https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/api.php?action=feedcontributions&user=72.169.224.103&feedformat=atomexplain xkcd - User contributions [en]2024-03-28T22:13:02ZUser contributionsMediaWiki 1.30.0https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=961:_Eternal_Flame&diff=22175961: Eternal Flame2012-12-06T12:08:22Z<p>72.169.224.103: /* Explanation */</p>
<hr />
<div>{{comic<br />
| number = 961<br />
| date = October 6, 2011<br />
| title = Eternal Flame<br />
| image = eternal_flame.gif<br />
| imagesize = <br />
| titletext = There's always the hope that if you sit and watch for long enough, the beachball will vanish and the thing it interrupted will return.<br />
}}<br />
<br />
==Explanation==<br />
{{w|Steve Jobs}} died on October 5, 2011, the day before this comic was posted. He was the {{w|CEO}} and one of the founders of {{w|Apple, Inc}}. He was the head of Apple for the introduction of {{w|OS X}}, the operating system used on all modern {{w|Macintosh}}es. For OS X, when a program ties up enough system resources, an animated cusor, affectionately referred to as "the beachball," appears and spins, seemingly endlessly. The image text refers to the fact that on the Mac, the application sometimes recovers and the system comes back; other times, however, the damage is irrevocable, a {{w|Kernel Panic}} happens and the system needs a restart.<br />
<br />
R.I.P. Steve Jobs.<br />
<br />
==Transcript==<br />
[Two people before a memorial with an eternally spinning wait cursor. They contemplate silently on an influential life. Goodbye, Steve.]<br />
<br />
{{comic discussion}}<br />
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]<br />
[[Category:Comics featuring Megan]]<br />
<br />
[[Category:Comics featuring Steve Jobs]]<br />
<br />
[[Category:Comics with color]]<br />
[[Category:Comics with animation]]</div>72.169.224.103https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=1072:_Seventies&diff=220641072: Seventies2012-12-05T19:36:43Z<p>72.169.224.103: /* Transcript */</p>
<hr />
<div>{{comic<br />
| number = 1072<br />
| date = June 22, 2012<br />
| title = Seventies<br />
| image = Seventies.png<br />
| imagesize = <br />
| titletext = Hey, man, the 1670s called. They were like 'Wherefore this demonic inſtrument? By what ſorcery does it produce ſuch ſounds?"<br />
}}<br />
<br />
==Explanation==<br />
[[File:746 telephone in red.JPG|right|thumb|A GPO 746, the standard UK telephone from the late 1960s to the 1980s.]]<br />
This is another take on the common insult "<year> called and they want their <whatever> back". Randall has used this joke before in the comic "[[875|2009 Called]]". In this case, this one is funny because someone in the 70s would not know how to leave a voicemail because answering machines and especially voicemail had not been invented yet. His telephone has a {{w|rotary dial}}, rather than a {{w|touch tone}}, so he can't "press 1". Originally telephones had rotary dials instead of buttons. When you lifted the receiver you would hear a tone that let you know you had a connection and you could dial the number, this is the "dial tone." This is the origin of the phrases "dial tone" and "dialing a telephone number".<br />
<br />
The title text plays off the fact that the telephone had not yet been invented in the seventeenth century. The title text also uses the {{w|long S}}, a standard way of writing the letter 's' in initial and medial locations of words. The character, 'ſ', looks like a lower-case 'f' without the cross-bar (or like an integral sign, which is derived from the long s (for sum) in much the same way that the summation symbol is derived from the Greek letter sigma). It was in common use in written English up through the mid 19th century, and would have been used in the 1670s.<br />
<br />
==Transcript==<br />
Person 1: Nice jacket. Hey -- the Seventies called.<br />
<br />
Person 2: Oh? What'd they want?<br />
<br />
[Person 1 looking at phone]<br />
<br />
Person 1: I don't know. They didn't leave a message.<br />
<br />
Person 2: Weird.<br />
<br />
1974:<br />
<br />
[Person with dense hair, sideburns, and bell-bottom pants, using a rotary phone to call the present day and looking at the receiver.]<br />
<br />
Voicemail service: If you'd like to leave a message, press "1".<br />
<br />
{{Comic discussion}}</div>72.169.224.103https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=1072:_Seventies&diff=220631072: Seventies2012-12-05T19:36:04Z<p>72.169.224.103: /* Transcript */</p>
<hr />
<div>{{comic<br />
| number = 1072<br />
| date = June 22, 2012<br />
| title = Seventies<br />
| image = Seventies.png<br />
| imagesize = <br />
| titletext = Hey, man, the 1670s called. They were like 'Wherefore this demonic inſtrument? By what ſorcery does it produce ſuch ſounds?"<br />
}}<br />
<br />
==Explanation==<br />
[[File:746 telephone in red.JPG|right|thumb|A GPO 746, the standard UK telephone from the late 1960s to the 1980s.]]<br />
This is another take on the common insult "<year> called and they want their <whatever> back". Randall has used this joke before in the comic "[[875|2009 Called]]". In this case, this one is funny because someone in the 70s would not know how to leave a voicemail because answering machines and especially voicemail had not been invented yet. His telephone has a {{w|rotary dial}}, rather than a {{w|touch tone}}, so he can't "press 1". Originally telephones had rotary dials instead of buttons. When you lifted the receiver you would hear a tone that let you know you had a connection and you could dial the number, this is the "dial tone." This is the origin of the phrases "dial tone" and "dialing a telephone number".<br />
<br />
The title text plays off the fact that the telephone had not yet been invented in the seventeenth century. The title text also uses the {{w|long S}}, a standard way of writing the letter 's' in initial and medial locations of words. The character, 'ſ', looks like a lower-case 'f' without the cross-bar (or like an integral sign, which is derived from the long s (for sum) in much the same way that the summation symbol is derived from the Greek letter sigma). It was in common use in written English up through the mid 19th century, and would have been used in the 1670s.<br />
<br />
==Transcript==<br />
Person 1: Nice jacket. Hey -- the Seventies called.<br />
<br />
Person 2: Oh? What'd they want?<br />
<br />
[Person 1 looking at phone]<br />
<br />
Person 1: I don't know. They didn't leave a message.<br />
<br />
Person 2: Weird.<br />
<br />
1974:<br />
<br />
[Person with dense hair, sideburns, and bell-bottom pants, using a rotary phone to call the present day, with an incredulous look on his face.]<br />
<br />
Voicemail service: If you'd like to leave a message, press "1".<br />
<br />
{{Comic discussion}}</div>72.169.224.103https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=Talk:1074:_Moon_Landing&diff=22062Talk:1074: Moon Landing2012-12-05T19:29:49Z<p>72.169.224.103: </p>
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<div>The distance from Earth to Moon (the farthest we have gone away from earth) is twenty four times the diameter of Earth. If the Earth was a Basketball, the farther we have gone would be three meters from it, as the basketball is about 12 cm. The Randall statement is either wrong or purposely wrong. [[Special:Contributions/189.60.126.96|189.60.126.96]] 00:55, 28 September 2012 (UTC)<br />
<br />
:The previous comment is wrong because the title text says that "[...]if the Earth were a basketball, in 40 years no human's been more than half an inch from the surface." Randall said "in 40 years" not the life of human space travel as a whole.<br />
::Further clarification: The last manned moon landing was in 1972, 40 years ago. Since then, no human has traveled past close Earth orbit. A regulation men's basketball is 29.5 inches in circumference, or roughly 9.4 inches (~21cm) in diameter. Using the basketball as a model for the Earth, half an inch off the surface of the basketball is about 340km from the surface of the Earth - a decent approximation for the average orbital distance of the International Space Station and other recent targets of human spaceflight. [[Special:Contributions/72.169.224.103|72.169.224.103]] 19:29, 5 December 2012 (UTC)</div>72.169.224.103https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=1084:_Server_Problem&diff=220591084: Server Problem2012-12-05T18:59:38Z<p>72.169.224.103: /* Transcript */</p>
<hr />
<div>{{comic<br />
| number = 1084<br />
| date = July 20, 2012<br />
| title = Server Problem<br />
| image = server_problem.png<br />
| imagesize = <br />
| titletext = Protip: Annoy Ray Kurzweil by always referring to it as the 'Cybersingularity'.<br />
}}<br />
<br />
== Explanation ==<br />
In this comic, [[Cueball]] has messed up his Linux server (again, so he apparently does this a lot). [[Megan]] comes over and enters the basic command 'ls' which is supposed to list the files in the current directory. Instead, the computer responds with a generic error message generated by a file named ls.jar in an obscure location.<br />
<br />
Even ignoring that the 'ls' command's executable file would not typically be named ls.jar (which suggests a Java-language program), the file's location appears to be nonsensical. The [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Filesystem_Hierarchy_Standard#Directory_structure /usr/share path should indicate] "architecture-independent shared data". Adobe is the maker of such programs as Acrobat, Flash and Photoshop. Android VM would be a virtual machine for the mobile Operating System created by Google called Android.<br />
<br />
[[Megan]] is annoyed at the weird result. [[Cueball]]'s answer seems as if he is less knowledgeable about the behaviour that is normally expected of the 'ls' command. The crux of the comic is then that the solution to [[Cueball]]'s lack of knowledge and tendency to mess up his server would be to just give up and "wait for the singularity". It is implied that after this future technological advancement a server will be able to properly operate itself without [[Cueball]] repeatedly having to ask for [[Megan]]'s assistance.<br />
<br />
The [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Technological_singularity singularity] is "the hypothetical future emergence of greater-than-human superintelligence through technological means. Since the capabilities of such intelligence would be difficult for an unaided human mind to comprehend, the occurrence of a technological singularity is seen as an intellectual event horizon, beyond which events cannot be predicted or understood.<br />
<br />
Proponents of the singularity typically state that an "intelligence explosion", where superintelligences design successive generations of increasingly powerful minds, might occur very quickly and might not stop until the agent's cognitive abilities greatly surpass that of any human."<br />
<br />
In the image text, Ray Kurzweil is an author and futurist who has talked and written much about the singularity.<br />
<br />
==Transcript==<br />
Person 1, sitting at laptop: I, um, messed up my server again.<br />
<br />
Person 2: I'll take a look. You have the *weirdest* tech problems<br />
<br />
[Person 2 uses the root prompt]<br />
<br />
~# ls<br />
<br />
[computer returns the following]<br />
<br />
usr/share/Adobe/doc/example/android_vm/root/sbin/ls.jar: Error: Device is not responding.<br />
<br />
[Person 2 has turned to address Person 1]<br />
<br />
Person 2: What did you ''do''!?<br />
<br />
Person 1: Maybe the device is busy. Should I try it later?<br />
<br />
Person 2: You should shut down this system and wait for the Singularity.<br />
<br />
{{comic discussion}}<br />
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]<br />
[[Category:Comics featuring Megan]]<br />
[[Category:Computers]]<br />
[[Category:Linux]]</div>72.169.224.103https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=Talk:1109:_Refrigerator&diff=22058Talk:1109: Refrigerator2012-12-05T17:59:13Z<p>72.169.224.103: </p>
<hr />
<div>I would argue that this is also a reference to {{w|The Incredible Machine}} and friends, where many levels revolve around conveyor belts and things on top of them that stir certain actions. [[User:Kaa-ching|Kaa-ching]] ([[User talk:Kaa-ching|talk]]) 10:46, 17 September 2012 (UTC)<br />
<br />
The main problem with this design is that the bad food needs to land softly otherwise it could splash\spatter over the good food. [[User:SaintGerbil|SaintGerbil]]([[User talk:User:SaintGerbil|talk]]) 12:17, 17 September 2012 (UTC)<br />
<br />
I thought an alternative design for the fridge could be to have the middle conveyor belt attached to the right, leaving a gap on its left and obviously it would move toward the left. This way we could put food on the topmost belt on its left side and the food would travel along that belt then drop onto the middle one, then travel to the bottom belt and finally fall into the BAD bin. Of course we'd have to relabel all belts accordingly. [[User:DelendaEst|DelendaEst]] ([[User talk:DelendaEst|talk]]) 12:27, 17 September 2012 (UTC)<br />
<br />
:The only problem with that is that different foods spoil at different rates (e.g. carrots last for about 2 months while milk is a week at best). The 3 shelves moving at different speeds seems to account for this. --[[User:Joehammer79|Joehammer79]] ([[User talk:Joehammer79|talk]]) 13:38, 18 September 2012 (UTC)<br />
<br />
::I disagree. I'm with DelendaEst. I presume the premise is that you initially place the food at the appropriate place. Milk might start at the 2-week mark on the shelf, whereas juice might start at the 4 week mark, and ketchup might start at the many month mark. Randall has designed it so you put the food on the relevant shelf. In the left-right-left right scenario, the top shelf might run 3 months to 1 month, and take two months to roll from left to right. Then the second shelf could be 1 month to 1 week, and take approximately 3 weeks to roll from right to left. The bottom shelf would take 1 week to roll from left to right into the "bad" bin. You would just have to put stuff down based on initial expiration date. Ketchup might go on the top-left, while milk might go in the middle of the second shelf, etc. In Randall's version, the food at "2 days" on the top shelf, the second shelf and the door shelf should all reach the bad bin at the same time. Thus, it could all have been on one shelf. [[User:TheHYPO|TheHYPO]] ([[User talk:TheHYPO|talk]]) 19:22, 19 September 2012 (UTC)<br />
<br />
Most of the stuff I find gone bad is in the bottom two drawers where it has become forgotten, like a half bag of lettuce.--[[User:DanB|DanB]] ([[User talk:DanB|talk]]) 14:19, 17 September 2012 (UTC)<br />
<br />
Sorry Randall: so much for brilliant... there's a bug in your design. Look at the top rack in the door. There is a chute that would prevent food from falling past when the door is closed. It would need to be rotated 90 anticlockwise in order to work. [[Special:Contributions/207.225.239.130|207.225.239.130]] 21:30, 17 September 2012 (UTC)<br />
*I see a space -[[User:Shine|Shine]] ([[User talk:Shine|talk]]) 02:00, 18 September 2012 (UTC)<br />
<br />
::I think the anon user is pointing out that the little "ramp" below the door belt would actually roll food into the side wall of the fridge when the door is closed. The ramp should be oriented from the wall of the door towards the back of the fridge (when the door is closed) instead of towards the side wall. so the food rolls from the door back into the fridge and the "bad" bin, rather than rolling into the side wall of the fridge. [[User:TheHYPO|TheHYPO]] ([[User talk:TheHYPO|talk]]) 19:25, 19 September 2012 (UTC)<br />
<br />
:::And Shine is pointing out that the middle and bottom shelves doesn't go all the way to the edge of the door. The fridge is designed so that the "BAD" bin is as long as the width of the body shelves plus the width of the door shelves. That way, the food from the top shelf of the door will fall between the middle/bottom shelves and the side wall, and into the front end of the "BAD" bin. [[Special:Contributions/72.169.224.103|72.169.224.103]] 17:55, 5 December 2012 (UTC)</div>72.169.224.103https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=Talk:1109:_Refrigerator&diff=22057Talk:1109: Refrigerator2012-12-05T17:55:28Z<p>72.169.224.103: </p>
<hr />
<div>I would argue that this is also a reference to {{w|The Incredible Machine}} and friends, where many levels revolve around conveyor belts and things on top of them that stir certain actions. [[User:Kaa-ching|Kaa-ching]] ([[User talk:Kaa-ching|talk]]) 10:46, 17 September 2012 (UTC)<br />
<br />
The main problem with this design is that the bad food needs to land softly otherwise it could splash\spatter over the good food. [[User:SaintGerbil|SaintGerbil]]([[User talk:User:SaintGerbil|talk]]) 12:17, 17 September 2012 (UTC)<br />
<br />
I thought an alternative design for the fridge could be to have the middle conveyor belt attached to the right, leaving a gap on its left and obviously it would move toward the left. This way we could put food on the topmost belt on its left side and the food would travel along that belt then drop onto the middle one, then travel to the bottom belt and finally fall into the BAD bin. Of course we'd have to relabel all belts accordingly. [[User:DelendaEst|DelendaEst]] ([[User talk:DelendaEst|talk]]) 12:27, 17 September 2012 (UTC)<br />
<br />
:The only problem with that is that different foods spoil at different rates (e.g. carrots last for about 2 months while milk is a week at best). The 3 shelves moving at different speeds seems to account for this. --[[User:Joehammer79|Joehammer79]] ([[User talk:Joehammer79|talk]]) 13:38, 18 September 2012 (UTC)<br />
<br />
::I disagree. I'm with DelendaEst. I presume the premise is that you initially place the food at the appropriate place. Milk might start at the 2-week mark on the shelf, whereas juice might start at the 4 week mark, and ketchup might start at the many month mark. Randall has designed it so you put the food on the relevant shelf. In the left-right-left right scenario, the top shelf might run 3 months to 1 month, and take two months to roll from left to right. Then the second shelf could be 1 month to 1 week, and take approximately 3 weeks to roll from right to left. The bottom shelf would take 1 week to roll from left to right into the "bad" bin. You would just have to put stuff down based on initial expiration date. Ketchup might go on the top-left, while milk might go in the middle of the second shelf, etc. In Randall's version, the food at "2 days" on the top shelf, the second shelf and the door shelf should all reach the bad bin at the same time. Thus, it could all have been on one shelf. [[User:TheHYPO|TheHYPO]] ([[User talk:TheHYPO|talk]]) 19:22, 19 September 2012 (UTC)<br />
<br />
Most of the stuff I find gone bad is in the bottom two drawers where it has become forgotten, like a half bag of lettuce.--[[User:DanB|DanB]] ([[User talk:DanB|talk]]) 14:19, 17 September 2012 (UTC)<br />
<br />
Sorry Randall: so much for brilliant... there's a bug in your design. Look at the top rack in the door. There is a chute that would prevent food from falling past when the door is closed. It would need to be rotated 90 anticlockwise in order to work. [[Special:Contributions/207.225.239.130|207.225.239.130]] 21:30, 17 September 2012 (UTC)<br />
*I see a space -[[User:Shine|Shine]] ([[User talk:Shine|talk]]) 02:00, 18 September 2012 (UTC)<br />
<br />
::I think the anon user is pointing out that the little "ramp" below the door belt would actually roll food into the side wall of the fridge when the door is closed. The ramp should be oriented from the wall of the door towards the back of the fridge (when the door is closed) instead of towards the side wall. so the food rolls from the door back into the fridge and the "bad" bin, rather than rolling into the side wall of the fridge. [[User:TheHYPO|TheHYPO]] ([[User talk:TheHYPO|talk]]) 19:25, 19 September 2012 (UTC)<br />
<br />
:::And Shine is pointing out that the middle and bottom shelves doesn't go all the way to the edge of the door. The fridge is designed so that the door shelves fit in over the legends for the conveyors in the body of the refrigerator (i.e., when the fridge is closed, there's some overlap between what's seen in the body and what's seen on the door). That way, the food from the top shelf of the door will fall between the middle/bottom shelves and the side wall, and into the front end of the "BAD" bin. [[Special:Contributions/72.169.224.103|72.169.224.103]] 17:55, 5 December 2012 (UTC)</div>72.169.224.103https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=Talk:1131:_Math&diff=22047Talk:1131: Math2012-12-05T15:45:33Z<p>72.169.224.103: </p>
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<div>Sorry, I don't know how to upload the correct image. - Artod<br />
<br />
:Picture downloaded from xkcd, uploaded to the wiki with the correct license and "xkcd" added to the filename as a prefix, then filename changed in page source to correct image. Hope this helps in the future! - [[User:Coombeseh|Coombeseh]] ([[User talk:Coombeseh|talk]]) 10:36, 7 November 2012 (UTC)<br />
:Can somebody please explain further? I guess the joke is about the forecast? thank you --[[Special:Contributions/89.144.192.97|89.144.192.97]] 14:17, 7 November 2012 (UTC)<br />
<br />
Randall's on the nose again. This is why I just turned off all media yesterday, especially toward the end of the evening. Unless you're up for contrived suspense, it's really just tediousness lived through: barely five minutes of "news" per hour, the remaining "empty" time filled with the drone of talking heads waxing obnoxious about irrelevancies. This morning, the results are in, and I'm no worse for not having endured the conjectural drivel... -- [[User:IronyChef|IronyChef]] ([[User talk:IronyChef|talk]]) 15:25, 7 November 2012 (UTC)<br />
<br />
:As a note, the title text is referring to the consensus polls, including those at fivethirtyeight.com, which were referred to in the previous episode. Another interpretation of the "numbers" comment is that the predictions based on polling numbers and proper statistical analyses of those, rather than mere punditry and opinion, were always the best predictors of what was going to happen in this election. So not only could numbers retroactively tell us who won (based on actual votes) but numbers when used as individual data points with variance and sample sizes, and combined into an aggregate, were far more effective in telling us prospectively who was going to win. [[Special:Contributions/128.104.149.65|128.104.149.65]] 18:11, 7 November 2012 (UTC)<br />
<br />
Numbers continue <ins>to be best</ins> system for determining? {{unsigned|204.191.29.154}}<br />
:Yes and no. In news stories (see newspaper headlines for an example), this is a typical format. You didn't notice the "To surprise of pundits" part that came first? [[Special:Contributions/76.122.5.96|76.122.5.96]] 00:57, 8 November 2012 (UTC)<br />
:I believe the previous entry was addressing the missing article "the" in the caption. [[User:mwburden|mwburden]] 16:17, 4 December 2012 (UTC)<br />
::So was the answer. The caption, like many news headlines, omits the articles. "To [the] surprise of pundits, numbers continue to be [the] best system..." [[Special:Contributions/72.169.224.103|72.169.224.103]] 15:45, 5 December 2012 (UTC)<br />
<br />
[http://election.princeton.edu/2012/11/06/comment-thread-3-live-blogging/ For more critical relevance], he texted along these lines yesterday to one of the more prominent non-Nate Silver analysts, Prof. Sam Wang of the Princeton Election Consortium {{unsigned|70.167.158.178}}<br />
<br />
I wish Randall had made the bar 538 pixels wide (it's only 400ish). - [[User:Frankie|Frankie]] ([[User talk:Frankie|talk]]) 11:52, 9 November 2012 (UTC)</div>72.169.224.103