explain xkcd - User contributions [en]

Talk:2382: Ballot Tracker Tracker

2020-11-11T14:41:33Z

108.162.216.22:

In the title text, Randall explicitly endorses candidates for one party. He's said things before to suggest which side he's pulling for, but has he ever done so explicitly like this? If not, it should be mentioned. [[User:DKMell|DKMell]] ([[User talk:DKMell|talk]]) 17:54, 9 November 2020 (UTC)

:He endorsed Clinton in 2016 through a comic. https://xkcd.com/1756/ [[Special:Contributions/108.162.216.22|108.162.216.22]] 14:41, 11 November 2020 (UTC)

Could this also refer to sites that track whether one’s ballot has been counted? --[[Special:Contributions/172.68.132.239|172.68.132.239]] 03:31, 7 November 2020 (UTC)

This sense of "calling it" is relatively uncommon, especially for non-native English speakers to encounter. Although having it in quotes is good, some explanation should be added in parentheses. [[Special:Contributions/188.114.110.4|188.114.110.4]] 04:13, 7 November 2020 (UTC)
:See [https://english.stackexchange.com/questions/550851/call-the-race-in-the-election English.stackexchange.com] [[User:Barmar|Barmar]] ([[User talk:Barmar|talk]]) 07:50, 7 November 2020 (UTC)

I remember an earlier comic,Cueball trying to incinerate an incinerator.(xkcd1821),and people tracking trackers(xkcd2376),Maybe there should be a "meta-usage" catogry?(e.g using an incinerator to incinerate another incinerator,using a tracker to track a tracker etc.) [[User:Xkcdjerry|Xkcdjerry]] ([[User talk:Xkcdjerry|talk]]) 13:34, 7 November 2020 (UTC)

The current explanation refers to a ballot tracker as a government site, but I believe they're typically independently provided by either news organizations or political information websites. However, I decided not to edit the explanation yet until someone else confirms they have the same interpretation of the term "ballot tracker" here. [[User:Ianrbibtitlht|Ianrbibtitlht]] ([[User talk:Ianrbibtitlht|talk]]) 14:27, 7 November 2020 (UTC)

:Well, I see that the next paragraph talks about "ballot tracker" in the context of my interpretation, so I'm not sure whether to modify the first paragraph that mentions government sites or not, but I would support removing that first part and just simplifying it to talk about the news organization interpretation of the term. Other input from anyone? [[User:Ianrbibtitlht|Ianrbibtitlht]] ([[User talk:Ianrbibtitlht|talk]]) 14:31, 7 November 2020 (UTC)

:I strongly agree that the correct interpretation for "ballot tracker" is the various sites that provided updates on the ongoing ballot counts at the various states. I think the first interpretation of sites where individual voters can check their ballots is wrong. It especially does not make sense to track how quickly those sites update, since one voter can only view the one site for their ballot, and can't see it updating at some frequency. On the other hand I was an example of the topic of this comic. I obsessively refreshed the New York Times tracking pages to add numbers to spreadsheets graphing trends while also refreshing the live blog at fivethirtyeight.com. As a result I noticed that the live blog quoted results from tracker site Decision Desk HQ several minutes before the same results from the states appeared on the NYT tracker page. I consider myself an example of the target of this comic using that interpretation. [[User:Bugstomper|Bugstomper]] ([[User talk:Bugstomper|talk]]) 21:39, 7 November 2020 (UTC)

The article that is linked to is not about tracking tracker sites. The article title is "Tracking Which News Outlets Have Called the Presidential Race in Each State". The article tracks which news sites have called which states. Each such news site presumably has a tracker page for each state in which they display the current reported vote counts. Cueball's tracker tracker is tracking how often each news site's tracker pages are updated with new counts. Each news agency has a "decision desk" which uses the data from their tracking page plus other related information to decide when they will declare a projected win for a candidate in a state. That is referred to as "calling" the race in a state. [[User:Bugstomper|Bugstomper]] ([[User talk:Bugstomper|talk]]) 06:45, 8 November 2020 (UTC)

Well now AP's called it. Biden won. [[User:Bubblegum|bubblegum]]-[[User_talk:Bubblegum|talk]]|[[Special:Contributions/Bubblegum|contribs]] 06:57, 8 November 2020 (UTC) (hm, my name looks to be in a different font than the timestamp, odd)
:Also, is anyone up for creating a recursive names category?
:News organizations may have called it, but states still have to certify the results, and certification in some states can't happen until pending litigation has finished making its way through the court system, which will take a few weeks. [[User:Dogman15|Dogman15]] ([[User talk:Dogman15|talk]]) 11:04, 9 November 2020 (UTC)

this makes me think of stud finder finder(Please Sign)

Which will be better, "recurcive names" "recurcive use“ or "meta-use"? (I think there's enough to make a catogory about -- 956,1821,2376 and maybe this one deciding on how it's interpeted). [[User:Xkcdjerry|Xkcdjerry]] ([[User talk:Xkcdjerry|talk]]) 15:32, 9 November 2020 (UTC)
: How about just "Recursion"? --[[User:NotaBene|NotaBene]] ([[User talk:NotaBene|talk]]) 16:57, 9 November 2020 (UTC)

There must be a a tracker that tracks when Randall updates the comic ... Where is that? How does it run? Is it open source? I want to make a tracker that tracks it ... [[Special:Contributions/173.245.52.215|173.245.52.215]] 20:13, 9 November 2020 (UTC)

Are we sure this is cueball in the panel? I mean it looks like there is some hair on his / her scalp. --[[Special:Contributions/188.114.110.132|188.114.110.132]] 18:52, 10 November 2020 (UTC)

Talk:2382: Ballot Tracker Tracker

2020-11-11T14:41:17Z

108.162.216.22:

In the title text, Randall explicitly endorses candidates for one party. He's said things before to suggest which side he's pulling for, but has he ever done so explicitly like this? If not, it should be mentioned. [[User:DKMell|DKMell]] ([[User talk:DKMell|talk]]) 17:54, 9 November 2020 (UTC)

:He endorsed Clinton in 2016 through a comment. https://xkcd.com/1756/ [[Special:Contributions/108.162.216.22|108.162.216.22]] 14:41, 11 November 2020 (UTC)

Could this also refer to sites that track whether one’s ballot has been counted? --[[Special:Contributions/172.68.132.239|172.68.132.239]] 03:31, 7 November 2020 (UTC)

This sense of "calling it" is relatively uncommon, especially for non-native English speakers to encounter. Although having it in quotes is good, some explanation should be added in parentheses. [[Special:Contributions/188.114.110.4|188.114.110.4]] 04:13, 7 November 2020 (UTC)
:See [https://english.stackexchange.com/questions/550851/call-the-race-in-the-election English.stackexchange.com] [[User:Barmar|Barmar]] ([[User talk:Barmar|talk]]) 07:50, 7 November 2020 (UTC)

I remember an earlier comic,Cueball trying to incinerate an incinerator.(xkcd1821),and people tracking trackers(xkcd2376),Maybe there should be a "meta-usage" catogry?(e.g using an incinerator to incinerate another incinerator,using a tracker to track a tracker etc.) [[User:Xkcdjerry|Xkcdjerry]] ([[User talk:Xkcdjerry|talk]]) 13:34, 7 November 2020 (UTC)

The current explanation refers to a ballot tracker as a government site, but I believe they're typically independently provided by either news organizations or political information websites. However, I decided not to edit the explanation yet until someone else confirms they have the same interpretation of the term "ballot tracker" here. [[User:Ianrbibtitlht|Ianrbibtitlht]] ([[User talk:Ianrbibtitlht|talk]]) 14:27, 7 November 2020 (UTC)

:Well, I see that the next paragraph talks about "ballot tracker" in the context of my interpretation, so I'm not sure whether to modify the first paragraph that mentions government sites or not, but I would support removing that first part and just simplifying it to talk about the news organization interpretation of the term. Other input from anyone? [[User:Ianrbibtitlht|Ianrbibtitlht]] ([[User talk:Ianrbibtitlht|talk]]) 14:31, 7 November 2020 (UTC)

:I strongly agree that the correct interpretation for "ballot tracker" is the various sites that provided updates on the ongoing ballot counts at the various states. I think the first interpretation of sites where individual voters can check their ballots is wrong. It especially does not make sense to track how quickly those sites update, since one voter can only view the one site for their ballot, and can't see it updating at some frequency. On the other hand I was an example of the topic of this comic. I obsessively refreshed the New York Times tracking pages to add numbers to spreadsheets graphing trends while also refreshing the live blog at fivethirtyeight.com. As a result I noticed that the live blog quoted results from tracker site Decision Desk HQ several minutes before the same results from the states appeared on the NYT tracker page. I consider myself an example of the target of this comic using that interpretation. [[User:Bugstomper|Bugstomper]] ([[User talk:Bugstomper|talk]]) 21:39, 7 November 2020 (UTC)

The article that is linked to is not about tracking tracker sites. The article title is "Tracking Which News Outlets Have Called the Presidential Race in Each State". The article tracks which news sites have called which states. Each such news site presumably has a tracker page for each state in which they display the current reported vote counts. Cueball's tracker tracker is tracking how often each news site's tracker pages are updated with new counts. Each news agency has a "decision desk" which uses the data from their tracking page plus other related information to decide when they will declare a projected win for a candidate in a state. That is referred to as "calling" the race in a state. [[User:Bugstomper|Bugstomper]] ([[User talk:Bugstomper|talk]]) 06:45, 8 November 2020 (UTC)

Well now AP's called it. Biden won. [[User:Bubblegum|bubblegum]]-[[User_talk:Bubblegum|talk]]|[[Special:Contributions/Bubblegum|contribs]] 06:57, 8 November 2020 (UTC) (hm, my name looks to be in a different font than the timestamp, odd)
:Also, is anyone up for creating a recursive names category?
:News organizations may have called it, but states still have to certify the results, and certification in some states can't happen until pending litigation has finished making its way through the court system, which will take a few weeks. [[User:Dogman15|Dogman15]] ([[User talk:Dogman15|talk]]) 11:04, 9 November 2020 (UTC)

this makes me think of stud finder finder(Please Sign)

Which will be better, "recurcive names" "recurcive use“ or "meta-use"? (I think there's enough to make a catogory about -- 956,1821,2376 and maybe this one deciding on how it's interpeted). [[User:Xkcdjerry|Xkcdjerry]] ([[User talk:Xkcdjerry|talk]]) 15:32, 9 November 2020 (UTC)
: How about just "Recursion"? --[[User:NotaBene|NotaBene]] ([[User talk:NotaBene|talk]]) 16:57, 9 November 2020 (UTC)

There must be a a tracker that tracks when Randall updates the comic ... Where is that? How does it run? Is it open source? I want to make a tracker that tracks it ... [[Special:Contributions/173.245.52.215|173.245.52.215]] 20:13, 9 November 2020 (UTC)

Are we sure this is cueball in the panel? I mean it looks like there is some hair on his / her scalp. --[[Special:Contributions/188.114.110.132|188.114.110.132]] 18:52, 10 November 2020 (UTC)

2015: New Phone Thread

2018-07-05T01:30:57Z

108.162.216.22: /* Transcript */ Two transcripts, removing one

{{comic
| number = 2015
| date = July 4, 2018
| title = New Phone Thread
| image = new_phone_thread.png
| titletext = I'm going to tell the manufacturer that their business practices are ADMIRABLE and ETHICAL and their developers are ATTRACTIVE and I'm going to report them to the FCC for their IMPECCABLE VIRTUE.
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Created by a YOU SHOULD DONATE TO EXPLAINXKCD - The transcript may be interesting, but as part of the explanation. In the transcript there should be no explanation but only the text and info about how it is written! Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}

This comic shows the posts on an online forum by a person whose new phone is apparently programmed to autocorrect every complaint about the phone to a plaudit, à la Orwell. The phone goes so far as to change a certain complaint to a scripted customer testimonial, complete with a hyperlink to an ordering site. This is of course a highly undesirable feature. This is continued in the title text, which presumably contains several unflattering epithets about the developers and the company.

The comic may have been inspired by a [https://www.androidcentral.com/samsung-messages-app-randomly-sending-pictures-some-users bug in Samsung Galaxy S9 and Note 8], discovered a few days earlier – the phone sometimes sent random photos to contacts without leaving any sort of evidence.

==Transcript==

:[A thread of posts by the same user is shown with a default user profile, and square and heart-shaped buttons.]

:Whoa, weird

:I'm looking at my timeline on my friends phone, and some of my posts look normal

:What the hell?

:I mean the words are correct

:That's exactly what I typed!

:?????????

:I think this new phone is working really well

:No, it's doing it again

:Those are my words!

:Help!

:How do I explain?

:It's taking the words I type and leaving them exactly the same

:Forget it, I give up

:I'll never get a new phone. This one is perfect.

:What?!?

:Listen, if you're thinking about buying the new Mobile Pro 3, you should. It's the best phone on the market at an incredible price. [ORDER NOW button]

:AAAAA HELPPP

:I love my new phone!!!!

{{comic discussion}}

Talk:1933: Santa Facts

2017-12-27T07:00:01Z

108.162.216.22: Pointing out a comic update that should entail an explanation update

I added a Taxonomy Note as I wanted to raise the difference between Santa and Father Christmas. The latter wears a hooded, ermine trimmed robe (red in Britain, green or white in other domains) with full sleeves and a simple tie cord for a belt. Probably shoes and gloves - if not bare hands. It's easy to spot the difference when you know.
He probably walked at the head of a procession, despensing good advice and the good news that the days were not getting any shorter. Latterly he fell on hard times and was the chief reveller and drunkard. [[User:RIIW - Ponder it|RIIW - Ponder it]] ([[User talk:RIIW - Ponder it|talk]]) 20:19, 26 December 2017 (UTC)

I'm not a lawyer, but I'm fairly certain Santa would only be charged with trespassing (rather than breaking and entering) in many states. Someone should try to find the 5 states where entering a house through a chimney would result in a warrant. --[[Special:Contributions/172.68.238.172|172.68.238.172]] 09:53, 25 December 2017 (UTC)

A vertical leap of 14 miles (~23 km), i''gnoring air resistance'' would require an initial launch velocity of slightly more than 2180 feet per second (665 m/s), somewhat over twice the speed of sound.

Is there something clever to be observed here about sonic booms (or lack thereof)? [[User:JohnHawkinson|JohnHawkinson]] ([[User talk:JohnHawkinson|talk]]) 13:46, 25 December 2017 (UTC)

I'm not going to bother to update the page, but the comic was updated to fix the arthropod error (the original wording implied that insects were not arthropods). Also, "RIIW - Ponder it", your description of Father Christmas is indistinguishable from that of Santa. Could you provide a source for whatever distinction might exist? [[Special:Contributions/108.162.216.22|108.162.216.22]] 07:00, 27 December 2017 (UTC)

== Arthropods ==

Is it worth mentioning that humans are "arthropods" if you treat that as a word rather than a taxon? "Arthropod" is Latin for "jointed legs." We do have joints in our legs.

Works with Alexa -- Starting this year (2017) owners of Alexa devices could use the "NORAD tracks Santa" Alexa Skill. This was mentioned several times in the news, and I even set it up on my Amazon Echo so the little cousins could use it. Might this also be related? [[User:Bpendragon|Bpendragon]] ([[User talk:Bpendragon|talk]]) 16:51, 25 December 2017 (UTC)

== Plural ==

This can also be a Pokémon reference, because all Pokémon have identical plural forms, e.g. "I caught two Pidgey today.", not "two Pidgeys".

Talk:1820: Security Advice

2017-04-05T15:16:18Z

108.162.216.22: Question about one of the explanations.

Secret questions are not 2-factor authentication (2FA). They are just a really shitty password, something that you know. --[[User:JakubNarebski|JakubNarebski]] ([[User talk:JakubNarebski|talk]]) 14:33, 5 April 2017 (UTC)

Secret questions are more like 0-factor authentication, since they typically ask for public data. Shirluban [[Special:Contributions/141.101.88.106|141.101.88.106]] 14:39, 5 April 2017 (UTC)

Use prime numbers in your password: this would only limit the number of possible passwords for a hacker to check.

Use special characters like & and % : this advice is thoroughly handled in https://xkcd.com/936/ Changing characters into a special one does adds just very little to the search space.
However, a video from Computerphile suggests ''inserting'' a random character somewhere in the password which might actually be rather helpful

[[Special:Contributions/162.158.111.211|162.158.111.211]] 14:53, 5 April 2017 (UTC)

Maybe you really should use a secure font [https://technet.microsoft.com/library/security/MS15-078 Font related bug] [[Special:Contributions/162.158.79.161|162.158.79.161]] 15:13, 5 April 2017 (UTC)

Should the blue check mark tip be noted as only being useful on Twitter? Usually, the advice doesn't apply to emails, which are significantly more likely to ask for your less-secret account details, but also significantly less likely to have a blue check mark. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.2.10|162.158.2.10]] 15:15, 5 April 2017 (UTC)

"If a border guard asks to examine your laptop, you have a legal right to challenge them to a chess game for your soul.", do any of you know exactly what is the original advice here? This is probably different in different countries, but if I recall correctly you can't prevent them from seizing your device, but you are not required to provide them your passwords (but they may give you a hard time or deny your entry if you are not a citizen). Anyone can confirm this? [[Special:Contributions/108.162.216.22|108.162.216.22]] 15:16, 5 April 2017 (UTC)

1638: Backslashes

2016-02-19T16:24:01Z

108.162.216.22: /* Explanation */

{{comic
| number = 1638
| date = February 3, 2016
| title = Backslashes
| image = backslashes.png
| titletext = I searched my .bash_history for the line with the highest ratio of special characters to regular alphanumeric characters, and the winner was: cat out.txt | grep -o "\\\[[(].*\\\[\])][^)\]]*$" ... I have no memory of this and no idea what I was trying to do, but I sure hope it worked.
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Entry for 8 backslashes is just described, not explained. Title text is a block, could use a bit of restructuring.}}

Most programming languages use the concept of a {{w|String literal|string}} literal, which is just a text between some delimiters, usually quotes. For example, "Hello, world" is a string literal. The text being represented is "Hello, world" without the quotes. However, the quotes are also written to mark the beginning and end of the string. This is a problem when the text itself contains a quote, as in "This is a "quoted" string". The quotes around the word "quoted" are intended to be part of the text, but the {{w|Lexical analysis|language processor}} will likely confuse it for the end of the string.

To avoid this problem, an {{w|Escape character|escape character}} (usually a backslash) is prepended to non-string-terminating quotes. So, the previous text would be written as "This is a \"quoted\" string". The language processor will substitute every occurrence of \" with only the quote character, and the string terminates at the quote character which does not immediately follow a backslash. However, the problem now is that the intended text might contain a backslash itself. For example, the text "C:\" will now be interpreted as an unterminated string containing a quote character. To avoid this, literal backslashes also are escaped with a second backslash, i.e. instead of "C:\" we write "C:\\", where the language processor interprets \\ as one single backslash and the quote terminates the string.

This doubling of backslashes happens in most programming and scripting languages, but also in other syntactic constructs such as {{w|Regular expression|regular expressions}}. So, when several of these languages are used in conjunction, backslashes pile up exponentially (each layer has to double the number of slashes). A reasonable example would be a {{w|PHP}} script on a web server which writes {{w|JavaScript}} code to be run on the client. If the JavaScript code has to output a smiley for scratching one's head (i.e. <code>r:-\</code> ), it would look like this:
document.write ("r:-\\");
However, since this JavaScript code is to be written through a PHP script, the PHP code would be:
echo "document.write (\"r:-\\\\\");";
where:
* The word <code>echo</code> is the PHP command for writing something
* The first quote starts the string
* The <code>document.write (</code> (including the open parenthesis) is written literally
* The <code>\"</code> following that is a literal quote to be written
* The <code>r:-</code> is written literally
* The first two slashes produce one single slash
* The next two slashes produce another single slash
* The next <code>\"</code> produces a literal quote character
* The close parenthesis and the semicolon are to be written literally
* The next quote finishes the string.
* The final semicolon terminates the <code>echo</code> command

So, the presented scenario has escalated from a simple <code>r:-\</code> smiley to no less than five backslashes in a row without stepping out of the most common operations. If we go a bit further and try to write a {{w|Java (programming language)|Java}} program that outputs our PHP script, we'd have:
System.out.println ("echo \"document.write (\\\"r:-\\\\\\\\\\\");\";");
Here, we have 11 backslashes in a row: the first 10 produce the 5 we need in our PHP script, and the last one is for escaping the quote character.

This kind of backslash explosion is known as {{w|Leaning toothpick syndrome}}, and can happen in many situations. The one in the title text is about a {{w|Bash (Unix shell)|bash}} command (which uses the backslash to escape arguments) invoking the {{w|grep}} utility which searches for text following a pattern specified by means of a regular expression (which also uses the backslash to escape special characters). This leads to 3 backslashes in a row in the command, which could easily become 7 backslashes in a row if the text being searched for also contains a backslash. Even advanced users who completely understand the concept often have a hard time figuring out exactly how many backslashes are required in a given situation. It is hopelessly frustrating to carefully calculate exactly the number of backslashes and then noticing that there's a mistake so the whole thing doesn't work. At a point, it becomes easier to just keep throwing backslashes in until things work than trying to reason what the correct number is.

Some programming languages provide alternative matching string literal delimiters to limit situations where escaping of delimiters is needed. Often, one can begin and end a string with either a single quote or a double quote. This allows one to write <code>'This is a "quoted" string'</code> if double quote marks are intended in the string literal or <code>"This is a 'quoted' string"</code> if single quote marks are intended. Both kinds of delimiters can't be used in the same string literal, but if one needs to construct a string containing both kinds of quote marks one can often concatenate two string literals, each of which uses a different delimiter.

Another feature that seems to be popular in modern programming languages is to provide an alternative syntax for string delimiters designed specifically to limit leaning toothpick syndrome. For example, in Python 3, a string literal starting with <code>r"</code> is a "raw string" [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/String_literal#Raw_strings] in which no escape processing is done, with similar semantics for a string starting with <code>@"</code> in C#. This allows one to write <code>r"C:\"</code> in Python 3 or <code>@"C:\"</code> in C# without the need to escape the backslash. This does not allow one to embed the terminating delimiter in the middle of the string and prevents the use of the backslash to encode the newline character as <code>\n</code>, but comes in handy when writing a string encoding of a regular expression in which the backslash is escaping one or more other punctuation characters or a shorthand character class (e.g., <code>\s</code> for a whitespace character). For example, when looking for an anchor tag in HTML, I may encode the regular expression as <code><[Aa]\s[^>]*></code>. If I express this regular expression as a raw string literal, my code looks like <code>r"<[Aa]\s[^>]*>"</code> instead of <code>"<[Aa]\\s[^>]*>"</code>. The point here is that leaning toothpick syndrome is such a real problem that it has influenced programming language implementations.

=== Entries in the list ===
* 1 backslash is appropriately named just "backslash".
* 2 backslashes are labelled "real backslash" as they refer to an escaped backslash.
* 3 backslashes would refer to an escaped backslash followed by an unescaped one. The first two backslashes would combine to make a "real backslash" while the third one would combine with the character following it to form an {{w|Escape sequence|escape sequence}}. The name "''real'' real backslash" does not make a lot of sense, as this is two escape sequences and not a single "very real" one.
* 4 backslashes form one single backslash escaped twice (the first escaping produces two backslashes, the second escaping doubles each of the backslashes). This is so common that even the [https://docs.python.org/2/library/re.html documentation for the Python regular expression library] mentions it explicitly. In this case, the backslash has to be escaped once for being part of a regular expression and then once more as the regular expression is inside a {{w|Python (programming language)|Python}} string. So this is named an "actual backslash, for real this time" as previous examples didn't contain enough escaping.

From 5 backslashes onwards the comic goes to occult explanations and does not refer any more to real uses of backslash escapes.

* 5 backslashes would be a doubly-escaped backslash plus an unescaped one. The reference to {{w|Elder}} in the comic has many meanings. It has become known through fantasy media; examples are the {{w|Elder Gods}} of the {{w|Cthulhu Mythos}}, various 'Elder' magical items and beings in the {{w|Dungeons and Dragons}} mythologies, and the {{w|Elder Days}}, which are the first Ages of {{w|Middle-earth}} in {{w|The Silmarillion}}, the more-or-less prequel to {{w|The Lord of the Rings}}. More recently it has been used in the {{w|Harry Potter}} universe with the {{w| Magical_objects_in_Harry_Potter#Deathly_Hallows|Elder wand}} made from {{w|Sambucus|Elder wood}}.
* 6 backslashes are said to "escape the screen and enter your brain", which is a play on the word "escape" as the backslash is supposed to be an "escape character" but obviously not "escaping the screen".
* 7 backslashes go further than escaping the screen and {{w|Transcendence (philosophy)|transcend}} {{w|Spacetime|time and space}}
* 8 backslashes would be a triply-escaped backslash (same as 4 backslashes but with an additional escaping layer). It is said to "end all other text".
* 11 backslashes followed by "..." (to indicate they continue forever) are said to be ''The true name of {{w|Baal (demon)|Ba'al}}, the {{w|Soul eater (folklore)|Soul-Eater}}''. This indicates that if you continue misusing backslashes like this you will end up devoured by a demon, for instance {{w|Beelzebub}}, for being so thoughtless... Ba'al has been mentioned before in [[1246: Pale Blue Dot]] and [[1419: On the Phone]].

=== Title text ===
It's unclear whether the regular expression in the title text is valid or not. A long discussion about the validity of the expression has occurred here on explainxkcd.com. The fact that many editors of the site, often themselves extremely technically qualified (citation needed for any evidence of this), can't determine whether the expression is valid or not adds a meta layer to the joke of the comic. This is probably an example of [[356: Nerd Sniping|nerd sniping]] (oh, the irony!!!).

==Transcript==
:[A list of the names of different numbers of backslashes. After each "item" there is a gray line to the text describing each item. As the text is aligned above each other, the lines becomes shorter as the sequence of backslashes becomes longer until there is just a line with the length of a single hyphen for the last item. There are 1 to 8 backslashes and then 11 plus "..." in the last entry.]
:\------------ Backslash
:\\----------- Real backslash
:\\\---------- ''Real'' real backslash
:\\\\---------- Actual backslash, for real this time
:\\\\\--------- Elder backslash
:\\\\\\-------- Backslash which escapes the screen and enters your brain
:\\\\\\\------- Backslash so real it transcends time and space
:\\\\\\\\------ Backslash to end all other text
:\\\\\\\\\\\...- The true name of Ba'al, the Soul-Eater

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Regex]]
[[Category:Programming]]

1640: Super Bowl Context

2016-02-09T02:08:58Z

108.162.216.22:

{{comic
| number = 1640
| date = February 8, 2016
| title = Super Bowl Context
| image = super_bowl_context.png
| titletext = Why did the chicken cross the road? It begins over five thousand years ago with the domestication of the red junglefowl in southeast Asia and the development of paved roads in the Sumerian city of Ur.
}}

==Explanation==
[[White Hat]] tries to make normal conversation with [[Cueball]] about yesterday's {{w|American football}} game, {{w|Super Bowl 50}} the 50th championship game, and thus the gold anniversary of the {{w|Super Bowl}}, which was played on 2016-02-07, the evening before this comic was released.

When asking Cueball if he watched the game, Cueball begins with a simple ''Yes'', but then continues to add the contextual fact that about a third of the US population watched the event, which is an incredibly high percentage in today's [http://dictionary.reverso.net/english-definition/media%20landscape media landscape]. And according to Cueball this [http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/live-feed/tv-ratings-super-bowl-50-862888 fraction is increasing], despite [http://moneyterms.co.uk/media-fragmentation/ media fragmentation]. Thus, even though there are today more and more different ways to watch news, sports and other entertainment, the Super Bowl continues to gain more viewers every year. (There was a fall in 2013, but from 2011-2015, this was the only year the rating/number of viewers dropped, and in 2014 it was above the 2012 level. At the time of this explanation it is not yet known if this gold anniversary Super Bowl broke last year's (2015) all time record).

It turns out that Cueball has a problem. He cannot just reply to a simple question without trying to put the conversation into some kind of {{w|Context (language use)|context}} which does not necessarily have anything to do with the question asked, or at least not with the expected answer. From White Hat's reply it is obvious that he has had conversations like this with Cueball before, as he asks if they could ''just talk without your weird need to give context for everything?''

Cueball feels the need to disseminate any information he finds interesting, even in trivial conversation. Normally people like to have context-free conversations and White Hat invites Cueball to try to fit in with normal people's conversational style.

Cueball apologizes and agrees to try, but even though he really tries hard, with White Hat encouraging him to just reply normally to a question about the [http://profootballtalk.nbcsports.com/2016/02/01/report-peyton-manning-has-told-close-friends-hell-retire/ rumored retirement] of {{w|Peyton Manning}} (an American football quarterback for the {{w|Denver Broncos}}, the game's winning team), he cannot stop himself from including context in his reply again.

This time he goes off on a tangent about Peyton as a {{w|mammal}}, as he (and everybody else) is, and then adding the process of {{w|aging}} and mentioning two reasons for this (which are not well understood). The first he mentions is {{w|Ageing#Damage-related factors|accumulation of damage}}, which includes {{w|mutations}} that can lead to diseases such as {{w|cancer}}. The other process he mentions is {{w|Ageing#Programmed_factors|timed factors}} which includes {{w|Telomeres}}. These have been linked to {{w|senescence|biological aging}} because of the shortening of telomeres at each {{w|Cell cycle|cell division}}; when telomeres become too short, the cells die (and so do mammals).

To cap it off, he mentions that {{w|retiring}} is a recent concept. But this only makes sense when compared to how long there have been mammals, not compared to how long there have been sports and games, where people could be too old, and thus need to retire long before they would die from old age. Before humans began to enjoy things for fun, the concept of retiring made no sense. You worked/fought for a living, until you got too old ... and then you died.

Peyton Manning is the quarterback for the Denver Broncos, who won Super Bowl 50. At the age of 39 years (and 320 days) he is the oldest quarterback to win the Super Bowl. There has been speculation (see another [http://www.today.com/news/peyton-manning-retiring-super-bowl-champ-says-he-ll-follow-t71921 example here]) that he will retire this year, ending his career on a high note. White Hat probably expects Cueball to join in such minimal-context speculation. But, failing miserably again, White Hat finally gives up, and suggests they should try another conversation in a year, when Cueball might have learned to talk about the Super Bowl without context (hence the title).

Cueball in this comic may represent [[Randall]], as much of {{xkcd}} is spawned from, or occasionally poking fun at, his own hyper-analytical tendencies. And it is also common knowledge that Randall is not very interested in sport, though there are several xkcd [[:Category:American football|comics about American football]] and specifically two of them are [[:Category:Comics sharing name|called Super Bowl]]. The year before this one he made another comic in relation to the final, and in this comic, [[1480: Super Bowl]], he even mentions the fact that he does not know much about [[:Category:Sport|sports in general]]. So this is the second year in a row a comic has been released in conjunction with the Super Bowl final. But before 2015, there has only been one other comic like this, which has in 2006 with [[60: Super Bowl]].

The title text continues the joke with Cueball replying to the old {{w|anti-humor}} joke: "{{w|Why did the chicken cross the road?}}" Cueball replies with a preposterous amount of information instead of the cliched simplistic answer: "To get to the other side."

Cueball begins with the origin of {{w|chickens}}. They are believed to be descendants from domestication of the {{w|Red junglefowl}}, which occurred at least five thousand years ago in Asia, as Cueball correctly explains. Before there were chickens, there could not be one crossing a road. Also there needs to be a road to cross. In order for it to be called a road, it seems Cueball defines this as a road with some kind of {{w|Road surface|pavement}}. The {{w|History_of_road_transport#Wheeled_transport|first development of paved roads}} was in the city of {{w|Ur}} in the ancient {{w|Sumer|Sumerian}} civilization about 4000 BC (6000 years ago) (also partly explained in Cueball's reply). This means that the joke may very well be at least 5000 years old, even in its current chicken/road version. It was just lucky Cueball wasn't asked which came first the {{w|Chicken or the egg}}...

Given that this comic is poking fun and providing too much context, it could be seen to be offering a parody of this site (i.e www.explainxkcd.com itself) in that this site does nothing but provide context for jokes from xkcd that are meant to stand alone. Explaining here how this comic is explaining this site's behaviour ends up going "full-meta."

As a trivial note, this comic is a rare instance of White Hat not being the fall guy for the joke.

==Transcript==
:[White Hat and Cueball are walking together.]
:White Hat: Did you watch the Super Bowl?
:Cueball: Yes, like a third of the country.
:Cueball: A fraction that is steadily ''increasing'' despite media fragmentation.

:[White Hat stops and Cueball turn towards him.]
:White Hat: Can't we just talk without your weird need to give context for everything?
:Cueball: Sorry. I'll try.

:[As White Hat asks Cueball another question Cueball bunches his hands into fists. He is clearly struggling.]
:White Hat: Sounds like Peyton Manning's probably going to retire.
:Cueball: Yes, I... ...It...
:White Hat: C'mon, you can do it...
:Cueball: He...

:[Cueball spreads out his arms a little as he replies with two long sentences, while White Hat walks away from him.]
:Cueball: ''—Mammals like Peyton age via a process that involves both the accumulation of damage and poorly-understood timed factors.''
:Cueball: ''Yet the concept of retirement itself is surprisingly recent...''
:White Hat: Okay, good try. Maybe next year.

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Comics featuring White Hat]]
[[Category:American football]]
[[Category:Animals]]

915: Connoisseur

2016-02-09T01:43:05Z

108.162.216.22: /* Transcript */

{{comic
| number = 915
| date = June 22, 2011
| title = Connoisseur
| image = connoisseur.png
| titletext = Our brains have just one scale, and we resize our experiences to fit.
}}

==Explanation==
[[White Hat]] is fond of good wine, and he can distinguish slight differences in different types of wine. On the other hand, [[Cueball]] doesn't mind a kind of wine or another; all of them taste the same for him. When White Hat tells Cueball that he should pay more attention to types of wine, Cueball answers that wine is not different than anything else in this respect, and chooses pictures of {{w|Joe Biden}}, famously gaffe prone {{w|Vice President of the United States}}, eating a sandwich as an example.

In the last panel, apparently White Hat and Cueball are actually running an experiment to see if people will concentrate on slight differences among pictures of Joe Biden eating a sandwich, just in the same way that White Hat concentrates on slight differences among kinds of wine. The result of the experiment is clearly going to Cueball's side.

The title text presents the same idea in a different wording. The "scale of our brains" refers to a concept similar to Richard Dawkins' {{w|Middle World}}, where things too small (say, smaller than the point of a pin) or too big (bigger than what we can see from a mountaintop) are just out of our comprehension, so the things our brains understand must be neither too small nor too big, i.e. the "middle world".

However, the title text goes further in this idea: When we find things too big (like the distance to the Moon), we shrink it so that it fits into the "middle world" we're used to. Conversely, when we find things too small (say, a mote of dust), we expand it for the same reason. In a quite similar way, if all we have is pictures of Joe Biden eating a sandwich, we "resize" that subject so that we can fill books with the details about the pictures.

==Transcript==
:[White Hat is standing with Cueball. They each hold a wine glass in one hand, White Hat is holding a bottle of wine in the other. He looks at the label.]
:White Hat: How do you stand this cheap wine?
:Cueball: Wine all tastes the same to me.

:[Close-up of White Hat.]
:White Hat: You've just never had ''good'' wine. If you paid more attention, you'd realize there's a whole world here.

:[Close-up on Cueball, who spreads his arms, sloshing his wine slightly.]
:Cueball: But that's true of ''anything!'' Wine, house music, fonts, ants, Wikipedia signatures, Canadian surrealist porn—
:Cueball: Spend enough time with any of them and you'll become a snobby connoisseur.

:[This panel has no border and is next to but aligned further down than the first three panels.]
:[The full frame of the two characters again. White Hat now has the bottle at his side, and a small puddle of wine is on the floor next to Cueball.]
:White Hat: But some things do have more depth than others.
:Cueball: If you locked people in a box for a year with 500 still frames of Joe Biden eating a sandwich, by the end they'd be adamant that some were great and some were terrible.
:White Hat: You're exaggerating.
:Cueball: Oh yeah?

:[This panel is below the others, and is indented about a third of the way to the right. It is wide.]
:A YEAR LATER:
:[A box. Voices emanate from inside.]
:Voice #1: Sure, most closed-mouth frames are boring, but in #415, the way the man's jaw frames the mayo on his hand is pure perfection, and—
:Voice #2: What a surprise- ''you'' praising a mayo frame. Listening to you, I'd think there was nothing else in The Sandwich. Frankly, the light hitting J.B.'s collar through the lettuce would put #242 in my top ten even if he had ''no'' mayo on his hand at ''all''.

{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Comics featuring White Hat]]
[[Category:Politics]]

1636: XKCD Stack

2016-02-05T00:53:09Z

108.162.216.22: /* Explanation of steps */

{{comic
| number = 1636
| date = January 29, 2016
| title = XKCD Stack
| image = xkcd_stack.png
| titletext = This site requires Sun Java 6.0.0.1 (32-bit) or higher. You have Macromedia Java 7.3.8.1¾ (48-bit). Click here [link to java.com main page] to download an installer which will run fine but not really change anything.
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Needs more detail. The table is great but should be corrected to not refer to a person's view or feelings. ''I think'' phrases are used more than once at the moment.}}

In software engineering, a tech stack is the set of technology platforms and tools that a company or app uses. A common tech stack is {{w|LAMP (software bundle)|LAMP}}, composed of a {{w|Linux}} {{w|Operating system|operating system}}, an {{w|Apache HTTP Server|Apache}} {{w|Web server}}, a {{w|MySQL}} {{w|Database}}, and the {{w|PHP}} programming language. In this comic, the XKCD stack is introduced. The technologies comprising it are either non-existent, unreliable, or outdated.

===Explanation of steps===
{| class="wikitable"
| | Layer
| | Explanation
|-
| |
EBNF/CSS
| |
BNF or {{w|Backus–Naur Form}} is a syntax used for describing {{w|context-free grammars}}.
{{w|Extended Backus–Naur Form|EBNF}} is "Extended BNF", it is the same thing as BNF with a few more syntactic constructs intended to ease its use in the most common cases. [[1343: Manuals]] mentionned EBNF.

CSS or {{w|Cascading Style Sheets}} are a language used to describe what a web page should look like. Web pages are usually written in {{w|HTML}}, which describes the ''structure'' of the page (i.e. divides the document into paragraphs, lists, etc.) complemented with CSS which describes the ''look and feel'' of the page (colors, fonts, margins, etc.). EBNF/CSS would suggest CSS with strange syntax.
|-
| |
Broken Java Applet
| |
In recent years it has become more difficult to run {{w|Java (programming language)|Java}} {{w|Applet|applets}} in several browsers. {{w|Google Chrome|Chrome}} 45 stopped supporting {{w|NPAPI}}, {{w|Mozilla Firefox|Firefox}} will drop support by 2016, and {{w|Microsoft Edge|Edge}} does not support NPAPI plugins at all. Furthermore, two days before this comic was published {{w|Oracle Corporation|Oracle}} (the developer of Java) [https://blogs.oracle.com/java-platform-group/entry/moving_to_a_plugin_free announced] plans to officially end support of Java applets in an upcoming version.
|-
| |
Archive.org Mirror
| |
{{w|Internet Archive|Archive.org}} is a website which archives websites, and created the {{w|Wayback Machine}}. It's ambiguous whether the "Archive.org mirror" would be a copy of the xkcd server or of Archive.org itself.
|-
| |
Hypercard.js
| |
{{w|HyperCard}} can be considered as a kind of predecessor for powerpoint developed at {{w|Apple Inc.|Apple}}. The file extension .js indicates that is was rewritten in {{w|JavaScript}}. A similar reference to JavaScript is found in [[1508: Operating Systems]]. The .js extension also refers to node.js, where most library names end in .js
|-
| |
QBasic on Rails
| |
A mix between {{w|QBasic}} and {{w|Ruby on Rails}}. {{w|BASIC}} is a programming language that was very widespread during the 80s. QBasic is an implementation of BASIC created by Microsoft in early 90s, that, among other things, added support for {{w|structured programming}}. QBasic, lacking several of the features present on modern computer languages, is known for its spaghetti code. {{w|Ruby (programming language)|Ruby}} is a rather modern language, often used with Ruby on Rails web application {{w|Software framework |framework}}. QBasic on Rails would likely mean a port of Ruby on Rails, replacing Ruby with QBasic. QBasic no longer runs on modern computers, however there are a couple of free {{w|open source}} implementation of QBasic, one being [http://www.qb64.net/ QB64] and the other [http://www.freebasic.net/ FreeBASIC], which are available for Windows, Linux, Mac, and Android. There also exists a webserver on BASIC called [http://www.runbasic.com/ RunBasic].

|-
| |
[Blocked by AdBlocker]
| |
{{w|Ad blocking}} software are extensions to browsers that try to remove ads from web pages, so the user is not distracted by them. [[624: Branding]] shows what "browsing without adblock" looks like. The joke is that AdBlocker is preventing us from seeing what makes up this portion of the stack. This could be because:
* someone inserted an ad in the stack description. Some sites do insert ads in the middle of tables and lists, a typical case being between posts in forums.
* an ad is actually an integral part of the stack. Some sites make ads an integral part of the site content, so that users with ad blocking software will be forced to disable ad blocking to be able to properly interact with the site. Usually, in real life, this is not really a case of ads being part of the site, only that the site artificially refuses to work until it has some confirmation that ads have been properly loaded in the client side (by means of some script within the ads which sends the confirmation to the server).
* ad blocking software has misidentified that portion of the stack as an ad, when in fact it is not (i.e. a false positive). This happens in real life, and it is a common source of great pains for the owner of the site which is being misidentified as an ad.

|-
| |
MongoDB/Excel
| |
{{w|MongoDB}} is a modern {{w|NoSQL}} {{w|Database|database}} system, {{w|Microsoft Excel}} is a {{w|Spreadsheet|spreadsheet}} program from Microsoft, which is sometimes used as a database system (rarely a good choice).

|-
| |
Some piece that works so nobody asks any questions
| |
Writing any non-trivial piece of software always require a phase of {{w|debugging}}, which consists in finding and fixing {{w|Software bug|bugs}}. With complex software, this is a long and tiring process, so when the product is finally finished no one dares to modify it any further for fear that it will fail in unexpected ways. After some time passes, it is even worse because nobody really remembers how the software was ''supposed'' to work, so the product becomes some kind of godlike treasure which must be treated with the utmost respect and reverence because, you know, if it stops working we're all doomed ([[1421: Future Self]]). After completion, {{w|Refactoring}} is the process of rewriting code for greater efficiency or reliability. However, if the performance is not 'too bad' (i.e. not unusably terrible in normal use) there is a great temptation to avoid this, in favour of the 'if it ain't broke, don't fix it' methodology. This could lead, for example, to a trained monkey and an abacus being used to crunch numbers. It works, but could be done far better. However, nobody wishes to change it, for fear of breaking a presently functional, if inefficient, system.
|-
| |
Triply-Nested Docker
| |
{{w|Docker (software)|Docker}} is a {{w|Operating-system-level virtualization|software container}}, which is a way that allows a complete operating system to run under different operating system (OS) (as long they share the same kernel, among other things). Triply-nested docker would mean OS A running under OS B running under OS C running under OS D (running under OS E?). That would likely be a performance and management nightmare
|-
| |
Paravirtual Boy®
| |
This is a reference to the {{w|Virtual Boy}}, a failed portable console created by {{w|Nintendo}}. It was [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MKKK6FH1vGw promoted as being a highly immersive, incredible experience], but the poor technology that it used caused to be [https://youtu.be/OyVAp0tOk5A?t=56s very criticized] for not meeting the high expectations. {{w|Paravirtualization}} is a way of virtualization, that requires cooperation of the guest operating system, contrary of {{w|full virtualization}}, on which the guest operating system does not require to do anything special and the host handles everything.
|-
| |
A dev typing real fast
| |
A dev is a {{w|Software developer|software developer}}. This is possibly a reference to [[341: 1337: Part 1]], where [[Mrs. Roberts]] edits the {{w|Transmission Control Protocol|TCP}} stream live while wearing oven mitts and baking cookies. It looks like the xkcd Webserver is not a computer after all -- we have a person manually replying to HTTP protocol queries. Such a feat would indeed require real fast typing. If this is the case, then its possible that almost none of the other layers of the stack actually do anything.

|-
| |
Older version of our software
| |
People are often reluctant to switch to newer versions of software because, even though newer versions are supposed to have more features and fewer bugs, they end up confusing users. Users of older versions are used to doing everything with less features and circumventing old bugs. They don't know how to use the new features, which of course come with new bugs they haven't learned how to circumvent yet. It is also often the case that newer versions remove weird unused old features, breaking the workflow of users who actually did use such features and are left without a suitable replacement ([[1172: Workflow]]). Alternately, since higher parts of a stack are dependent on lower parts, this could also be a reference to how the consumer versions of Microsoft Windows (3.x, 95, 98, and ME) ran on the "older version" software Microsoft DOS until Windows 95. Paired with the previous layer, it could instead mean that the human is merely retyping the output of the older version.
|-
| |
Mystery Networking Horror
| |
Randall suggests here that the whole networking stuff behind the XKCD service is both mysterious (no one actually knows the details) and horrific (technically questionable architecture and implementation, or somehow tentacled and eldritch in nature).
|-
| |
Microsoft Bob Server®
| |
{{w|Microsoft Bob}} was a short-lived, failed attempt by Microsoft, around 1995, to provide a user-friendly interface for the {{w|Microsoft Windows|Windows}} 3.1x, Windows 95 and Windows NT operating systems. It consisted of a virtual "house" and "rooms", and the idea was that you could click on a pen and open the word processor. It was heavily criticized and was soon discontinued. Randall seems to be making the suggestion the Bob has continued to be developed and now there's a Bob Server, similarly to Windows server.
|-
| |
A giant {{w|Central processing unit|CPU}} someone built in Minecraft
| |
{{w|Minecraft}} is a popular sandbox game where you place blocks to build things. Since the introduction of Redstone objects (materials used to create basic electric circuits within the game) people have made many machines within Minecraft, including calculators and clocks. The most complex of these machines simulate simple computers, capable of storing several lines of code and performing basic mathematical operations such as division, which requires thousands of blocks and extremely complex designs. A Minecraft CPU capable of hosting a website would be ridiculously huge.
|}

The title text contains several jokes about the Java programming language:

* First, it refers to Java both as {{w|Sun Microsystems|Sun}} Java and {{w|Macromedia}} Java. This is a pun on the fact that older documents refer to "Sun Java" where newer documents refer to "{{w|Oracle Corporation|Oracle}} Java", as if there were two different languages. The fact is that Java was designed originally by Sun and then bought by Oracle, so it "changed name" even though the language is the same. Macromedia was the company that developed Flash before it was bought by Adobe. Both Flash and Java were popular in the early WWW to have interactive web pages, but both are being deprecated in favor of JavaScript.

* Second, the version numbers: older software products used to have two version numbers: major and minor (e.g. in {{w|MS-DOS}} 6.22 the major number is 6 and the minor is 22). Newer products tend to have hundreds of minor revisions, all of them numbered, so a typical user may well find themselves updating version 6.0.0.1 to 7.3.8.1 without knowing at all the differences between both versions or which other versions are in between. The ¾ in the Macromedia Java version is a joke on complex version numbers, which (so far) have never included fractions.

* Third, the 32-bit or 48-bit version: The {{w|Intel 80386}} processor used an architecture known as {{w|IA-32}}, which implies the data bus is 32-bit wide and thus able to handle up to 4{{w|Gibibyte|GiB}} of {{w|Random-access memory|RAM}} memory. This was plenty for the early 1990s, when a typical home PC would have about 8MiB (this is 512 times less than 4GiB). However, about 10 years after that, a typical home PC could well use more than 4GiB of RAM, so several 64-bit architectures were created. These architectures are not compatible, so programs (including the Java Runtime Environment, or JRE) often have 32-bit and 64-bit versions. Furthermore, the JRE is heavily used by many web browsers, and for this to work the JRE and browser need to be the same "number of bits". This means that most people have installed both versions of the JRE to be able to use it with both 32-bit and 64-bit browsers. There's no 48-bit architecture (though some 64-bit processors including the {{w|x86-64|most common ones}} don't actually use all 64 bits everywhere, ignoring some bits so actual virtual or physical memory is smaller (in the case of the most common ones, 48bits virtual and 40bits physical), they simulate a full 64-bit environment to allow adding more bits later, so there are no specific 48-bit applications).

* Fourth, an application trying to let the user install a new version of the JRE should direct the user to the download page in the [http://java.com/ java.com site], not to the main page which deals with lots of issues with java and is not particularly helpful when trying to update the JRE.

* Fifth, and continuing with the joke of users updating from 7.3.8.1¾ to 6.0.0.1 and not knowing why they should, the new version is said to "run fine but not really change anything". This is the usual behavior for Java updates: they run fine (possibly in opposition to [[1197: All Adobe Updates]], where updating must be done several times and the user is never sure they have installed all the newest updates), but after finished updating the user can't see any difference with the previous behavior, and/or may still be told that an update is required. Considering that 7.3.8.1¾ is bigger number than 6.0.0.1, it can also refer to the fact that the test for upgrading is incorrect and 7.3.8.1¾ is actually newer version or that a downgrade is required for the aplet to work properly, because no one fixed it to work with the newer version.

* Sixth, Macromedia was a multimedia software company in the 90s that originally developed Flash, a popular plug-in similar to Java. Adobe purchased Macromedia in 2005.

==Transcript==

:Introducing

:The XKCD Stack
:{| class="wikitable"
| |
EBNF/CSS
|-
| |
Broken Java Applet
|-
| |
Archive.org Mirror
|-
| |
Hypercard.js
|-
| |
QBasic on Rails
|-
| |
[Blocked by AdBlocker]
|-
| |
MongoDB/Excel
|-
| |
Some piece that works so nobody asks any questions
|-
| |
Triply-Nested Docker
|-
| |
Paravirtual Boy®
|-
| |
A dev typing real fast
|-
| |
Older version of our software
|-
| |
Mystery Networking Horror
|-
| |
Microsoft Bob Server®
|-
| |
A giant CPU someone built in Minecraft
|}

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Computers]]
[[Category:Programming]]
[[Category:Video games]]

474: Turn-On

2015-12-16T20:36:36Z

108.162.216.22: /* Explanation */

{{comic
| number = 474
| date = September 10, 2008
| title = Turn-On
| image = turn-on.png
| titletext = Supercollider? I 'ardly know 'er!
}}

==Explanation==
This comic refers to the first start up (Turn-On) of {{w|CERN|CERN's}} {{w|Large Hadron Collider}} (LHC). There was a theoretical concern that that the LHC experiments could create a {{w|black hole}} which would suck in our planet.

[[Cueball]] uses this concern when telling [[Megan]] this could be their last night on Earth, but since the scene is in a bar this is just another lame entry he uses because he just wants to stay the next night together with her.

Megan answers as a physicist and explains that first of all they will not start colliding particles just because they actually turn-on the collider. That will take a while during which everything needs to be checked. Secondly scientists have determined that the fears are unfounded - amongst other because cosmic rays have already been bombarding the earth with particles even more energetic than those created by the LHC. Thus if the LHC could create a black hole that would suck up the earth, then that would have happened long ago due to the cosmic rays! (At present time the collider has been colliding particles for years, and we are still here!)

Cueball feels rejected by her answer and turns away to leave her, but she calls him back explaining very directly that she did not say "no" to his request (to try to stay a night with her). Also as she is a physics grad student she needs an excuse to party - the excuse being that the LHC is turned-on.

Cueball feels encouraged and continues his attempt to get her in to bed. But in his next sentence he involuntarily uses three of the six {{w|Quark}} flavors ({{w|Up quark}}, {{w|Charm quark}}, and {{w|Strange quark}}). Megan continues to be very direct when asking if she has to be on top or bottom (when they are going to have sex). But this is also a sentence she chooses so she can continue using quark flavors ({{w|Top quark}} and {{w|Bottom quark}}). Cueball is flustered and complains that she is assuming too much since he hasn't even bought her a drink. Megan then makes it even worse when she does the order of two {{w|Whiskey sour|Whiskey sours}} just straight down - to use the final flavor ({{w|Down quark}}).

The title text is also a reference to [[259: Clichéd Exchanges|clichéd exchanges]].

Maybe she just teases Cueball (with her knowledge about the LHC and quarks), or else she is actually so turned-on by the LHC Turn-On that she wishes to have sex with Cueball as soon as possible.

The quarks are some fundamental particles the LHC is generating. All six {{w|Flavour (particle physics)|flavors}} of quarks are in the last panel: Up, Down, Top, Bottom, Charm and Strange.

Yet another joke is hidden in the identity of the barkeeper. Given [[Beret Guy]]'s strange behavior, "two whiskey sours, straight down" could be interpreted in a range of ways. This, however, is left to the reader's overactive imagination.

The title text is of course a very old joke "[http://da.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=I+Hardly+Know+Her I 'ardly know 'er!]". In this case Supercollider (another name for the LHC) should be misunderstood as "(Did you) Supercollide her?", which you could put into a (nasty?) sexual context. Using this sentence at the wrong moment could be bad for a nice romance. This could be a reference to the {{w|Futurama}} episode {{w|That's Lobstertainment!}}, in which Humorbot 5.0 tells a similar supercollider joke.

==Transcript==
:[Cueball walks up to Megan sitting at bar.]
:Cueball: So, the LHC's turning on. This could be our last night on earth.
:[While Beret Guy as a bartender walks into the frame Megan replies without turning]
:Megan: Gimme a break. They're not even colliding yet, and it won't do anything cosmic rays haven't.
:[Cueball turns and walks away. But then Megan turns towards him and says:]
:Megan: Hey, I didn't say no.
:Megan: I'm a physics grad student. I need the excuse to party.
:[Cueball turns back and they talk:]
:Cueball: So, you're up for a night with a charming stranger?
:Megan: Depends. Top or bottom?
:Cueball: Hey, I haven't even bought you a drink.
:Megan: Barkeep, two whiskey sours, straight down.

{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Megan]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Beret Guy]]
[[Category:Physics]]
[[Category:Romance]]
[[Category:Sex]]

886: Craigslist Apartments

2015-11-25T19:28:09Z

108.162.216.22: /* Explanation */

{{comic
| number = 886
| date = April 15, 2011
| title = Craigslist Apartments
| image = craigslist apartments.png
| titletext = $1600 / 1386153BR 3BATH, MODERN SLIDING DOORS, GUEST ROOMS, GARBAGE DISPOSAL. FREE MANDATORY PARKING (ENFORCED). CONVENIENT TO ALDERAAN.
}}

==Explanation==
This is a comic about the potential pitfalls in finding an apartment on {{w|Craigslist}}. Just as in Craigslist, some of the posts are re-posted several times. Additionally, lots of posts use lots of tildes, exclamation points or asterisks as above to set their posts apart from others.

'''BR''' means bedroom, e.g. 3BR means that apartment has 3 bedrooms (common measurement of apartment size).

*'''$1600 / 2BR <nowiki>~~~</nowiki> Hardwood floors, utilities included. Cats OK, limit one per square foot.'''
:This ad is aimed at "crazy cat ladies/bachelors" who compulsively keep a number of animals much greater than is appropriate to the living space.

*'''$1100 / **** GREAT DEAL SQUARE HOUSE DOOR IN FRONT!!! ****'''
:This is the first repetition of an entry that appears multiple times. It is also extremely generic, telling the reader little useful about the house. The square house might be a garage, or just a regular square house. Beside that, most houses have a door in front, there's nothing special about a door.

*'''$2300 / 3BR !!!!!!!! Elegant apartment permanently lit by strobe light!!!! No floor.'''
:A strobe light is a very bright light that, instead of remaining on, flashes very quickly. It's frequently used in parties. A constant strobe light and the stated lack of a floor would probably make living in the apartment somewhat difficult.

*'''$980 / 1BR New "hammock"-style dwelling. Water and heat free from same dispenser. Viking landlord.'''
: This is a post to live as an oarsman on a {{w|Viking ship}}. The water and heat presumably both come from the sky, in the form of rain and sunlight.

*'''$1550 / 2BR (one inside the other). Has running water, in a sense. Free heat in short, intense bursts. Klein stairs.'''
: This is a completely alien landscape, meant to be unimaginable and maddening. Possibly this represents some "other universe" or an extraterrestrial living space. Clearly this is unlivable, for humans at least. Short, intense bursts of heat disturb if not kill. Stairs that do not have a clear top or bottom and rooms that can be seen as inside of each other would be confusing and impractical if not impossible to navigate. Water that runs 'in a sense' is disturbingly vague. Seems to be on a planet with a quick rotation, also close to a star, hence the "short, intense bursts" of heat. A {{w|Klein bottle}} is a surface which has no difference between "inside" and "outside", so essentially if you own a Klein bottle all the universe is inside it (and at the same time it is outside). It is physically impossible to build a Klein bottle in a three-dimensional space. A "Klein stair" is possibly a stair connecting a BR to itself. This is why the 2BR in this ad are "one inside the other".

*'''$3200 / 1BR W/trimmed carpet and pert fixtures. Previous tenants clean. Call now, want you inside. $120/night (no animals)'''
:This is a disguised "adult services" (sex) posting, with references to trimmed pubic hair, an attractive body, and a lack of {{w|Sexually transmitted disease|STD}}s. Craigslist no longer allows posts for this, because prostitution is illegal in most places in the US. This post tries to evade the adult services ban by pretending to be something else.

*'''$2100 / 3BR on scenic Ash Tree Lane. Builder unknown; house has always existed. Walls shift; center of house may contain minotaur.'''
: This {{w|Minotaur}} house is an ad for the house in the novel ''{{w|House of Leaves}}''. It may also refer to the Labyrinth in Ancient Greek mythology.

*'''$600 / 5BR Three floors w/pool, rooftop garden, beautiful glass facade, no catch, 5-min drive to historic Pripyat.'''
:This is an ad for a residence in the {{w|Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant}}, located near to the town of {{w|Pripyat}}, in northern Ukraine. The NPP is a 3-level structure, and contains a pool for temporary spent nuclear fuel storage. The rooftop now has plants growing on it after years of neglect, and the glass facade references radioactive glassy minerals created by the explosion.

*'''$7100 / 60BR Sleek modern w/extreme running water. Previous tenants may resist entry. Contains all new wiring and is a submarine.'''
:This house is a submarine, as indicated by the advertisement, presumably operated by a navy. The "previous tenants", being members of the armed forces, would undoubtedly resist entry of someone attempting to board their submarine. The sixty bedrooms refers to the crew members' bunks on board the ship, which are in extremely tight quarters and can be very uncomfortable. This may also be a reference to [[496: Secretary: Part 3]], which makes reference to [[Black Hat]] stealing a submarine, presumably for [[405: Journal 3]] - apparently this is him trying to get rid of it.

*'''$1616 / 3BR + 2Bath, tub full of blood. Closet full of board games which play themselves. Pets OK but won't survive long.'''
: This is an ad for a house in a generic horror movie.

*'''$1600 / 1386153BR 3bath, modern sliding doors, guest rooms, garbage disposal. Free mandatory parking (enforced). Convenient to Alderaan.'''
:Appearing in the title text, this is a reference to the {{w|Death Star}} in ''Star Wars''. {{w|Alderaan}} is the home planet of {{w|Princess Leia}}, which was obliterated by the Death Star. Mandatory parking references the tractor beams used to drag nearby ships (such as the Millennium Falcon) into the base. The garbage disposal refers to an iconic scene from Star Wars aboard the Death Star involving a garbage disposal. It seems somewhat inconvenient that this "apartment" has over a million bedrooms but only three bathrooms. The guest rooms are probably the detention blocks such as [http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Detention_Block_AA-23 Detention Block AA-23].

==Transcript==
:[The comic is a single panel, presented as an apartment search.]
:[Title bar.]
:All apartments
:Search for: [_______] in: All apartments ( ) Title only (*) Entire post Search
:Rent: [Min] [Max] 0+ BR [ ] Cats [ ] Dogs [ ] Has image
:[Date bar.]
:Fri Apr 15
:[Begin the apartment listings.]
:$1600 / 2BR <nowiki>~~~</nowiki> Hardwood floors, utilities included. Cats ok, limit one per square foot.
:$1100 / **** GREAT DEAL SQUARE HOUSE DOOR IN FRONT!!! ****
:$2300 / 3BR !!!!!!!! Elegant apartment permanently lit by strobe light!!!! No floor.
:$1100 / **** GREAT DEAL SQUARE HOUSE DOOR IN FRONT!!! ****
:$980 / 1BR New "hammock"-style dwelling. Water and heat free from same dispenser. Viking landlord.
:$1550 / 2BR (one inside the other). Has running water, in a sense. Free heat in short, intense bursts. Klein stairs.
:$1100 / **** GREAT DEAL SQUARE HOUSE DOOR IN FRONT!!! ****
:$1100 / **** GREAT DEAL SQUARE HOUSE DOOR IN FRONT!!! ****
:$3200 / 1BR W/trimmed carpet and pert fixtures. Previous tenants clean. Call now, want you inside. $120/night (no animals)
:$2100 / 3BR on scenic Ash Tree Lane. Builder unknown; house has always existed. Walls shift; center of house may contain minotaur.
:$1100 / **** GREAT DEAL SQUARE HOUSE DOOR IN FRONT!!! ****
:$600 / 5BR Three floors w/pool, rooftop garden, beautiful glass facade, no catch, 5-min drive to historic Pripyat.
:$7100 / 60BR Sleek modern w/extreme running water. Previous tenants may resist entry. Contains all new wiring and is a submarine.
:$1616 / 3BR + 2Bath, tub full of blood. Closet full of board games which play themselves. Pets ok but won't survive long.

{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Comics with color]]

Hairbun

2015-07-08T04:14:54Z

108.162.216.22: /* Characteristics */

{{Infobox character
| image = Hair_Bun_Girl.png
| imagesize =
| caption = Hair Bun Girl, as seen in [[1253: Exoplanet Names]]
| first_appearance = [[337: Post Office Showdown]]
}}

'''Hair Bun Girl''' is a [[stick figure]] character in [[xkcd]]. She is distinguished by her hair that is set up in a bun.

==Characteristics==
Hair Bun Girl is a minor character in xkcd. She appeared two weeks in a row in the spring of 2015 and was recognized as a "new" character at that time, though she had been used several times prior to then.

She is not the same character from comic to comic. She is mainly just another woman that [[Randall]] can use when he wishes to give a woman a specific characteristic so to set her aside from the more commonly used women [[Megan]] and [[Ponytail]]. Often she is depicted together with both Megan and Ponytail proving this point. (4 appearances as of April 2015: [[1052]], [[1253]], [[1504]], and [[1507]]).

*In her very first appearance, [[337: Post Office Showdown]], she is drawn with glasses.
**She also wears glasses in [[1110: Click and Drag]], [[1088: Five Years]], [[1052: Every Major's Terrible]] and in [[835: Tree]] (in this latter comic she actually portrays Cueball's mother and/or the wife of [[:Category:Multiple Cueballs|another version]] of Cueball).
**She wears sunglasses (as Trinity) in [[566: Matrix Revisited]]
*Her first appearance without glasses was in her second appearance: [[378: Real Programmers]]. And with the four recent comics (past no. 1500) this is now her most prevalent appearance.
*Since she is a grown woman - she cannot be the little girl in [[1519: Venus]].
*A character with a hair bun was also featured in [[911: Magic School Bus]], but she is drawn in color and with a dress and represents the fictive character Ms. Frizzle. She is thus not included as a Hair Bun Girl.
*She can, however, represent a real person, like when she was Emily Dickinson in [[788: The Carriage]]. In that comic Emily is drawn exactly as the standard version of Hair bun Girl, and she is thus included. This is similar to [[Cueball]] who also represents real persons from time to time.
*In [[1520: Degree-Off]] her hair looks somewhat different, but since her main and only distinguishing characteristic is a hair bun, this comic is included herre.

{{navbox-characters}}

1471: Gut Fauna

2015-01-09T20:14:57Z

108.162.216.22: /* Explanation */ adding a wiki link to "I know an old lady ..."

{{comic
| number = 1471
| date = January 9, 2015
| title = Gut Fauna
| image = gut_fauna.png
| titletext = I know it seems unpleasant, but of the two ways we typically transfer them, I promise this is the one you want.
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|First draft, needs editing and expanding}}

The {{w|microbiome}} is the collection of "good" bacteria that reside in the human digestion tract and help digest certain foods. It is sometimes referred to as {{w|gut flora}}. The title "Gut fauna" is a play on words. ''Fauna'' means animal life in Latin, and ''flora'' means vegetable life. However, in this context ''flora'' means bacterial life.

In this comic, [[Cueball]] is visiting a doctor ([[Ponytail]]) for some unknown problem. The doctor informs him that his gut macrobiome is out of balance, which Cueball responds to with confusion over whether or not she meant the microbiome or macrobiome. A macrobiome, instead of being composed of small organisms such as bacteria, would be composed of larger organisms such as mammals. The phrase "gut fauna" would refer to any animals living inside a gut (as the word fauna refers to animals living in an ecosystem).

Cueball is right to be worried by the doctor's reference to his macrobiome, as normal humans shouldn't have large animals living inside them. This fear is compounded when the doctor prescribes one wolf for Cueball to swallow, which is normally impossible for humans and would, at the very least, result in major interior damage when the wolf resists being swallowed. The choice of a wolf echoes the reintroduction of the animals into the macrobiome of {{w|Yellowstone National Park}} in the United States, where they have improved the balance by, in part, preying on elk and reducing the damage caused by their grazing.

The dialog between the characters ends with the doctor asking the patient whether he needs a glass of water, a typical question asked by health professionals to help patient with swallowing the oral medication being administered. This last phrase further extends the humorous nature of the proposition to swallow the wolf by displaying a confidence of the doctor in her choice of the treatment modality. In reality, of course, drinking a glass of water while attempting to swallow a wolf would make the latter procedure neither easier, nor more feasible.

The title text suggests that swallowing the wolf is not the worst situation that could have occurred, as the doctor refers to "another way" that the wolf could be administered. One typical way that microbiome's are restored is through {{w|fecal bacteriotherapy}}, most easily described as a "poop transfer". The worse "other way" that the doctor is referring to is thus likely the rectal route, which is definitely less preferable than attempting to swallow a live wolf. Both ways, even if they were physically possible, would, however, be likely lethal. {{Citation needed}}

If we are to take the doctor at her word and there is indeed some sort of macrobiome inside Cueball's gut, then perhaps he has some kind of matter compression ability that would make [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/There_Was_an_Old_Lady_Who_Swallowed_a_Fly introducing a live wolf a legitimate therapeutic option].

Randall has referenced wolf reintroduction programs before, in comic [[819]].

==Transcript==
:Doctor: I see the problem. Your gut macrobiome is out of balance. One moment.
:Cueball: I think you mean ''micro''biome... Right?
:Doctor: No. Here, swallow this.
:Cueball: That's a wolf.
:Doctor: Do you need a glass of water?

==Trivia==
*For a good description of the microbiome see [http://youtu.be/5DTrENdWvvM The Invisible Universe Of The Human Microbiome].

{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Ponytail]]
[[Category:Animals]]

1460: SMFW

2014-12-15T05:58:27Z

108.162.216.22: /* Explanation */ --Please correct anything that seems generalized, poorly dictated, or blatantly incorrect.

{{comic
| number = 1460
| date = December 15, 2014
| title = SMFW
| image = smfw.png
| titletext = wtfw it's like smho tbfh, imdb.
}}

==Explanation==

{{incomplete|Little to no peer revision.}}

On various forums on the internet, people will use acronyms for common phrases as opposed to the common phrases themselves (e.g. "LOL" as opposed to "laughing out loud"). As the comic suggests, SMFW is a plausible acronym, but does not have any potential phrases to represent. The acronym itself is eerily close to a number of other acronyms commonly used, including: "SFW" (meaning "safe for work", denoting that something does not have suggestive content), "MFW" (meaning "my face when...", setting up for a user's reaction to something: possibly the intended replacement for the caption at the bottom of the comic), and "SMF" (meaning "so much fun"). Because "SMFW" is so familiar to these other acronyms, for some it would intuitively feel like "SMFW" has its own meaning. The title text contains more examples of imaginary acronyms of similar nature: "WTFW", "SMHO", and "IMDB". "WTFW" is a combination of "WTF" ("What the fuck?") with "TFW" ("That feel when...", used in a similar nature to "MFW"). "SMHO" appears to hybridize "IMHO" ("In my humble opinion...") with acronyms starting with the letter "S". "IMDB" is a popular online database for film known as the [http://www.imdb.com/ Internet Movie Database], but it may appear initially like "IMHO" when used in the wrong context.

Below are possible examples of potential representations for each acronym, according to [http://www.urbandictionary.com/ Urban Dictionary]:

SMFW is an acronym for "Smoke more fucking weed".

WTFW is an acronym for "What the fuck, what?".

SMHO is an acronym for "Shaking my head off".

TBFH is an acronym for "To be fucking honest".

==Transcript==

[Cueball is sitting at a desk, crouched over a laptop]

Caption: SMFW an acronym ''almost'' makes sense

{{comic discussion}}

Talk:1411: Loop

2014-08-22T05:52:25Z

108.162.216.22:

First explanation. How did I do, veterans? [[User:Lacedemonian|Lacedemonian]] ([[User talk:Lacedemonian|talk]]) 04:45, 22 August 2014 (UTC)

Not bad.
I reorganised the content and fixed some stylistic flaws.

Awaiting older veterans to cross-reference with older entries. [[Special:Contributions/108.162.229.70|108.162.229.70]] 05:11, 22 August 2014 (UTC)Sylvertech

I count 4 devices: monitor, laptop, tablet, phone.
[[Special:Contributions/108.162.216.22|108.162.216.22]] 05:52, 22 August 2014 (UTC)J. from Mi.