explain xkcd - User contributions [en]

1467: Email

2014-12-31T10:12:19Z

Goufalite:

{{comic
| number = 1467
| date = December 31, 2014
| title = Email
| image = email.png
| titletext = My New Year's resolution for 2014-54-12/30/14 Dec:12:1420001642 is to learn these stupid time formatting strings.
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Created for a live studio audience. - Please change this comment when editing this page.}}
Beret guy doesn't seem to know what email is, even though the term has existed since 1993, and in use by the general public since 1998 when free email providers appeared. Megan is visibly appalled and wonders how else he expects electronic messages to be sent. Beret guy offers two alternatives: fax and snapchat. When Megan tries to point out that snapchat is mostly used to send naked pictures, Beret guy takes her to mean that fax is mostly used to send naked pictures. He terms this use of faxes faxting, a made-up word by analogy with sexting.

The mouseover text shows what is possibly Randall's new years resolution: to learn how to use time formatting functions. When programming, it is often useful to obtain the current time by means of a time function. However, these time functions often provide more detail than what the programmer needs, such as time zone and milliseconds. Time formatting functions allow the output of the time function to be converted into what the programmer needs. Randall appears to have used a time function to get the current year, but when trying to convert the output with a time function, rather than delimiting to just the necessary detail, he appears to have added more detail in; mostly unnecessary detail such as redundantly displaying the month as both "12" and "Dec".

The time formatting string can be split into these elements :
2014 : 4 digit year
54 : 2 digit minutes according to the timestamp below
12 : 2 digit number of the month in the year
30 : 2 digit number of the day in the month
14 : 2 digit year
Dec : english 3 character month name
12 : 2 digit number of the month in the year
1420001642 : unix timestamp for 2014-12-31 at 5:54:02 (Paris timezone)
Since all languages have different time formatting strings, it can be :
PHP : date("Y-i-m/d/y M:m:U");

==Transcript==
:[Megan approaches Beret Guy.]
:Megan: Any New Year's resolutions?
:Beret Guy: Gonna figure out what email is.
:Megan: ''...Email?''

:[Megan points to her phone.]
:Beret Guy: People always say they're sending them. They sound really into it, so I always nod, but I have no idea what it is.
:Megan: You have an address on your website!

:[Megan and Beret Guy walking.]
:Beret Guy: Oh, ''that's'' what that thing is.
:Megan: Email is important! You can't just ''never'' check it. It's not like voicemail.

:Beret Guy: Can't they just send messages ''normally?''
:Megan: How?
:Beret Guy: Fax! Or Snapchat.
:Megan: ...The naked pic thing?
:Beret Guy: Fax machines aren't ''just'' for faxting!
{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Comics featuring Beret Guy]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Megan]]

Talk:1467: Email

2014-12-31T10:10:21Z

Goufalite:

The strftime format used is probably %Y-%M-%D %h:%m:%s, which visibly looks as if it will yield a date and time, yet doesn't. A more correct format would have been %Y-%m-%d %H:%M:%S.

There's a strange thing with the date string : why 30 ? The timestamp shows 31 as a day in month and 5:54 which doesn't match 30... 54 looks like the week in year but matches with the minutes. [[User:Goufalite|Goufalite]] ([[User talk:Goufalite|talk]]) 09:57, 31 December 2014 (UTC)

What on earth does 'Created for a live studio audience mean'?! [[Special:Contributions/141.101.106.143|141.101.106.143]] 10:03, 31 December 2014 (UTC)

Talk:1467: Email

2014-12-31T10:04:12Z

Goufalite:

The strftime format used is probably %Y-%M-%D %h:%m:%s, which visibly looks as if it will yield a date and time, yet doesn't. A more correct format would have been %Y-%m-%d %H:%M:%S.

There's a strange thing with the date string : why 30 ? The timestamp shows 31 as a day in month and 5:54 which doesn't match 30, and this week is the 53rd in the year/1st next year... [[User:Goufalite|Goufalite]] ([[User talk:Goufalite|talk]]) 09:57, 31 December 2014 (UTC)

What on earth does 'Created for a live studio audience mean'?! [[Special:Contributions/141.101.106.143|141.101.106.143]] 10:03, 31 December 2014 (UTC)

Talk:1467: Email

2014-12-31T09:57:51Z

Goufalite:

The strftime format used is probably %Y-%M-%D %h:%m:%s, which visibly looks as if it will yield a date and time, yet doesn't. A more correct format would have been %Y-%m-%d %H:%M:%S.

There's a strange think with the date string : why 30 ? The timestamp shows 31 as a day in month and 5:54 which doesn't match 30, and this week is the 53rd in the year... [[User:Goufalite|Goufalite]] ([[User talk:Goufalite|talk]]) 09:57, 31 December 2014 (UTC)

1467: Email

2014-12-31T09:51:12Z

Goufalite:

{{comic
| number = 1467
| date = December 31, 2014
| title = Email
| image = email.png
| titletext = My New Year's resolution for 2014-54-12/30/14 Dec:12:1420001642 is to learn these stupid time formatting strings.
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Created for a live studio audience. - Please change this comment when editing this page.}}
Beret guy doesn't seem to know what email is, even though the term has existed since 1993, and in use by the general public since 1998 when free email providers appeared. Megan is visibly appalled and wonders how else he expects electronic messages to be sent. Beret guy offers two alternatives: fax and snapchat. When Megan tries to point out that snapchat is mostly used to send naked pictures, Beret guy takes her to mean that fax is mostly used to send naked pictures. He terms this use of faxes faxting, a made-up word by analogy with sexting.

The mouseover text shows what is possibly Randall's new years resolution: to learn how to use time formatting functions. When programming, it is often useful to obtain the current time by means of a time function. However, these time functions often provide more detail than what the programmer needs, such as time zone and milliseconds. Time formatting functions allow the output of the time function to be converted into what the programmer needs. Randall appears to have used a time function to get the current year, but when trying to convert the output with a time function, rather than delimiting to just the necessary detail, he appears to have added more detail in; mostly unnecessary detail such as redundantly displaying the month as both "12" and "Dec".

The time formatting string can be split into these elements :
2014 : 4 digit year
54 : number of the week in year
12 : 2 digit number of the month in the year
30 : 2 digit number of the day in the month
14 : 2 digit year
Dec : english 3 character month name
12 : 2 digit number of the month in the year
1420001642 : unix timestamp for 2014-12-31 at 5:54 (Paris timezone)
Since all languages have different time formatting strings, it can be :
PHP : date("Y-W-m/d/y M:m:U");

==Transcript==
:[Megan approaches Beret Guy.]
:Megan: Any New Year's resolutions?
:Beret Guy: Gonna figure out what email is.
:Megan: ''...Email?''

:[Megan points to her phone.]
:Beret Guy: People always say they're sending them. They sound really into it, so I always nod, but I have no idea what it is.
:Megan: You have an address on your website!

:[Megan and Beret Guy walking.]
:Beret Guy: Oh, ''that's'' what that thing is.
:Megan: Email is important! You can't just ''never'' check it. It's not like voicemail.

:Beret Guy: Can't they just send messages ''normally?''
:Megan: How?
:Beret Guy: Fax! Or Snapchat.
:Megan: ...The naked pic thing?
:Beret Guy: Fax machines aren't ''just'' for faxting!
{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Comics featuring Beret Guy]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Megan]]