Post Race!

[dclamp]

I tried to think of a pun with Billy Ray... but it didnt work

[Shaggy Hiker]

Good thing, FD might have given you a Ray ban....which would have been a shade over the top.

[Witis]

If you insist... Ladies and gentleman... Mrs. Miley Cyrus.

Great choice.


After that I turned the snake into a belt heh heh.

[Witis]

There are only three colors there: Red, Tan, and Gray. I see that the picture also picked up a couple non-square bricks, which were used as filler and are covered by the borders of raised beds in the final garden. The red bricks make up the eigth bit of every byte, since the ASCII character set (at least the normal set with the digits and punctuation) doesn't use the eigth bit.

It doesn't spell out my name, though. I did consider having a message like, "The money is found under brick X", but I felt that would be too lame. So, it's just a phrase.

Don't keep us hanging Shaggy tell us what the phrase is.

[Witis]

Miley Cyrus needs to brush her tongue, it's nasty.

No French kissing in the USA?

[henrytrs35]

No French kissing in the USA?

A kiss is not a kiss without the tongue.

[Shaggy Hiker]

Don't keep us hanging Shaggy tell us what the phrase is.

To tell you the truth, I have forgotten. However, I know I have it written down somewhere....in binary.

[Shaggy Hiker]

My father helped me do the rock work. He's an old DEC engineer, so he was reading in octal, while I was reading in hex. Kind of funny, that.

I still have the program that I wrote to design the yard, in case anybody wants to do something nutty like that. You set up the number of rows and columns you have to work with, if you know, then type in a string, and it shows some rough...and inaccurate...appearance of how it will look, as well as telling you the total number of each color brick needed, a count of the bricks, and a count of the characters. With a bit of measuring, you can know the maximum phrase length possible. In my case, I had something like 80 characters to work with, and kept tinkering with phrases until I got to something like 79. The remainder was a set of red bricks that are largely buried under raised beds.

[Bonker Gudd]

Coat my goat.

[Witis]

To tell you the truth, I have forgotten. However, I know I have it written down somewhere....in binary.

How embarrassing. :-\ Also why the red bricks for the unused eighth bit instead of a zero, seems like pseudo binary to me.

[Witis]

Coat my goat.

Random act of kindness?

[Bonker Gudd]

Random act of kindness?

I had some emulsion left over.

[dday9]

Btw bonker, the link in your signature is broken.

[dclamp]

dday9. I blocked your bug gif. I didnt like it.

[dday9]

I vote dclamp to become a super moberator.

[Witis]

[dclamp]

I vote dclamp to become a super moberator.

Thank you. Here is your sticker.

[Shaggy Hiker]

How embarrassing. :-\ Also why the red bricks for the unused eighth bit instead of a zero, seems like pseudo binary to me.

I had them. The other reason is that a two bit binary pattern is very hard to read. When written out, as in your posts, there is a clear left to right pattern to the bits. In the case of a 2D arrangement, a person could be forgiven to not finding any meaning at all. The pattern would look random, and any attempt to turn them into ASCII would work only if the person happened to start on a byte boundary and read in the right direction. That takes a whole lot of chance. I wouldn't expect anybody to figure out that there was a binary pattern, as it would appear random, and would read random in most directions, but by making every eigth bit red I left a clue as to how to read the pattern. A person might notice that the arrangement isn't truly random, and if they do, they'd also notice that the non-random part is a regularly repeating pattern of 8, which would suggest ASCII binary to any computer geek of the last couple decades. The pattern is an easter egg, but one with a hint built in.

[Witis]

I had them. The other reason is that a two bit binary pattern is very hard to read. When written out, as in your posts, there is a clear left to right pattern to the bits. In the case of a 2D arrangement, a person could be forgiven to not finding any meaning at all. The pattern would look random, and any attempt to turn them into ASCII would work only if the person happened to start on a byte boundary and read in the right direction. That takes a whole lot of chance. I wouldn't expect anybody to figure out that there was a binary pattern, as it would appear random, and would read random in most directions, but by making every eigth bit red I left a clue as to how to read the pattern. A person might notice that the arrangement isn't truly random, and if they do, they'd also notice that the non-random part is a regularly repeating pattern of 8, which would suggest ASCII binary to any computer geek of the last couple decades. The pattern is an easter egg, but one with a hint built in.

I guess you do have a point regarding the visibility of any binary pattern, 01000010-01101001-01101110-01100001-01110010-01111001 is easier to read than 010000100110100101101110011000010111001001111001, however, using 3 colours and seven bits doesn't make it an intuitively or obviously binary pattern. Is there a picture of the finished result so that we can see it now that we know what to look for?
Also how's the memory today?

[Shaggy Hiker]

I could look up the phrase, but it's on a different computer in a different building, so I can't look it up today.

There isn't a picture of the complete thing. The picture I showed was taken from the roof after the brickwork was finished, there is a second picture that overlaps the first and covers the remainder of the message. However, the start of the message is in the picture I posted, and neither of the pictues is really all that good. The lighting wasn't excellent, nor was the position for the picture.

There couldn't be a picture today. The smaller squares on the left side are where the posts for a pergola were located. That pergola is heavily covered by honeysuckle, hops, and a couple other climbing vines, which means that any picture taken from the same vantage point would show a bed of green with occasional rafters showing through. The bricks along that side would be covered. There is also a raised garden in the center with a Japanese maple in it, which would further break up the picture. I knew all those were going in, which is why I took the picture when I did. There is currently no vantage point that would show more than a few bytes of the pattern, and it would take several pictures to capture the whole message anymore.

[Shaggy Hiker]

I also see that there are some extra red bricks in the upper left corner of that picture, which are now covered by a raised bed, but would throw off the pattern in the picture. The lighting is due to the shadows on a sunny day. However, since the place is a desert, had I waited to take the picture on an overcast day, I would have made no progress for nearly a year. Overcast days are rare during the summer.

[Witis]

I also see that there are some extra red bricks in the upper left corner of that picture, which are now covered by a raised bed, but would throw off the pattern in the picture.

I was about to ask about those, they seem to completely obstruct any binary encoded Ascii characters. Does tan = zero or one?

[Shaggy Hiker]

There's no way I'm going to answer that question...except, now that I think about it, I can answer it literally with a Yes.

I'm not sure why I decided to use red as a filler brick. It may be because it didn't have any other meaning, so it is the only color I really COULD use. Aftwer all, the code does include the rule red=ignore, so using red as a filler is fine. Still, there must have been some reason why I opted for the red bricks there. They were due to be covered, and may even have been removed (I'd have to go out and look), since the end posts of the pergola would be in that area, along with a raised bed.

[Witis]

There's no way I'm going to answer that question...except, now that I think about it, I can answer it literally with a Yes.

Yes tan = 0 or yes tan = 1?

I'm not sure why I decided to use red as a filler brick. It may be because it didn't have any other meaning, so it is the only color I really COULD use.

I'm not that convinced Shaggy, what about using a gap or a half tile instead?

Aftwer all, the code does include the rule red=ignore, so using red as a filler is fine. Still, there must have been some reason why I opted for the red bricks there. They were due to be covered, and may even have been removed (I'd have to go out and look), since the end posts of the pergola would be in that area, along with a raised bed.

Yeah it kinds ruins the whole binary backyard thing, I'd check to see if the red tiles are still there.

[dclamp]

So where does the number 2 come into play?

[FunkyDexter]

dday9. I blocked your bug gif. I didnt like it

So did I and now I can't get the typex off my monitor

[dclamp]

Had to google Typex... AKA Whiteout...

[dday9]

Had to google Typex... AKA Whiteout...

I was wondering too.

[FunkyDexter]

A white out's what happens if I run into a wall really fast.

[dclamp]

And black out is when you drink too much

[dday9]

And grey out is when you go red.

[Witis]

And you don't want a blue out when traveling at high speeds.

[Witis]

And grey out is when you go red.

Nah, greyouts can happen when you are pulling some serious positive Gs, redouts when you try for too many negative Gs.

[Shaggy Hiker]

I'm not that convinced Shaggy, what about using a gap or a half tile instead?

Half tiles are seriously difficult for a variety of reasons, not the least of which is cutting them (you can't buy them).

Yeah it kinds ruins the whole binary backyard thing, I'd check to see if the red tiles are still there.

If they are there, as I suspect they are, they form the foundation for the wall of the raised bed that is back there, so they are covered under gray blocks...of a sort....I really don't know whether there is a name for that shape.

[Witis]

Half tiles are seriously difficult for a variety of reasons, not the least of which is cutting them (you can't buy them).

Such a small amount of trouble in order to preserve binary purity. ☹

If they are there, as I suspect they are, they form the foundation for the wall of the raised bed that is back there, so they are covered under gray blocks...of a sort....I really don't know whether there is a name for that shape.

You mean the error you built into your binary backyard is still there? °o°

[dday9]

Wow. I've been at work for 15 minutes and it's already been one of those days....

[dclamp]

Wow. I've been at work for 15 minutes and it's already been one of those days....

Ugh. Thats how my shift was last night. Longest 12 hours shift of my life.

[dday9]

On a positive note, I am moving from P&C insurance to supplemental insurance in the next 30 days. Bigger commission with less hours.

[dclamp]

That is positive. Congrats you insurance sales man you.

[dday9]

I knew I should've bought that volcano insurance, just like my need for that earthquake insurance.