https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/api.php?action=feedcontributions&user=172.70.135.154&feedformat=atomexplain xkcd - User contributions [en]2024-03-29T08:30:25ZUser contributionsMediaWiki 1.30.0https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=1508:_Operating_Systems&diff=2271051508: Operating Systems2022-02-15T22:44:33Z<p>172.70.135.154: /* Explanation */</p>
<hr />
<div>{{comic<br />
| number = 1508<br />
| date = April 6, 2015<br />
| title = Operating Systems<br />
| image = operating systems.png<br />
| titletext = One of the survivors, poking around in the ruins with the point of a spear, uncovers a singed photo of Richard Stallman. They stare in silence. "This," one of them finally says, "This is a man who BELIEVED in something."<br />
}}<br />
<br />
==Explanation==<br />
In this comic, [[Randall]] gives an {{w|Gantt chart|overview}} of the past, present and (speculatively) future of the {{w|operating system}}s running in his house at any given time. Notably, because Randall is fascinated by technology, he has had more than one OS running in his household since the mid '90's. The timeline tracks how Operating Systems have come and gone over the years, and the gradual shift from desktop Operating Systems to mobile can be observed. Beyond the present day, we see some of Randall's humorous predictions as to which technologies and companies will dominate the Operating System landscape in the future.<br />
<br />
It may be that the OS that is closest to the time-line is also the one he mainly uses during these extended periods.<br />
<br />
Previous and current systems:<br />
*{{w|MS-DOS}} (Microsoft Disk Operating System): The default, command-line-based OS on most IBM PC-compatible computers. Early versions of {{w|Microsoft Windows}} operated as shells on top of MS-DOS rather than stand-alone OSes in their own right, which may explain part of the overlap in those two bars.<br />
*Apple's {{w|Mac OS}} (Macintosh Operating System): The OS of Apple's Macintosh line of computers. Randall's bar indicates that he stopped using Macs in 2001, after Mac OS had been superseded by the new and then-buggy {{w|Mac OS X}}.<br />
*{{w|Linux}}: A [https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-sw.html free and open source] Unix-like OS. Randall's bar indicates that he likely used it on one or two PCs starting from 1999 while still using Windows on other PCs, or perhaps was dual-booting one or more PCs with Windows, until abandoning Windows in 2007 to use Linux full-time. This timing coincides with the release of Microsoft's controversial {{w|Windows Vista}} and the advent of more user-friendly Linux distributions.<br />
*{{w|OS X}} (Macintosh Operating System v10): The successor OS of Apple's Macintosh line of computers. Although it was sometimes marketed as merely the 10th version of the earlier Mac OS, it was largely a new product. The bar indicates Randall's renewed use of Macintosh computers in 2009 after the OS had matured and Macs had transitioned to Intel processors.<br />
*{{w|Android (operating system)|Android}}: The upper layers of the OS running on Android phones and tablets, above the Linux {{w|Kernel (operating system)|kernel}}. Randall is indicating that he has at least one of these devices.<br />
*Apple's {{w|iOS}}: The OS of {{w|iPhone}}, {{w|iPad}}, {{w|iPad mini}}, {{w|iPad Air}}, {{w|iPod Touch}} and {{w|Apple TV}}. Randall is indicating that he also has at least one of these devices.<br />
<br />
His predictions for the future include:<br />
*2018: That {{w|OS X}} and {{w|iOS}} will merge. There is frequent speculation on technology blogs as to whether or not this merging will come to pass in the future. The two OSes have a common origin, share a lot of software, and are maintained by the same company that would benefit from the efficiency of maintaining a single unified OS. Opposing this is the fact that interaction patterns are very different between traditional computers and tablets/phones and a one-size-fits-both solution may not be feasible (as proven by {{w|Windows 8|Microsoft's disastrous attempt at such}}), the fact that iOS and OS X (now macOS) run on different processor architectures (Mac OS X/OS X/macOS formerly ran on {{w|PowerPC}} processors and now runs on {{w|x86}}-family processors, while iOS runs on {{w|ARM architecture|ARM}} processors), and the fact that Apple spends some time in each of its recent keynotes mocking computers like the Microsoft Surface Pro which use both standard computer and touch control. However, that said, with the release of {{w|iOS 11}}, the iPad version of iOS has diverged greatly from the iPhone version and is now converging rapidly with macOS, so a merger between macOS and ''part'' of iOS might not be too far off...<br />
*2019: That an operating system designed with and for {{w|JavaScript}} will become attractive, perhaps along the lines of [http://node-os.com/ NodeOS] and/or [http://runtimejs.org/ Runtime.js].<br />
*2022: That there'll be an OS based on the {{w|Tinder (application)|Tinder}} dating app.<br />
*2024: That there'll be an OS from {{w|Nest Labs}}, presumably oriented towards home automation and the {{w|Internet of things}}.<br />
*2029: That {{w|Elon Musk}} will come up with an operating system.<br />
*2030: That {{w|Disk operating system|DOS}} would make a comeback, but only in an ironic fashion (maybe because there would be no more disks left for it to operate from).<br />
*2034: That Randall will be deploying an [http://geneticliteracyproject.org/2014/07/genetically-engineered-red-blood-cells-could-be-drug-delivery-drones/ autonomous drug-delivery drone] in his body.<br />
*2042: Human civilization comes to a fiery end, maybe due to some unholy combination of the above innovations. Another possible explanation is that human civilization will be wiped out by an artificial super-intelligence, superior to human intelligence, as Elon Musk, Ray Kurzweil, Bill Gates and many tech pundits foresee that 2045 will be the year to see such technology becoming real, and as Elon Musk, Bill Gates and many other tech pundits fear that it will be the extinction of all life on earth, as explained [http://waitbutwhy.com/2015/01/artificial-intelligence-revolution-2.html on this page].<br />
*2059: At this time his operating system will be {{w|GNU}}/{{w|Hurd}}. This infamously and perennially late [http://www.gnu.org/software/hurd/hurd.html GNU/Hurd] OS will finally make it in to Randall's home after human civilization has been wiped out. The joke is that GNU/Hurd began to be developed in 1990, and while it was expected to be released in a relatively short time, even now only unstable builds have been released. So Randall is saying that he will finally run it in his house a decade or two after the end of civilization. GNU/Hurd will presumably have an advantage as humanity rebuilds civilization due to the widespread availability of its code and development tools, and perhaps also because of Stallman's depth of belief, based on the title text. Alternatively, GNU/Hurd might be finished by the same force that finished humankind, for instance {{w|Skynet (Terminator)|Skynet}}, in case of {{w|Cybernetic revolt|AI Apocalypse}}. (Interestingly, although still far from completion, [http://git.savannah.gnu.org/cgit/hurd/hurd.git/commit/?id=b8ffab7c38f3ede424b8a07553d6ee6b16abb85b a new version of GNU/Hurd] was released less than a week after this comic.)<br />
<br />
The title text refers to {{w|Richard Stallman}}, the founder of the {{w|Free Software movement}} and the GNU and Hurd projects. A survivor of the fire that ended the human civilization has uncovered a slightly burned ({{w|Singe|singed}}) picture of him. Those gathered can see, either directly from the picture or because they already know of Stallman, that this was a man that really believed in something. In this case it was ''free software''. Inspired by his image, they rebuild their lost civilization and finish Hurd development.<br />
<br />
The GNU/Hurd reference might also be a pun, as in a "herd" of {{w|Wildebeest|Gnus}} "running" in his living room, as wild animals reclaim the Earth after the end of human civilization.<br />
<br />
GNU is a collection of free software utilities, particularly the system utilities used with the Linux Kernel to form the Linux operating system (often called GNU/Linux by those who wish to emphasize the contribution of the GNU project). Hurd is an operating system kernel designed as part of GNU project that could be used in place of the Linux kernel to produce a complete GNU operating system. Hurd has a microkernel architecture, which has many perceived advantages over Linux's monolithic kernel, and is thought by many to be technically superior, despite its low adoption rate compared to the Linux kernel.<br />
<br />
Randall has made several comics about free software and also about Stallman. See this list of [[:Category:Comics featuring Richard Stallman|comics featuring Richard Stallman]]. Most of these are also about free software in some form.<br />
<br />
==Transcript==<br />
:[All text is in capitals. At the top of the panel:]<br />
::'''Operating Systems''' <br />
::running in my house<br />
<br />
:[At the bottom there is time-line that runs from 1990 to 2066. It has small indicators for every year, larger for every 5 years and largest for every 10 years. Below the 10 year indicators are written the years. Also the year 2015 is marked:]<br />
:1990 2000 2010 Now 2020 2030 2040 2050 2060<br />
<br />
:[Bars above the time-line in four levels are labeled with operating system names, representing the time period for that OS. Below is a list of the bars on the time-line in order of first appearance (with approximate year ranges given). Also the level from 1-4 is indicated, with level 1 just above the time-line and level 4 the highest level above the line:]<br />
<br />
:[Level 1 from 1988 to 1998 (extends a little left past the beginning of the time-line but not off panel):]<br />
::MS DOS<br />
:[Level 2 from 1993 to 2007:]<br />
::Windows<br />
:[Level 3 from 1994 to 2001:]<br />
::Mac OS<br />
:[Level 1 from 1999 to 2018:]<br />
::Linux<br />
:[Level 2 from 2009 to 2023. On the way the bar merges with iOS around 2018 thru 2022:]<br />
::OS X<br />
:[Level 3 from 2009 to 2016:]<br />
::Android<br />
:[Level 4 from 2013 to 2022. On the way to 2022 the bar moves down past Android to merge with OS X after 2018:]<br />
::iOS<br />
:[Level 1 from 2018 to 2028. The text is written in square brackets:]<br />
::[Something].js<br />
:[Level 3 from 2022 to 2029:]<br />
::TinderOS<br />
:[Level 2 from 2023 to 2032:]<br />
::Nest<br />
:[Level 1 from 2028 to 2041:]<br />
::Elon Musk Project:<br />
:[Level 3 from 2030 to 2036:]<br />
::DOS, but ironically<br />
:[Level 2 from 2034 to 2041:]<br />
::Blood Drone<br />
:[This is not a bar, but the text (in three lines) is in a double bar-height (level 1-2) square bracket. The bracket extends from 2042 to 2051:]<br />
::[Human civilization ends in fire]<br />
:[Level 1 from 2059 going past the end of the panel past 2066:]<br />
::GNU/Hurd<br />
<br />
{{comic discussion}}<br />
<br />
[[Category:Charts]]<br />
[[Category:Timelines]]<br />
[[Category:Computers]]<br />
[[Category:iOS]]<br />
[[Category:Comics featuring Richard Stallman]]<br />
[[Category:Comics featuring Elon Musk]]</div>172.70.135.154https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=2580:_Rest_and_Fluids&diff=2269522580: Rest and Fluids2022-02-13T02:11:24Z<p>172.70.135.154: </p>
<hr />
<div>{{comic<br />
| number = 2580<br />
| date = February 11, 2022<br />
| title = Rest and Fluids<br />
| image = rest_and_fluids.png<br />
| titletext = Remember not to take it easy. Put a hot washcloth on your forehead, remain standing, and breathe dry air while taking lots of histamines. You need to give your body a chance to get sick again.<br />
}}<br />
<br />
==Explanation==<br />
{{incomplete|Created by a HYDROPHILIC EDITOR - Please change this comment when editing this page. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}<br />
[[Black Hat]] congratulates [[Cueball]] on his recovery from some type of illness or injury. Common advice when someone is sick is to get plenty of rest and drink lots of water, to aid recovery and to ensure they don't ignore various common causes of fluid loss.<br />
<br />
However, being Black Hat, he targets Cueball (who has been restored to full health) to tell him that he now should do the opposite of this. While a healthy person should get a reasonable amount of exercise, and should not spend excessive time in bed, Black Hat goes to an absurd extreme. He tells Cueball to stop drinking water entirely and engage in an excessive amount of activity — in this case, by running on a {{w|treadmill}} to the point of physical collapse. The caption explains this, saying that it is "important" to tell people who have recently recovered from sickness to stop resting and drinking fluids, clearly asserting that these behaviours are for the exclusive purpose of healing, and that they are useless (or even counter-productive) for someone who is now healthy.<br />
<br />
(Obviously, because {{w|dehydration}} and over-exerting yourself is generally bad, people should not take this advice literally. They should gradually resume normal activities, including exercise, in safe amounts.)<br />
<br />
The title-text expands on this backward line of thinking by suggesting to do the opposite of common remedies for various usual remedies: a hot cloth, standing, breathing parched air, taking {{w|histamines}} (this is as opposed to reducing a fever with a cool compress, resting in bed, inhaling hot water vapours and using {{w|antihistamine}}s). Done inadvisedly, each of these can make one ill. Needless to say, this is the opposite of what most people want to achieve with their health.<br />
<br />
==Transcript==<br />
:[Cueball and Black Hat are talking to each other. Black Hat has his arms outstreched.]<br />
:Black Hat: So glad you're feeling better!<br />
:Black Hat: Be sure to get dehydrated and run on a treadmill until you black out!<br />
<br />
:[Caption below the panel:]<br />
:Once people aren't sick anymore, it's important to remind them to stop resting and drinking fluids.<br />
{{comic discussion}}<br />
[[Category:Comics featuring Black Hat]]<br />
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]<br />
[[Category:Biology]]</div>172.70.135.154https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=Talk:2580:_Rest_and_Fluids&diff=226951Talk:2580: Rest and Fluids2022-02-13T02:11:03Z<p>172.70.135.154: </p>
<hr />
<div><!--Please sign your posts with ~~~~ and don't delete this text. New comments should be added at the bottom.--><br />
I added in an initial explanation; feel free to add anything you think is needed. [[User:KirbyDude25|KirbyDude25]] ([[User talk:KirbyDude25|talk]]) 19:45, 11 February 2022 (UTC)<br />
<br />
I think the 'antihealing' advice is a two-edged sword. Just like the adage of "feed a fever, starve a cold" (however true that is), a hot-compress might at times be useful (hypothermia?), and similarly for the rest. Or most of them, anyway. A healthy person would need an excess of antimedicine to actually become ill again. Not sure where that limit lies with histamines, that might be the 'worst' to suffer, going by relative ease of application. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.86.68|172.70.86.68]] 02:18, 12 February 2022 (UTC)<br />
<br />
this is something like the "extremely wet cough" etc etc comic i think [[Special:Contributions/172.70.135.154|172.70.135.154]] 02:11, 13 February 2022 (UTC)Bumpf</div>172.70.135.154https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=1671:_Arcane_Bullshit&diff=2267881671: Arcane Bullshit2022-02-09T13:11:50Z<p>172.70.135.154: /* Explanation */</p>
<hr />
<div>{{comic<br />
| number = 1671<br />
| date = April 22, 2016<br />
| title = Arcane Bullshit<br />
| image = arcane_bullshit.png<br />
| titletext = Learning arcane bullshit from the 80s can break your computer, but if you're willing to wade through arcane bullshit from programmers in the 90s and 2000s, you can break everyone else's computers, too.<br />
}}<br />
<br />
==Explanation==<br />
When fixing/improving an existing computer program, programmers sometimes need to read, understand, and improve old (and usually bad) code. The older a piece of code is, the less it tends to conform to modern programming practices, and the more likely it is to be "arcane bullshit" from the perspective of a 21st Century programmer.<br />
<br />
[[Randall]] seems to feel that willingness to deal with "arcane bullshit" is a "{{w|Catch 22}}" that prevents 80s arcane bullshit from being fixed. Someone completely unwilling to deal with arcane bullshit would lack the patience to learn how to program. Someone extremely willing to wade through an 80s programmer's arcane bullshit is likely to "[[356: Nerd Sniping|nerd snipe]]" themselves into fiddling with {{w|Kernel (operating_system)|kernels}} (which are inherently arcane bullshit) instead of making useful code. Cueball is in the middle of the scale: smart and patient enough to make the 80s bullshit worse, but not smart and patient enough to know how to fix it.<br />
<br />
This comic could be a reference to changes in programming methodologies. As the first computer programs were written in the 40's and 50's they were prone to becoming "spaghetti code", where the flow of execution would jump from one part of the program to another using the JUMP which gives no state information. While this method of programming can work very quickly, it makes it difficult to predict program flow and can create interdependencies that are not obvious. In the BASIC language JUMP was called GOTO and the courses for new programmers argued that using GOTO in all but trivial cases was a very bad idea. On the other hand, old programmers argued that calculated GOTO was a sexy way of programming.<br />
<br />
To combat the problem computer scientists have relied on increasing the levels of abstraction and encapsulation, by developing {{w|structured programming}}, {{w|procedural programming}}, and {{w|object oriented programming|OOP (object oriented programming)}}.<br />
<br />
In structured programming you break your program into well defined blocks of code with specified entry and exit points. Using the stack (a portion of memory dedicated to storing information / program state) it is possible to call a block of code and then have that block of code return control to the point that called it after it has done what was requested.<br />
<br />
Very quickly it was decided to mark these blocks of code as functions or procedures, making it a lot easier to know how to call the blocks and edit them. Languages that made this a focus include Pascal, Modula, and C.<br />
<br />
Structured and procedural programming were well entrenched in the 80's. Most systems programming was done in mid- or low-level languages, which to improve performance don't do much to control access to the data structures in the programs. Because they are low level the code requires many steps to do seemingly easy things like draw a box on a screen, making it hard for a non-experienced programmer to understand what is happening.<br />
<br />
Although the idea of OOP was around as early as the 1950's, it was not implemented in a widespread fashion until the 1990's. OOP encapsulates the data structures inside of functions, so rather than manipulate the variable directly you call the data structure and tell it to do something. This additional level of abstraction can make it a lot easier to work on varied data. It also can protect the program data from unexpected changes by other sections of the program.<br />
<br />
Because code in the 80's was typically done at a much lower level, it can be hard for programmers used to having the language and libraries do more work for them. It also meant that programmers would often hard code expectations into their source code such as the number of files that can be opened at once, or size of the operating system disk buffers, rather than make them configurable while the program is running, or even while it was being loaded. This means if you need the program to handle a larger file, you might need to recompile it after finding and changing all the places in the code that assume the smaller max file size.<br />
<br />
As such, few people are willing to try to surpass the massive barrier to learning. This group is on the left. To the right are people who have gotten so used to the tools and conventions of the 80's that they spend all of their time adjusting and recompiling the kernel of their computers to match their current needs, instead of actually creating new programs.<br />
<br />
In the center is Cueball, presumably representing Randall, who has learned enough to try and fix code, but not enough for his fixes to actually work.<br />
<br />
As programs age, they often lose support from the initial project head and die out, no longer supported on new computers. So, as the title text says, learning more coding from the '90s and after is necessary for also breaking everyone else's computers.<br />
<br />
This could also be a comment on hacking and the advent of the internet and the technologies behind that (TCP/IP, HTML, CSS, PHP...) being 90s/2000s. Computers in the 80s were typically stand alone so what you are learning can only be applied to your machine. To break everyone else's you need to understand networking.<br />
<br />
The title text might be a reference to various recently discovered {{w|security vulnerabilities}} in {{w|open-source software}}. In some cases, underskilled programmers have provided flawed code for critical infrastructure with very little review, resulting in global computer security disasters. Randall described some of these in [[424: Security Holes]] (2008), [[1353: Heartbleed]] and [[1354: Heartbleed Explanation]] (2014). Other recent examples include {{w|Shellshock (software bug)|Shellshock}} and vulnerabilities in the {{w|Linux kernel}} involving the [http://timetobleed.com/a-closer-look-at-a-recent-privilege-escalation-bug-in-linux-cve-2013-2094/ perf] and [http://perception-point.io/2016/01/14/analysis-and-exploitation-of-a-linux-kernel-vulnerability-cve-2016-0728/ keyrings] subsystems.<br />
<br />
==Transcript==<br />
:[A horizontal graph with arrows pointing left and right with labels. The line has three ticks one towards each end and one in the middle above which Cueball is drawn. Below each tick there is a caption. There is a caption at the top of the panel:]<br />
: Willingness to wade through some 80's programmer's arcane bullshit:<br />
:[Left end:] Low<br />
:[Left tick:] Never learn to program<br />
:[Above Cueball:] Me<br />
:[Center tick:] Learn enough to break everything but not enough to fix it<br />
:[Right end:] High<br />
:[Right tick:] Spend all your time compiling kernels and never make anything<br />
<br />
{{comic discussion}}<br />
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]<br />
[[Category:Charts]]<br />
[[Category:Programming]]</div>172.70.135.154https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=2578:_Sword_Pull&diff=2267402578: Sword Pull2022-02-08T14:03:39Z<p>172.70.135.154: /* Explanation */</p>
<hr />
<div>{{comic<br />
| number = 2578<br />
| date = February 7, 2022<br />
| title = Sword Pull<br />
| image = sword_pull.png<br />
| titletext = Merlin really shouldn't leave his dirt bike lying around.<br />
}}<br />
<br />
==Explanation==<br />
{{incomplete|Created by a DIRT BIKE WITH UNBREAKING II AND CURSE OF VANISHING (I SHOULD REALLY LEARN S.G.A.)- Please change this comment when editing this page. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}<br />
A surprised [[Cueball]] walks up to a stone where the hilt of a sword is sticking out. The sword thus appears to be stuck in a stone, like {{w|Excalibur}} from the legends of {{w|King Arthur}}. Usually the one that can pull the stone out becomes king of England, see for instance Disney's {{w|The Sword in the Stone (1963 film)|The Sword in the Stone}}. This was featured in [[1521: Sword in the Stone]], where [[Megan]] decides to return the sword back into the stone after reading about {{w|England}} on Wikipedia.<br />
<br />
Cueball thus crawls on to the stone and pulls hard yanking it almost out of the stone. But then his surprise is even greater than before, as he finds that the pull of the sword starts a motor inside the stone, and soon after the stone starts moving to the right with Cueball on top. He did not manage to remove the sword from the stone, and after he release it the sword is retracted back to it's original position inside the stone.<br />
<br />
According to the title text the sword is actually the {{w|rope start|rope starter}} for Merlin's {{w|dirt bike}}. {{w|Merlin}}, a wizard, is typically known as King Arthur's advisor. The title text mentions that Merlin really should not just let his dirt bike lie around, indicating that this is a bad habit. Since rocks are usually not dirt bikes in disguise,{{citation needed}} [[Randall]] may be meaning this literally, as in a stone-bike that travels through the dirt, which appears to be represented in the last panel.<br />
<br />
Since Merlin is an ancient person, then if this comic is set today, then maybe it is not really a stone, but rather a pile of dirt that has covered Merlin's old dirt bike. Of course rope starters (and engines) were not invented in Merlin's time{{citation needed}}. However, he was a wizard so who knows what was possible for him.<br />
<br />
Some similarly-sized stones, namely {{w|Sailing stones|sailing stones}}, do move spontaneously with up to 0.3 km/h in precise conditions. However, the stone in the comic appears to be moving at a higher speed, and sailing stones require no rope starting{{citation needed}}.<br />
<br />
==Transcript==<br />
:[Cueball walks towards a large stone on the ground from which the hilt of a sword is protruding. The ground he walks on is uneven, with small plants growing and small stones lying on the ground.]<br />
:Cueball: ??<br />
<br />
:[Cueball stands on the stone and attempts to pull the sword out of the stone using both hands and leaning a bit back away from the sword.]<br />
<br />
:[Cueball manages to pull the sword partially out of the stone, still using both hands, and now he is almost standing in full height, but still leaning a bit back. Both he and the sword is vibrating from the effort, as indicated by several sets of two lines around the sword and Cueball's arms. The pull gives off a loud sound, and also a snoring sound comes because of the pull. And three small lines above the right part of the stone indicated that other sounds are coming from the stone]<br />
:Pull: <big><big>''Yank!''</big></big><br />
:Sword: ''Zzz<big>z</big>z'' <br />
:Stone: Put put put<br />
:Stone: <small>Brrr</small>rr<big>rr</big><br />
<br />
:[Cueball is still holding on to the sword, with the tip still inside the stone. But he is not pulling anymore and is now looking down on the stone beneath him. There are now several lines from both sides of the stone indicating noises coming from the stone, which now is written on both sides of Cueball on the stone.]<br />
:Cueball: ?? ??<br />
:Stone:<small>Rr</small>r<big>r<big>rrrrrrrr</big></big>r<small>r</small><br />
<br />
:[Cueball has released the sword which has then returned to the original position deep in the stone. The stone is now clearly moving to the right of the panel, with Cueball on top of it. He is looking behind him and holding his arms out to the side to keep his balance. The patch where the stone lay to start is dark. Four large lines behind the stone indicates how it is moving. The stone is already partially outside the right edge of the panel. The sound from the stone is floating behind the stone as it moves to the right]<br />
:Stone: <small>R</small>r<small>r</small>r<big>rrrrrr<big>r</big>rr</big><br />
<br />
{{comic discussion}}<br />
<br />
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]<br />
[[Category:Fiction]]</div>172.70.135.154https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=Talk:2576:_Control_Group&diff=226449Talk:2576: Control Group2022-02-03T15:18:35Z<p>172.70.135.154: </p>
<hr />
<div><!--Please sign your posts with ~~~~ and don't delete this text. New comments should be added at the bottom.--><br />
This is my first explanation, feel free to improve upon it. [[User:KirbyDude25|KirbyDude25]] ([[User talk:KirbyDude25|talk]]) 00:30, 3 February 2022 (UTC)<br />
<br />
Ran into your edit when I tried to submit mine, hah.<br />
I don't actually like Know Your Meme that much but I'm not sure where else I could source that joke. Maybe it's unnecessary. [[User:Obw|Obw]] ([[User talk:Obw|talk]]) 00:36, 3 February 2022 (UTC)<br />
:Sorry about that. Thanks for expanding my explanation, especially the description of the "study" aspect. I think the joke is fine, though we'll see what others think. [[User:KirbyDude25|KirbyDude25]] ([[User talk:KirbyDude25|talk]]) 00:43, 3 February 2022 (UTC)<br />
:Your explanation of the title text actually helped me understand the joke there! I added a bit more to flesh out the explanation [[User:Obw|Obw]] ([[User talk:Obw|talk]]) 00:45, 3 February 2022 (UTC)<br />
:Thanks! Your edits definitely helped clear up the study terminology. [[User:KirbyDude25|KirbyDude25]] ([[User talk:KirbyDude25|talk]]) 00:50, 3 February 2022 (UTC)<br />
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Is the text exceptionally large for an xkcd comic? I was seeing if my browser was zoomed in, but the previous comics are all a normal size [[Special:Contributions/172.70.134.215|172.70.134.215]] 00:55, 3 February 2022 (UTC)<br />
:I noticed that, too. It looks about 1.5 times larger than normal. I don't think it means anything, though; Randall probably just made the image the wrong size by accident. [[User:KirbyDude25|KirbyDude25]] ([[User talk:KirbyDude25|talk]]) 01:00, 3 February 2022 (UTC)<br />
:The image is the size normally used for the _2x version. In this case, the main image is the same size as the _2x version for some reason. Normal image: https://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/control_group.png; 2x image: https://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/control_group_2x.png; Normally the _2x version is double size for hi-DPI displays. I'm hoping that will get fixed and we'll get the normal size back. [[User:Orion205|Orion205]] ([[User talk:Orion205|talk]]) 01:11, 3 February 2022 (UTC)<br />
::This size is way better though. Do people still use low-res monitors? When I check the website, it shows up as 478 x 613 pixels, which is absurdly small, even for a webcomic. - [[Special:Contributions/172.70.130.153|172.70.130.153]] 01:33, 3 February 2022 (UTC)<br />
:::The site standard is to give the standard version, for various reasons not just confined to monitor (or, in my case, tablet) resolution. It doesn't happen here, but the double-wide version of some comics would often make my device shrink the rest of the page to make the image fit within the width.<br />
:::(Ironically, my device seems to load the _2x in the original published context, in normal non-huge comics, ''without'' changing the xkcd site dimensions, so maybe there's a CSS solution to that, as well as it clearly heing the reason for the current problem due to hard-coded pixel-widths adding up to less than necessary to wholey contain the image-width.)<br />
:::If the _2x version is necessary to see details (not the case here), a link to that version is given. Or if it has been uploaded as well, I suppose. But anyone can go to the source and get the _2x if they want it. But for this comic it adds little value. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.85.79|172.70.85.79]] 02:57, 3 February 2022 (UTC)<br />
::::Is there some way to make it DEFAULT to the 2x version (here or on xkcd.com) without some kind of addons or external scripts? I didn't see any settings, and I don't want to register an account. - [[Special:Contributions/162.158.74.166|162.158.74.166]] 03:05, 3 February 2022 (UTC)<br />
:::: Why is the "standard" version so tiny? If anything, they should make the <1mp version mobile-only, and the standard should be desktop/hd - [[Special:Contributions/172.70.131.122|172.70.131.122]] 03:03, 3 February 2022 (UTC) <br />
::::: I could give you several technical reasons why this is just not going to work here, without a lot of reworking that will probably involve breaking a significant number of readers of this site, but I don't think you'll be dissuaded. Like I said, it works 'natively' like that in the xkcd site, but it often breaks things here on explainxkcd (in my case, YMMV). It's been discussed under the Community Portal pages for this site, I know, but I'll leave it to you to find out how that went. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.159.29|162.158.159.29]] 03:15, 3 February 2022 (UTC)<br />
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Anyone know why the title text doesn't show properly? For me, the rows are on separate lines on xkcd.com but display on the same line over here, ruining the effect. Is there a hidden break character that's not displaying in the source? [[User:Zzyzx|Zzyzx]] ([[User talk:Zzyzx|talk]]) 03:07, 3 February 2022 (UTC)<br />
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Knowing if you are in the control group or not can falsify the results, which is why any self-respecting study (aka blind or double blind) won't tell their participants this information. [[User:Kimmerin|Kimmerin]] ([[User talk:Kimmerin|talk]]) 10:25, 3 February 2022 (UTC)<br />
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imo placeable could mean you get to place the correct or incorrect into the box? and the x/6 could have x be a variable, and the grey squares are actually blank to change to correct or incorrect? idk ive never played wordle [[Special:Contributions/162.158.187.158|162.158.187.158]] 13:23, 3 February 2022 (UTC)Bumpf<br />
:It says "Placeble," without the second A (meaning described above). Perhaps your theory about the squares is correct, but I think it's more likely that they're just blank and that the "placebo" Wordle doesn't actually have a word to guess. [[User:KirbyDude25|KirbyDude25]] ([[User talk:KirbyDude25|talk]]) 13:32, 3 February 2022 (UTC)<br />
::"Wordle" is just a portmanteau of "Word" and "Wardle" - so "Placeble" is likewise one of "placebo" and "Wordle". I don't think much more should be read into it. It would be interesting to think about how hard it is to not get any squares right in a Wordle puzzle, though. You'd have to get "lucky" on the first word. I'm not sure - can you enter the same word twice, or does the page stop you? [[Special:Contributions/172.70.135.154|172.70.135.154]] 15:18, 3 February 2022 (UTC)</div>172.70.135.154