The Toughest Developer Puzzle Ever | Hacker News Reader

The Toughest Developer Puzzle Ever

toughestdeveloperpuzzleever.com

48 pointspavel74 comments

I think the puzzle is why they used ASP.

I think the puzzle demonstrates they are idots, and the fact they are idiots is why they use ASP.

  http://toughestdeveloperpuzzleever.com/tdpe2/step1.aspx
  obvious ?
  http://toughestdeveloperpuzzleever.com/tdpe2/step2.aspx
  looking at the source it uses: Assets/Images/step3.png
  Change that to Assets/Images/step2.png
  stepthree.asp
  http://toughestdeveloperpuzzleever.com/tdpe2/stepthree.aspx
  hey it's Morse code !!! ...

This has next to nothing to do with being a developer. But it's easy to create and far harder to solve so hey why not...

as evidenced by a lot of the people in this thread, the first few answers may seem obvious in hindsight but 1. they need to warm people up for the puzzle, 2. everything seems obvious in hindsight, its very easy for smart people miss simple thing.

calling them idiots for making the first few questions easier and for using asp is miles away from what I see hacker news as, bit sad to see this upvoted.

Indeed, I'm on 14 at the moment, and having a blast with this. Some really interesting riddles.

I am stuck on this one (14), atm.

Thanks, that's what I was looking for they are riddles and not puzzles.

With programming for any given puzzle there are thousands of equally valid solutions. However, a riddle has only one fairly arbitrary solution.

EX: I am thinking of a sweet number between 1 and 10. What is it? A: It's pie! Get it because it's a sweet number...

Leaving aside the name-calling, I agree with the sentiment that this is pretty lame. At the point where I had to find a morse code lookup sheet I gave up (although maybe that's a red herring?) anyway I don't care enough to find out. When you call something the "toughest developer puzzle ever" you're setting people up to be disappointed and critical. I was expecting something more like this (which I think is a joke but you get the idea) http://wiki.xkcd.com/irc/Puzzles#the_hardest_interview_puzzl...

I was being semi-sarcastic. I'm often at a complete loss as to why people expose .aspx, .php, .cfm, .cgi or even .html on their pages. It causes enormous amounts of trouble later when you switch engines. Go naked!

In Apache you can hide all this simply by enabling MultiViews. Super easy. Then later if you switch from .html to .php, nobody will be the wiser and all your old pageranked pages will still work.

I feel dumb that I'm stuck on level 2. I assume it's a form submission ...

I tried adding a submit button with firebug, but that didn't accomplish anything.

Me too. Tried base64 decoding the viewstate value, looked like garbage to me. Also tried changing the stuff in formbox to inputs, no luck. Anyone get passed step 2?

That's typically just general ASP session tracking stuff. They might sneak something in there, though.

heh, over thinking

Yeah, I'm on level 8, which is where is starts getting hard.

EDIT: Got it. That was fun.

level 8 is fun. reminds me of picture books when i was younger

Yeah I'm on 8. Then I realised I was at work and I should really save it for later.

Ahhh stuck on 8 too... what is the fox symbol? It's killing me!!

I recognized it... FoxPro

Any tips on Level 5

Stuck. I've obviously found the email it is referencing, but none of my answers seem to work.

If your answer takes you to a different page, then you've done it.

Email? Hint: Google the image name.

Yeah, I don't recognize a bunch of the images in 8. Bleh.

...Ok, I give up.

Nevermind, got it.

5 (To my defense, I am no engineer/programmer)

Take a close look at the img-tag in the source code...

look at the image src... what would you expect it to be?

You're thinking of step 1.

Go back to step 1 and look closely at the clue - and what you needed to guess.. (and compare that to where you are now if that doesn't work)

I'm totally stuck on level 13. It's been a breeze so far (fortunately my wife wears "uggs" that one took me a minute to figure out, it would have been impossible before I met her).

I'm guessing from the title it has to do with the CSS, but the CSS just looks odd, I'm not even sure why the text is showing up with display:none

[edit] okay I found something hidden in the stylesheet but no clue what it means

Don't give away the answer when you find it! =)

I see the stylesheet weirdness but I can't figure out what they are referring to.

looks like someone found notpron. http://www.deathball.net/notpron/

Yeah, and http://www.pythonchallenge.com/

I'm working on the language math. Seems to take quite a bit of time just looking things up!

Completely stuck on 15... the movie "Homegrown" fits but there must be another...

Is 14 any way programming related or is my hunch correct and I've got to find an album which has all those songs in it?

Not programming related.

Hint: track #, band name

Murder in the First also fits if you just go by one thing, but I have a feeling there are other clues. There is only one right answer, and it fits perfectly. Now, if I can only find it.

So does Shrek

Rnpu zbivr vf pbaarpgrq gb gur bar rvgure fvqr bs vg ol na npgbe jub fgneerq va obgu. Va guvf pnfr, Wbua Yvgutbj (Sbbgybbfr) naq Zbetna Serrzna (Qnex Xavtug).

Someone has already posted a cheat sheet:

http://allaroundgeek.blogspot.com/2010/06/toughest-developer...

Submitted the correct pass phrase for 5, but stumped as to what to do next. I'm assuming the 404 is supposed to happen?

Yes, I have same issue - unless it's a dummy error....

Check out the .NET and ASP version numbers.

Save the clues, maybe you need them at the end

t-h-i-s ...

You need them in one of the earlier puzzles.

Stuck on level 10... feel stupid because it seems no one else has gotten stuck on level 10.

Yngvghqr naq ybatvghqr

This is fun, I'm on 7 now - was easy until now. Might as well get a coffee.

edit: OK, 8 is really tough.

Seven was where I got stuck as well.

clue is in the colours and image name.

also, think of the old calculator tricks where you spell with numbers

I haven't figured out what two things in 8 are supposed to be.. at least the obvious thing doesn't make sense in that context...

I got stuck on 8, here is what i got so far:

(Ruby-Ru) + (FoxPro-Kung Fu Panda-XX)+

(Python-K-T-(hay-A)) + S

(CD-PHI-XX) + (JAVA-XX-J) +

(XX+H-(G))+Te+R+XX

where XX is what I don't know

(Ruby-Ru) + (FoxPro-Kung Fu Panda-XX)+

The panda is Po, and I assume the other is Fox.

(CD-PHI-XX) + (JAVA-XX-J) + Should be (Delphi - PHI - EL) + (Java - VA - J)

EL is the initials of Emmeril, and VA is of course Virginia abbreviated.

I'm still stuck on the boot. =/

FoxPro - Po - Fox

It's an "ugg" not a boot!

That was the missing link! Perfect answer!

Phew, thanks for that. You just saved me from wasting away the rest of my night. Head smacking moment when I got the final answer.

You don't need to figure them all out. I was able to guess based on parts. Like I have no clue what the hand is supposed to be or that mountain looking thingy.

Feel like I've got a very reasonable looking answer for 8, but it won't accept it... some special trick on how to submit?

Edit: Turns out you can make big errors by guessing small details... on to 9.

The puzzle answer is just a clue for the real answer.

This one definitely took me awhile, but I figured it out.

SPOILER BELOW

(ruby - ru) + (foxpro - po - fox) + (python - p - t - (hay - a)) + s + (delphi - phi - el) + (java - va - j) + (ugg + h - g) + te + r + ?

For those too lazy to pull this all together, it reads "byrons daughter". You should be able to take over from here.

Hint on the calculator words one? I think I solved them all but it won't let me past.

The riddle was given in a certain way. The answer is expected in the same manner.

Yep stuck on 16 - I can find my way to blind alley's show room - but then what?

Stuck on 9. Think I'll stop before I lose my whole day.

hint: The name of the picture might suggest something.

hint: You might want to do some image manipulation.

another hint: After 8, this is really really simple.

I guess 8 killed my brain. Figured it has something to do with the image, but I'm stumped.

Okay, another hint: data URIs.

OK 9 is just dumb. Opened the image in vim.

19? Anybody?

I'm stuck on 18 :(

Yeah, that's a tricky one. Try http://phonespell.org/ and look for patterns.

Take away the mirror.

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