The Restaurant at the End of the Universe

Marvin

1:47 AM

0

Q: Trying t find a story where aliens are like giant tarantula hawks, implanting eggs into human hosts

Short story. Probably Astounding or Analog. Earth gets invaded by aliens. The aliens (or their soldiers) are like giant tarantula hawks that capture people and take them back to their caves where they implant their eggs in the victims. The hero is a hunter who works with a telepathic eagle or haw...

Marvin

5:32 AM

0

Q: Trying to find time travel pulp story about traveller who gives proto-Inca the wheel which allows them to resist Europeans

Trying to find a short story. Probably Astounding or Analog. Guy goes back in time to early South America. Shows locals how to use the wheel. Then tries to go forward in time. Story ends with Incan or Aztec priest/prince waiting on top of a temple for the prophet to appear. meanwhile off in the d...

story-identification time-travel pulp

Marvin

5:57 AM

0

Q: Does Bethsaida really not speak Universal?

Re-reading the beginning of Even the Wingless, it struck me that Bethsaida is said to not understand Universal. But she's a Galare, and Liolesa's heir. Even if she comes from one of the few Galare families that don't believe in learning Universal, how could Liolesa choose an heir with such a defe...

peltedverse

TheLethalCarrot

8:17 AM

9

Q: Hot Meta Posts: Allow for removal by moderators, and thoughts about future improvements

We have just released a new feature for Moderators across the entire network: the ability to remove a Meta post from showing up in the Hot Meta Posts (HMP) section of the Community Bulletin on the parent site. Some details about this feature: Moving forward, any meta posts that are added to HMP ...

discussion featured moderator-tools per-site-meta community-bulletin

Jenayah

9:27 AM

4

Q: Automatically inserted comments don't appear anymore

Usually when someone flags/votes to close a question as a duplicate, a comment is automatically inserted. Does this answer your question? [link to proposed duplicate] But since this morning those comments don't seem to appear anymore. I first noticed it on this (now deleted) question after I vo...

bug status-review automatic-comments

FYI

Babel fish

0

Q: Which movie has the most actors from Game of Thrones?

I have just seen Outlaw King (2018), and there are three actors of Game of Thrones (listed by characters): Stannis, Lord Commander Mormont, Blackfish Tully. Which movie has the most actors from Game of Thrones?

game-of-thrones

TheLethalCarrot

They done goofed

Now when they fix it if they could revert the auto text for the possible dupe comment that's be great

Marvin

10:58 AM

0

Q: Comic book issue where the Red Skull [sarcastically] calls Captain America gay

I remember reading a Captain America story arc where the Red Skull captures Captain America (I guess). The Skull the offers Captain America anything he wants in exchange for his support. During the same conversation, the Red Skull also makes some snarky remarks on Captain America being in a homos...

marvel comics episode-identification

0

Q: Book where God decides to send a second flood with interesting complications

I read this book at my local library in the 90s, but haven't been able to locate it again. My library has book sales where old books are sold off, and the layout has changed. I believe it was published by Gollancz, as it had the yellow cover with black title. In the book, God has decided to send ...

story-identification books

Jenayah

12:02 PM

@TheLethalCarrot yes 😀

Jenayah

2:37 PM

So much spacing with the new formatting @_@

Napoleon Wilson

Yeah, I just noticed. Odd.

TheLethalCarrot

Quotes are indented?

Napoleon Wilson

Well, that's something.

TheLethalCarrot

Not a fan of click to reveal spoilers or spoilers being indented at least

Doesn't make sense to me for a spoiler to be indented

Napoleon Wilson

But this new spacing isn't going to do well on people who tend to write motherfucking essays for answers.

TheLethalCarrot

2:41 PM

What's with the spacing? You mean between lines?

Napoleon Wilson

But I'm sure the formatting is perfect for SO.

Donald.McLean

nasa.gov/feature/goddard/2020/…

DavidW

2:58 PM

Ugh, that's ugly. I hate the bloated 1.5 linespacing. Didn't we have studies already 20 years ago that linespacing should be either 1x or 2x line height, but most definitely not 1.5x?

2

TheLethalCarrot

The first thing I do in any new word document is change the line spacing to 0

Mithical

My problem is that the quotes are now in a much lighter font, which is annoying.

Napoleon Wilson

The quotes are actually an improvement. At least they don't hide as normal text anymore now.

Though, just putting back the old background would probably have been the best solution.

But well, gotta change something. Otherwise da SE bosses will think the design team is superfluous.

b_jonas

@DavidW I don't think so, not in a way that applies to the web.

In print we use 1x line spacing because 1x is defined as the normal linespacing that you should have, or 2x linespacing so that the reviewer can write notes between the lines of your thesis. I don't know how anyone can handwrite such tiny letters, they'd have to be smaller than the printed letters, but a lot of forms are printed with so little space for handwriting so it's tradition. And no, reviewers won't actually write that many notes, but we pretend to give them the option.

That's what the margin is for anyway. 1.5x spacing had some use on typewritten manuscript if you type technical text if you want mark double underlines for italic and symbols that aren't on the typewriter with a pen later, but very few people write manuscripts with a typewriter now.

@Mithical A lighter font? What? Is this on Sci-Fi? I don't see a lighter font, it seems exactly the same font as the rest of the posts, even if I temporarily enable websites to choose custom fonts. Maybe I'm not loading some webfonts?

Napoleon Wilson

But I'll be waiting for the extensive A\B testing results SE is about to show us when proving the changes' necessity anyway.

b_jonas

3:10 PM

All I see is the thick gray line on the left of blockquotes, which I consider an improvement, and possibly changed vertical spacing.

@NapoleonWilson Wait, what background?

Oh right, quotes used to be in a shaded box. I think no box is an improvement. The box is just distracting and adds a need for more vertical spacing.

Don't add it back, the thick gray line on the left is more than enough to distinguish quotes.

@NapoleonWilson That may be part of the reason, but I think this is mostly just a normal reaction of everyone hating design changes no matter whether they actually improve the site.

@NapoleonWilson You may have a point there. I might change the line spacing on client side, I hate when websites mess with that, though usually they mess with it in the worse direction, making lines too tightly spaced.

Mithical

@b_jonas It's a much lighter gray than unquoted text

TheLethalCarrot

You'd think they wouldn't status-bydesign the line spacing answer on the main post considering the amount of negative feedback instantly about it

Napoleon Wilson

@b_jonas The grey line was there since that terrible change months ago. However, they indented it now, which is a huge improvement.

DavidW

@b_jonas Some quick googling suggests that line spacing as a fraction of text height is widely recommended to be around 1.5, with a range of 1.4-1.8 suggested.

As rendered on my screen font height is 11px, and the line spacing (measured baseline-to-baseline) is 24px, which is way too much.

b_jonas

@Mithical Ah indeed. Sorry, I didn't notice that in the stupid lighting in this workplace in late afternoons.

Napoleon Wilson

3:21 PM

@TheLethalCarrot Given that every reasonable idea that takes 2 seconds to implement needs to go through extensive A\B testing in order to say "ah, not gonna be worth it", this "let's mess up the line spacing just because we can" seems utterly ridiculous.

b_jonas

Ok, I can see why you wouldn't like that. You should feel free to override it on client side of course, the gray line is enough to distinguish them.

TheLethalCarrot

Every change goes through A/B testing when it's something the user's are more likely to want over SE or it's something brand new

Everything else is just blindly applied, at least we got a day or so warning on this

b_jonas

@TheLethalCarrot Maybe, but why would I believe the users which features are bad when they also hate the changes that really improve the site? I'd better decide on my own, and for formatting changes like this, quietly work it around on my side if I don't like it.

I have my own peculiar taste when it comes to website formating, and SE is MUCH closer to it than many other sites, needs much fewer workarounds, except on the chat sites which are horrible in all sorts of ways.

In SE non-chat, I usually have much fewer formatting complaints than typical other websites that I use often.

Napoleon Wilson

Problem is, SE lives extensively from reading.

DavidW

The change doesn't seem as bad on mobile, but it means that content that would previously have fit on one page now requires scrolling, which is just a different annoyance.

Marvin

3:34 PM

-2

Q: what is the mechanism of flying condor and landing

actually i'm the one who is interested with this 80's TV cartoon The Mysterious Cities of Gold its a amazing bird while its take off or landing. ive draw the first condor and its still there then i watch the new season i ve shocked when i see it. Its totaly difference from the previous one i like...

story-identification

TheLethalCarrot

Sorry folks, I was in a meeting. Our line spacing is ~1.6. W3C writes the following: "Many people with cognitive disabilities have trouble tracking lines of text when a block of text is single spaced. Providing spacing between 1.5 to 2 allows them to start a new line more easily once they have finished the previous one." We prefer more spacing between our lines for better readability. I think there are possible refinements between block level elements though, and plan on further refinement to header spacing now that this is in production. — Aaron Shekey ♦ 54 secs ago

Ironic given that all the complaints are it's hard to read

And did they really test it that much? Everything about spoilers seems to be broken because of the hover -> click change

Napoleon Wilson

Yeah, turns out it's supposed to be easier to read. You'd have known.

b_jonas

@TheLethalCarrot What? Clicking on spoilers always worked, and the hover was just annoying. It's the opposite of broken.

TheLethalCarrot

You can't select text now, click on links etc.

b_jonas

@TheLethalCarrot Really? Let me try

TheLethalCarrot

3:41 PM

Also I personally prefer the hover functionality, but yes I know it always used to work with click

It's removing functionality for the sake of the "Wahhh spoilers" brigade

b_jonas

Mind you, the best way to handle spoilers would probably be to have one link next to the first spoiler to reveal all spoilers in the post, and another next to it to reveal all spoilers in the thread, and no messy clicking on individual boxes, but still

Napoleon Wilson

Oh, you can't even select text? That's kind of crap. Though, I actually thought the clicking idea is okay, since you can permanently show them now.

TheLethalCarrot

You could before couldn't you?

Napoleon Wilson

Oh.

b_jonas

Mind you, you already can't easily select text in a previewed post, which is annoying.

I can select text, it just hides the spoiler. Indeed that can be annoying.

Luckily we already have expand boxes as built-in browser features, in a few years they'll even be in old browsers, and then we (but not SE or all the cool webdevs who think they know better) can just use those and let the viewer choose the details.

Null

3:52 PM

Time to edit my userstyles again.

2

b_jonas

Come on, story-id guys, scifi.stackexchange.com/q/236404/4918 is story-id with the publisher known, it can't be hard.

there's a book called "Mr. Noah and the Second Flood" by Sheila Burnford that might match but I haven't found a synopsis yet

> Mr and Mrs Noah, true descendants of the original Noah, live on an isolated mountain-top. They are visited once a year by their Bank Manager who brings them a gold bar, a years supply of The Farmers Monthly, and a cake from Mrs Bank Manager wrapped up in an old Sunday Newspaper

> Convinced that a second Flood is imminent as a result of today's environmental pollution, Mr. Noah builds an ark.

Napoleon Wilson

The one with the guy drawing a foam condor?

b_jonas

Ah, kirkusreviews.com/book-reviews/a/sheila-burnford-4/… has a review

> a computer-selected elite

@NapoleonWilson Dunno, there are multiple editions with different covers, I didn't pay attention

Doesn't seem to be a good match, but at least worth a comment.

DavidW

@b_jonas It seems odd to me that they could specifically recall it was published by Gollancz. I could maybe name the publishers of a few books, but mostly because I know that, for example, Lois McMaster Bujold is published by Baen, not by remembering the publisher of a specific book.

b_jonas

@DavidW OP mentions that they remember the cover. Some publishers have uniform distinctive covers, or at least a series of books with such, eg. the Springer yellow books. This book is apparently from such a series or publisher.

> as it had the yellow cover with black title

DavidW

4:07 PM

Oh, I guess I'm not familiar with a publisher style for books.

b_jonas

Though the cover images that I find for the Gollancz printing don't match

DavidW

@Null What tool do you use for that? Apparently I'm looking for one...

b_jonas

@DavidW I use the Stylus plugin for Firefox

Null

@DavidW Stylus

For Chrome

b_jonas

But I'm also looking for a Firefox plugin recommendation that seems to be elusive: I'd like one that can rewrite URLs for top level pages that I load (i.e. what would be shown in the browser bar only, not URLs of resources or links) using rules that I can set up, and ideally has a way to temporarily disable a rule (or all rules together).

Null

4:40 PM

Line height of 1.3 looks good to me.

1 is a little too closely spaced, but SE's ~1.6 is too much.

.s-prose {
    line-height: 1.3 !important;
}

DavidW

6:09 PM

@Null That works beautifully, thank you!

Null

@DavidW Happy to help.

It's a blessing and curse, though. Now you'll be tempted to re-style every little thing that bugs you.

And you'll have to update the style every time SE changes base style.

DavidW

@Null Oh, believe me, I was already looking into that. :)

Well, this one at least, considering they've made .s-prose a major base style, it should be relatively slow-changing.

b_jonas

6:44 PM

@Mithical Sorry, you are absolutely right. At home with the decent lighting, the brighter color of quotes is obvious.

Marvin

6:55 PM

0

Q: Do we know Sting's real name?

During the events of The Hobbit, after dealing with the trolls, the Bilbo and co. find three magic weapons in the troll's lair: ... among them were several swords of various makes, shapes, and sizes. Two caught their eyes particularly, because of their beautiful scabbards and jeweled hilts. Gand...

tolkiens-legendarium the-lord-of-the-rings the-hobbit

DavidW

7:12 PM

@Marvin Ooh! I know that one, it's Gordon Sumner!

Marvin

-3

Q: What kind of crimes could a walking, talking mini fridge commit?

Like, if somebody was just a straight up mini fridge, what kind of crimes could he commit?

robots technology laws-of-robotics engineering

Marvin

9:25 PM

0

Q: Clarification on lies incorporated

I've seen few references for the book lies incorporated online, and having read through it, I'd like some answers. In Philip K. Dick's book lies Inc, what is Abba? Does he represent something? When lies incorporated beams the information about the rat into Applebaum's head, information which isn'...

philip-k-dick

Marvin

10:36 PM

0

Q: Stargate SG-1 S3E3 Fair Game: Why is the talker's lecternn so close to the Stargate?

In the episode where SG-1 is trapped on a prisoner's planet we learn from Daniel Jackson that the initial blue burst out of the Stargate is deadly and not a way to escape. So why is the speaker's lectern where Hammond stays in this shot so close to the Stargate? What if the Stargate activates fro...

stargate stargate-sg1

Transcript for

The Restaurant at the End of the Univ…