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1:28 AM
Thanks GPR for adding mine to the list of responses, I couldn't edit it.
 
 
1 hour later…
2:35 AM
1
Q: Return to the Minotaur's Labyrinth

Big AgnesThis is an extension of the puzzle The Minotaur's Labyrinth which is inspired by the comments from histocrat. You are trapped (again) in a chamber at the center of the minotaur's labyrinth. There are $N$ tunnels, $m$ of which lead to safety; the remaining tunnels only lead back to the chamber. E...

 
 
2 hours later…
4:16 AM
@Rubio May I suggest that you say something like 'the containers in the bays are taken through the doors and measured'? It would make it a bit clearer (and I don't really understand what the doors had to do with anything in the first place).
 
I more or less did, in a comment
 
Oh, so that's what you mean. I interpreted it differently
 
4:57 AM
I must thank this Minotaur puzzle for giving me the opportunity to use my favorite C++ statement
if (ret != ret) {
 
...what
 
this is true if and only if ret is NaN
 
I... guess that makes sense, in some sort of twisted way.
 
@ffao I like what you did there... :)
 
5:21 AM
v
 
w
 
GaMen. That v was intended to be typed somehere else, sorry. (NaN is not a number and therefore compares false to every other value, including itself.)
Eggs! Not only are my typing skills poor, I even suck at selecting the right windows.
 
5:54 AM
Haha.. I wonder, what could a single letter mean... :-)
 
I'll post a single letter here in chat for the next 30 days or so. They'll form a secret message. Or maybe you have to wfrite the letters in a calendar and it will be a wordsearch.
 
> wfrite
wait, was that one of them? I'm losing track already...
 
Hah.. Cool idea! :p
@Alconja Did you confirm the answer to your CC?
 
...did someone answer it?
 
Yeah
15 hours ago, by n_palum
So ADMIT (Shelter) takes ONION (Leaky), Warning = ADMONITION (def)
I think this was the attempt..
 
6:04 AM
Ahh, ok. @n_palum. Not admonition.
not sure what kind of onion's you're buying ;)
 
@Alconja No, that doesn't count as single letter. If you take all the letters I've fat-fingered in between my regular texts, you'd have the Necronomicon already.
 
A thousand fat fingers on a thousand on screen keyboards and all that :)
 
Hey! I'm not a monkey and I'm very careful not to write the works of Shakespeare with my keyboard-fumbling accidental steganography!
 
I'm way more efficient with my puzzling typos. Just this oen alone, when repeated, contains the complete works of Shakespeare! It's just encrypted with a vigenere cipher... I've got 1000 typewriting monkeys working out the key as we speak.
 
Don't lose the key, then. :)
 
6:25 AM
Sorry for interrupting
But do you guys know what this means?
 
The orange ones look like SMILE but not sure in what context to look..
 
I don't see how I and L are there
 
Yeah.. That's what I said. I'm not sure what is the context behind it..Just interpreted it to be IL..No specific reason..
 
Look like SMOKE & NESK to me... unless you think they're supposed to mean something more, I'd've just said they were tags
(or SMORE)
 
interesting...
 
6:32 AM
Could be Smite as well..
Smite is a third-person multiplayer online battle arena (MOBA) video game developed and published by Hi-Rez Studios for Microsoft Windows, PlayStation 4 and Xbox One. In Smite, players control a god, goddess, or other mythological figure and take part in team based combat, using abilities and tactics against other player-controlled gods and non-player-controlled minions. The game has multiple PvP modes, many playable characters, and has a successful esports scene with multiple tournaments, including the annual Smite World Championship which has a large US$1 million dollar prize pool. == Gameplay... ==
 
I'm not seeing any T from there
 
Yes. Smoke looks more promising..
Like this
 
7:10 AM
@Deusovi, can you tag this ?
5
Q: Should we abolish tags that only describe the origin of a puzzle?

rand al'thorWe have at least two tags (possibly more) which say nothing about the content of the puzzle but only describe what context it originated or was found in. iq-test - "For puzzles that have appeared in IQ tests", 38 questions. job-interview-question - "For puzzles that were asked at a job intervie...

Hi @Alconja!
 
Hey
 
7:29 AM
@manshu nope, that's not the most starred in here. That has 14 stars. This has 16:
Aug 30 '15 at 23:30, by lloyd
It must be really hard to be a mod on this site.
 
7:40 AM
"This one got the most stars (on the first page of starred posts of TSL)"
manshu is still correct
 
*facepalm*
 
Sid
7:59 AM
I would agree with Lloyd's statement there. The mods were asked(even ordered?) to show classified information to the community.
Heh, Rand could have attempted a coup and users would still have supported him. :P
 
250
Q: Why don't we keep public records of suspensions?

Jon EricsonWhenever the topic of a suspended user crops up, there's often confusion about what information moderators ought to share and what they should keep private. Sometimes moderators are just as unsure as other users. This can cause all sorts of unnecessary problems. The immediate effect of a suspen...

 
8:59 AM
@Alconja I don't know whether PORTENT is a verb, but if it is then my guess is POR(TENT)ING
Hmm or is it POR(TEND)ING
Yeah probably the latter, shelter as verb?
Hmm yeah I'm having trouble reconciling. Probably one of the two though.
 
9:20 AM
@Sp3000 PORING doesn't mean leaky but it's not far from something that does...
 
Hm. Good point, damn :P
For some reason I thought PORING also meant "full of pores"
 
that's POROUS
 
... hides in corner
 
@Sp3000 Don't worry, Deus is 11th on the list of users in this room
(Then again I was 9th and still watching...)
@Sp3000 Those ...s aren't italics :P
 
I'm going to guess that you're all being nice to me and that I was meant to go @Alconja POR(TENT)OUS
:P
 
Not quite the def you were going for? :P
 
Hm? What do you mean?
 
Warning
 
Warning = (~leaky) takes (~shelter), right?
(not quite getting what you mean sorry)
 
No, portentous meaning warning
 
9:37 AM
If you mean as an adjective, then yeah I didn't expect that
 
@Sp3000 That's the one. Nice work.
 
Neat :) (Nice surface)
CCCC: The primarily wealthy possessing proprietary set of artworks (8)
 
@Sp3000 That's what I meant
@Rubio Surprised you managed to dig my puzzle out. I'd all but forgotten of it.
 
9:52 AM
I keep intriguing puzzles in tabs
puzzling.stackexchange.com/questions/43787/… is still sitting in my tab set for example. :)
Ones I've either spent time trying to solve, or really want to know the answers to, so I don't lose track of them. I probably should just favorite them, but meh
 
So... how many tabs do you have open?
 
I ... don't want to count. hehe
 
^ (Obligatory xkcd, sorry for chowing up the screen)
 
11
Q: Mi, So, Re, Do?

boboquackNot quite! But it's even easier to do! Here's what you'll need: It may? help some people, but the title should have been: Hints: Warning! One step of the solution! I'm not sure what people need help on, s...

 
@Rubio What browser? Chrome is putting a limit on how many random tabs I can have open
Oop, no, I can open more...
 
10:01 AM
I don't use Chrome for that reason. I use Firefox, with an unload-tab extension to save memory
(And yes, that should be a good hint as to the sheer number of tabs I habitually have sticking around)
Also, that xkcd is entirely accurate. TVtropes is a time-sucking void
 
@Rubio So is Puzzling
Hmm... when I click on GPR's pinned link it says socket create error. Happen to you?
@Rubio can you unpin Alconja's CCCC, nice as it is?
 
which pinned link?
 
'Farewell to Emrakul'
 
works fine for me
 
Does this link work for you? (Don't worry, I swear it's not a rickroll)
Now socket create error is coming up on all Q/A pages. Probably the MathJax.
And on the main page
Other SE sites are gone too!
Restarting...
 
10:10 AM
yeah I think it's you. :)
 
Ah... now it's working.
 
On the subject of xkcd btw
... is the first thing I ever did here. Apparently I joined specifically to answer that question.
 
Xkcd is a worse time sucker than Tvtropes. And SE is worse than both of them combined.
 
@Rubio Back when the hovertext was informative, not part of the joke
 
I'd argue that TVTropes is more of a time sink than xkcd, but SE yes :P
 
10:21 AM
^^
 
I'm speaking from experience...
 
@Rubio I joined StackExchange on StackOverflow because I kept going there to get help, then realised that enough Python questions came that if I could write down an answer quickly, I could help people! It got boring pretty quickly... then I heard of Puzzling. The only time since that I've done something SO is to get 2 rep to get to a round 200 rep.
@Mithrandir Poor you.
 
hehe
 
I've been stuck on all three...: /
(I've been stuck on SE for over two years now, actually :P)
 
Hey, if you're ever bored, just click on everything that pops up here for an hour, then read it all...
'Vowel harmony as epiphenomenon?' Looks interesting... click! etc.
 
10:24 AM
Yeah actually I was on SE because of a question on SO I had posted a community edit to LONG ago, before I actually signed up to any of the networks, that I was glancing back at. I happened to see that post somehow, probably having noticed something interesting on HNQ and eventually making my way to that question which I could actually answer. And life as I had previously known it ended. :)
 
I've done that, watwatch the real time tab and go read some of them
 
@Mithrandir watwatch?
Temple-watch?
 
@Rubio I got here in a strange way.
@boboquack slight phone hiccup
 
@Mithrandir Don't leave us hanging!
 
It all started when I got a copy of Percy Jackson when I was... 9? I got the first two.
I liked them, so I asked my parents for the next ones.
 
10:28 AM
user image
5
 
I then traveled to Rick Riordan's website, where I discovered the series called The 39 Clues
 
@Sp3000 lol. yes. this.
 
I then traveled to the 39 Clues website. After a couple of months, I became active on the forum there.
@Sp3000 :D
 
Oh no... I can see where this is going...
 
There. A reference to all 3 at once :P Problem solved
 
10:31 AM
After a couple of months, Sci asked a question on Science Fiction & Fantasy about the 39 Clues:
5
Q: Did Fiske Cahill try to stop the Holts from blowing up the Franklin Institute?

ScimonsterIn The Maze of Bones, Fiske (known as the Man in Black) is at the Franklin Institute in Boston when the Holts blow it up. His job is supposedly to watch over Amy and Dan and know everything about the other teams. Did he know that the Holts were going to blow up the museum? Did he try to stop them?

 
Wait... still no answer
 
So he asked me to link it on the forum there, in case anyone knew the answer. I told him probably not, as there aren't any external links allowed (and I was right).
 
And their spoiler-tagging is pretty lax
 
But then I became active on SFF, starting with Harry Potter.
 
@Mithrandir I didn't felt like checking all 1294 starred posts at that time :p
 
10:34 AM
And I've been active on SFF ever since, and I found other sites as well.
I found Puzzling via
 
&lit?
(Sorry for the formatting, I couldn't resist)
 
An HNQ while traversing Mi Yodeya.
And here we are! :P
@manshu tsk tsk. Have you no work ethic? :P
@boboquack it's in like the 3rd or 4th chapter
 
@Mithrandir I have read the books. But it's not like it's the first book unless my memory is very bad Whoop, my memory is very bad
 
How did you know I work at SE? It's a highly secret information. D:
 
10:56 AM
@Sp3000 TRIPTYCH (set of artworks) = T[he] + PTY (abbr. of proprietary) in RICH
 
Yup, your turn
 
Nice surface.
CCCC: Racket in clean place for courses (6, 4)
 
11:28 AM
I got rid of the spoiler; if I accidentally just destroyed your puzzle please roll it back :) — Mithrandir 4 mins ago
 
@Mithrandir Thanks. How did you do that?
 
@incesterror21 MathJax
$%The image is all that you need.$
And that won't show up, but it'll count towards the 30 characters.
 
Clever.
I only knew the html thinspace
 
Thanks :)
 
Unfortunately it doesn't work anymore.
 
11:37 AM
So now you can use the MathJax trick :)
(if the site supports MathJax)
 
Will do! Can I simply use $%some text$ and I'm all set?
 
As long as the 'some text' is at least 30 characters, yeah
 
So the "$%" does not count, I see
 
It actually might, not 100% sure
 
"thirty letters"is actually more than "sixty letters" - what a time to be alive
 
11:41 AM
Okay, it does - you need 27 characters and the $%$
Source:
30
Q: EEEEK! My puzzle disappeared!

Mithrandir $%Insert30characters,please..$

 
Now I'm fully prepared it seems. What else is there to know?
How is life?
 
I've got a cold, but otherwise I'm fine
You?
I'm also trying to pick up a diamond here on Puzzling.
 
I've got no cold but a guy with a rifle is threatening my family.
19
Q: Who stole the diamond?

MithrandirInspiration from @BeastlyGerbil's Puzzle - This is an opprtunity. Can you take it? In Puzzlville last night, someone stole the famous Stone of Wondrous Mystery! Can you help the police find it? But first... maybe you should read the news. Note: I cannot confirm that all of the images came t...

That one?
 
Heh
No, a moderator diamond :P
 
I think you already have jewelry on literature, right?
How greedy can one be...
I bet you are planning to sell them!
 
11:48 AM
:O How on earth did you find out?
There's one guy who has 7 diamonds...
 
7 diamonds
 
And then there are the staff, with 167 diamonds.
 
Holy excrements
I see, so that is not a problem it seems
 
Right. :P
 
Do you get money from SE when reaching, say, 5 diamonds?
 
11:54 AM
No, but you do get swag
Like, I'm currently wearing my mod hat.
 
<|:^)
 
And elected mods get stickers
 
You are a hammer?
 
And a t-shirt
in The Reading Room, 5 hours ago, by Mithrandir
@Riker hammered
 
Oh, nailed it so to speak.
 
11:59 AM
Whew.
My hat is now officially in the ring.
 
What a hat day.
 
*clap clap clap*
 
I had to chop my nominee posting by almost 40% to make it fit in the 1200 allowed characters. That was actually difficult to do without, well, losing something
 
Why not use images
I mean, images with text on them
 
You could write it, put it in a Google Doc, and link it in a comment.
 
12:03 PM
meh. I made it work. :)
Who will be the first to tell me why it was difficult?
 
There is no tl;dr section - I'm disappointed.
 
There was no room. :)
I literally used, exactly, 1200 characters. The limit.
 
Stegonagraphy?
 
Sure. Call it that.
 
12:15 PM
Ha! @Mithrandir you still there?
 
@incesterror21 hmm?
 
@Mithrandir when I reload my puzzle it shows the mathjax text for a split of a second
Not acceptable!
 
Yep, that's the only downside :/
 
I'll let you get away with it this time but make sure to have sth better prepared next time!
 
You can always eat the character count up with a string of &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;
 
12:24 PM
Heh, I was considering posting a to allow users with 100 or more rep to allow image-only questions on Puzzling Meta.
 
Or &zwnj;&zwnj;&zwnj;&zwnj;
 
they display as spaces, they count toward the character count, and they don't do anything MathJaxy
 
@Mithrandir I would like that!
 
1:05 PM
@Mithrandir I don't think I'd agree with that, most visual puzzles can be improved with a little bit of backstory, or text transcripts
 
1:21 PM
-1
Q: NEW Puzzle Game - Mandorla

Zoltan HojszaMandorla is a brand new, patented, combination puzzle game invented and developed in Hungary. The game contains a total of 19 elements in three different colours; the elements can be shuffled by turning the two interlocking wheels left or right. The game is distributed only in Hungary and we are ...

 
@Sphinx close fodder
 
not certain if that's spam or not
 
I certainly don't see how it's a puzzle, looks very much like an ad
 
the only disclosure is the word 'we' nestled in somewhere
it's definitely an ad, not certain if it falls under Stack Exchange's rather strict Spam definition
 
Either way, it's off topic
 
1:29 PM
Eh, I think it's spam, based on this: puzzling.stackexchange.com/help/promotion
 
Wow, it's getting dv'ed to oblivion
I love how he says that it's "brand new". I've seen that precise puzzle years ago (not in physical form however)
 
He doesn't do a great job of explaining what the puzzle is
is it like a rubix cube thing with only two twist-directions available?
 
I know what it is by looking at it (because I've solved one before) but I agree
Basically you have 2 dials, left and right. The goal is to get the disks to look how he has them in the picture
 
1:46 PM
That backs up what he said about Hungary, but I don't think 4 years old is "new"
 
spam
'exists only to promote a product or service'
 
Not disputing that, like I said earlier, it's an ad
 
@Mithrandir the only question arose from the fact that that's only half of the close reason
 
@Sconibulus it's an or statement, I think it's been said
 
Dissappointed no onions were needed :( and GaMen
 
1:54 PM
GaMen
 
I did end up voting it as spam, but it has a similar problem as 'the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed'
 
Not really, it was clearly off-topic
 
@Rubio I had the same issue :P but you've probably booped me out of contention now XD
 
I'll be in a meeting for x minutes so I probably won't answer if you ping
(x because I have no idea how long it'll be)
 
2:00 PM
*waves*
 
Still waiting on you to solve my doodles @MOehm
 
Oh yeah, I'll just drop this here:
 
False advertisement
 
2:25 PM
@Techidiot that's a huge trash can :O
 
For some reason my brain keeps claiming that the CCCC is BATTLE ROOM
 
Haha.. That might be a huge puzzle :p
 
but it probably isn't
especially because the B in battle keeps coming from two places, or there's a dropped letter that's unclued
B(+[B/R]ATTLE)ROOM is my brain's dumb logic
 
0
Q: Jack was not there...Need to find him!

TechidiotIf you don't remember me, I am Aidan. I was in search of Detective Jack a few months back. And after a hard fought battle, I reached where he called me. But, unfortunately, when I reached the rendezvous, I didn't find him. Probably, they identified his location as well.. I knew, Jack won't just ...

 
@Sconibulus I cant find how that def works haha
 
2:30 PM
oh, the def'd be an Ender's Game reference, at Battle School they taught kids to use the Battle Room, which they then fought in as armies
I don't think it's right, but i keep thinking of it, maybe now that I posted it my brain will shut up and think of something more likely
 
I think you're on the right track with room
 
S WEEP also seemed plausible, but I couldn't make WEEP work into anything
 
More likely that courses is the def
And racket could be like NOISE of some kind, or a literal racket like a PADDLE but those all seem too big of words to fit
 
Oh!
DINING ROOM
Din In Groom
 
How is racket din
but that seems right
 
2:45 PM
noise
 
Din is a bad noise - just ask the DYNNE
 
Ah well then it seems you've gotten it
@MOehm we have found you out :P
 
3:00 PM
Should I wait for confirmation?
 
0
Q: What is a Closely Capital Phrase™?

tilperIn the spirit of the What is a Word™/Phrase™ series started by JLee, a special brand of Phrase™ and Word™ puzzles. If a phrase conforms to a special rule, I call it a Closely Capital Phrase™. Use the examples below to find the rule. $$ % set Title text. (spaces around the text ARE important;...

 
Dunno
 
@Sconibulus looks right to me
 
CCCC: Tragic Western; Open: Lorries; unmanned, wrecked, countless, rust-laden. (6)
 
That's quite a lot of clue for only 6 letters
 
3:13 PM
(ping me for more pins :P)
 
@Mithrandir What if I want to pin you for more pings?
 
Yeah what about that ^
 
@dcfyj then too bad, because you're not blue or italicized
 
:O :O :O :O :O
 
So many open mouths. Did you see a ghost?
 
3:20 PM
Yep
 
Are you running for mod?
 
@Mithrandir Not in this room :P
 
Sid
GamEn folks!
Hm, looks like @Rubio has thrown his hat into the ring..
 
indeed.
 
Sid
I like what you did there, though. Sticking to the ideals, eh? :P
 
3:27 PM
@Rubio Why are you italic? Room owner or something like that?
 
Room Owner here, yes.
@Sid (hehe. it's my platform, right?)
 
Does anyone know why Emrakul doesn't want to be mod anymore? Has he explained why?
 
@incesterror21 Read his post pinned on the side
 
Waning time and interest, basically, but - yeah. their post says it
 
I see, seems like he's been here for quite some time!
 
3:36 PM
The appropriate pronouns are "they" and "them", btw. puzzling.stackexchange.com/users/20/emrakul
 
I don't understand
"He is a masculine third-person, singular personal pronoun"
From what I know about him and grammar, that should be about right.
 
Sid
We don't know if it's a He or a She. So, we use "they"
 
Soon Rubio will be blue and not just italics...
 
Sid
@Rubio if you win, that whole thing actually works. Once might be a happenstance, twice is not.
 
0
Q: School is for learning things

indubitableeA mother asks her son what he learned at school today. Her son responds by reciting this poem. Bed holders Leaves at close Keys at Lowes Dies in years Men south are bros (aka "brothers" or close friends) Red folders Peas on toast Fleas on rose What subject did the son learn a...

 
3:44 PM
@Sid You lost me there.
@incesterror21 Emrakul prefers the pronouns "they" and "them" to reference them, so - your understanding notwithstanding, you're not using the pronouns Emrakul's profile indicates are correct
 
Just for my understanding, since when do people actually choose pronouns?
 
Sid
@rubio Someone has already won with your platform. If you win, this platform actually works. :P
 
Oh. lol ok gotcha :)
 
@incesterror21 It's a more common thing in the past, maybe decade? With an increased acceptance of people choosing their own pronouns, it's becoming more common that people with a preference will let you know what they prefer.
 
Yes, I got that it seems to be thing these days. But...why? I don't see a reason.
What Sid said was right, we might not know their gender. But that's for us.
 
3:56 PM
No it's not for us - what they choose is for them
Perhaps they don't identify with a specific gender or pronoun. That's not up to anyone else to decide. If they prefer a non-descriptive one, then that's what we use.
 
^ that. Someone who either does not wish to disclose their gender (here) or does not identify with either gender in general would be free to let us know that they don't want to identified as a "he" or a "she" which is their right
 
Keeping genders a secret is a valid point.
 
The latter is increasingly common these days, but by no means rules out the former. Someone who really keeps a low profile might just want to preserve their gender as a mystery, and highlight it by explicitly not wanting to be called by either gender's pronouns.
 

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