|talk]]) 06:42, 15 September 2024 (UTC)

Re: unicycles, the COG thing doesn't look right either, but I was distracted by a (thankfully) now-deleted troll comment before and actually fixing the description is beyond my skills, especially on so little sleep.[[Special:Contributions/172.69.43.184|172.69.43.184]] 08:35, 10 September 2024 (UTC)
:i had good intentions, we need to call randall out --[[Special:Contributions/172.69.194.122|172.69.194.122]] 09:44, 10 September 2024 (UTC)
:::If you mean your calling out the ''other'' point, that has been deleted anyway: Randall doesn't read this site (that we know; and, if I had a site such as this made for my works, I'd think it wisest to stay clear), so he probably won't get your 'message'. This particular comic doesn't even have the slightest connection to that subject, so not even the page to say anything about it. And the point made (even if it was a valid one... it presupposes that there are no nuances and compromises, that one cannot have a complex set of opinions that neither wholly match nor wholly mismatch ''your'' opinions) was also absurd, when you consider how the ''other'' party involved has proven to be even more so. I won't dignify this issue further by putting names and places here, it really isn't the forum for it. But please realise (if you don't already) that your irrelevent point is out of place here. And most places on this site that you/others like you may have tried such messaging on before. Go to /pol/, or your favourite forum's dedicated boards/threads. Ok? [[Special:Contributions/172.70.85.19|172.70.85.19]] 12:26, 10 September 2024 (UTC)
::Call him out for *what* exactly? [[Special:Contributions/172.68.70.135|172.68.70.135]] 12:05, 10 September 2024 (UTC)
:::As I dare to hint, just above, someone thinks Randall has a wrong personal opinion on some current issue. Which has nothing to do with this comic. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.85.19|172.70.85.19]] 12:26, 10 September 2024 (UTC)
:::You can check the history of this Talk section like I just did, some weirdo wrote a wild rant about Randall's politics (seems out of left field and based on nothing) which had nothing to do with the comic beyond ranting about Randall and Randall being the author. It was the original first comment. Most proper deletion, I say. [[User:NiceGuy1|NiceGuy1]] ([[User talk:NiceGuy1|talk]]) 06:31, 15 September 2024 (UTC)
::::Actually, I think the rant came more out of ''right'' field, but I agree with the rest of that assessment... ;) [[Special:Contributions/172.71.26.23|172.71.26.23]] 13:54, 15 September 2024 (UTC)

As a unicyclist myself, I don't think the unicycle is easier to balance because of a lower center of mass and a chain drive. As a few others have mentioned, they don't normally have a chain drive, although there are a few specialist ones that do. Normally, the cranks are just attached to the hub so you can directly control the speed of the wheel at a 1 to 1 ratio, which makes it easier to balance on. The other thing that would make the unicycle easier than the monocaster is that you can control what direction the wheel is pointing by turning the seat with your thighs. [[Special:Contributions/172.68.186.128|172.68.186.128]] 09:22, 10 September 2024 (UTC)

Love the log-log scale. Now let's see the zoomed-out version, with orders of magnitude more wheels and orders of magnitude larger diameters. [[Special:Contributions/172.71.166.230|172.71.166.230]] 13:59, 10 September 2024 (UTC)
:The scale if off either way. Or Randall wrote centimeters while he meant inches... At least for some cases. Examples: he placed the skatebord at 2cm while skateboord wheels are at ca 5cm - which are approx. 2 inches. Scooter wheels are approx 8.5 inches, not 8.5 cm... The car is mostly fine, albeit it would be a rather small car at ~50cm (a 19 inch (50cm) wheel designates the size of the rims, not the wheel) [[User:Elektrizikekswerk|Elektrizikekswerk]] ([[User talk:Elektrizikekswerk|talk]]) 15:18, 10 September 2024 (UTC)
::out of all people i would think Randall would be the last one to use a non-SI unit to measure distance. --[[User:Markifi|Markifi]] ([[User talk:Markifi|talk]]) 17:45, 10 September 2024 (UTC)
:::He usually prefers SI units, yes. [[User:Elektrizikekswerk|Elektrizikekswerk]] ([[User talk:Elektrizikekswerk|talk]]) 10:03, 11 September 2024 (UTC)

I have NEVER heard anyone call inline skates "three wheel skates". [[Special:Contributions/141.101.109.193|141.101.109.193]] 19:04, 10 September 2024 (UTC)
:As a quad skater through most of my youth, the depicted "three-wheel skate" was only called "inline" skates. Not sure where this 3-wheel designation came from! [[User:RandalSchwartz|RandalSchwartz]] ([[User talk:RandalSchwartz|talk]]) 21:59, 10 September 2024 (UTC)
::I too thought the term “three-wheel skate” seemed odd, and thought “inline skates” might be more appropriate. Then I remembered that in fact, most inline skates have four wheels… a memory that a quick Google image search seemed to support. So I guess a three-wheel skate is a special case of inline skate, rather than the default implementation. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.160.137|172.70.160.137]] 06:56, 11 September 2024 (UTC)
:Both variants exist and the three-wheeled version has generally bigger wheels - so the relative depiction of both variants in the diagram is correct. But their position regarding to wheel size is not. See my comment above [[User:Elektrizikekswerk|Elektrizikekswerk]] ([[User talk:Elektrizikekswerk|talk]]) 10:03, 11 September 2024 (UTC)

title text sounds like beret guy ngl--[[User:1234231587678|1234231587678]] ([[User talk:1234231587678|talk]]) 23:38, 10 September 2024 (UTC)

Not a single mention of Pollux? [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Castor_and_Pollux Wikipedia] [[Special:Contributions/172.68.70.122|172.68.70.122]] 11:53, 11 September 2024 (UTC)

Disconcerting that this explanation does not describe any of the vehicles, instead entirely making one-sided arguments regarding the title text. [[Special:Contributions/172.71.175.16|172.71.175.16]] 15:53, 11 September 2024 (UTC)
:I was considering a tabular list of all subjects, when I had time, at least to the Preview stage. Very brief: 'Vehicle' (wikilinked, as appropriate)/№ of wheels/typical size of wheel(s)/Typical use. No long paragraphs intended. Might need a range in the size column (possibly some in the # of wheels column). If someone gets there before me, though, I wouldn't mind. :p
:...and I just discovered that the # 'key', in the numbers 'screen' of this touchscreen keyboard has ”№” as a long-press alternative! How long have I been using this and hadn't realised? (Four years. That's how long.) [[Special:Contributions/172.70.90.137|172.70.90.137]] 16:43, 11 September 2024 (UTC)

[[User:DougM|DougM]] ([[User talk:DougM|talk]]) 16:35, 11 September 2024 (UTC)Missed opportunity to bring in the Letourneau l2350 loader, which I think has the largest production tires in the world at 4m, outshining those monster trucks (Bigfoot I think never had tires bigger than 3m).

I notice also a hole regarding ~30cm, multi-wheel. I say that space is filled by those amusement-park little trains. Yesss, they're "separate wagons," however, as it's several attached wagons operating together as a unit, for practical purposes, I say those trains constitute "one single" vehicle. Some have a very ingenious directional drive system, so wagons follow each other in the same path instead of a cathenary, for example in Disney; I was fascinated.[[User:Yamaplos|Yamaplos]] ([[User talk:Yamaplos|talk]]) 17:15, 11 September 2024 (UTC)

No mention either of the Rip Stick, which successfully employs only two castored wheels for locomotion. [[Special:Contributions/172.68.23.189|172.68.23.189]] 18:11, 11 September 2024 (UTC)

Is there any reason the title text uses "tiny" twice? [[Special:Contributions/172.71.150.3|172.71.150.3]] 22:38, 11 September 2024 (UTC)
:I'm guessing it's meant to be interpreted as the tiny "single-tiny-caster" [[Special:Contributions/172.71.150.2|172.71.150.2]] 22:50, 11 September 2024 (UTC)

== (Inception Sound Effect) ==

Somewhere in the far corner of the chart:

{{w|Bagger 288}}

[[User:Fephisto|Fephisto]] ([[User talk:Fephisto|talk]]) 20:26, 11 September 2024 (UTC)
:Somewhere in the upper right (but closer than that), the {{w|BelAZ_75710}}, what a missed opportunity! I think it has 8 wheels, 2 at each point a car has 1... I think each wheel is like 8 feet in diameter! [[User:NiceGuy1|NiceGuy1]] ([[User talk:NiceGuy1|talk]]) 06:13, 15 September 2024 (UTC)

What a missed opportunity to include the 14 wheeled flowboard [[User:Scab|Scab]] ([[User talk:Scab|talk]]) 10:17, 13 September 2024 (UTC)

Since regular roller skates are pretty much gone now, seems wrong to miss standard rollerblades (4 wheels per skate, not the 3 Randall specified). Except it would go very close to the skates - I think the wheels aren't quite the same size - I guess that's why, but seems strange to choose the classic 2-by-2 skates over currently common rollerblades... [[User:NiceGuy1|NiceGuy1]] ([[User talk:NiceGuy1|talk]]) 06:13, 15 September 2024 (UTC)

Talk:2973: Ferris Wheels

2024-08-17T10:52:12Z

141.101.99.88:

Where is the Cueball shouting "wheee!!"? [[User:Barmar|Barmar]] ([[User talk:Barmar|talk]]) 19:59, 16 August 2024 (UTC)

In the transcript I described how the cars are hanging, but I'm worried I've gone too far from transcript to explanation. Hopefully someone can improve it. [[User:Barmar|Barmar]] ([[User talk:Barmar|talk]]) 20:02, 16 August 2024 (UTC)

There's no category for "X fired me because" comics. There probably should be. [[User:Barmar|Barmar]] ([[User talk:Barmar|talk]]) 20:06, 16 August 2024 (UTC)

I once attached the motor of a Lego ferris wheel directly to its axis instead of the beginning of the gearing system. Not only did all the cabins fly across the room, the entire thing dismantled itself. Worth it! [[User:Fabian42|Fabian42]] ([[User talk:Fabian42|talk]]) 01:03, 17 August 2024 (UTC)

== Just HOW fast? ==

I was vaguely surprised to see nobody had done the math yet. So here it goes -- someone more confident in editing the main entry can feel free to adapt this if you think it's interesting enough (I doubt anyone would want to read the math as I wrote it). But first, someone please check my work. :)

I opened the comic in a pixel-level photo editor and took some quick measurements. The wheel on the left seems to be approximately 160 pixels wide, whiile the inner hub is about 14 pixels high.

So the gear ratio is 160:14 or about 11.04 Just for simplification, let's call it a 10x ratio.

The [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ferris_wheel#The_original_Ferris_Wheel original Ferris Wheel] took about 20 minutes to load and unload passengers, then ran for 9 uninterrupted minutes for another, full, rotation. So again, let's round up and say the wheel on the left takes about 10 minutes to go around once.

The middle wheel, then, would take a minute. And the last one, a tenth of a minute, or 6 seconds.

The original wheel (again) was about 265 feet【80.77 m】 across, or a circumference of 832 feet【253.59 m】. So if these wheels are the same size (why not?), any car on the right-most wheel would move about 832 feet【253.59 m】 in 6 seconds, or 138 feet【42.06 m】 per second, which is about 94 miles【151.28 km】 per hour (151 kilometers per hour).

I can see why he was fired.

Taking the reverse: The rightmost wheel would take about 10 minutes for a rotation, the middle wheel, 100 minutes (1:40) and the left most, 1000 minutes (16 hours and 40 minutes).

Actually, if you move slow enough that the right wheel can load and unload (let's say 20 minutes, just like the original wheel), it'd take over a day to load the left wheel.

@DarthNull@infosec.exchange [[Special:Contributions/172.70.175.87|172.70.175.87]] 20:58, 16 August 2024 (UTC)

This Amusement Ride manufacturer has a helpful diagram of rotational speed on their website: https://www.sinorides.com/everything-you-need-to-know-about-ferris-wheels/#q11
The example wheel happens to have 18 gondolas, just like Randall's and appears to be roughly the same scale. The sample values they provide are a linear speed of 4 m/s at the edge of the wheel and a rotational speed of just under 3 revolutions per minute. My best guess at the gearing ratio of Randall's belt driven wheels is 10:1, so if the left wheel is being driven at normal speeds, the center wheel would be 40 m/s or 30 rpm and the left wheel would be 400 m/s or 300 rpm. This exceeds the square root of the specific strength of standard steel, so we'll need to hope that the right most Ferris wheel is made of a particularly strong alloy. [[Special:Contributions/172.69.71.97|172.69.71.97]] 21:19, 16 August 2024 (UTC)

: Ah, well, I started down my own road for calculations, based upon the assumption that they were 75 feet【22.86 m】 diameter (from the height of the figures, assuming that the ones I actually checked definitively up to 6ft【1.83 m】, give or take, although pixel-counts upon antialiased graphics can be quite inaccurate the fewer 'apparent' pixels there are). As a truck-portable/mounted fairground-style ride, it's probably quite a bit smaller than the 'original Ferris wheel' and many of those 'permanent' wheels (London Eye, theme park rides, etc) that are built specifically to be architectual 'statements'/tourist-magnets. I'm thinking more the kind that you'd see in Grease (though that one's 55-foot【16.76 m】, apparently) or the one that 'Night Monkey' had to deal with in Spiderman: Far From Home. I also looked up [https://www.giantwheel.co.uk/35m-vision-ferris-wheel-hire/ actual specs] (that's 35m, ~105ft【32 m】 and 0.5rpm, so not too far off my initial assumptions). There also was a rather larger 60-metre (197 ft) {{w|Wheel of Sheffield|semi-permanent}} transportable version with 13 minute continuous 'ride', but that'd be completely out of scale to those depicted.
: If there are any actual 'carnies' out there who know what kind of thing actually gets used at County Fairs in the US, that might help. (Here in the UK there's currently a Fun Fair about a quarter of a mile from my house, at the moment - though I'm not there at the moment, but they have no 'big wheels' of that kind, only the more energetic types that ''do'' fling their riders around, like the "Terrifying Claw" and various other heavy duty hanging and/or spinning-seat rides.) ((Slightly ninjaed, now, by the above contribution.))) [[Special:Contributions/162.158.33.197|162.158.33.197]] 21:37, 16 August 2024 (UTC)

I can't help but think of this as Randall wanting to make an upscaled version of [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QrkiJZKJfpY Steve Mould's Spintronics video] from a year ago... [[Special:Contributions/172.68.50.126|172.68.50.126]] 21:54, 16 August 2024 (UTC)

Given that air resistance increases exponentially with air speed, this setup would actually act as its own speed regulator, with the main factor being the torque of the power source. Which wheel is powered would not matter much [[Special:Contributions/172.71.118.167|172.71.118.167]] 22:05, 16 August 2024 (UTC)

If you powered the middle one, you'd end up with one moderately exciting ride, one normal ride and one really long ride, which would be highly impractical, but not overly dangerous (depending on the structural strength of the fast wheel). [[Special:Contributions/172.71.142.88|172.71.142.88]] 23:08, 16 August 2024 (UTC)

The ratio is listed as 12.5:1, but then the calculations are done using a ration of 20:1. The 12.5 seems to be more accurate, given the drawing, but in the comments here, someone else measured the pixel ratio as 11.04. I think 10 or 12.5 would be fine, but it should be consistent. Knowing the ratio ahead of time would also make the rotation calculations easier to explain. We should probably use the pixel technique to estimate the diameter too. I don’t have access to measuring tools right now, but it’s about 20 times the height of the tallest person, so roughly 120’【36.58 m】. --[[Special:Contributions/172.69.34.87|172.69.34.87]] 00:32, 17 August 2024 (UTC)

== Are the transcript eds going to go into the speeds depicted? ==

Should the transcript involve the diameter ratios when explaining the speed depiction gray lines? [[Special:Contributions/172.70.211.83|172.70.211.83]] 23:06, 16 August 2024 (UTC)
:Such analysis is going towards the speculative. Perhaps we can say that the wheels are <so many> people-heights high, but that doesn't give us any actual definitive speeds to go with the lines, with no actual given first-wheel speed (two minutes a spin? three minutes per spin? thirteen minute 'trips'?). It might be reasonable to mention the hub-to-rim ratio details, but the speed-lines just need to be subjectively described. 172.70.58.3 23:24, 16 August 2024 (UTC)

By my measurement, wheel1 (outer) is 203 pixels from left edge (at the belt 'grip surface' radius, i.e. as far in as the outer-black-line is before it becomes 'background white' wheel rim), wheel2 hub is 16 pixels (likewise), wheel2 outer is also 203, wheel3 hub is 15 (debatable). Wheel3 (outer) is 202, but the relevence here is more that it's 238 pixels from gondola-bottom to gondola-bottom. (Wheel1 hub is 15, but doesn't even have that relevence.) Can't measure the verticals of the outers, because of the supporting structure, but the the vertical hub measurements agree exactly with the horizontal spreads (which at least means that Randall can draw circles reasonable accurately). 203/16=12.6875, 203/15=13.533... Maybe I should be looking a pixel further out, which gives 204/17=12 or 204/16=12.75. 1:12 (and, by extension 1:144 for the both) seems nicely numbered slightly better and more symbolically than 1:12.5 (or 2:25) and its square (4:625) might be, whatever choice of measurements came up with that. - The tallest figures are 10 pixels high (maybe you could stretch some to 11, depending upon where you 'zero' the ground-line), meaning 20(and-a-bit) figure-heights (some are smaller, single-pixels could be variations/stereotypically slightly smaller females, but I think there are clear child/adolescent figures as part of/all of some groupings, whether by deliberate artistic design or just a matter of how the quick squiggles turned out). 120ft (6 foot figures) is not really far off the 35m mentioned above (with the wrong feetwise equivalent!) as an actual wheel of 0.5rpm. So 6rpm and then 72rpm. 22m radius (taking a decent round figure, whilst metrifying the extended width of the) at that speed seems to be 128g (if I've not messed up), a nice 'round' figure to a nerd. But that'd be at the base of the gondalas, and decrease (bit by bit) if you move even a pixel 'inward' from the that (and a 128g centrifuge isn't going to have a paper-thin floor!)... Plenty of open questions/rooms for error in all that, so not at all worth giving as an Explanation calculation, nor Transcript detail, but it's where I personally ended up. 172.68.205.134 00:11, 17 August 2024 (UTC)

Ferb, I know how we're gonna execute war criminals today!

[[Special:Contributions/141.101.99.88|141.101.99.88]] 10:52, 17 August 2024 (UTC)

2832: Urban Planning Opinion Progression

2023-09-24T10:34:48Z

141.101.99.88: /* Explanation */

{{comic
| number = 2832
| date = September 22, 2023
| title = Urban Planning Opinion Progression
| image = urban_planning_opinion_progression_2x.png
| imagesize = 675x2033px
| noexpand = true
| titletext = If they're going to make people ride bikes and scooters in traffic, then it should at LEAST be legal to do the Snow Crash thing where you use a hook-shot-style harpoon to catch free rides from cars.
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Created by a DUTCH BOT - Please change this comment when editing this page. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}

This comic follows Cueball, Megan, Knit Cap and Ponytail as they begin to favor pedestrian-centered design. In the first panel, Cueball and Megan complain about the common problem many car-centric cities face about not having enough space for all the cars, and give the naive suggestion of making more space for cars. In the second panel, Knit Cap mentions how she is going to visit Amsterdam, a city known for its {{w|walkability}} and bike friendliness. Ponytail expresses concern over the popularity of cycling in the street presumably because cycling in the street is dangerous where she lives and so she expects it to be dangerous in Amsterdam.

In the third panel, Cueball discusses another problem many car-centric cities face which is that there are not a lot of bike paths. Since there is a limited amount of space on a street, cities face a dilemma on how much space they should allocate to pedestrians, cycles and vehicles. Car-centric cities often allocate the most space to cars, leaving less space for bikes and pedestrians. The default for cities is to just let cyclists to cycle in the streets with the cars, as the road vehicles they are. This, however, is considered by some to be significantly more dangerous than a city having dedicated bike lanes, which is why Ponytail was likely concerned in the second panel. (A recent study reported that painted bike lanes are more dangerous than no bike lane, and only protected bike lanes are safer: <span title="Conclusions: Protected bike lanes and buffered bike lanes had estimated protective effects on segments between intersections but estimated harmful effects at intersections. Conventional bike lanes had estimated harmful effects along segments and at intersections.">Garber, Michael D., et al: ''[https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2214140523001056 Bicycle infrastructure and the incidence rate of crashes with cars: A case-control study with Strava data in Atlanta]''. Journal of Transport & Health, '''32'''. September 2023: Received 13 February 2023; Received in revised form 10 July 2023; Accepted 14 July 2023; Available online 11 August 2023. doi:[https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jth.2023.101669 10.1016/j.jth.2023.101669]) This danger was discussed more in the fifth panel as well. From a wider perspective, however much you attempt to segregate different forms of transport (at junctions and other bottlenecks where space cannot be reserved), you'll always need to bring bicycles and traffic back into contact, briefly, and in circumstances where motorised traffic has become unused to sharing the roadspace with the lighter vehicles. This is unlike a more integrated and less segregated place like Amsterdam where you are rarely going to be surprised by the presence of bicycles, overlook them and therefore cause an accident.

Megan's comment in the sixth panel is likely referring to pickup trucks in addition to regular trucks. Many pickup truck owners care a lot about the distance their vehicle is off the ground and so they will either purchase a pickup truck with a high ground clearance or raise it themselves, resulting in what is known as a lifted pickup truck. Many people believe that a vehicle with higher ground clearance will keep them safe on the road, and while this is in some ways true (one editor learned the opposite, that the elevated center of mass reduced safety due to reducing the stable tipping angle, although they’ve certainly appreciated high clearance on unpaved roads), it comes at the cost of potentially hurting others who are in smaller vehicles or no vehicle at all. Alternatively, it could refer to many large tractor trailer cabs or garbage trucks that if you move directly in front of the cab you can't see the driver and they can't see you. It is particularly dangerous for children.

{{w|Induced demand}} is an economic theory in which increasing the supply of a good or service causes the demand to rise faster than the increased supply, worsening the shortage. The most common example is traffic: some US cities have tried to alleviate traffic jams by widening the roads and highways, which incentivized more people to take up driving, thereby ''worsening'' their traffic jam problem. Conversely, other cities have tried removing traffic lanes or converting them to dedicated public transit lanes, and have claimed a reduction in traffic congestion. Among urban planners, this is known as the {{w|Downs–Thomson paradox}}.

Cueball's comment in the second-to-last panel that "anything that makes a city a worse place to drive in makes it a better place to live, short of scattering random tire spikes on the road" is a slight exaggeration. 

The title text references a cyberpunk book called "{{w|Snow Crash}}", by Neal Stephenson. An early scene in that book involves the equivalent of a skater using a magnet on a cable to attach onto the back of a pizza delivery vehicle. He swerves in order to dislodge her, she taunts him and attaches stickers to his vehicle.

=== What makes a city walkable? ===
As all of Europe''[citation needed]'' agrees, urban planning (or zoning) must be seamlessly integrated with public transport planning. The central truth is that everybody is a pedestrian for some time, which also includes car drivers. Crucially, the average pedestrian is willing to walk about 2000 ft from their home to the next public transport stop, and an additional 2000 ft between the last public transport stop and their workplace. Opportunities for shopping and eating should exist at every connecting station, with the connections scheduled in a way that it both allows changing to the connecting train/tramway/bus immediately - as well as buying groceries.

All roads should have a sidewalk, which, of course, costs area, but make the pedestrians' lives much easier. But then, not only roads impact walkability. In the United States, many places open to the public are, by municipal ordinances, forced to provide enough parking space for [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OUNXFHpUhu8 all customers at any given time], which leads to serious knock-on effects: Pedestrians must often cross a large and weather-exposed parking lot in order to shop. A building can often be only re-purposed if a neighboring building is bulldozed to create the necessary parking area. And tenants who live in an apartment, but do not own a car, are forced to pay for the parking space they do not need.

Another topic is subsidizing public traffic. Municipalities in Switzerland, for example, order bus connections - e.g. a hourly bus from 6 AM until 10 PM, and in exchange, they cover the deficit of any such connection. That way, families, who usually are better taxpayers, move to villages, and beginning with grade 5, 6 or 7, pupils can still easily commute to a district school.

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

:'''Typical urban planning opinion progression'''

:[Each panel is connected to a point on a timeline. Timeline is recognizable as the tread of a bicycle tire]

:Cueball: I wish there wasn't so much traffic to get into the city. They should put in more lanes.
:Megan: And more parking.
:Megan: Parking is so bad here.

:Knit Cap: I have to go to Amsterdam for work next week. I hear they all ride bikes there.
:Ponytail: Bikes are fine but people shouldn't ride them in the street! I worry I'm going to hit someone!

:Cueball: It would be nice if we had better transit options!
:Cueball: I tried a scooter. It was fun but I wish there were more bike paths.

:Megan: It's funny how widening roads to speed up traffic makes them more dangerous to walk near, making driving more necessary and creating more traffic.
:Megan: Really makes you think.

:Knit Cap: Visiting the Netherlands was cool!
:Knit Cap: Amsterdam is really neat.

:Cueball: We've ceded so much of our land to storing and moving cars, with the rest of us tiptoeing around the edges and making drivers mad for trespassing on "their" space.
:Cueball: Even though '''''we're''''' the ones in danger from '''''them!'''''

:Megan: Those giant trucks with front blind spots that keep hitting kids should be illegal.

:Knit Cap: We should be more like the Netherlands.
:Knit Cap: They design their streets to prioritize...

:[Cueball is frustrated.]
:Cueball: The problem is car culture. It's systemic.
:Cueball: I don't know if we can fix it.

:[Megan’s arms are thrown out, and her hair is bedraggled.]
:Megan: People approach road planning decisions from the point of view of drivers because that's how we're used to interacting with the city, so we make choices that make it more car-friendly.
:Megan: It's a vicious cycle.

:[Knit Cap is walking around with two Dutch flags raised in his hands.]
:Knit Cap: '''''Netherlands! Netherlands! Netherlands! Netherlands!'''''

:Cueball: Anything that makes a city a worse place to drive in makes it a better place to live, short of scattering random tire spikes on the road.

:Megan: Honestly, I think the city council should consider the tire spikes thing.

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Megan]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Knit Cap]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Ponytail]]

2809: Moon

2023-08-02T08:29:55Z

141.101.99.88: Undo revision 320089 by Dtgriscom (talk) Not redundant. Probably written as a turn of speech, but actually depends upon relative densities, too. Polystyrene bowling ball vs lead tennis ball, yep?

{{comic
| number = 2809
| date = July 31, 2023
| title = Moon
| image = moon_2x.png
| imagesize = 313x402px
| noexpand = true
| titletext = I mean, it's pretty, but it doesn't really affect us beyond that. Except that half the nights aren't really dark, and once or twice a day it makes the oceans flood the coasts.
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Created by a STRANGE ORB FLOATING IN THE SKY. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}

The {{w|Moon}} is a celestial body orbiting Earth, first formed approximately 4.5 billion years ago - about 50 million years after the initial formation of the solar system. As of today, the Moon is still orbiting the Earth{{Citation needed}} at a distance of approximately 384,400 kilometers, or about 238,900 miles.

This comic points out how weird it is to have such an enormous celestial body near to us. The Moon has a radius more than one quarter of Earth's, and is around one eightieth of Earth's mass, and is close enough that we can see the craters and other stuff on the surface with our naked eye, though a telescope would help. The second nearest body of comparable size, Venus, is approximately 46.576 million kilometers away at its closest.

There are other planets with moons, but Earth's moon is very big compared to Earth - Mars's moons are way smaller and the biggest moon in our solar system, Ganymede, is just twice as massive with 1.5 the radius, despite orbiting Jupiter, which is 317 times more massive than Earth with 11 times the radius.

In human history, we have landed twelve people on the moon in the Apollo missions from 1969 to 1972. Despite advancements in technology since then, we have yet to land another person on the Moon,{{Citation needed}} though plans are being made.

The title text refers to two facts about how the Moon majorly impacts life on Earth, which, by the comic, also would seem strange if they weren't real. Firstly the lunar cycle, in which in roughly half the time, the Moon's orbit is on the opposite side of the Earth from the Sun and (being visibly at least half-illuminated, whilst there, except briefly during rare eclipses) provides a low but significant amount of reflected illumination that nature (as well as humanity) has found a nocturnal use for. Secondly, the tides, a very nearly twice-daily cycle where the Moon's gravity, modified by the Sun's, subtly pulls upon the Earth and drags the waters of the seas and oceans around, periodically increases the sea levels in most places. To a lesser extent the Moon's gravity also {{w|Earth tide|drags land up}}. Most people have a naïve point of view that these effects are minor and incidental, underestimating the profound ways in which they have shaped the history of the Earth. This reflects general attitudes - we like the Moon because it is close to us, but tend to be relatively unaware of its huge significance. This comic may be a way to call out how interesting and important the Moon is to humanity and the Earth in general.

==Transcript==
:[Ponytail is pointing and looking up to the left, while Cueball behind her looks the same way.]
:Ponytail: That thing hanging in the sky is a second nearby world. It's close enough that you can see its surface as it passes overhead.
:Cueball: Wow. Isn't that ... weird?
:Ponytail: I dunno, it's just always been there.

:[Caption below the panel:]
:If it didn't exist, the moon would sound like such an outlandish sci-fi concept.

==Trivia==
*Earth's moon can be considered weird for additional reasons.
**It is by far the largest and most massive moon relative to the planet it orbits.
**Our moon is the only moon in the solar system to not have a proper name, not even a jumble of letters and numbers. In English it is simply given the proper name of "the Moon" (capitalized), being the ancient archetype for all other moons discovered since the time of Galileo, although it can also be described by other titles such as "Luna" (directly taken from from Latin mythology/astronomy).
**It is almost exactly the same apparent size as the Sun in the sky which at various times enables both total solar eclipses (for which it needs to be close/large) and annular ones (for which it must not be ''too'' close/large). Much earlier in history it was too close to do both and much later it will gradually drift too far away to do so – making it additionally a temporal coincidence that humanity gets to witness it as we are so used to seeing it.
**There are even a couple of hypotheses that think that to get protein shaped right for life, the tides were needed, and that to evolve for living on land the tides are needed.
{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Comics featuring Ponytail]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Astronomy]]

Talk:Main Page

2014-12-02T22:29:56Z

141.101.99.88: /* #1454 - bad description */ new section

{{notice|This page is for discussion of the [[Main Page]] itself. Other issues probably belong at the [[Explain XKCD:Community portal]].}}

As a new user, I think the first page is very important. So I thought why not begin a discussion here what to have on the first page every user visits.--[[User:Relic|Relic]] ([[User talk:Relic|talk]]) 05:59, 1 August 2012 (EDT) Re-signed here - b/c I broke the comment in two when I added the "List of comics" header. --''[[User:Philosopher|Philosopher]]'' [[User talk:Philosopher|Let us reason together.]] 23:01, 2 August 2012 (EDT)

==List of comics==
I was thinking of having a quick link to the list of comics that is explained. Right know, it took me a while to even see any of them. Eventually I found the "List All Pages" (found it in Special pages) where I could find the comics that have been explained. What do you think?
:A category tag will do that for you automatically. Having a list of comics indexed by its number would be a little different.--[[User:Relic|Relic]] ([[User talk:Relic|talk]]) 05:59, 1 August 2012 (EDT)
::Sounds like a great list - I ''think'' it'd have to be manually maintained until/unless we get someone who knows how to make a bot update it. Categories will be useful, but they only work if someone added the category to the page in the first place. --''[[User:Philosopher|Philosopher]]'' [[User talk:Philosopher|Let us reason together.]] 07:21, 1 August 2012 (EDT)
:::A (somewhat) related question - should [[:Category:Comics]] be sorted alphabetically or by comic number? --''[[User:Philosopher|Philosopher]]'' [[User talk:Philosopher|Let us reason together.]] 07:43, 1 August 2012 (EDT)
::::I think [[:Category:Comics]] should be sorted by comic number. If you are looking for a specific comic, you will use the search field. Is there a way to make that happen? --[[User:Jeff|Jeff]] ([[User talk:Jeff|talk]]) 08:11, 1 August 2012 (EDT)
:::::They are two different functions. For the former, instead of adding <nowiki>[[Category:Comics]]</nowiki>, add, say, <nowiki>[[Category:Comics|1]]</nowiki>. For the second, we can create redirects. Normally, I'd say just make sure the search term was in the article text, but since numbers are going to be use for other purposes than just comic titles, it may be better to create [[1]] and [[Comic 1]] as redirects to the relevant articles right off the bat. --08:24, 1 August 2012 (EDT)
::::::We could also have a comic-list template on the Main Page, I suppose, or perhaps two - one for number and one for name? --''[[User:Philosopher|Philosopher]]'' [[User talk:Philosopher|Let us reason together.]] 08:54, 1 August 2012 (EDT)
:::::::Here's what I was thinking of for that: {{tl|Comics navbox}} Thoughts? ''[[User:Philosopher|Philosopher]]'' [[User talk:Philosopher|Let us reason together.]]
:(outdent) It's ugly, but a sortable wikitable [[User:SurturZ/sandbox|(click here for example)]] could be used as a checklist to see what has been uploaded and what hasn't. What's the project namespace here, anyway (analogue of "WP:")? --[[User:SurturZ|SurturZ]] ([[User talk:SurturZ|talk]]) 03:04, 3 August 2012 (EDT)
:OK, I've found a way to get all the titles of the comics, so I was confident enough to create <big>[[Explain XKCD:Checklist]]</big> which can be used to fill in the gaps. --[[User:SurturZ|SurturZ]] ([[User talk:SurturZ|talk]]) 03:41, 3 August 2012 (EDT)
::I'm liking the checklist! That should do quite nicely as a "tool for editors". (I'm linking to it at the Community Portal). We still need the "template for readers." Did you think {{tl|Comics navbox}} was on the right track or should we do something else for that? --''[[User:Philosopher|Philosopher]]'' [[User talk:Philosopher|Let us reason together.]] 20:09, 3 August 2012 (EDT)
::Better idea - I'm throwing it directly onto the Main Page. --''[[User:Philosopher|Philosopher]]'' [[User talk:Philosopher|Let us reason together.]] 20:10, 3 August 2012 (EDT)

==Admin list==
You can find a system-accurate list of admins [{{canonicalurl:Special:ListUsers|group=sysop}} here], so that might good to share, along with the manual list. --''[[User:Philosopher|Philosopher]]'' [[User talk:Philosopher|Let us reason together.]] 07:13, 1 August 2012 (EDT)
:Added to page. --''[[User:Philosopher|Philosopher]]'' [[User talk:Philosopher|Let us reason together.]] 08:10, 1 August 2012 (EDT)
::That's exactly what I wanted, but couldn't find the auto page for it. I knew it was somewhere. I don't see any reason to keep the link to the manual page. Do you? --[[User:Jeff|Jeff]] ([[User talk:Jeff|talk]]) 08:11, 1 August 2012 (EDT)
:::Not unless you want it. I'll remove it. Should I add the similar link for 'crats or is that unnecessary at this point? --''[[User:Philosopher|Philosopher]]'' [[User talk:Philosopher|Let us reason together.]] 08:25, 1 August 2012 (EDT)
::::To be honest, I have no idea what the Burecrats role does. Might be unnecessary now but helpful in the future? --[[User:Jeff|Jeff]] ([[User talk:Jeff|talk]]) 11:16, 1 August 2012 (EDT)
:::::Bureaucrats can turn other users into administrators (or indeed, other bureaucrats). That privilege isn't available to ordinary administrators. I'd keep it to yourself for the time being. :-) --[[User:Yirba|Yirba]] ([[User talk:Yirba|talk]]) 17:39, 1 August 2012 (EDT)
::::::You can actually see a technical list of which rights each group confers at [[Special:ListGroupRights]]. As the wiki grows, you might want to spin off a few, such as the ability to grant rollbacker and autopatrolled, to admins as some other wikis have. But for the time being, at least, there's really no reason for the wiki to have more than one 'crat. --''[[User:Philosopher|Philosopher]]'' [[User talk:Philosopher|Let us reason together.]] 17:07, 2 August 2012 (EDT)

== Community portal ==

I've created the [[Explain XKCD:Community portal]] as a tools/help page. If that's not what you want, feel free to change/move/whatever it, but I thought it'd be nice to save this page for discussion of the Main Page and discuss the wiki as a whole/ask for help there. --''[[User:Philosopher|Philosopher]]'' [[User talk:Philosopher|Let us reason together.]] 08:36, 1 August 2012 (EDT)

== Direct link to latest comic ==

There should be a direct link to the latest comic at the top of the Main page. A nice thing about going to explainxkcd.com was that the latest comic is right there at the top. For those changing their default link to the wiki, there should be an easy "Latest Comic" link that quickly takes them there. I'm sure some folks actually skip xkcd.com and come directly here instead to read the latest offering from Randall. They shouldn't have to search for it.
[[User:Christopher Foxx|- CFoxx]] ([[User talk:Christopher Foxx|talk]]) 11:59, 1 August 2012 (EDT)

: Maybe the page [[latest]] should redirect to the most recent comic? Could that be taken care of by some sort of script/template so it doesn't have to be manually updated? Should each explination page also have "next", "previous", "random", "first" and "latest" links, possibly also generated automatically via scripts/templates? Additionally, shouldn't the number page be the canonical one? It seems like [[Internal monologue]] should redirect to [[1089]] rather than the other way around - certainly it would make a bunch of scripting types of things a lot easier. [[User:J-beda|J-beda]] ([[User talk:J-beda|talk]]) 13:02, 1 August 2012 (EDT)
:::If you wanted, we could even use wiki-magic to show the title of the page as the Comic name, but the URL as the number - in order to parallel the actual XKCD website. --''[[User:Philosopher|Philosopher]]'' [[User talk:Philosopher|Let us reason together.]] 17:09, 2 August 2012 (EDT)
:: Shouldn't there be a way to programmatically find the comic with the highest number that has a page with content? That would work as long as no one puts future comic pages up. --[[User:Jeff|Jeff]] ([[User talk:Jeff|talk]]) 20:25, 1 August 2012 (EDT)
:::It's all sounding like folks are over-complicating something quite easy. All I'm suggesting is a prominent link to http://www.xkcd.com/. No need, I think, to list which number the latest is, or include the next/last/random buttons, etc. [[User:Christopher Foxx|- CFoxx]] ([[User talk:Christopher Foxx|talk]]) 11:41, 3 August 2012 (EDT)
::::Oh. We've got that, now, in the sidebar - labeled as "XKCD." I do think that having an internal link to the latest (explained) comic would be a great thing, though. --''[[User:Philosopher|Philosopher]]'' [[User talk:Philosopher|Let us reason together.]] 16:36, 4 August 2012 (EDT)

You can transclude the latest comic on the main page like this: <nowiki>{{:pagename}} e.g. {{:Internal_monologue}} </nowiki>--[[User:SurturZ|SurturZ]] ([[User talk:SurturZ|talk]]) 00:25, 2 August 2012 (EDT)
: I've started with just a manual link to the latest comic. Ideally it will be automatic, but a manual link will work for now as I've had quite a few people ask for it. --[[User:Jeff|Jeff]] ([[User talk:Jeff|talk]]) 21:09, 1 August 2012 (EDT)

Transclusion of the latest comic is great. Someone with the right permissions should add (for instance on the top-right corner of the grey transclusion area) a link to edit the corresponding wiki page, so that people seeing something they could add would feel invited to do so (wiki style). In my opinion this would be a good way to improve the quality of the user-generated explanations.
Also, all the "XKCD"s in the "New here?" section should be converted to the lowercase "xkcd"...
[[User:Cos|Cos]] ([[User talk:Cos|talk]]) 14:00, 6 August 2012 (UTC)
:Good points. I've done both. --[[User:Waldir|Waldir]] ([[User talk:Waldir|talk]]) 15:48, 6 August 2012 (UTC)

Call me dumb, but... You've got a link called "prev" that goes to the explaination for the previous comic. Then a link called "comic #42" but that goes to xkcd. And then a smaller, less prominent link called "go to this comic" that doesn't go to the comic but to its explaination. Anyone else think that's a little back-to-front? [[User:Zootle|Zootle]] ([[User talk:Zootle|talk]]) 17:18, 31 August 2012 (UTC)
:OK, you're dumb :-). The standard template for an explanation page includes the header with "Prev", "Comic # (date)", and "Next" links. If we don't have explanation pages for the previous or next comic, we don't show the respective link. I hadn't noticed that the "Comic # (date)" bit was a link to the xkcd site before, but in context it makes sense to me. Including a link to the Explain page for the comic who's explain page you are already looking at doesn't make sense.
:The explanation page for the latest comic is "transcluded" in the main page pretty much as-is, so we get the header, the comic, the explanation, etc. We don't get the discussion, which is visible at the bottom of the Explain page. Because there is never an explanation for a comic that hasn't been released yet, there is never a "Next" link on the main page's transcluded header. So you get "Prev" and "Comic" links. The "Go to this comic" link is added by the main page above the transcluded explain page.
:I can see how the "Go to this comic" link might be poorly worded especially as it's placement seems to be within the explanation it's linking to. [[User:Blaisepascal|Blaisepascal]] ([[User talk:Blaisepascal|talk]]) 18:16, 31 August 2012 (UTC)
::Rather than "Go to this comic" maybe it could be "Go to full explanation" ? Something else? [[User:J-beda|J-beda]] ([[User talk:J-beda|talk]]) 13:38, 5 September 2012 (UTC)
::There was [http://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=explain_xkcd:Community_portal/Admin_requests#.22Edit_this_explanation.22_link_on_main_page a discussion at one point] about a wittier/more descriptive link - but no one came up with anything. I do like "Go to Full Explanation" better, for what it's worth. --[[User:DanB|DanB]] ([[User talk:DanB|talk]]) 15:31, 5 September 2012 (UTC)
:::My problem with that suggestion is that it implies that the main page explanation is not full. As of right now, the full explanation is transcluded on the main page. There's nothing more to see by clicking that link (explanation wise) Perhaps "Go to full explanation page" but that doesn't quite sound right to me... [[User:TheHYPO|TheHYPO]] ([[User talk:TheHYPO|talk]]) 15:42, 7 September 2012 (UTC)
::::How about "Go to this Comic Explanation Page"? One nice thing about the specific page rather than the [[Main_Page]] transcoding is that it nicely includes the discussion as well. I have a bookmark to the [[Main_Page]] that I look at every day, but I want to easily read the discussions, not only the explanation. Humm, maybe we could have a page [[most recent comic]] that automagically redirects to the most recent comic? [[User:J-beda|J-beda]] ([[User talk:J-beda|talk]]) 12:42, 8 September 2012 (UTC)
:::::I tried to get [[most recent comic]] to redirect to LATESTCOMIC, but can't get the syntax working - it is possible? [[User:J-beda|J-beda]] ([[User talk:J-beda|talk]]) 13:03, 8 September 2012 (UTC)
::::::Apparently it isn't. I would have tried <code><nowiki>#REDIRECT [[{{LATESTCOMIC}}]]</nowiki></code> like you did, but since that doesn't work, I'll delete the page for now. --[[User:Waldir|Waldir]] ([[User talk:Waldir|talk]]) 16:38, 20 November 2012 (UTC)

== Discussion of latest comic ==
Perhaps include the discussions of the latest comic here? I almost missed there was a discussion field a few times because I would only read about the latest comic on the main page. [[User:Carewolf|Carewolf]] ([[User talk:Carewolf|talk]]) 14:54, 22 September 2012 (UTC)

This comics's explanation is complete bollocks, I think. Of course it is NOT a "fact that such a room exists". This comics parodies trope often used in cop movies - an elderly cop goes to work for the last time before his retirement, packs things, plans fishing the next day ... only to be called to one more case (possibly with a new, young and brash partner). And despites his efforts not to screw anything and stay clear of danger, he is either mortally wounded or screws big time and is degraded. So much clichè, that if someone says "It's my last day or service", you might be sure one of the two options above happens. See http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/Retirony [[User:edheldil|Edheldil]] 10:17, 26 September 2012 (UTC)

I believe this link maybe relevant: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turtle_graphics {{unsigned|Rhudi}}

== The comic explanation count is wrong ==

The adjustment is currently 3, but there are now 6 subcategories and one list making the current correct adjustment 7.
If the wiki was upgraded to version 1.20, a form exists to automatically exclude subcategories.
--[[User:Divad27182|Divad27182]] ([[User talk:Divad27182|talk]]) 09:56, 8 October 2012 (UTC)

:Looks like another week of the wiki going down then.
:But seriously, I've been noticing this too. Didn't know what was causing it, but it's going to have to be fixed sometime.[[User:Davidy22|Davidy22]] ([[User talk:Davidy22|talk]]) 10:25, 8 October 2012 (UTC)

::The text reads <pre><nowiki>We already have [[:Category:Comics|'''{{#expr:{{PAGESINCAT:Comics}}-3}}''' comic explanations]]!</nowiki></pre> The -3 is to account for the subcategories and non-explanation pages in the category. There apparently used to be three such pages, and now there are seven. I would fix this myself, but the page is protected. If the wiki where upgraded to version 1.20, the categories could be explicitly excluded, but the [[List of all comics]] would still be in the category. (Note that the -3 actually appears twice.) --[[User:Divad27182|Divad27182]] ([[User talk:Divad27182|talk]]) 05:03, 11 October 2012 (UTC)

:::Mediawiki 1.20 fixes this issue, although it'd be nice if this could be fixed in the meantime via the hack reccommended by divad. [[User:Davidy22|Davidy22]][[User talk:Davidy22|<tt>(talk)</tt>]] 06:40, 16 November 2012 (UTC)

:Looks like Waldir updated the "Comic Correction Count" to "10" (as of 20 November 2012):
<nowiki> We already have [[:Category:Comics|'''{{#expr:{{PAGESINCAT:Comics}}-10}}''' comic explanations]]!</big>
Note: the -10 in the calculation above is to discount subcategories (there are 7 of them as of 20 November 2012),
non-comic pages (2 as of same date: [[List of all comics]] and [[Exoplanet]])
and the comic 404, which was deliberately not posted. Thus 7 + 2 + 1 = 10
(But there are still {{#expr:{{LATESTCOMIC}}-({{PAGESINCAT:Comics}}-10)}} to go. Come and [[List of all comics|add yours]]!)</nowiki>
:Could we possibly make this more dynamic by creating a "IGNORE_IN_COUNT" category or something? and then using something like: <nowiki>{#expr:{{PAGESINCAT:Comics}}-{{PAGESINCAT:IGNORE_IN_COUNT}}}</nowiki>? Then any additional entries to the "Comics" category (that are 'special' entries) could just have the special category added and no main page editing would be necessary? --[[User:Bpothier|B. P.]] ([[User talk:Bpothier|talk]]) 07:50, 22 November 2012 (UTC)

==Make Jeff stop apologizing==
The apology for server downtime has been around for a while now. Can we take it down? [[User:Davidy22|Davidy22]] ([[User talk:Davidy22|talk]]) 04:41, 11 October 2012 (UTC)

== Spambots ==

I think someone should install [http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Extension:AbuseFilter AbuseFilter]. --[[User:Kronf|Kronf]] ([[User talk:Kronf|talk]]) 10:09, 13 October 2012 (UTC)

== Purge ==

We should regularly purge the server's cache for the main page using http://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=Main_Page&action=purge to keep the explanation up to date. --[[User:Kronf|Kronf]] ([[User talk:Kronf|talk]]) 02:28, 3 November 2012 (UTC)

== Updating the Rules ==

I've been having a lovely discussion with someone who apparently thought the "edit anything you want" rule applied to the Talk pages. As we don't have any codified rules for ''here'' and can only point to "well the canonical way this is done on Wikipedia is..." I think that there are a few things we need to put into the list of Rules on the front page, and then have a link to a more in-depth talk about why the rules exist and what-not.

Specifically, I'm talking about writing "Feel free to edit any page on the wiki to be better. But, treat talk pages like you would blog comments: comments by other people ''cannot be changed by you'', you can only respond to them." as a new rule to be plastered on the front page, as there seems to be an increasing number social neophytes that seem to think that editing words that are attributed as being said by another person is perfectly legitimate and non-controversial.

Shall we discuss? [[User:Lcarsos|lcarsos]]_a ([[User talk:Lcarsos|talk]]) 01:25, 15 November 2012 (UTC)

:We could add the etiquette rules as an addendum to the signature reminder at the top of the page. Just an extra note below the alert box asking people to not edit other people's comments. [[User:Davidy22|Davidy22]][[User talk:Davidy22|<tt>(talk)</tt>]] 06:40, 16 November 2012 (UTC)

::It really should be right down with the "edited mercilessly" description, because this is an exception to that statement. Shouldn't have two sets of contradictory instructions in different places. When I made my improper edit, I had a semi-conscious moment of doubt about whether changing the other guy's comment was ok, even though this is a wiki (and even though it wasn't really clear to me that this "discussion" box held something totally separate from the page content), but that statement at the bottom put all such doubts to rest. I read it multiple times to be sure. But I did not notice that line at the top about the four tildes until ''much'' later. It's somewhat lost, visually, in the header line, when you're not looking directly at it.[[Special:Contributions/50.0.38.245|50.0.38.245]] 18:32, 18 November 2012 (UTC)

:::There's discussion to replace that message with a more noticeable alert box. The message at the bottom of the page appears for all pages, including talk pages, so a talk-page specific message there would not entirely fit. [[User:Davidy22|Davidy22]][[User talk:Davidy22|<tt>(talk)</tt>]] 00:18, 19 November 2012 (UTC)

::::If that text at the bottom is in fact alterable, it should be written to take every case into account. It's an extremely poor user interface that has instructions appearing on a page stating rules that are the exact opposite of reality. And note that the altert box on the top looks a lot like a banner add, when you don't focus on it and read it. People will tend to habitually filter out anything written there from their perception. Also, it can easily be scrolled off the top of the screen when the discussion starts to get long, and they have a preview displayed.
::::So I think after the "...then do not submit it here.", it should add, "'''Exception''': others' comments in Discussion pages are not to be altered. See full rules at <<link to appropriate wikipedia page>>."[[Special:Contributions/50.0.38.245|50.0.38.245]] 15:46, 28 November 2012 (UTC)

== Update after changes ==

The front page explanation hasn't been updated at all day to match changes in the explanation on the comic's page. This is a major problem i think, as it is the front page explanation people visitors will most often read. --[[User:St.nerol|St.nerol]] ([[User talk:St.nerol|talk]]) 20:43, 26 November 2012 (UTC)
: It might be a caching issue. Appending <code>&action=purge</code> to the URL will probably fix it. Can you confirm it looks good to you now? --[[User:Waldir|Waldir]] ([[User talk:Waldir|talk]]) 00:29, 27 November 2012 (UTC)
::Yep, now it updates instantly! Well done, whatever you did! :) --[[User:St.nerol|St.nerol]] ([[User talk:St.nerol|talk]]) 16:24, 27 November 2012 (UTC)

:::I've also added a link underneath the comic box that has the action embedded, so no one has to do any manual URL hacking. [[User:Lcarsos|lcarsos]]_a ([[User talk:Lcarsos|talk]]) 17:38, 11 December 2012 (UTC)

::::Just wanted to check in on this - are there issues with automated systems or spammers following this link? I know it can affect performance - caching is important on a busy site! --[[User:Overand|Overand]] ([[User talk:Overand|talk]]) 22:37, 13 September 2013 (UTC)

== Suggestion: Change "Go to this comic" to "Go to this entry" ==

Just a small suggestion. For the Main Page, I suggest changing "Go to this comic" to say "Go to this ''entry''" instead to remove any confusion for new and regular viewers. It certainly took me a while to figure how to go to each featured comic's entry from the main page.

[[Special:Contributions/69.43.114.2|69.43.114.2]] 17:04, 11 December 2012 (UTC)

:How about if it reads "Go to this comic explanation"? Would that be less confusing? I only quibble because the explanations aren't really entries, in wiki parlance each page is usually called an article, but that doesn't seem to fit here as we really have explanation pages. [[User:Lcarsos|lcarsos]]_a ([[User talk:Lcarsos|talk]]) 17:41, 11 December 2012 (UTC)

::Agreed. [[User:Ctxppc|Randy Marsh]] ([[User talk:Ctxppc|talk]]) 22:55, 8 January 2013 (UTC)

== Explain the Unreleased Comic? ==
:I wonder if [[http://i56.tinypic.com/a9ton8.png this comic]] is permitted to be explained, despite the double issue of Randall pulling the comic plus me finding the pulled comic through "xkcd overrated"... [[User:Greyson|Greyson]] ([[User talk:Greyson|talk]]) 18:21, 12 December 2012 (UTC)

== Comic 1156 ==

I don't have an account to edit the page directly, so here's an edit someone should make:
It looks like whoever wrote the existing page simply googled 'conditioning' and found the first link that came up.
Please modify the link to point to 'Classical conditioning', not 'Operant conditioning'.
Thanks. {{unsigned ip|124.191.56.91|05:26, 7 January 2013‎ (UTC)}}

:Hi. This is the talk page for the main page of the wiki. This page only has a "view" of the actual comic explanation. The actual explanation page is at [[1156: Conditioning]], and I assure you, edit permissions have not been restricted for that page. Someone has already changed the page to link to Classical conditioning, but the original editor came back stating that Operant was correct. If you would like to start a discussion about this [[Talk:1156: Conditioning|on the talk page for this explanation]] that would be much more conducive to getting this matter settled. [[User:Lcarsos|lcarsos]]_a ([[User talk:Lcarsos|talk]]) 05:52, 7 January 2013 (UTC)

== Comic Links ==

Some of the links seem to be confusing, as they're titled in a weird way. The link/button 'go to this comic', I'd expect would go to the actual comic on XKCD's page. Yet it goes to the comic's wiki page. And clicking on the comic # and date directs you to the XKCD page, yet I really feel that link should go to the wiki page, as it's right at the top center there, and has the date and everything, sort of indicating that it's a wiki page, yet it's not. And the prev and next buttons next to it don't go to the xkcd page, they go to the wiki pages. Which is really messed up, I think. Because of my confusion, every single time I visit here, I clicked on the wrong link, though now I've gotten used to it. I suggest rewording the links as 'XKCD Comic # and date' and 'go to this comic's wiki page'. And possibly switching the links' positions so that the wiki links could be in that navigation bar and the XKCD links could be off to the side. After all, we are a wiki, so putting our wiki links to the comic off to the side and the direct xkcd link in the center seems odd. Anyway, has anyone had the same thoughts and/or agree with me on this?--[[Special:Contributions/69.119.250.251|69.119.250.251]] 18:19, 9 January 2013 (UTC)

== Unexplained comics ==

The template that starts each explanation page should be edited to have the next and previous buttons automatically skip over pages that don't exist, rather than simply not being there if comic n+1 or n-1 doesn't exist. Preferably it would append a notice to the next page (like the redirect notices commonly found on mediawiki) telling you how many comics have been skipped. I'm not sure how feasible this would be to script, however. [[Special:Contributions/130.160.145.185|130.160.145.185]] 23:45, 9 March 2013 (UTC)

== Percentage of remaining comics calculation is off... ==

Okay, I hate to be "that pedantic math guy", but... Today the main page reads "We have collaboratively explained 936 xkcd comics, and only 252 (27%) remain." While I agree that 252/936 is roughly 27%, I believe we should really be calculating the percentage as "the number left to explain" divided by "the total number of comics that exist", not divided by "the number we have finished". That is (today), 252/1188=21%. Think about it. If we had completed 594 comics today, with 594 remaining, what should the percentage be? 594/594=100%? That's not right... 594/1188=50%? That's what we really want to say.

The page is protected, which makes sense. So I'll make my suggestion here.

Change this:

<pre>
and only {{#expr:{{LATESTCOMIC}}-({{PAGESINCAT:Comics}}-9)}}
({{#expr: ({{LATESTCOMIC}}-({{PAGESINCAT:Comics}}-9)) / ({{PAGESINCAT:Comics}}-9) * 100 round 0}}%)
remain.
</pre>
To this:
<pre>
and only {{#expr:{{LATESTCOMIC}}-({{PAGESINCAT:Comics}}-9)}}
({{#expr: ({{LATESTCOMIC}}-({{PAGESINCAT:Comics}}-9)) / {{#expr:{{LATESTCOMIC}}}} * 100 round 0}}%)
remain.
</pre>
[[User:Imperpay|Imperpay]] ([[User talk:Imperpay|talk]]) 15:32, 20 March 2013 (UTC)

:Done and done. '''[[User:Davidy22|{{Color|purple|David}}y²²]]'''[[User talk:Davidy22|<tt>[talk]</tt>]] 15:37, 20 March 2013 (UTC)

:Thanks for the heads-up! However, notice that the #expr: around LATESTCOMIC was unnecessary. I've removed it. [[User:Waldir|Waldir]] ([[User talk:Waldir|talk]]) 11:30, 21 March 2013 (UTC)

::Waldir, you have exposed me as a charlatan and a fool! (I just copied, pasted, and tinkered until I made something that worked. I don't actually understand it. No formal training, you see. It's what we used to call "hacking" back in the dawn of the digital era, before the word took on connotations of vandalism, trespassing, and fraud. Have you kids come up with another word for it?) [[User:Imperpay|Imperpay]] ([[User talk:Imperpay|talk]]) 13:59, 22 March 2013 (UTC)

::: Joke's on me then, 'cause you sure fooled me – I readily assumed you knew your way around those parser functions. Nice job hacking the code, it was a nearly perfect crime ;) --[[User:Waldir|Waldir]] ([[User talk:Waldir|talk]]) 03:26, 25 March 2013 (UTC)

:::I've heard the cool kids call that the "Maker Mentality", usually with a reference to [http://makezine.com/ Make magazine] and [http://makerfaire.com/ Maker Faire]. But I think there's also a movement to resurrect the original meaning of hacker. [[User:Lcarsos|lcarsos]]_a ([[User talk:Lcarsos|talk]]) 04:21, 25 March 2013 (UTC)

==sidebar ads?==
''Moved to [[explain xkcd:Community portal/Proposals]] –– [[User:St.nerol|St.nerol]] ([[User talk:St.nerol|talk]]) 08:06, 4 May 2013 (UTC)''

== Expression error on Main Page ==

Please use <code><nowiki>{{PAGESINCAT:...|R}}</nowiki></code> instead of <code><nowiki>{{PAGESINCAT:...}}</nowiki></code> to correct these errors :) --[[Special:Contributions/110.168.83.62|110.168.83.62]] 10:55, 8 April 2013 (UTC)
:Dun diddly done. '''[[User:Davidy22|{{Color|#707|David}}y²²]]'''[[User talk:Davidy22|<tt>[talk]</tt>]] 11:21, 8 April 2013 (UTC)

== Compile a list of non-technical comics to non-technical readers? ==

I'm a long-time reader and fan of >< |< C |}, but my normal approach is useless when I introduce this provocative comic series to my less technical friends. They stay at the apparent level of many comics. They don't bother reading the explanations, but they would say, "it's hard to make sense". Imagine an average non-technical (and non-arts) major guy/girl, can we compile a list of state-of-the-art but less-technical, easy-to-comprehend but "ah ha!!" strips that is suitable for them? --[[User:FrenzY|W shll nvr flly xpln xkcd!]] ([[User talk:FrenzY|talk]]) 12:39, 18 May 2013 (UTC)
:Oh my god that signature.
:Gaah, derailment. Uh, pretty much anything that isn't tagged with the physics or math categories are easy enough to understand for the average English speaker, so just check the categories at the bottom of the page for that. Also, avoid comics with the incomplete tag, and that oughta be fine. '''[[User:Davidy22|{{Color|#707|David}}y²²]]'''[[User talk:Davidy22|<tt>[talk]</tt>]] 14:41, 18 May 2013 (UTC)

== Quit building? ==
''This post was moved to [[Talk:1214: Geoguessr]].''

:Hello, this is the talk page for the content of the front page of the wiki, not for discussion of the most recent comic, that happens [[Talk:1214: Geoguessr|here]]. I've moved your post over there for you. Cheers, and welcome to explain xkcd! [[User:Lcarsos|lcarsos]]_a ([[User talk:Lcarsos|talk]]) 05:09, 22 May 2013 (UTC)

== List of incomplete comics ==
We need a link to the "Incomplete articles" at the main page below the "Missing link". Most pages are created but many are incomplete.--[[User:Dgbrt|Dgbrt]] ([[User talk:Dgbrt|talk]]) 19:06, 7 June 2013 (UTC)

== Header message ==

'''Please don't take this seriously unless you actually think it's a good idea:'''

I think the header should be changed from "explain xkcd: It's 'cause you're dumb." to "explain xkcd: It's 'cause you're dumb... or still have some hope that comic [[1190]] will end." or something similar. [[User:Schiffy|Schiffy]] ([[User_talk:Schiffy|Speak to me]]|[[Special:Contributions/Schiffy|What I've done]]) 14:53, 9 June 2013 (UTC)

::Nope! This page is trying to explain more than 1222 comics, not only [[1190: Time]]. The header just states the truth.--[[User:Dgbrt|Dgbrt]] ([[User talk:Dgbrt|talk]]) 15:49, 9 June 2013 (UTC)

I'd vote for a change. People have started coming over to discuss the comic even when they've 'gotten' it. That, and the fact that this is one step ahead of Googling the references yourself. So.. maybe, "it's because you're dumb..and lazy."[[Special:Contributions/220.224.246.97|220.224.246.97]] 02:26, 31 August 2013 (UTC)

As a regular reader of explainxkcd (who was to lazy to cotribute anything until now), I'd like to support the proposed edit. (... and lazy) It really fits to the tone of our favourite waste of otherwise productive time (which is xkcd for myself). Best wishes from Heidelberg, Germany. --[[Special:Contributions/147.142.13.86|147.142.13.86]] 14:38, 10 October 2013 (UTC)

== A point of confusion ==

Why is 'Apatosaurus' a category but 'Internet Argument' no longer a category? [[User:Greyson|Greyson]] ([[User talk:Greyson|talk]]) 13:53, 20 June 2013 (UTC)
:Cuz people hit the random button, see an Apatosaurus feature in three comics and figure it must be a recurring theme. Same as the internet argument thing. Will get round to a category purge after we've cleared out all the incomplete tags. I think there's one for ferrets hidden away somewhere in the dark recesses of our catalog of categories. '''[[User:Davidy22|{{Color|#707|David}}y²²]]'''[[User talk:Davidy22|<tt>[talk]</tt>]] 14:45, 20 June 2013 (UTC)
::On the subject, can I suggest a "Barred from Conferences" category, or similar? That's definitely a recurring theme (for a long, long time), and thus should be justified enough. I'd be happy to add various qualifying articles as I scroll through again, if I can, but first I'll leave it up to someone else to solidify the actual name. (In case it turns out not to be just conferences, for example.) [[Special:Contributions/178.98.31.27|178.98.31.27]] 16:27, 22 June 2013 (UTC)

== Incomplete comics statement ==

I suggest the minor change: "We have an explanation for all x xkcd comics, and only y (y/x %) are '''marked as''' incomplete." –[[User:St.nerol|St.nerol]] ([[User talk:St.nerol|talk]]) 08:07, 21 June 2013 (UTC)

== 1262 is out ==

So what are you waiting for? [[Special:Contributions/75.60.27.102|75.60.27.102]] 06:25, 9 September 2013 (UTC)
:<nowiki>(diff | hist) . . N 1262: Unquote‎; 06:23, 9 September 2013 (UTC) . . (+322)‎ . . ‎Davidy22 (Talk | contribs | block)‎ (Created page with "{{comic | number = 1262 | date = September 9, 2013 | title = Unquote | image = unquote.png | titletext = I guess it's a saying from the Old Country. }} ==Expl...")</nowiki>
:Examine the time stamps. '''[[User:Davidy22|{{Color|#707|David}}y²²]]'''[[User talk:Davidy22|<tt>[talk]</tt>]] 06:30, 9 September 2013 (UTC)

== Adverts ==

I am not going to disable my adblock, I hate ads. If you accept bitcoin I can make a donation though. [[Special:Contributions/184.66.160.91|184.66.160.91]] 05:24, 27 September 2013 (UTC)
:Our ads are always easy-to-load images as opposed to flash ads, they're always pointing to some valuable product of some form and we've looked at and approved all of them. They also occupy space that would otherwise have been empty, as our one ad is bound strictly to the sidebar. We used to have a paypal donation button, but it was pitifully tended to and a much less reliable source of income than ads. Ads are the only reliable business model for small sites like this one; unless our readers suddenly become willing to pay all our server costs for us, we can't feasibly afford a better hosting plan without ads. We legally aren't allowed to open a merch store, because that infringes on Randall's shop, and we haven't had a single generous benefactor yet. If you want to stop seeing our server error messages, loosening up adblock for us and contributing to our impressions count will help us massively. '''[[User:Davidy22|{{Color|#707|David}}y²²]]'''[[User talk:Davidy22|<tt>[talk]</tt>]] 06:00, 27 September 2013 (UTC)

I don't care about your server message, I wanted to make a donation. Sooo, you don't want any bitcoins? [[Special:Contributions/37.221.161.235|37.221.161.235]] 07:16, 27 September 2013 (UTC)
:This took a bit of digging. We're fine with bitcoin donations, it's just that at the rate donations came in, they were just not enough to pay for anything. [https://coinbase.com/checkouts/b19f921822ac962807a8f72d51509e59] '''[[User:Davidy22|{{Color|#707|David}}y²²]]'''[[User talk:Davidy22|<tt>[talk]</tt>]] 20:34, 28 September 2013 (UTC)

Donation made! [[Special:Contributions/184.66.160.91|184.66.160.91]] 23:23, 30 September 2013 (UTC)
:Thanks! '''[[User:Davidy22|{{Color|#707|David}}y²²]]'''[[User talk:Davidy22|<tt>[talk]</tt>]] 02:27, 1 October 2013 (UTC)

== /wiki is returning a 403 ==

Hello, 
http://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/ is returning a 403 now. In my eyes you should redirect it to the main-page instead :-). --[[User:DaB.|DaB.]] ([[User talk:DaB.|talk]]) 12:41, 8 November 2013 (UTC)
:We have a new, hopefully better, server. The problem is already reported to [[User_talk:Jeff#Forbidden]] --[[User:Dgbrt|Dgbrt]] ([[User talk:Dgbrt|talk]]) 14:22, 8 November 2013 (UTC)

== Explain Explain XKCD / Explain^2 XKCD ==

This particular comic explanation requires explanation. Way too many potential cross references with each conjecture requiring its own explanation page. Dial it back a little. {{unsigned ip|108.162.245.11}}
:Uh, sorry, could you clarify that a little? '''[[User:Davidy22|{{Color|#707|David}}y²²]]'''[[User talk:Davidy22|<tt>[talk]</tt>]] 07:23, 19 November 2013 (UTC)

::He is talking about the [http://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/ http://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/] issue. --[[User:Dgbrt|Dgbrt]] ([[User talk:Dgbrt|talk]]) 21:32, 19 November 2013 (UTC)
:::Well if it's that, that's an intentional permissions setting on a URL that no-one is feasibly going to type. Unless you can come up with a better use for that URL, with a reason? '''[[User:Davidy22|{{Color|#707|David}}y²²]]'''[[User talk:Davidy22|<tt>[talk]</tt>]] 08:40, 20 November 2013 (UTC)
::::A symlink to "index.php" at the root folder would solve the problem.--[[User:Dgbrt|Dgbrt]] ([[User talk:Dgbrt|talk]]) 09:26, 20 November 2013 (UTC)
:::::I cannot believe how many weeks that took to fix. Amazing. No one was going to type it, but everyone was going to get redirected to it from the home page! [[Special:Contributions/108.162.222.227|108.162.222.227]] 11:37, 20 November 2013 (UTC)

The problem is still not solved. [http://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/ http://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/] gives still a 403 error because "index.php" is not included in the http server configuration as a default index page. --[[User:Dgbrt|Dgbrt]] ([[User talk:Dgbrt|talk]]) 20:07, 20 November 2013 (UTC)
:: I've fixed this. Sorry about the delay. Was super busy! --[[User:Jeff|Jeff]] ([[User talk:Jeff|talk]]) 16:02, 21 November 2013 (UTC)
:::Thanks Jeff, it's working. --[[User:Dgbrt|Dgbrt]] ([[User talk:Dgbrt|talk]]) 22:20, 21 November 2013 (UTC)

== Webmaster: Obtrusive video ad on your site ==

In the ad section I saw a box sticking out and blocking out the explanation. This was therefore a very obtrusive botched video ad. Please remove this ad from your site. [[Special:Contributions/199.27.128.188|199.27.128.188]] 22:29, 6 June 2014 (UTC)

EDIT: It's now sticking out and preventing me from clicking on the "Save page" button. [[Special:Contributions/199.27.128.188|199.27.128.188]] 22:29, 6 June 2014 (UTC)
:We only accept GIFs for moving ads. Ads should also be contained within the sidebar as they're techonogically restricted to standard-sized PNGs and GIFs, so an extruding ad would be a CSS error on the site end/browser error. In addition, we run ads from lots of advertisers, and "this ad" is not specific enough to tell us which ad you want us to remove. Could you provide a screenshot/link/more information? '''[[User:Davidy22|{{Color|#707|David}}y²²]]'''[[User talk:Davidy22|<tt>[talk]</tt>]] 22:54, 6 June 2014 (UTC)

== Adding an arcs list page ==

I think there should be a page listing all webcomics arcs so far (the red spiders, the race, etc.)[[Special:Contributions/188.114.102.134|188.114.102.134]] 12:47, 2 October 2014 (UTC)

== This explanation may be incomplete or incorrect: link ==

This has been bothering me for a while now. Why does the link in the info box for the main page link to editing the main page? It needs to link to the editing of the page which the comic's explanation is on. When I would like to edit the latest XKCD explanation, I click that thinking I am going to edit the explanation, but instead I am led to editing the main page. [[User:Auraxangelic|Auraxangelic]] ([[User talk:Auraxangelic|talk]]) 15:19, 24 October 2014 (UTC)
:Ooooooh, nice catch. I've actually never noticed that before, and it's definitely not intentional. It happens because the text of the explanation page is folded into the main page before mediawiki parses links and syntax, and the "Edit this page" button links to the page that the link is on. I have an idea for how to fix it though, so I'll get on that. '''[[User:Davidy22|{{Color|#707|David}}y²²]]'''[[User talk:Davidy22|<tt>[talk]</tt>]] 01:49, 25 October 2014 (UTC)

== #1454 - bad description ==

"Curly-hair states longingly..." She comes across as disappointed (or even heartbroken), not "longing", which suggests sounding somewhat positive and energetic, rather than deflated. [[Special:Contributions/141.101.99.88|141.101.99.88]] 22:29, 2 December 2014 (UTC)