I read about it on the BBC news site and have done 4 days now
(they give a word per day).
Twice at the 4-th try, once and the third and once at the
last, sixth (which was a word I did not know, I just guessed
what it could be then looked it up (was "shard")).

https://www.powerlanguage.co.uk/wordle/

In article <stjsi1$v07$1@dont-email.me>, dp@tgi-sci.com says...
>
> I read about it on the BBC news site and have done 4 days now
> (they give a word per day).
> Twice at the 4-th try, once and the third and once at the
> last, sixth (which was a word I did not know, I just guessed
> what it could be then looked it up (was "shard")).
>
> https://www.powerlanguage.co.uk/wordle/

So you do not know that "Shard" is the nickname of a London skyscraper?
(Or did you learn that from looking it up?)

On 2/5/2022 1:09, Mike Coon wrote:
> In article <stjsi1$v07$1@dont-email.me>, dp@tgi-sci.com says...
>>
>> I read about it on the BBC news site and have done 4 days now
>> (they give a word per day).
>> Twice at the 4-th try, once and the third and once at the
>> last, sixth (which was a word I did not know, I just guessed
>> what it could be then looked it up (was "shard")).
>>
>> https://www.powerlanguage.co.uk/wordle/
>
> So you do not know that "Shard" is the nickname of a London skyscraper?
> (Or did you learn that from looking it up?)

No, never been there. And I did not know that meaning until you
posted :-).
What I found was it meant some sort of piece of broken ceramics
or something like that. I don't think I had ever encountered the
word, if I did I had zero memory of that.

That wordle thing is pretty nice, I liked it. Reminded me of a
game we played at school, bulls and cows, but more varied. And it
is just one word per day so one cannot be bored too easily nor
waste much time with it.

On 2/4/2022 11:50 AM, Dimiter_Popoff wrote:
> I read about it on the BBC news site and have done 4 days now
> (they give a word per day).
> Twice at the 4-th try, once and the third and once at the
> last, sixth (which was a word I did not know, I just guessed
> what it could be then looked it up (was "shard")).
>
> https://www.powerlanguage.co.uk/wordle/

<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mastermind_(board_game)>

A slightly different problem as each "character" (peg)
in the guess has no semantic ties to those around it
(whereas letters in a word, do!)

On 2/5/2022 2:00, Don Y wrote:
> On 2/4/2022 11:50 AM, Dimiter_Popoff wrote:
>> I read about it on the BBC news site and have done 4 days now
>> (they give a word per day).
>> Twice at the 4-th try, once and the third and once at the
>> last, sixth (which was a word I did not know, I just guessed
>> what it could be then looked it up (was "shard")).
>>
>> https://www.powerlanguage.co.uk/wordle/
>
> <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mastermind_(board_game)>
>
> A slightly different problem as each "character" (peg)
> in the guess has no semantic ties to those around it
> (whereas letters in a word, do!)
>

Have never seen that one. But I am not the gamer type at all
you know, can't be drawn for too long on a game, it takes some
real problem to get me going.
IIRC you had designed/programmed some games some time ago?
My only game was that "bulls and cows" on a 6800 hex kit,
manually assembled on paper while I was learning the trade.

That wordle is globally the same I think, one word per day,
people can share phone screenshots of how they did it etc.,
let me see how long it will keep me (going to bed now with the
intention to do today's word).

On 2/4/2022 5:39 PM, Dimiter_Popoff wrote:
> On 2/5/2022 2:00, Don Y wrote:
>> On 2/4/2022 11:50 AM, Dimiter_Popoff wrote:
>>> I read about it on the BBC news site and have done 4 days now
>>> (they give a word per day).
>>> Twice at the 4-th try, once and the third and once at the
>>> last, sixth (which was a word I did not know, I just guessed
>>> what it could be then looked it up (was "shard")).
>>>
>>> https://www.powerlanguage.co.uk/wordle/
>>
>> <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mastermind_(board_game)>
>>
>> A slightly different problem as each "character" (peg)
>> in the guess has no semantic ties to those around it
>> (whereas letters in a word, do!)
>
> Have never seen that one.

It was common (inexpensive) when we were kids. It doesn't require
any special equipment and, anyone with "decent" reasoning capability
can become proficient.

> But I am not the gamer type at all
> you know, can't be drawn for too long on a game, it takes some
> real problem to get me going.

Yup. The advantage is that the games are short. And, once you
"learn" how to play (beat) it, they almost become trivial.

Sort of like playing solitaire -- a reasonably mindless distraction...
unlike putting together a 5000 piece jigsaw puzzle!

> IIRC you had designed/programmed some games some time ago?

Those were "arcade pieces" (things you put money into in order
to play) and "gaming devices" ("gaming" being a euphemism for
*gambling* -- slot machines, pai gow poker, etc.) Each has
"profit" as a design motivation.

> My only game was that "bulls and cows" on a 6800 hex kit,
> manually assembled on paper while I was learning the trade.

Mastermind is conceptually similar. But, an "excuse" for
someone to make a few dollars selling you a bunch of colored
plastic pieces!

> That wordle is globally the same I think, one word per day,
> people can share phone screenshots of how they did it etc.,
> let me see how long it will keep me (going to bed now with the
> intention to do today's word).

On Friday, February 4, 2022 at 6:36:18 PM UTC-5, Dimiter Popoff wrote:
> On 2/5/2022 1:09, Mike Coon wrote:
> > In article <stjsi1$v07$1...@dont-email.me>, d...@tgi-sci.com says...
> >>
> >> I read about it on the BBC news site and have done 4 days now
> >> (they give a word per day).
> >> Twice at the 4-th try, once and the third and once at the
> >> last, sixth (which was a word I did not know, I just guessed
> >> what it could be then looked it up (was "shard")).
> >>
> >> https://www.powerlanguage.co.uk/wordle/
> >
> > So you do not know that "Shard" is the nickname of a London skyscraper?
> > (Or did you learn that from looking it up?)
> No, never been there. And I did not know that meaning until you
> posted :-).
> What I found was it meant some sort of piece of broken ceramics
> or something like that. I don't think I had ever encountered the
> word, if I did I had zero memory of that.
>
> That wordle thing is pretty nice, I liked it. Reminded me of a
> game we played at school, bulls and cows, but more varied. And it
> is just one word per day so one cannot be bored too easily nor
> waste much time with it.

Yeah, archeologists dig up pottery shards. That's where I've mostly seen the word... that and shards of glass in accidents, real or in stories.

--

Rick C.

- Get 1,000 miles of free Supercharging
- Tesla referral code - https://ts.la/richard11209

On Friday, February 4, 2022 at 8:15:43 PM UTC-5, Don Y wrote:
> On 2/4/2022 5:39 PM, Dimiter_Popoff wrote:
> > On 2/5/2022 2:00, Don Y wrote:
> >> On 2/4/2022 11:50 AM, Dimiter_Popoff wrote:
> >>> I read about it on the BBC news site and have done 4 days now
> >>> (they give a word per day).
> >>> Twice at the 4-th try, once and the third and once at the
> >>> last, sixth (which was a word I did not know, I just guessed
> >>> what it could be then looked it up (was "shard")).
> >>>
> >>> https://www.powerlanguage.co.uk/wordle/
> >>
> >> <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mastermind_(board_game)>
> >>
> >> A slightly different problem as each "character" (peg)
> >> in the guess has no semantic ties to those around it
> >> (whereas letters in a word, do!)
> >
> > Have never seen that one.
> It was common (inexpensive) when we were kids. It doesn't require
> any special equipment and, anyone with "decent" reasoning capability
> can become proficient.
> > But I am not the gamer type at all
> > you know, can't be drawn for too long on a game, it takes some
> > real problem to get me going.
> Yup. The advantage is that the games are short. And, once you
> "learn" how to play (beat) it, they almost become trivial.
>
> Sort of like playing solitaire -- a reasonably mindless distraction...
> unlike putting together a 5000 piece jigsaw puzzle!
> > IIRC you had designed/programmed some games some time ago?
> Those were "arcade pieces" (things you put money into in order
> to play) and "gaming devices" ("gaming" being a euphemism for
> *gambling* -- slot machines, pai gow poker, etc.) Each has
> "profit" as a design motivation.
> > My only game was that "bulls and cows" on a 6800 hex kit,
> > manually assembled on paper while I was learning the trade.
> Mastermind is conceptually similar. But, an "excuse" for
> someone to make a few dollars selling you a bunch of colored
> plastic pieces!
> > That wordle is globally the same I think, one word per day,
> > people can share phone screenshots of how they did it etc.,
> > let me see how long it will keep me (going to bed now with the
> > intention to do today's word).

Anyone remember a game in the Sunday paper called "Blind Pig"? It was a small crossword puzzle where the clues were like the name. The resulting "word", in this case, would be "PG", PIG with no eyes. It was very creative, but when they author died, the puzzle ended.

--

Rick C.

+ Get 1,000 miles of free Supercharging
+ Tesla referral code - https://ts.la/richard11209

In article <stkh01$uhg$1@dont-email.me>, dp@tgi-sci.com says...
>
> On 2/5/2022 2:00, Don Y wrote:
> > On 2/4/2022 11:50 AM, Dimiter_Popoff wrote:
> >> I read about it on the BBC news site and have done 4 days now
> >> (they give a word per day).
> >> Twice at the 4-th try, once and the third and once at the
> >> last, sixth (which was a word I did not know, I just guessed
> >> what it could be then looked it up (was "shard")).
> >>
> >> https://www.powerlanguage.co.uk/wordle/
> >
> > <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mastermind_(board_game)>
> >
> > A slightly different problem as each "character" (peg)
> > in the guess has no semantic ties to those around it
> > (whereas letters in a word, do!)
> >
>
> Have never seen that one. But I am not the gamer type at all
> you know, can't be drawn for too long on a game, it takes some
> real problem to get me going.
> IIRC you had designed/programmed some games some time ago?
> My only game was that "bulls and cows" on a 6800 hex kit,
> manually assembled on paper while I was learning the trade.
>
> That wordle is globally the same I think, one word per day,
> people can share phone screenshots of how they did it etc.,
> let me see how long it will keep me (going to bed now with the
> intention to do today's word).

Agreed that programming a "game" is much more interesting than playing.

Especially true of zero-person games like Conway's Game of Life. I
enjoyed coding that on a rather slow machine. I can still run it but
don't know where my source code is.

Similarly true with puzzle (not game) or the "eight queens" problem. I
coded that to (try to) eliminate symmetrical answers ("fundamental"
solutions) but got (IIRC) 14 patterns instead of 12. Non-fundamental
gives 92 patterns! Now we have web and wikipedia I can see other
people's algorithms...

On 2/5/2022 14:39, Mike Coon wrote:
> In article <stkh01$uhg$1@dont-email.me>, dp@tgi-sci.com says...
>>
>> On 2/5/2022 2:00, Don Y wrote:
>>> On 2/4/2022 11:50 AM, Dimiter_Popoff wrote:
>>>> I read about it on the BBC news site and have done 4 days now
>>>> (they give a word per day).
>>>> Twice at the 4-th try, once and the third and once at the
>>>> last, sixth (which was a word I did not know, I just guessed
>>>> what it could be then looked it up (was "shard")).
>>>>
>>>> https://www.powerlanguage.co.uk/wordle/
>>>
>>> <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mastermind_(board_game)>
>>>
>>> A slightly different problem as each "character" (peg)
>>> in the guess has no semantic ties to those around it
>>> (whereas letters in a word, do!)
>>>
>>
>> Have never seen that one. But I am not the gamer type at all
>> you know, can't be drawn for too long on a game, it takes some
>> real problem to get me going.
>> IIRC you had designed/programmed some games some time ago?
>> My only game was that "bulls and cows" on a 6800 hex kit,
>> manually assembled on paper while I was learning the trade.
>>
>> That wordle is globally the same I think, one word per day,
>> people can share phone screenshots of how they did it etc.,
>> let me see how long it will keep me (going to bed now with the
>> intention to do today's word).
>
> Agreed that programming a "game" is much more interesting than playing.
>
> Especially true of zero-person games like Conway's Game of Life. I
> enjoyed coding that on a rather slow machine. I can still run it but
> don't know where my source code is.

I also have one of these "can run but lost the source" :).
Not exactly a game, a "knight walk" exercise I did for a friend
whose wife had to do it for some exam... I did it in Pascal,
I had this integer pascal on my first MDOS09 system, took about
half an hour of torture to the floppies and the 1 MHz 09 to compile...
My English was not bad at that time but - as it is now - clearly
imperfect, upon completion the question was meant to be
"Got it. Bored?" (80-s, ha-ha). I had written "Annoyed", thinking
it meant "bored", LOL.

>
> Similarly true with puzzle (not game) or the "eight queens" problem. I
> coded that to (try to) eliminate symmetrical answers ("fundamental"
> solutions) but got (IIRC) 14 patterns instead of 12. Non-fundamental
> gives 92 patterns! Now we have web and wikipedia I can see other
> people's algorithms...

A few years ago I wanted to do a sort of a directory display
and just looked up the algorithms; works fine and the sources I wrote
are intact but for the life of me I can't remember what the algorithm
was called and how it worked. I think I do remember how algorithms
I have made up work though.

On 2/5/2022 5:39 AM, Mike Coon wrote:
> In article <stkh01$uhg$1@dont-email.me>, dp@tgi-sci.com says...
>>
>> On 2/5/2022 2:00, Don Y wrote:
>>> On 2/4/2022 11:50 AM, Dimiter_Popoff wrote:
>>>> I read about it on the BBC news site and have done 4 days now
>>>> (they give a word per day).
>>>> Twice at the 4-th try, once and the third and once at the
>>>> last, sixth (which was a word I did not know, I just guessed
>>>> what it could be then looked it up (was "shard")).
>>>>
>>>> https://www.powerlanguage.co.uk/wordle/
>>>
>>> <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mastermind_(board_game)>
>>>
>>> A slightly different problem as each "character" (peg)
>>> in the guess has no semantic ties to those around it
>>> (whereas letters in a word, do!)
>>>
>>
>> Have never seen that one. But I am not the gamer type at all
>> you know, can't be drawn for too long on a game, it takes some
>> real problem to get me going.
>> IIRC you had designed/programmed some games some time ago?
>> My only game was that "bulls and cows" on a 6800 hex kit,
>> manually assembled on paper while I was learning the trade.
>>
>> That wordle is globally the same I think, one word per day,
>> people can share phone screenshots of how they did it etc.,
>> let me see how long it will keep me (going to bed now with the
>> intention to do today's word).
>
> Agreed that programming a "game" is much more interesting than playing.

That depends on the nature of the "game".

While I consider myself pretty creative/original in my thinking, I
simply don't have the mindset to come up with the *concept* for
something like Space Invaders, PacMan, Defender, Joust, Tempest, etc.
(Most of these games were conceived of *by* their "programmers")

[My involvement with "games" was confined to designing processors
and systems that would "host" the games]

OTOH, I found designing gaming (gambling) devices to be very
interesting! The rules are typically already in place and it
then becomes an exercise in implementation efficiency (e.g.,
can you make "reels" that move smoothly as if on a mechanical
slot machine?), probability theory (the owner of a machine
has to be able to *set* the house advantage/take desired from
the machine without distorting game play) and regulatory
compliance (most games are regulated by agencies in the
areas where they are deployed; and, even illegal/grey area
games want to be well behaved -- imagine word gets out that
there is an "edge" that can be exploited by the player in your
game!)

[Pai Gow Poker is especially challenging to implement as you
want the game to have an "optimal" strategy so good players can't
beat it!]

> Especially true of zero-person games like Conway's Game of Life. I
> enjoyed coding that on a rather slow machine. I can still run it but
> don't know where my source code is.

Reverse engineer it? (I did that for a client who "lost" the sources.
It's an interesting exercise and gives you insight as to how to
frustrate such efforts in *your* designs]

> Similarly true with puzzle (not game) or the "eight queens" problem. I
> coded that to (try to) eliminate symmetrical answers ("fundamental"
> solutions) but got (IIRC) 14 patterns instead of 12. Non-fundamental
> gives 92 patterns! Now we have web and wikipedia I can see other
> people's algorithms..

Number of unique games of Tic-Tac-Toe? (not unique *results* but actual
"play sequences")

On 2/5/2022 6:51 AM, Dimiter_Popoff wrote:
>> Especially true of zero-person games like Conway's Game of Life. I
>> enjoyed coding that on a rather slow machine. I can still run it but
>> don't know where my source code is.
>
> I also have one of these "can run but lost the source" :).

Sources are relatively easy to hold onto -- esp if created after
the advent of the PC (before that, "paper" was the most universal
medium).

[I even have a BASIC routine I wrote in ~1969 to fit cosines to
experimental data... printed on TTY paper (and later covered
with packing tape as a poor man's lamination lest it "break"
into little pieces!)]

My regret is in not saving hardware samples or schematics from the
first decade or so of my career. But, back then, it was all
C/D/E size vellum and the only practical copying alternative
was to make a diazo of the drawing set. Of course, those would
be even more fragile than TTY printouts -- in very short order!

Amusingly, saving sources doesn't afford me much as most of the
code I wrote was for "deeply embedded" systems -- like the code
running on your MCE; hardly of much use without also preserving
the hardware to host it!

[OTOH, I *do* have some of the larger prototypes that I designed!
There, the cost of shipping a prototype back to a client (when
working remotely) is high enough (crating, shipping, etc.) that
it is easier for them to just write-off the costs of the
hardware. So, you ship schematics, sources and assembly drawings,
instead, and let them recreate your design at their end. You
then are faced with either disposing of your copy or finding a
place to keep/store it -- the latter if it is really interesting!]

> Not exactly a game, a "knight walk" exercise I did for a friend
> whose wife had to do it for some exam... I did it in Pascal,
> I had this integer pascal on my first MDOS09 system, took about
> half an hour of torture to the floppies and the 1 MHz 09 to compile...
> My English was not bad at that time but - as it is now - clearly
> imperfect, upon completion the question was meant to be
> "Got it. Bored?" (80-s, ha-ha). I had written "Annoyed", thinking
> it meant "bored", LOL.

I designed a medical instrument many years ago. After POST, it would
display "Unit Operational".

At the same time, it would play the first few bars from "Shakedown
Street" -- the accompanying lyrics being:
"Well, well, well...
You can never tell!"
An insider joke as I imagine most users wouldn't make the connection.

[I love easter eggs!]

>> Similarly true with puzzle (not game) or the "eight queens" problem. I
>> coded that to (try to) eliminate symmetrical answers ("fundamental"
>> solutions) but got (IIRC) 14 patterns instead of 12. Non-fundamental
>> gives 92 patterns! Now we have web and wikipedia I can see other
>> people's algorithms...
>
> A few years ago I wanted to do a sort of a directory display
> and just looked up the algorithms; works fine and the sources I wrote
> are intact but for the life of me I can't remember what the algorithm
> was called and how it worked. I think I do remember how algorithms
> I have made up work though.

That's where comments are most useful! I learned the value of this
in one of my earliest software roles.

[Most of my designs are proof of concept or used in "startups".
So, I *know* that someone else will have to sort through what
I've done with an eye towards commercializing the product.
Often, a "programmer" with a very shallow level of education
in CS -- or even EE.]

I got a call from one such programmer desperately trying to make sense
of a string matching algorithm I'd used (Boyer Moore). I told
him this, thinking it would trigger some memory in his mind.

Nope. His idea of matching strings was little more than memcmp()
(adjusted for NUL terminated vs. "counted" strings, etc).

But, had I left a reference to the algorithm in the comments,
it would have saved me having to interact with him at all!

(I only interact with clients -- after delivery -- if there is a
demonstrable *bug* in my code. Otherwise, it's *their* product
to maintain).

On 2/5/2022 17:56, Don Y wrote:
> On 2/5/2022 6:51 AM, Dimiter_Popoff wrote:
>> .....
>> A few years ago I wanted to do a sort of a directory display
>> and just looked up the algorithms; works fine and the sources I wrote
>> are intact but for the life of me I can't remember what the algorithm
>> was called and how it worked. I think I do remember how algorithms
>> I have made up work though.
>
> That's where comments are most useful!  I learned the value of this
> in one of my earliest software roles.

Oh the source is well commented, I can always look into it and
see what/how etc. This is valid for everything I have written
since say 1985.
But without looking I could not remember *a thing* about how
it worked. Unlike algorithms I have made up, one notable being
the event processing for the MCA DSP part; complex as it is I
still remember what it does, for details I'd have to look at
the sources of course, it is >10 years since I made it. And the
sort was just 4-5 years ago...

On 2/5/2022 9:43 AM, Dimiter_Popoff wrote:
> On 2/5/2022 17:56, Don Y wrote:
>> On 2/5/2022 6:51 AM, Dimiter_Popoff wrote:
>>> .....
>>> A few years ago I wanted to do a sort of a directory display
>>> and just looked up the algorithms; works fine and the sources I wrote
>>> are intact but for the life of me I can't remember what the algorithm
>>> was called and how it worked. I think I do remember how algorithms
>>> I have made up work though.
>>
>> That's where comments are most useful! I learned the value of this
>> in one of my earliest software roles.
>
> Oh the source is well commented, I can always look into it and
> see what/how etc. This is valid for everything I have written
> since say 1985.
> But without looking I could not remember *a thing* about how
> it worked. Unlike algorithms I have made up, one notable being
> the event processing for the MCA DSP part; complex as it is I
> still remember what it does, for details I'd have to look at
> the sources of course, it is >10 years since I made it. And the
> sort was just 4-5 years ago...

Putting names on things typically helps others more than yourself
(you likely weren't looking to implement FLOGNAZ but, rather, the
algorithm that it described).

Others, OTOH, will see "FLOGNAZ" and no how to find a reference
describing it.

I tend to remember the more interesting/exotic aspects of a design
and leave the "pedestrian" parts for later review as they are
usually boring.

E.g., I did an NS32K design that was unremarkable (as is the case for
most "big" processors) -- save for two issues:
- I designed the MMU and FPU to be plug-in options (for the MMU,
this requires some glue logic be reconfigured -- which I handled
automagically in a small PLA)
- I installed a 647180 "supervisory processor" that acted as a:
+ smart watchdog (it had control over the board's RESET)
+ BOOT PROM (using a portion of the internal EPROM for NS32K code)
+ diagnostic UART
+ status indicator
+ single-step logic (with interface to diagnostic terminal via UART)

I'd likely never have the hardware budget for such an extravagance in
a consumer bit of kit so it was a fun design!