The Nineteenth Byte

Learn How To Be Transparent

1:47 PM

@El'endiaStarman Your studies are progressing well, youngling.

hey, why do i see users with id<0 ? e.g
http://chat.stackoverflow.com/users/-2/feeds
http://chat.stackexchange.com/users/-363/new-main-posts
http://chat.stackexchange.com/users/-278/new-sandboxed-posts
http://chat.stackexchange.com/users/-263/captain-obvious

Learn How To Be Transparent

@LearnHowToBeTransparent Those are chat bots.

http://chat.stackoverflow.com/rooms/111347/sobotics
has lots of chat bots id>0

New Main Posts posts links to new challenges on the main site.

@LearnHowToBeTransparent All those bots were made by users. The ones with id < 0 are feed bots.

They're basically RSS feeds in chat.

Anonymous

I was right!

Anonymous

1:59 PM

I predicted 12:45 AM UTC for post 100000. It was posted at 12:41 AM UTC

Very impressive.

@Mego Congrats!

I guess that means you get a cookie, too, but you'll have to see the mods for that. They don't allow me to distribute the cookies.

Anonymous

But what if I want a downcookie from you?

I can give you a whole batch of those, but not all at once ;)

Don't want to get popped for cereal cooking.

2:03 PM

Isn't that just oatmeal?

Ssssshhhhh

I'm pretty sure I've had quite a few correct predictions. If only I could remember any of them...

Anonymous

@mınxomaτ You were 4 years off with your world-ending-in-2012 prediction

@Geobits I thought you were exempt from that

No, just for voting. Cooking is different.

2:09 PM

Ahh.

Anonymous

What about pie? I heard you have a bunch of peaches

Millions of peaches

@Mego Couldn't we please phrase that as at least 4 years off...

Sounds ominous otherwise :P

@trichoplax I think you misunderstand. The world has already ended.

Anonymous

@trichoplax David Bowie died in January. That's pretty world-ending to me.

2:11 PM

I think that was the point

@El'endiaStarman Nobody tells me anything :(

Anonymous

After his death, the harbingers have run free

@Mego And here I thought you were talking about the election. :P

It's not one thing, but the accumulation of things :)

Anonymous

@El'endiaStarman The election went great! We got 4 reasonable, mature people who care about us.

Anonymous

2:13 PM

But PPCG graduating is another sign of the alpacalypse, so...

@Mego Sarcasm so thick you'd need a lightsaber to cut through it.

Anonymous

@El'endiaStarman I think you mean 10-foot laser pole

That works too.

My sarcasm sensors are off today clearly

Anyway, I've got a technical interview for a job I really want in about 45 minutes. o_o

Anonymous

2:14 PM

And it wasn't really sarcasm - it was a diversion

Anonymous

@El'endiaStarman Good thing you got some prep last night with that peaches problem

2016 wasn't bad at all though >_> (not quite SFW)

@Mego Oh yes, absolutely.

@El'endiaStarman eat a big breakfast and don't be too proud to panic

i recommend just screaming but running around screaming is also effective

@quartata I just finished breakfast, actually. :P

"So, tell us about yourself."
"AAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"

2

2:16 PM

yes perfect

@El'endiaStarman did they give you feedback on your code submission?

instahire

Try to let your voice waver a bit in the middle of the scream.

"Why are you qualified for this job?"
"AAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"

Sp3000

@Geobits And here I was hoping Oliver would have another nice mashup :( but then again not as many fancy stunts this year though

2:17 PM

@El'endiaStarman You should try the golf approach: gist.github.com/turbo/…

@NathanMerrill No, although it took only two hours between their acknowledgement of my submission and being told that they wanted an interview.

Coherence: 0/10
Enthusiasm: 20/10
We'll call that 10/10 average. Hired

@mınxomaτ hahaha

@trichoplax It's math too so you know it must be true

Exactly

2:19 PM

Okay, seriously, I gotta go. I'll let you guys know how it went afterward, and they apparently usually make their decision within 24 hours.

Leeeerrrroooooooyyyyyyyyyyyy...Jeennkkiiiiiiiiiiinnnnnnnsssssssss...

good luck don't panic

channel your inner mego

or at least the part that gets hired at google not the lemon drop drinking one

Anonymous

@quartata Wait what does that mean

Anonymous

Oh

Anonymous

But I didn't get the Google job ;_;

@mınxomaτ I know that comic says it's gluten free, but are there other gluten-containing products manufactured at the same facility? If so, what sort of precautions are there so they don't cross-contaminate?

Anonymous

2:20 PM

And what's wrong with drinking lemon drops?

@Mego Wait what?

@Mego Wait, really?

Damn, I thought it was pretty much done and over with.

Anonymous

Nov 1 at 5:38, by Mego

So I didn't get the Google job :(

We were too busy with the graduation design at that date, missed it

2:22 PM

Oh, see that's why. Nobody believes anything that happens on November 1st around here.

Today is the deadline for me to decide my job title :)

@Geobits I was also under this assumption

@Shebang Just please, please, don't make it The Shebanger

November 1st next year Google gets a new design (obligatory: mark my words).

@Mego Seriously? "SVPs didn't approve the job offer?" Ugh.

2:24 PM

@Geobits I think I'm going with Software Engineer but that's only because I can't think of something closer to what I actually do

Software Mechanic?

Software Surgeon

Sp3000

@Mego If it makes you feel any better, that makes two of us :)

> Code Artisan

King of Fabric Covered Boxes with Strange Glowing Things?

2:26 PM

Liveware Engineer

Free-range Whitespace Wrangler

I (a) develop software for use in operations, (b) assist with existing software maintenance and (c) create and modify existing reports

In order of least to most often

Devop

I thought DevOps was a general way of running a company rather than the name of the position

Maybe more like opdev though. Not sure if the order implies frequency

2:27 PM

I tried googling it and a lot of answers seem to conflict though

How much of the planning are you involved in? Could be a BSA, depending.

Unless it's something I started developing myself, I usually am not involved in planning

Why does the title even matter that much?

Because people at the next place usually care.

I do end up going back and forth with the person if specs need to be ironed out

Yeah, it should be something that looks good on the resume

2:29 PM

Like Uberguru?

devops is often used as a job title or department because there is generally a disparity between the positions' roles. That being said ideally software engineers should be able to bridge that gap between dev and ops otherwise your devs are going to need to have good communication with your ops guys

Yes. Like Uberguru

@Fatalize you get paid per adjective in the title

Plus my boss is looking to hire students after I leave and is posting an ad on my university's job board

The more specific it is, the narrower range of future jobs it is useful for

2:30 PM

Very true

It sounds like you're in a system infrastructure role with a background in development

sometimes. But sometimes a more specific job title helps you get a similar job title better than a general job title

I think we should just roll with "Deity."

you have a narrower range, but a better chance in that range

Right. Not commenting on the quality of the next job, just the narrowness.

2:31 PM

The current full "working" title is "Software Engineer and Report Designer" which seems a bit specific to me

I would put Computer Science engineer but I don't know if Engineer is an actual title in your country

@Shebang That seems a perfect blend of generic and specific to me...

@Shebang That sounds completely made up and your resume will probably get overlooked more because of it. No offense.

@Shebang Hmm. I mean that isn't too bad

But report designer sounds kind of strange

"Software Engineer and Systems Maintenance"?

2:32 PM

It doesn't sound like an official title at all, just "what I put on my resume to add stuff".

Software Engineer is way too general.

@Shrbang That kind of gets into IT range I feel

Does "Systems" imply more hardware or software focus? I definitely do no hardware stuff

@Shebang Come on, it's not too late:

@Shebang In case you haven't figured it out yet, there is a lot of conflicting resume advice out there :P

2:33 PM

Oct 6 at 16:44, by DJMcMayhem

@Shebang "Supreme overlord of Database Management"

Wouldn't designing reports be more on the Business Analyst side of things?

Usually

Welcome to the US, where the job titles are made up but boy do they matter.

@TimmyD Possibly, a lot of writing the reports requires a solid knowledge of SQL to actually obtain the data

If you actually are a Software Engineer, your title should say what your do. E.g. "Full Stack Software Engineer" or "Senior iOS Software Engineer".

2:35 PM

+1 for that

@mınxomaτ Disagree

Software engineer is purposely a broad term

You should be able to do anything

That's why the technology is always specified in job offers and most of the time in titles.

If I only make stuff for use within the company should I title it "Internal Software Engineer"?

If you want to work on full stack (or whatever), you should use it though.

any competent programmer knows that many of the skills from a Full Stack Software Engineer cross over.

2:36 PM

@Shebang Never really heard it used before, so not sure.

so, it helps you get a full stack job as well as an IOS job

Full-Stack would definitely apply I guess

I'm a Software Engineer because I'm able to get things done regardless of language/tech

I know how to acquire necessary skills

etc

Frontend Software Engineer means (to me) that you like frontend development and buzzwords

The only possible issue with Full-Stack in this particular position is that front-end doesn't mean CSS/HTML, more like a desktop GUI. Would it still apply?

@Poke Or that this is your responsibility within the company, which is what should be reflected in your title. Not your philosophy.

2:40 PM

I don't think that should be reflected in title

If you go to school and/or train to be a Software Engineer that should carry a lot with it

after you get the phone screening you can say you prefer frontend dev

or w/e

What should be reflected in the title is what value you bring. The main problem with vague/broad titles is that it doesn't really show that.

Sometimes the specific aspect can be useful and relevant. If you trained to be a medical doctor you probably wouldn't call yourself a vet

As far as I'm concerned "Software Engineer" is not a vague title. The confusion ends up being that people use it when they shouldn't

Alternatively, it should match the job you're seeking. If you want a job that's labeled "Full Stack Engineer" and your last job was close to that, match that shit up! Resumes are all sorted by keyword matching first anyway.

I would expect any C++ programmer to be able to learn Python, but there's a difference between saying "I am a programmer with the potential to learn Python" and "I have years of experience with Python"

2:43 PM

Well there's my two cents

or 20

In the end, the entire job hunt and resume game is a terribly warped reality. Nothing is the way it should be, and words matter too much.

2

No disagreement with that

I figured there wouldn't be much lol

Even the hiring managers I know would say the same.

Noam Chai

Hi everyone ! I'm looking for an intresting experiment with superconductor for my third year lab class. Do you have an idea? or can someone suggest where to look to get intresting ideas?
we use ybco/bscco superconductors with varies geometries. we can change the magnetic field, temperature

If my boss wanted to keep the "Report" section in (since a decent chunk is in regards to reports), would it be better to specify the actual technology in use? i.e. "Crystal Reports Developer"

Or would a more broad title work better and instead specify in the posting what exactly the job requires

2:48 PM

@NoamChai I was going to suggest you ask in the h bar, but I see you've already done that. This isn't really a physics-related chatroom, though.

@NoamChai Try Electrical Engineering's room

@Shebang From a hiring perspective, it depends on how much is really reports. If it's pver 50%, I'd include it. If less, I'd probably put that under duties or skills, etc.

It depends on whether he wants people who don't use Crystal Reports to immediately scan past it or not, I guess.

Not sure if "Developer" is a great word for it though

New Main Posts

0

Q: Golf me a Cashier

Challenge You are the owner of a local supermarket, and your cashier doesnt seem do the work you told him/her to do. He/She is never on time, returns to much change and doesnt really show optimism at the workplace. So you, as the space saving, but ruthless owner opt to replace him/her. Rules ...

code-golf

@Shebang Look at offers to see what titles are common for that: monster.com/jobs/search/?q=Crystal-Reports

2:55 PM

@JacobusConradi I would suggest in this case the program must have two functions: If the input is "0,0" it must output a random number; if the input is the old random number and the money payed the output is the change. This is because what you're going to do otherwise is to make challange easier for some languges keeping the difficulty for other languages! — Martin Rosenau 4 mins ago

o_O

So Crystal Reports Developer or SE Crystal Reports.

Oh I thought this was going to be used in addition to software engineer. If it's just by itself I think it kind of downplays the coding IMO which isn't ideal

By SE I mean Software Engineer ofc

WTH? They rolled back my grammar edits

I meant in regards to the first one.

which is what shebang had suggested originally

2:59 PM

@DrMcMoylex It looks like you were editing at the same time and yours got overwritten. It wasn't an explicit rollback.

@quartata Well, it's the most common title. I don't have to agree with it.

Ah, OK. I'll just edit again

The actual job descriptions still include the programming and cert requirements.

Maybe I should wait until they slow down editing first

I was just thinking that lol

Isn't this a dupe anyway though? The only difference I see between it and our other "give change" challenges is that you take two inputs, but that's just one subtraction.

Oh. I see. The other change challenges are closed as a dupe of 78 cents, which is closed as not being objective at all. Weird.

3:05 PM

Yeah, cause it's a fastest-code code-golf

I could've sworn we had at least one open challenge to make change though :/

So busy with job title discussions, totally missed that GitHub was down:

We are currently experiencing major service outages.

Tweeted by githubstatus on November 16, 2016 at 2:50 PM

Work perfectly here

hi guys

> was down

3:14 PM

@GamrCorps Any particular reason you accepted this answer?

3

A: Percent-Encode a String

Vim, 67 bytes/keystrokes :s/\c[^a-z!'()*0-9._-]/\='%'.printf("%02x",char2nr(submatch(0)))/g<cr> Note that <cr> represents the enter key, e.g. 0x0D which is a single byte. This is a pretty straightforward solution. Explanation: :s/ ...

Oliver

my hololens is arriving today

Not that I mind the rep, but it didn't win

@Oliver Woah. That's awesome

Sp3000

@mınxomaτ Thanks for the heads up, was wondering why the site was slow to load a moment ago

Soldier: 76 got a buff! I am now 10% more powerful!

Overwatch is free-to-play this weekend, too.

3:23 PM

:O no way!

playoverwatch.com/en-us/blog/20372506

I have 143 hours on Soldier: 76

@Geobits Do you play?

Nope. Not much of an FPS player.

@TimmyD That's really sad. I have a friend who's huge into overwatch, so I've wanted to play with him but I'll be out of town this week so I can't play it while it's free. :(

Yodle

I suck at FPS games. For some reason I have the hardest time seeing enemies before they see me.

3:31 PM

Just like anything else in life, it's all a learned skill that takes practice.

I like single player FPS, but multilplayer is always pretty frustrating

Then again, I don't like very many competitive multiplayer games at all. Rocket league being the obvious exception

A: Sandbox for Proposed Challenges

I said "I don't play FPS" when I left Halo and didn't play another FPS for like 7 years, but then Overwatch happened and I gave it a shot. Now I don't play MMO's, but I'm sure I will again someday.

Yodle

I'm pretty good at RTS games though, Warcraft 3 is still my favorite game though I don't play it much anymore.

New Sandboxed Posts

0

Challenge You are the owner of a local supermarket, and your cashier doesn't seem to do the work you told him/her to do. He/She is never on time, returns too much change and doesn't really show optimism at the workplace. So you, as the space saving, but ruthless owner opt to replace him/her. R...

@Yodle You could play again and get top 50 NA

Anonymous

3:34 PM

@Yodle I have that problem too. It took a lot of training to actually pay attention to radar

You need radar to see enemies? pleb

I like the Overwatch system of using footsteps as a radar. The enemy's footsteps are intentionally much louder than your own team's. (I'm definitely a fanboy)

Yodle

@Poke Meh, there's a lot less people playing nowadays, and apparently cheating is pretty common (maphacks and such). Also I was top 50 East Coast in 4v4 :[.

Yeah listening to footsteps is a must in any FPS.

Anonymous

@quartata Sorry for not using maphacks :P

Anonymous

3:36 PM

I play Destiny a lot. The lack of footsteps in PvP is frustrating

@Mego You could just use your eyeballs and ears. I hear they're good at this

Anonymous

But basically everything else makes noise so that kind of makes up for it

Anonymous

@quartata Well my eyeballs aren't good enough to see through walls, and see previous comment about lack of footsteps sound

Do people still play Destiny?

My friend has a Destiny youtube channel

3:38 PM

@Yodle gg turtle strats

Anonymous

@quartata Har har

?

honest question

Anonymous

Yeah, it's still huge

Anonymous

Player numbers dropped a bit about 6 months after release, but the Y2 and Y3 updates brought a lot of people back + a lot of new players in

Anonymous

I think the last time Bungie quoted player stats, it was more popular now than at release back in 2014

3:43 PM

interesting

Anonymous

Over 10 million people have Destiny. I don't know what percentage is active, but I'm trying to find those stats.

No I mean I know it was a big deal at launch but I didn't know how many of those players were still around. Console FPSs can burn out fast

Anonymous

It did have a significant drop during Y1 due to some questionable decisions by Bungie, but they got their act together, started communicating with the players, and fixed most of the problems that caused people to quit.

Anonymous

Frequent (~6 months), consistently-good content releases have kept Destiny fresh

read: not hats

3:48 PM

But.... hats...

Anonymous

There are 2.4 million people at character level 40 (where the exp grind ends and the loot grind begins). I'd say that's a pretty good estimate of the game's population (at least, I'm not sure how to get a better estimate without actual numbers from Bungie or MS+Sony)

Dec 1 '15 at 21:30, by TimmyD

2

Eᴀsᴛᴇʀʟʏ Iʀᴋ

@Downgoat is the ppcg design script borked for you?

I can't get it or the sandbox viewer to work on chrome, $ is not defined.

and with them on I can't even enter TNB

It's kind of funny how first TF2 started going downhill whilr CSGO was doing great, then when they started putting effort into TF GO went downhill and all the while Dota 2 was getting like weekly content updates

Eᴀsᴛᴇʀʟʏ Iʀᴋ

lol

3:51 PM

It's not that Valve is lazy they're just weird

I still want them to just one day quietly release Half-Life 3 onto Steam. No announcement or anything.

they probably already have

Anonymous

Oh huh, apparently that 2.4 million number isn't even all Destiny players - just the ones tracked by a fansite (meaning those usernames have looked up on the site at least once)

Anonymous

So yeah, people still play Destiny. A lot.

Or, like I said a year ago --

Dec 22 '15 at 18:15, by TimmyD

Valve releases Half-Life 3, Portal 3, Left for Dead 3, Team Fortress 3, DOTA 3, all in the same bundle. Effective output of humanity completely shuts down for 6 weeks.

3

Anonymous

3:55 PM

> all ~~in the same bundle~~ as the same game

Anonymous

It'll just be called 3

@TimmyD The orange box 2

The Orange Box 2: Everything 3.

"Free?" "No, Three."

They should just skip three altogether and move on to four.

Quarter-Life

3:59 PM

Either that, Eighth-Life, or Two-Life

Anonymous

@Pietu1998 I ran your decoratorator script on Seriously's source code. It's now 4 MB (up from a few hundred KB). This is clearly better.

Half^3 -Life

Third-life

Pietu1998

@Mego Sounds good. And it still works?

Anonymous

Hell if I know

4:01 PM

@KritixiLithos Half-Life 3 coming out as a mod for Second Life, confirmed.

Anonymous

I don't want to try to wrangle the imports

betseg

blog.google/products/translate/…

Google Translate is way better now.

Neat:

Anonymous

123,21

@betseg I saw that in the news earlier. Google is getting better by the second

Downgoat

4:13 PM

@betseg still, reverso > GT

CMC: Determine if N is a "Timmy Number", e.g. a number whose digits go n, n+1, n+2, ... n+2, n+1, n

betseg

You mean palindromic?

Palindromic and increasing

betseg

Ah k

4:18 PM

89098? 9109? 1210?

8675309

No, only single digits to keep it simple

What about leading zero? Like 01210

@DrMcMoylex this may be the first CMC that's actually a valid CMC in a while

@Geobits No leading zeroes, since then you must take it as a string

@NathanMerrill What does "valid" CMC mean?

4:20 PM

not a joke

CMC: Write a valid CMC

5 mins ago, by DrMcMoylex

CMC: Determine if N is a "Timmy Number", e.g. a number whose digits go n, n+1, n+2, ... n+2, n+1, n

This is actually surprisingly difficult.

Should I post it to main?

Is 13531 valid?

4:21 PM

(Obviously more fleshed out)

@KritixiLithos No, only increasing by one

How is 123321 false?

There's no increase or decrease between 3s

@DrMcMoylex I vote yes. It's something I would enjoy working on

they are called the Giza numbers

That's funny, I was just thinking of calling them "Pyramidal numbers"

It's convenient that the total number of them is limited.

4:28 PM

Argh. Banker's rounding, you old fiend!

Good grief, I'm over 100 bytes on this

And it's still not working

Time for a new approach

test for odd length, palindromic, and increasing over the range 0 to n/2

I think it may be shorter to take the first digit, build a Giza number from it to the input's length, and see if they're equal

Sounds like about 128 bytes of Java

@Geobits Hey, at least it's not 444

oh! recursive sounds like the best way here

take the first and last digit, see if they are equal

oh, that doesn't check for increasing

still may be easier

Gabriel Benamy

4:37 PM

fun fact

First, you can see if the number of digits is odd.

Gabriel Benamy

a number n is a "timmy number" if it satisfies all three of the following criteria:
1) odd number of digits
2) palindrome
3) drop the first digit of 'n' and call it 'a'. drop the last digit of 'n' and call it 'b'. a - b is a number consisting of a number of 1's (call it 'c'), optionally followed by a 0, followed by 'c' 8s, followed by a s.

Posted!

Gabriel Benamy

e.g. 456787654 is a timmy number because
1) it has 9 digits (odd)
2) is a palindrome (456787654)
3) 56787654 - 45678765 = 11108889

That's my first challenge in almost a month

4:42 PM

@DrMcMoylex you're missing a couple of valid inputs

Such as?

you only go to 23456765432

also, you should determine whether they have to handle 0

Oh, crap you're right

> You must write a full program or a function that takes a positive integer as input

ah ok

Are single digit integers valid?

4:44 PM

yep, and on the truthy list

Downgoat

@EᴀsᴛᴇʀʟʏIʀᴋ idts, I'll check when I get home

@NathanMerrill Fixed now

I thought OEIS listed them all, so I just blindly copied and pasted them like an idiot, haha

lol

New Main Posts

4

Q: Goodness Giza Golf!

A "Giza number", also colloquially known as a Timmy Number is any number where the digits represent a pyramid (A134810). For example, "12321" is a giza number because it can be visualized like this: 3 2 2 1 1 However, something like "123321" is not a Giza number because there are two di...

code-golf math sequence

Good grief ... I've got a PowerShell answer, but it's 147 bytes

I refuse to be outgolfed by Java.

4:53 PM

Powershell seems to be naturally verbose I must say

Measure-Command Get-Command Select-Object Get-Content...

The verbosity of PowerShell, mixed with the fact that there does not seem to be a single standard for how to write PowerShell code, it why I hate writing PowerShell code.

I don't mind verbose C# code because everyone typically writes C# code the same way

And that is odd to me, because PowerShell is like C# scripting

@quartata Measure-Command gcm select gc

@TimmyD Need to take off 30 then :P

@TimmyD Oh, OK. Maybe I just don't know enough Powershell then