cross-posted from: https://programming.dev/post/8677292

• xkcd / 221
• Explain xkcd / 221

Transcript:

[A computer program.]

int getRandomNumber()
{
   return 4; // chosen by fair dice roll.
             // guaranteed to be random.
}

Hover Text:

RFC 1149.5 specifies 4 as the standard IEEE-vetted random number.

cross-posted from: https://programming.dev/post/8653164

• xkcd / 217
• Explain xkcd / 217

Transcript:

Cueball: Hey, check it out: e^π^−π is 19.999099979. That's weird.
Black Hat: Yeah. That's how I got kicked out of the ACM in college.
Cueball: ...what?

Black Hat: During a competition, I told the programmers on our team that e^π^−π was a standard test of floating-point handlers -- it would come out to 20 unless they had rounding errors.

Cueball: That's awful.
Black Hat: Yeah, they dug through half their algorithms looking for the bug before they figured it out.

Hover text:

Also, I hear the 4th root of (9^2^ + 19^2^/22) is pi.

cross-posted from: https://programming.dev/post/8619086

Title text:

It's like the traveling salesman problem, but the endpoints are different and you can't ask your friends for help because they're sitting three seats down.

Links:

• xkcd/173
• Explain xkcd/173

cross-posted from: https://programming.dev/post/8609865

• xkcd/156
• Explain xkcd/156

Hover text:

Your IDE's color may vary.

Source: Itchy Feet (https://www.itchyfeetcomic.com/2024/01/real-name.html)

Title text: An apple fell on Isaac Newton's head and gave him the idea that the moon might be a tasty apple, though this turned out not to be true--the Apollo program eventually determined that it was just a desolate and bland Red Delicious.

• xkcd/2820
• Explain xkcd/2820

Title text: In the LotR map, up and down correspond LOOSELY to northwest and southeast respectively.

Transcript too long for lemmy, check Explain xkcd wiki to get one ;)

These charts show movie character interactions. The horizontal axis is time. The vertical grouping of the lines indicate which characters are together at a given time.

• xkcd/657
• Explain xkcd/657

Title text: A circle with an A in it means that the circuit has committed a sin and has been marked as punishment.

• xkcd/2818
• Explain xkcd/2818