Babbage and Dark Mode

[Ian]

Babbage explored (in the paper & ink era!) many of the issues raised in
the Dark Mode thread. There is a book of mathematical tables in the
Science Museum in London, which he had printed with varying type
colours on varying paper colours. His objective was to see what
combination was most reliably readable. I don't remember his
conclusion, and unfortunately I haven't been able to find an image
online.

[Anton Shepelev]

Post by Ian
Babbage explored (in the paper & ink era!) many of the
issues raised in the Dark Mode thread. There is a book of
mathematical tables in the Science Museum in London, which
he had printed with varying type colours on varying paper
colours. His objective was to see what combination was
most reliably readable. I don't remember his conclusion,
and unfortunately I haven't been able to find an image
online.

At least we know what to look for:

Specimen of logarithmic tables
printed with different coloured inks
on variously coloured papers

recently (1988) published in issue 3, volume 10,
of /Annals of the History of Computing/.

See also:

Babbage's Guidelines for the Design of Mathematical Notations:
<https://www.cs.mcgill.ca/~dirk/dutzSchlimm2021-AM-babbage_guidelines.pdf>

[Salvador Mirzo]

Post by Anton Shepelev

Post by Ian
Babbage explored (in the paper & ink era!) many of the
issues raised in the Dark Mode thread. There is a book of
mathematical tables in the Science Museum in London, which
he had printed with varying type colours on varying paper
colours. His objective was to see what combination was
most reliably readable. I don't remember his conclusion,
and unfortunately I haven't been able to find an image
online.

Specimen of logarithmic tables
printed with different coloured inks
on variously coloured papers
recently (1988) published in issue 3, volume 10,
of /Annals of the History of Computing/.
<https://www.cs.mcgill.ca/~dirk/dutzSchlimm2021-AM-babbage_guidelines.pdf>

Thank you so much for the references! I had no idea about this.

[Anton Shepelev]

Post by Ian
*********** To reply by e-mail, make w single in address **************

How long till AI becomes cheap enough for spammers to employ
it for unmunging such riddles?

[Salvador Mirzo]

Post by Anton Shepelev

Post by Ian
*********** To reply by e-mail, make w single in address **************

How long till AI becomes cheap enough for spammers to employ
it for unmunging such riddles?

I couldn't figure out the riddle in question here. I'd take my hat to
any intelligence that can.

[Computer Nerd Kev]

Post by Salvador Mirzo

Post by Anton Shepelev

Post by Ian
*********** To reply by e-mail, make w single in address **************

How long till AI becomes cheap enough for spammers to employ
it for unmunging such riddles?

I couldn't figure out the riddle in question here. I'd take my hat to
any intelligence that can.

Their email has two 'u' characters, so I think you're meant to read
that as a 'w' (this might be more obvious with some fonts than
others). Then in the riddle to "make w single" means to "make w a
single character", so "uu" becomes "w".

The w-ified domain resolves and has an MX record so it can receive
email (seen with command: "dig [domain] mx"), unlike the original.
So that's my guess.

[Sn!pe]

Post by Computer Nerd Kev

Post by Salvador Mirzo

Post by Anton Shepelev

Post by Ian
*********** To reply by e-mail, make w single in address **************

How long till AI becomes cheap enough for spammers to employ
it for unmunging such riddles?

I couldn't figure out the riddle in question here. I'd take my hat to
any intelligence that can.

Their email has two 'u' characters, so I think you're meant to read
that as a 'w' (this might be more obvious with some fonts than
others). Then in the riddle to "make w single" means to "make w a
single character", so "uu" becomes "w".
The w-ified domain resolves and has an MX record so it can receive
email (seen with command: "dig [domain] mx"), unlike the original.
So that's my guess.

I read it as make 'double-you' (w) single i.e. to delete one of the two
'u's in "Ian <***@sfuu.ca>" so that it becomes "Ian <***@sfu.ca>".
I don't know if that resolves. Whatever, it's an ambiguous riddle.

[Salvador Mirzo]

Post by Computer Nerd Kev

Post by Salvador Mirzo

Post by Anton Shepelev

Post by Ian
*********** To reply by e-mail, make w single in address **************

How long till AI becomes cheap enough for spammers to employ
it for unmunging such riddles?

I couldn't figure out the riddle in question here. I'd take my hat to
any intelligence that can.

Their email has two 'u' characters, so I think you're meant to read
that as a 'w' (this might be more obvious with some fonts than
others). Then in the riddle to "make w single" means to "make w a
single character", so "uu" becomes "w".
The w-ified domain resolves and has an MX record so it can receive
email (seen with command: "dig [domain] mx"), unlike the original.
So that's my guess.

You're brilliant! If you are a computer program, I take not just my hat
to you, but would be happy to buy you a cup of coffee, if you could care
about it. :)

[Computer Nerd Kev]

Post by Salvador Mirzo

Post by Computer Nerd Kev

Post by Salvador Mirzo

Post by Anton Shepelev

Post by Ian
*********** To reply by e-mail, make w single in address **************

How long till AI becomes cheap enough for spammers to employ
it for unmunging such riddles?

I couldn't figure out the riddle in question here. I'd take my hat to
any intelligence that can.

Their email has two 'u' characters, so I think you're meant to read
that as a 'w' (this might be more obvious with some fonts than
others). Then in the riddle to "make w single" means to "make w a
single character", so "uu" becomes "w".
The w-ified domain resolves and has an MX record so it can receive
email (seen with command: "dig [domain] mx"), unlike the original.
So that's my guess.

You're brilliant!

As Sn!pe pointed out, make a riddle open-ended enough and everyone
can sound smart coming up with their own (different) answer to it!

Post by Salvador Mirzo
If you are a computer program, I take not just my hat to you, but
would be happy to buy you a cup of coffee, if you could care
about it. :)

Meer flesh and blood so far as I know. Yet really I believe
computers have been more intelligent than me since the start, in
specific ways. They'd be pretty useless things if they weren't.