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Comment by Sean1708 | Hacker News Reader

> syntax highlighting, or as I prefer to call it, spitzensparken blinkelichtzen

Google Translate reckons this means "peak parking", is that a correct translation? If so would somebody mind explaining what parking has to do with syntax highlighting? And if not, what is the correct translation?

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It's not something to be translated, it's a mock language.

See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blinkenlights

Ah, thank you. I suppose there are no prizes for guessing which generation I belong to then?

: ACHTUNG!

    ALLES TURISTEN UND NONTEKNISCHEN LOOKENPEEPERS!
    DAS KOMPUTERMASCHINE IST NICHT FÜR DER GEFINGERPOKEN UND 
    MITTENGRABEN! ODERWISE IST EASY TO SCHNAPPEN DER 
    SPRINGENWERK, BLOWENFUSEN UND POPPENCORKEN MIT 
    SPITZENSPARKEN.
    IST NICHT FÜR GEWERKEN BEI DUMMKOPFEN. DER RUBBERNECKEN 
    SIGHTSEEREN KEEPEN DAS COTTONPICKEN HÄNDER IN DAS POCKETS MUSS.
    ZO RELAXEN UND WATSCHEN DER BLINKENLICHTEN.

"This silliness dates back to least as far as 1955 at IBM and had already gone international by the early 1960s, when it was reported at the University of London's ATLAS computing site."

source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blinkenlights

Heh. Google translate actually recognises some of those, er, terms:

  ATTENTION!

     ALL TOURISTS AND NONTEKNISH LOOKENPEEPERS!
     THE COMPUTER MACHINE IS NOT FOR THE GEFINGERPOKEN AND
     CENTER DIG! ORWISE IS EASY TO SNAP THE
     SPRINGENWERK, BLOWENFUSEN AND POPPENCORKEN WITH
     TIP sparken.
     IS NOT FOR TRADE IN STUPID HEADS. THE RUBBER TIPS
     SIGHTSEARS KEEP THE COTTON PICK HANDS INTO THE POCKETS.
     ZO RELAXING AND WATCHING THE FLASHING LIGHT.

I'm kind of amazed that it can go even that far. But mostly, I'm amazed at the fact that I can just pick up and read a completely made-up language, or a severely garbled real language, depending on your point of view.

We got some way to go before machine translation can match human language abilities, eh.

It's actually semi-correct German with "germanified" American words. "DAS KOMPUTERMASCHINE IST NICHT FÜR DER ..." is grammatically correct. But gefingerpoken isn't a German word, obviously, though it's close to gefingert (fingered). Blinken means flash, and lichten means lights, so blinkenlicht at least means soemthing, though blitzende Lichter would be more idiomatic.

blinklicht is the german term for the flashing turn indicator on a car. and any other light that periodically turns on and off can be called that.

This is mock German - Google translate is probably taking spitzens parken as peak parking. But it is probably a refernce to blinkenlights https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blinkenlights

I'm not German, but I'd say it's close to: bells and whistles.

Or more directly: sparkles and flashing lights.

Seems like this Wikipedia entry is relevant: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blinkenlights

This was entertaining: ": ACHTUNG! ALLES TURISTEN UND NONTEKNISCHEN LOOKENPEEPERS! DAS KOMPUTERMASCHINE IST NICHT FÜR DER GEFINGERPOKEN UND MITTENGRABEN! ODERWISE IST EASY TO SCHNAPPEN DER SPRINGENWERK, BLOWENFUSEN UND POPPENCORKEN MIT SPITZENSPARKEN. IST NICHT FÜR GEWERKEN BEI DUMMKOPFEN. DER RUBBERNECKEN SIGHTSEEREN KEEPEN DAS COTTONPICKEN HÄNDER IN DAS POCKETS MUSS. ZO RELAXEN UND WATSCHEN DER BLINKENLICHTEN."

Seems to fit what our author was going for too.

German native speaker here with lots of assumptions.

For the first word, "spitze" can be "peak", but also the pattern/cloth as seen when you google doily. In this context, that's probably what he means. That means the "s" belongs together with the "parken", making it the English "spark". "sparken" could be "making sparks"

For the second word "Blinklicht" ist "blinking light", "Blinklichtchen" would be the diminutive, it's probably written "Blinkelichtzen" to make it look ever more German.

He appears to be kind of an unpleasant person.

Not a native German, but probably this:

"spitzen sparken blinken lichtzen" -> "pointed sparkles flashing lights"

Or maybe "brightly high-lighted pointers".

No, it means "spitting sparks". Like you see coming out of the control panels in the original Star Trek, when they got shot by Klingons.

I guess they remrnbered about circuit breakers when they built the later Enterprisen.

those seem to be based on german words. in german that reads as: pointy sparks, blinking lights.

I would call it Rindfleischetikettierungsüberwachungsaufgabenübertragungsgesetz but that's me.

Du must be Deutsch

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