Btw, does anyone know why do some SE sites support LaTeX and others don't? It could be really useful from time to time for the more mathy challenges on PPCG. Is it just some kind of switch the mods or SE staff would have to activate or does it actually require some patching the particular site? (Or does it work on PPCG, just not with $$?)
This is implemented on http://math.stackexchange.com -- you can check it out there. It will never be on Stack Overflow, though, as it is an extremely heavy dependency. (See also Nick's investigations about impact in November 2013.)
Info here:
TeX math markup is sorely needed
I saw a post on Meta.SE about it some time ago. If there's enough call for it, it can be enabled. It's not by default because of increased loading time, etc.
@Quincunx I know I've got quite a few of them added to my keyboard layout, because I'm using them a lot on study groups on facebook and in emails, but still, the possibilities are somewhat limited.
@Rusher haha, thanks for the link, didn't know that (and yes, I am living in the UK). That being said as the sign-off of an email I've seen American friends use it.
What do people in the UK think about Misfits? Is it less funny? I ask because some Americans (myself included) think British comedy is 10 times funnier because of the accent
I have no clue to be honest. The only British TV series I know is the original Coupling (which I find absolutely hilarious), but I don't think it's really popular here.
@user2179021 sometimes you're just unlucky... I posted one challenge so far... judging by the votes it was quite well received but I only ever got one submission, even after offering a bounty.
The challenge (or the tag even) could use a blurb like "I have to run your code in order to test it. A compiler for your submission must be freely available for [my platform]. If I ask you for one and you don't respond in 48 hours, I am not obligated to test and score your submission."
Obviously written a little differently if it goes in the tag
Now that I think about it, I would put it in the challenge and not the tag. It might not be a good idea to put tons of non explicit rules behind a challenge
I've seen someone's suggestion to just use some online markdown editor (e.g. a gist or stackedit) and post a link to it in the chat. I think that's actually a decent idea.
Chat seems the other extreme. Unless there were a lot of people actively hanging out in there, you'd probably get less eyeballs on it. That, and the need to keep a list of links to transcripts handy.
the advantage would be, if the chatroom has a few active users in it when you post, you can maybe reduce the hold sandbox period to a few minutes instead of a few days/weeks
For me at least, I'm not sure. I like to leave it sandboxed for a few days to get good feedback. For example, if certain people happen across it, I'm confident they will tear apart any ambiguous wordings, etc. I like to give it time to hit those users as well, not just "whoever happens to be in chat".
If I try to leave something in a chatroom sandbox, I don't foresee people looking at it a couple days later.
Okay, currently where the number of highly active users is very limited, I can agree with that. But if this site should grow (and I hope it does), you're not going to wait for a particular out of dozens of active users to look at your challenge, are you?
But that's just it. If I want to change some bit of ambiguous wording, I can't if it's been more than two minutes, and I wouldn't want to "spam" if it's only been ten.
@m.buettner Depends. I've seen questions in the sandbox get two or three upvotes before I first see them, but still have flaws which I think are obvious.
@Howard yeah, I'm graphing out the site and trying to create an effective method, but I don't think there'll be one without some new special site functionality
Wait, if the only sane way to sort a sandbox is by "Active", why does it matter if there are 950 answers in it? Just, umm, don't look at the other pages. The thirty most recently active will show up there, in order. What more is needed?
Java - 184
This is inspired by @Geobits (and a little of @Tal's answer) answer, but enough of it is different that I decided to create my own answer.
class G{public static void main(String[]a){Integer i=1,q,n=i.valueOf(a[q=0]),m=i.valueOf(a[1]);for(;m>=++i;q=0){for(;n%i+m%i<1;){q++;n/=i;m/=i;}S...
But the current system isn't that bad, it's just that occasionally a flaw is discovered and fixed and answers need to be edited. What about a post 'review mode' being the initial state, where answers are allowed but require, say, 500 rep until it's approved by somebody with, say, 5000 rep? :P
@Trimsty It's not wrong, it's just that SE, wikipedia links won't become chat bubbles and the person won't get to see what specifically you were replying to.
I'm trying to do it always to get in the habit of it.
@Howard To a byte-unconscious person as myself, the terminating newline in the 0th element in your answer to the aforementioned question is quite painful. :P
@m.buettner I guess. But I'm one of those strange people that think if I wanted a newline there, I'd have put it there myself.
It creates confusion specifically with systems that don't have the last newline or files that don't. You never know whether it was inserted by some system or whether it's a legitimate part of the file...it makes it hard for developers, like how you can't get Unix time in C reliably :P
as Steve Ballmer once said, "DEVELOPERS DEVELOPERS DEVELOPERS DEVELOPERS"
@durron597 That brings your earlier statement into question, actually, what if line-feed includes the carriage return if present and newline is just the \n character?
Java - 184 175
This is inspired by @Geobits (and a little of @Tal's answer) answer, but enough of it is different that I decided to create my own answer.
class G{public static void main(String[]a){for(Integer i=1,q,n=i.valueOf(a[0]),m=i.valueOf(a[1]);m>=++i;System.out.print(q>0?i+"^"+q+" ":""))...
When you "ungolf" code, do you change the structure? for example, if you removed curly braces to save 2 characters, should you put them back if it makes it more legible?
@Rusher in Mathematica, I do to some degree... my ungolfed versions are always manually ungolfed, because a few things are structural and I sometimes go with the terse version right away, to see if my idea is even feasible compaired to other answers
I recently posted a Java golf that massively abuses for loop syntax to save a few characters. However, this makes it almost impossible to ungolf without changing the semantics (of the uncompiled code).
Should I do so?
Pros:
Ungolfed logic is easier to read/follow
Cons:
Some of the golfing...
@Rusher I don't code golfed, but sometimes the process of golfing dramatically changes the way I'm doing something. I may move entire loops around, etc. Posting the original that doesn't resemble the golfed version (and might not even work the same way) is not an option.
I also don't keep a backup of ungolfed code, either. I write it, then golf it. There's no "ungolfed" version to paste in at that point.
This is implemented on http://math.stackexchange.com -- you can check it out there. It will never be on Stack Overflow, though, as it is an extremely heavy dependency. (See also Nick's investigations about impact in November 2013.)
Info here:
TeX math markup is sorely needed
Java - 184
This is inspired by @Geobits (and a little of @Tal's answer) answer, but enough of it is different that I decided to create my own answer.
class G{public static void main(String[]a){Integer i=1,q,n=i.valueOf(a[q=0]),m=i.valueOf(a[1]);for(;m>=++i;q=0){for(;n%i+m%i<1;){q++;n/=i;m/=i;}S...
