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1:55 AM
1
Q: Where do you think Voldemort planned on living?

Corinne AdamsWhere did Voldemort live? If he was so special, and clearly he thought so, where was "his" manor? Did he just mooch off other people's homes or camp out hobo style all the time? Where did he sleep with Bellatrix? (A little vomit just came up my throat...) For that matter where did Bellatrix li...

 
2:20 AM
0
Q: Man/Tree Symbiosis

Vaughn OhlmanIt was an old book... I'm pretty sure it was a book, and pre-1990's I think. The basic plot was this man somehow interacted with this tree, and as a result he became a carrier of the tree's 'seed'. They were in a symbiotic relationship: the man got a much longer life, more strength, etc.; but whe...

 
 
3 hours later…
5:10 AM
0
Q: How to download from Royalroad with android?

Pulse RebornDon't have a desktop. Can't use webtoepub chrome extension. Is there another way?

 
5:26 AM
@Alex as in you said you liked this user's questions, and they haven't posted for a while
 
@Jenayah Wow, I'd completely forgotten about that.
I knew there was a reason we keep you around.
 
6:10 AM
*slight slap on the back of @Alex's head*
2
 
Ouch.
Maybe that's it.
 
6:39 AM
@Jenayah I don't think that was nearly hard enough
 
6:49 AM
@Mithical I'm actually still seeing stars.
No pun intended.
 
7:35 AM
-1
Q: Why isn't 'they ate from the finest porcelain' described as a pro-Palestine sci-fi film?

Mozibur UllahIn 2017, the science fiction film, 'They ate from the finest porcelain' by Larissa Sansour was shown at the Barbican, London. Gillian Merron, the then chief executive of the Board of Deputies, an umbrella organisation representing British Jews accused the Barbican of promoting anti-Semitism by gi...

0
Q: TV show episode about an afterlife predator

user73910I remember a long time ago watching an episode of a TV show. I think it might have been Red Dwarf, but I'm not sure. Here are some notable details that I remember about it: A female character flies away from the ship and goes down to a planet and somehow dies. She then meets what looks like her f...

 
SQB
8:14 AM
@Marvin @Null @AncientSwordRage@Randal'Thor this question might be trouble.
I made an edit that was rolled back by OP.
And I think OP is going to defend their question fiercely.
 
FWIW the user does seem to be a bit of an awkward one, some not so great comments over the past few days imo
 
SQB
Ah, hadn't noticed that.
 
Not flag worthy, just what I'd classify as odd
 
SQB
Ah yes, I see.
 
8:18 AM
Refusing to add the work tag too
 
8:29 AM
@TheLethalCarrot Will confirm there's been some... wonkiness on Lit as well.
 
More wonkiness than here maybe it seems
Or hopefully!
@F1Krazy: Those are the tags that I myself would have chosen. If you don't think they are useful, fine, that's your opinion. Once I have enough rep, I'll add them myself. — Mozibur Ullah 26 secs ago
Wicked
You might have to leave the tags alone @SQB he's not going to accept it
 
SQB
So I see.
 
Annoying as that is
Cheers @Randal'Thor
Can't follow a locked post though? That's annoying
 
SQB
I was already following.
(I suspect I can't unfollow).
 
SQB
8:43 AM
^^^ @Randal'Thor
 
8:57 AM
I'm staying away from that one haha
 
Thanks @AncientSwordRage
 
@SQB PING ALL THR MODS
 
SQB
@AncientSwordRage will do next time. I pinged three of you, then saw Rand reacting, so I limited myself to pinging Rand only, in case you were away. Wouldn't want to see you coming back to a stack of pings that were already handled.
 
@SQB I have no issue with pings stacking up on me
 
Let the ping stack overflow!
 
9:04 AM
A colleague recently said "Don't email people while they're away, otherwise they'll have to read email when they're back"
 
9:17 AM
-1
A: How did Thor know to go to Wakanda?

TheLethalCarrotI think there are two aspects to this question, "why did Thor go to Earth?" and then "how did he know to go to Wakanda?" The first is pretty clear and answerable but I'll include it to be complete, the second is still speculation but we can make some educated guesses. Why did Thor go to Earth? Th...

Any ideas on the downvote here?
I also got one here on an older recently bumped post which I'm not sure why but it's not as good as that first one linked
 
9:48 AM
@TheLethalCarrot ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
 
Oh well
 
I'm going to struggle to accept one of these
41
Q: First fictional programming language in sci-fi or fantasy?

AncientSwordRageI'm looking for the first written fictional programming language. This would exclude where a computer interprets human speech, and where we 'assume' a human is programming as they can be seen making input to a computer, but we don't see that input. References by name without code is also acceptab...

it's devolved into "is that fictional or not?"
 
Just accept mine then clearly ;P
I doubt mine is the oldest though
I do like regex but mine is a bit rusty if I'm doing one to match the tag I don't need to escape the - do I? ^story-identification$?
Also if anyone else wants to do that go ahead, I can't really think of how you would do it other than just appending all the tag names together
 
@TheLethalCarrot nope that seems right
 
@TheLethalCarrot regex101.com
 
10:01 AM
- only means something in [a-z] type thingies
 
^(science-fiction-genre|fantasy-genre)$
Aye that's what I thought
 
@TheLethalCarrot ^(science-fiction|fantasy)-genre$ works too
 
In that case aye
@Jenayah I usually use regexstorm cos that does C# flavour
 
@TheLethalCarrot ah and the stack stack is a C# stack
 
Oh is it ASP.NET? I've never really looked
 
10:07 AM
@TheLethalCarrot okay
 
@TheLethalCarrot I think so, they've got a baller websocket library but only in C#
 
I love the smell of debunked Wikia trolls in the morning
2
A: Was Octavius Brine once human?

JenayahThe following Wikia "tech" analysis replaces my earlier character-based analysis. Simply put, this origin story is complete [insert expletive]. It was made up by a user who's either a troll, or completely unaware Wikias aren't their personal fanfiction sites. The history of all Wikia pages is pub...

 
@Jenayah Isn't it afternoon in your timezone?
 
9
A: How should SFF's "Ask Question" page be customised?

TheLethalCarrotTo be honest there's not too much generic stuff we can really state to give some guidelines when asking considering the broadness of topics asked about it. That said, considering the nature of our site there are probably a few wording choices that can be tailored to fit a bit better. The "welco...

Someone check this to see if the update with the regexes (regexs, regex's, regex?) makes sense?
 
@TheLethalCarrot yup, love it
 
10:23 AM
Anyone know how to remove the annoying yellow highlight that google/chrome adds when going through a search result?
> Maybe add guidance in here for how media tags work, when to use them etc. Then also include a link to the specific story id guide if the tag has one.
I did put that and then my breakdown only includes the story-id side of things
Should I add something like:
> You've included the {tag} media tag. Media tags should be used alongside the work tag to disambiguate between different media the work tag covers. If the work tag is only used for one media please remove the {tag} tag.
Albeit probably worded better
 
@TheLethalCarrot NOPE
I hates it
 
Me too
 
@TheLethalCarrot that seems good still
 
Added it, not overly fond of the wording but largely because I'm not entirely sure how the regex warning section works. Especially with multiple warnings ones covering multiple tags... hopefully they use their common sense and implement it sensibly
 
@TheLethalCarrot lets hope so
 
10:38 AM
14 hours and no nominations in SO election, that seems slow
 
There was one when I looked earlier.
 
Removed I guess then
 
Thoughts on revisting this?
-4
Q: Can we have a defined format for answers to 'first/earliest' type questions?

AncientSwordRageThere's a well defined format for code golf questions over at Programming Puzzles & Code Golf Mouse-2002, 4 bytes. That's 4 bytes of pure, sweet ASCII. ... Sample question I'd propose a similar construct of Title, Author, Year Justification for meeting the question's criteria This should make...

 
The difference between us and PPCG is on PPCG most answers are answers, here there's a bit of a grey area, something might be earliest but is it necessarily correct
 
@TheLethalCarrot true
very true
At least it would show the dates in a list somewhere
 
10:46 AM
Yeah I do like the idea. Admittedly it's been a while since I've been active on PPCG, but IIRC they didn't use the scoreboard universally there
And there were some issues with it
 
both of those are true facts
I'm tempted to try it out though
 
I do like it but only as a partial solution
If it gets adapted everywhere we have to be careful of the OP blindly picking the earliest rather than checking it is actually valid
The good thing though is that if done right you could find answers that were posted late and are way newer than something older and make it grounds for deletion... makes that part easier than checking each answer individually
Are code snippets even enabled on SFF?
Doesn't look like it
 
@TheLethalCarrot I was contemplating a 'valid' flag as well, but that's ripe for dispute
 
I don't even know how you'd implement that properly
 
the 'title' would be
date, author, work title, valid
 
10:59 AM
In that case way too prone for dispute and abuse
 
and either you ignore invalid ones, while keeping them up (I don't think we delete invalid or wrong answers to these questions)
@TheLethalCarrot exactly
 
@AncientSwordRage we don't delete enough stuff on [history-of] questions
Which is a large part of why people don't like them
 
@TheLethalCarrot true
is there already a meta question on that?
 
SQB
@TheLethalCarrot looks good, except that everything below it is now indented.
 
@AncientSwordRage Don't know, there probably should be though. My personal opinion is to delete something which is posted after something else that is earlier of it and it matches. And if it doesn't match delete
@SQB I did mean to, they're a subset of the previous one
 
11:03 AM
@TheLethalCarrot thats hard to police though, right?
 
Sure, which is why I've rarely ever done anything about it
Just silently moaned
 
SQB
@TheLethalCarrot Ah, okay.
 
I do thnk if the quality of those questions was higher, it would be worth it, but maybe by policing it they'd become worth salvaging?
 
@TheLethalCarrot There'd be more moaning if we started deleting all non-optimal answers to those questions.
It'd be like deleting all incorrect answers to story-ID questions.
 
Maybe they need a post notice to say "Stop and check your post is older than the last one"
@Randal'Thor only if it was after the OP accepting
the benefit/difference to these is that you can check how old your suggested material is yourself
 
11:06 AM
Oh wait, now I see you said deleting less-optimal answers posted after more-optimal answers. (That sentence was a bit confusing.) Makes a bit more sense then.
 
@Randal'Thor I'm of the opinion we should delete incorrect answers to those only if it was posted after another answer was accepted
 
Post 1: Date 1970
Post 2: Date 1960
Post 3: Date 1965 (FAIL)
@TheLethalCarrot this
 
There are also borderline cases, as it's not always fully clear whether or not a posted answer really satisfies what the OP is asking about.
 
Yeah there's always some grey areas, but there are clear cut cases that we really should get rid of
 
Meta post title suggestion "Should we more heavily police, demonstrably incorrect answers"?
 
11:07 AM
Like "what's the first werewolf story", you could probably argue edge cases on what exactly counts as a werewolf. (Bad example since that goes back into pre-writing legends, but you get the point.)
 
or something
@Randal'Thor there's often caveats to those sorts of questions, if the asker wants a 'modern' or 'written' story.
 
The whole thing has some overlap with posting religious answers and/or mythology
 
@TheLethalCarrot don't remind me....
 
SQB
@TheLethalCarrot this, as with the programming language question.
 
@AncientSwordRage Ignore the parenthetical; my point was that even modern written stories could be edge cases, like arguable whether this fits the criteria or not.
 
SQB
11:09 AM
I do agree with using a standard format, though.
 
@Randal'Thor I can dig that
 
A deletion policy would be very easy to apply too over-zealously (especially with this site's community).
@AncientSwordRage thought you'd gone Scottish for a moment with "cana" :-P
2
 
@Randal'Thor Me? Overzealous? cackles in power hungry mod
 
@Randal'Thor A formal policy would be problematic I agree, some more moderation not so. As in it would okay to delete answers that aren't really attempts at answering (don't match, too new, etc.)
 
@TheLethalCarrot "This isn't an answers, but let me share this cool story I like"
 
11:12 AM
For a blatant one aye haha
 
@TheLethalCarrot I've seen it too often
anyway time for lunch
 
Me too, people love doing it on story-ids, if it's already accepted the only time I don't mind it is if the answerer argues that the OP may be mistaken which does happen from time to time
@JamesJenkins Honorable mentions are generally welcomed as answers on SFF.SE — Lexible 14 hours ago
 
@AncientSwordRage Have you decided if you're going to accept "symbolic logic" yet?
 
Or for a recent example haha
 
/me is loving trying to debug a scenario I haven't been granted permissions to actually run.
 
11:16 AM
@TheLethalCarrot Have you met this site's community? :-) I think it would be very hard to have a meta in favour of "some more moderation" without it being interpreted as a "formal policy".
 
Oh sure, having any meta on it is a problem. You'd have to argue for deletion in the comments and send it to the queue and see what happens
 
@TheLethalCarrot For story-ID it's more arguably useful, as other people later might be looking for a story with a similar description but not exactly the same one. For first-occurrence questions, it's most useful if you assume that they're recommendation questions in disguise.
 
Which would end up in mixed responses every time depending on who does the LQP
 
Still could be useful if the OP wants to learn about the whole history of a topic in sci-fi/fantasy, not just the first occurrence but various early occurrences and how the idea developed.
 
@Randal'Thor Might be useful, but if it knows it isn't the answer then it isn't an answer and really just a comment
 
11:19 AM
@TheLethalCarrot And most such answers would have positive scores, meaning a mod would be required to delete them.
 
Yup, which is generally why I don't bother
99% of the time it's just a waste of time, with the 1% being when you catch it straight away and even then you've just got to cross your fingers and hope others agree
 
11:34 AM
@DavidW I'm leaning on not accepting it
 
11:50 AM
I'd agree.
 
12:02 PM
0
Q: The stars started going out

Vaughn OhlmanTwo men were, as I recall, walking up a hill on some alien planet, discussing a religious group they had just installed a computer for. The group believed that when they had written down all of the possible names for god, then the universe would end. They were getting near the end of their discus...

 
@Randal'Thor was almost midday but still morning
 
12:55 PM
@Jenayah it's also a tuesday
 
@AncientSwordRage woah, you're right! :O
 
@Jenayah you can have that Tuesday Free
a Mardi Gras if you will
 
@Marvin yeah, that one is easy. you can probably find it by a web search on that title.
@Randal'Thor Yes, and that's why we shouldn't close story-id questions as duplicates when the accepted answer matches but the questions are different.
 
@b_jonas Or just have it burned into your mind
 
@b_jonas Your argument against the duplicate policy is so we can have more answers that we know aren't correct? That seems... wrong
 
1:08 PM
@TheLethalCarrot Yes. Not correct for the original poster, but may still help other posters who search and find the question.
 
Then it's not an answer, if you know something isn't correct it can't possibly be an answer to the question. That's a case for a comment
 
@TheLethalCarrot Or another Question/answer
 
Sure depending on the circumstance
 
Q: <Similar to other Story-Id>/ Answer: While looking for X, I found <Similar Story-Id> and I was reminded the answer was X
@TheLethalCarrot sure, depending
@Randal'Thor not sure if we should even allow 'Recommendation in disguise'
The only good thing 'in disguise' are transformers, and only really half of them
 
1:25 PM
Recommendation/list is what those sorts of things devolve into
 
@TheLethalCarrot story-id?
 
Referring to late answers to them after an accepted answer
Not in general
 
SQB
@AncientSwordRage as a kid, English not being my native tongue, I first thought they were robots in the skies. Which made sense for the Decepticons, but not so much for the Autobots.
14
Q: Why can only Decepticons fly in robot mode?

phantom42In all continuities, the Autobots and Decepticons were originally one race which split into two factions. In some, this was largely a civilian vs military split; others were a bit more ambiguous. In many of the continuities, the Decepticons are capable of natural flight while in robot mode (or ...

 
@SQB As an kid, even being english, I made that mistake
 
2:03 PM
0
Q: What does Sauron look like?

PNSDuh! But, do the books ever describe what he actually looks like? I found a diagram by Tolkien himself: But this looks too... vague? And I don't know whether he was ever intent on continuing with this one as the official look for the great villain. I just started reading Fellowship, completed h...

 
[ SmokeDetector | MS ] Few unique characters in answer, mostly punctuation marks in answer, repeating characters in answer (203): How long was Tom Paris' prison sentence? by Ted Heavy on scifi.SE
 
2:52 PM
-2
Q: Space Centurions V

Vaughn OhlmanAbout 1977 some friends and I played a game called ‘Space Centurions V’ (5). It was a play by mail game, colonizing and conquering planets. I am inventing a similar game and wonder if anyone has a copy of the old rules.

 
 
1 hour later…
4:05 PM
0
Q: Are vampires or werewolves immortal in Harry Potter universe?

HarryDoes the vampire or werewolf in Harry Potter universe possess eternal life? If so, why don't some ancient vampire or werewolf wizards become the most powerful character, as their experience and knowledge accumulated year by year?

 
4:16 PM
@Marvin Why would they be? I don't know of a single source where werewolves are immortal.
 
4:29 PM
0
Q: SF Movie containing a psychic girl, a time capsule that is unearthed (or buried?) and lots of numbers

Alan WhitteakerThe movie was released probably in the latter half of the 2000-2010 period. There is a time capsule that is shown to have been buried earlier and is then unearthed (although I'm not sure of the unearthing part). There is an adolescent girl who encounters a huge set of numbers that mean gibberish ...

0
Q: Episode of a show where people lose their memory in the afterlife

dbmag9I'm sorry for the vagueness here: As a child (I would say definitely in the range 1995–2003) I watched an episode of a TV show which had as a plot point that people in the afterlife lost their memory of their life and those they had known. Definitely live-action, English-language and I'm pretty c...

 
5:00 PM
Get it. Thank you a lot! Updated the request. — Nicolas Chabanovsky 4 mins ago
 
5:23 PM
@TheLethalCarrot nice
 
5:54 PM
Greetings, Earthlings.
 
6:31 PM
0
Q: Science fiction short story with blind woman one cannot tell is blind

Loretta MearsShort Story of man wandering who comes across area with strange ground, topography. Meets young woman who is barefoot. He eventually learns she is blind but can move without limitations because her world is designed to allow full functionality for the disabled. The story is forty maybe fifty year...

 
6:56 PM
0
Q: Why did James Potter let Dumbledore borrow his invisibility cloak, knowing his child's life was in danger?

ManikCouldn't the invisibility cloak be used to sneak out baby Harry when Voldemort finds out Harry's location?. If yes, then why did James let Dumbledore borrow it? also the question can be: why did Dumbledore borrow it knowing that baby Harry's life was in danger? It seems like plot convenience to m...

 
7:13 PM
0
Q: Trying to remember a book about a girl with gray eyes and powers related to metal

soup barI read this book about 10 years ago in either late elementary/middle school. It was a light fantasy novel (perhaps YA) and I'll try to summarize all the main points I remember. The main character was a girl named Petra and she had gray eyes (which was important to the book) and powers related to...

 
0
Q: Hyrule Warriors Location of Twilight princess Castle Gone?

Lana is a Time LordHyrule Warriors has a level called Twilight Field from The Twilight Princess Era of Zelda yet twilight princess's castle has completely disappeared Is there a canon reason why the castle is completely gone? The bridge is in the correct position and kakariko village is almost correct But where did...

 
7:58 PM
0
Q: How was Thor revived in Thor (2011)?

FeringIn Thor we see him get killed near the end of the movie by the Destroyer that was sent by Loki. Yet once he regains the hammer, all his injuries are gone. The entire fight sequence is here. 0:53 his face is badly injured Starting at 1:00 we see Jane, Lady Sif, Loki, and the Destroy all seem to b...

 
8:33 PM
0
Q: Where did the Whitecloaks get their funding?

chasly from UKThe Whitecloaks ride around telling people what to do. They are unwelcome everywhere they go. They have spotless uniforms and tents to maintain as well as horses. They can afford lodgings and drinks in taverns. Maintaining an army costs money. Where do they get it from? Who would want to fund them?

 
8:58 PM
0
Q: Why the name "Dark"?

AdamantThe German TV show Dark obviously has a certain name. But why was this name chosen? Typically, the name of a series has a connection with its main plot point. Obviously, the cave that contains the passage between times is dark (duh). But that seems a little mundane, especially compared to the hea...

 
9:29 PM
0
Q: Any book with plot element

Vaughn OhlmanIs it ok to ask a 'plot element' question? Something such as, "Are there any sci-fi books where a future Earth uses the gold standard'?

 
9:41 PM
@Jenayah Do you wear a helmet while riding? (I hope you wear a helmet while riding...) It occurred to me that when I had long hair it used to be a pain trying to get the helmet to sit properly when I tied my hair up. It's important to make sure the helmet sits right, even if it means wearing your hair funny to do it.
 
Yeah, of course I have a helmet
My hair doesn't stay tucked under my shirt, but it's not enirely free either, I tie it and it mostly stays under my backpack's strap
it's tied like this
 
That was how I normally wore it when I wanted it out of my face, but there was enough of a mass of hair at the nape of my neck to interfere with the helmet seating properly.
 
0
Q: How Andalites have babies?

4.12.22.4.18.0.Is it said anywhere in the series how Andalites have babies? The same way as humans do, another way (explained please) or it isn't told in the Animorphs books?

 
I'd usually tie or braid it starting lower; the friend I rode with one summer tied it in 2 bunches behind the ears.
(His hair wasn't as thick as mine, though.)
I still had to adjust the pads to get the helmet to sit properly.
I've never cracked a helmet myself, but I've seen enough people who have to take wearing it properly seriously.
 
Friend of mine hit the ground at 60kmph. Helmet totally smashed, all cut up, but the helmet prevented a concussion or worse.
 
9:52 PM
There was one night we were in Koblenz, and we met another cyclist at the hostel who, cycling across the Rhine, had been distracted enough by the scenery to ride headfirst into a lamppost. Split his helmet completely in half; we were pretty sure he was concussed, but he didn't want to go to the hospital so we kept an eye on him all night.
 
Sheesh.
 
I depends on the helmet, of course; the one I was wearing then had a fixed band that went around the head just above the neck to keep it from sliding forward; my current helmet has a ratchet there, so it's massively easier to adjust.
@Mithical Which part? Riding into a post, or not going to the hospital?
(a) Tourist, (b) young, male.
 
All of it, but specifically not going to get checked out.
:/
 
TBF, I had a few hits to the head when I went to university and the only time I went to the hospital was when I was bleeding badly enough I definitely needed stitches. (As opposed to the other time when the bleeding stopped, or the time I got a black eye...)
Young + male = stupid.
2
 
I watched one of my friends ride his bike head first into a lamp post as he was riding away from us on his way home without a helmet on. He wasn’t going very fast so he wasn’t hurt much at all and it was pretty damn hilarious I must admit
We would have been mid teens at the time as well so that didn’t help
 
10:08 PM
I rode into the back of a parked car when I was 7 or 8. Since then I've only had accidents in corners. :/
Every single one of which comes under the umbrella of "riding too fast for the road conditions."
 
@DavidW When we first moved to PA, one of the candidates running for office in our area had a TV add where he was riding a motorcycle without a helmet. Instantly disqualified on the basis of stupidity.
 
A friend of mine (who rode a motorbike) referred to riders who refused to wear helmets as "organ donors."
 
Apt,
 
All motor vehicles are dangerous enough without taking stupid risks.
 
@DavidW FWIW, in France the joke wouldn't work as much: you're an organ donor by default if you die, unless you did all the paperwork to be taken off the list
(for once, a recent law that is actually a good one)
 
10:29 PM
It's more about dying young from a head injury, thus leaving all your organs in good condition.
 
One man's trash...
 
Lol
 
(okay, mildly appropriate humor)
 
11:11 PM
@Jenayah Is that actually you?
 
11:32 PM
@Jenayah nah, the joke still works. we call them "voluntary organ donors" too. it's not just about permission, but how they die young and healthy in accidents that leave their organs in prime condition.
 

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