DamnInteresting

> "A computer matched her with him? I don't think so."

When I first watched this movie, I felt like this was a weak moment in the film. "Computer dating" at the time was laughably bad, so seeing a character regard it as infallible ruined the immersion.

With age and experience, I now see that some people just throw themselves behind certain technologies, and fail to find flaw. So maybe this character was just a misguided computer dating evangelist, blind to the technology's failings.

> Mac OS makes it very easy to type the em dash. You just long press the regular -.

Curious, this doesn't work for me. It does work for other characters, such as long-pressing 'n' to get variants such as 'ñ'.

I do use em dashes a lot though. I just use Shift-Option-hyphen.

> Also drag&drop to group is too precise

FWIW, you can also highlight multiple tabs and right-click "Add tabs to group".

> President Donald Trump personally called Amazon founder Jeff Bezos on Tuesday to complain about about a report that the online retail giant was considering displaying U.S. tariff costs on its product listings [...] Within hours of the call, Amazon publicly downplayed the scope of its plan — and then announced that it had been scrapped entirely.

Apparently Amazon's temporary spine was made of slugs, and it just got salted.

Nevermind, I've just discovered that the problem isn't Smithsonian, it's uBlock Origin's "cosmetic filters." One of the lists was removing the date from the Smithsonian pages. Inscrutable.

My home-grown daily word game Omiword[1] (previously discussed on HN[2]) is nearing completion. Just a few last features and bug fixes to go, including a hint feature, access to archives, and a sharing feature.

[1] https://www.omiword.com/

[2] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43654350

I've been reading Smithsonian Magazine for a long time, and I would like to take this opportunity to complain about one element of their recent website redesign. I find it deeply annoying that there is no publication date anywhere on the page. It's especially annoying in their News section. Am I looking at new news, or old news? I do know that it's in the source code, but I shouldn't have to view source for such a basic and important detail.

Just click/tap on the emoji eyes to see the intended solution.

After a heavy snowfall, there is an increase in the rate of heart attacks owing to the exertion[1]. Easter is the busy season in Christian church, so it may be along the same lines.

[1] https://www.aarp.org/health/conditions-treatments/snow-shove...

Agreed, I find platform DMs completely unnecessary. If I want to solicit messages from people I don't know, I'll just publish an email address. A semi-disposable one if I'm worried about too much volume. On the occasion I've received a DM on Twitter, it generates an email to notify me that I've received a DM, but I can't reply to the email to reply to the person. Wastage.

Thanks! I hope to have the archive feature working within the week.

You are correct, it's my home-grown solution.

> I wondered if you were working to assure there is only one solution; from today's puzzle I see not, since I found "another."

In a perfect world there would be just one solution per puzzle, agreed. But the pool of possible puzzles would be so much smaller.

> It would be great to be able to start over.

Agreed, I think I'll add a "reset" feature that puts all of the tiles back in their starting positions (and allows replay if the puzzle is already solved).

> It would be great to keep track of how many distinct solutions you have found. / It would be great to know how many solutions there are.

Something like "you've found X of Y possible solutions", perhaps? Not a bad idea.

Several people have requested a button to move the tiles to their starting positions. It's on the to-do list. Thanks!

According to Merriam-Webster, "assi" is a synonym for yaupon, a kind of holly plant native to the southeastern U.S.:

https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/assi

It's quite obscure, but valid.

Nice, thanks! I'm still working out how much the one-time fee should be (and of course I still need to code the archive access).

This game is designed to follow the tradition of puzzle games that are easiest on Mondays, and harder through the week. Friday/Saturday/Sunday puzzles can be quite tricky indeed.

If you fill in a whole word and it doesn't appear broken, that means that it's a word found in the game's word list. It's a very permissive word list, including some pretty obscure words. Do you recall what the questionable word was?

Thanks! That edge-of-screen bug is something that several people have encountered. I'll need to find an Android phone to test on so I can replicate it.

Hmm, the light show is meant to highlight the sector boundaries, so it's clear where a given letter tile can be dragged. I could tone it down if it's too much, my goal was to give it some personality.

Regarding the sound, if you don't care for it, there is a volume slider in the menu that can disable it.

Thanks for trying it out!

Yeah, I think you're right that it needs a hint mode, especially on the harder puzzles later in the week.

I am pleased that you like it.

Perhaps I did not make it sufficiently self-explanatory. The play area is divided into sectors (some puzzles have 2, others have 4). Each sector contains some letter tiles. You can drag the letter tiles onto the dotted-line-bordered boxes, with the goal of spelling four valid English words. If you spell a word that is not in the game's dictionary, it will appear "broken."

Thanks!

Thanks!

Thanks! Do you have any thoughts on what a fair one-time price for the archive would be? At this moment there are puzzles going back to 1/1/2025, so about 100 (and growing daily). I've been leaning toward something on the order of $3-$6 (but of course I still need to code the archive access).

In case you didn't already notice, there is a volume slider in the game's menu.

Hooray! I may add other languages, if it gets some traction as-is, and if I can find someone to help assemble a dictionary for another language. Code-wise it wouldn't be prohibitively difficult.

This game has a fairly comprehensive dictionary, kind of like Scrabble. The idea is that words should not be rejected merely for being uncommon.

https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/Pyrus

https://dictionary.cambridge.org/us/dictionary/english/yack

Basically, if a respected dictionary includes a word, this list does as well. I do understand the appeal of omitting weird words, but that would be a considerable and subjective undertaking.

But I'll see if I can find that thread, perhaps it will change my mind. Thanks!

This game's dictionary is similar to Scrabble; it includes as many valid words as possible, even when they are obscure. It turns out that "asse" is a kind of fox:

https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/asse

It's a sticky wicket with these obscure words. I've made other word games before, and people get upset when oddball-but-valid words are rejected. It feels more fair to be permissive, but that's just me.