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My presentation

Posted: Wed Jun 22, 2011 7:54 pm
by yeni_ceri
My name "yeni_ceri" here, but I am called for many other names. I am not an hacker myself, I do not wish to become an "hacker". Since I do not have desire to harm other people neither to make my life a life of screwing any other people's business.
I solved mortal coil until level 20, I had some difficulties, I did research and I got the hints specially the ones in the url. I couldn't interpreter it correctly. I know the math principle behind mortal coil (well I know it since yesterday as I did some research). It took me 5 days just to reach level 20, I got stuck in level 18 since Sunday (definitively not one of my best days). But I solved level 18. 19, 20 just now somehow! I guess I am a very intuitive person, and my mind is very hyperactive right now. Well I did and english exam just a few hours ago, I did it twice! One on the scrap paper and other on exam (I just copy pasted what I wrote in the scrap paper). I am portuguese, and in order to enter to enter a translation course I had to do the national exam. The english exam is easier than the portuguese one. Since it doesn't require me to remember things about portuguese master pieces. I did portuguese either. It was my safe boat actually. The theme this year was "Fernando Pessoa", well I mean 2 of his heteronyms in this case "Ricardo Reis" and "Alvaro de Campos". I am very glad actually because I did not study Saramago. I read "Memorial of the Convenant" last year, I read it half way then I couldn't stand it anymore! The story is boring, and I get confused with the writting style. As you see I am not much a math's person, my grades at math were terrible! I did "Sciences and Technologies" in high school which I loved very much! Except for all the Math and "Memorial of the Convenant". So, when was the time to choose a course I dedicated myself to translation, just because it seems natural and pacific for me.
Well I'm kinda famous in the otaku portuguese community I know this my sound like a cliché, but I love anime (well not much in the last times, like the last I watched was "Code Geass" or "Detroit Metal City". I do love anime and I do love to translate (despite not knowing japanese my aim is to trying to translate the best I know from english to portuguese, I think few people dedicate theirselves to the local scenes). I hate conventions, because people on cosplays freak me out, and then screaming "Kawai Desu". By the way I'm known there as Zephirus, maybe with this you guys can check me out a little better.
You're maybe thinking what I'm doing so far from my environment. Well I have pretty good reasons to learn a few things to help myself and to help others! It is nothing serious, but outside there I can't get some answers... Also the way I found this was pretty laughable too, I just wrote "hack my server" in google and this was the first result! I must say I am not a genious, neither average probably. But I don't like to sit down on the corner and let people push me. I don't expect you guys to do my dirty job! But I expect you teach me a few things! Is that reasonable? Don't worry I won't ask you to join me to hack something in London, or to create a new virus that spreads the wonders of hello kitty or something! (Yeah I've been reading!)
Sorry I'm kinda hyperactive right now! (I will rest before I answer you guys back!) At least I did my presentation correctly, maybe you're laughing with it right now.) Maybe you say that I "speak" too much. Well I was always like this, and there's no use to hide myself either, because my account points out to my main email address. At least I was sincere!
Nice to meet you all!

Posted: Wed Jun 22, 2011 8:14 pm
by yeni_ceri
Sorry for replying well seems I am bit distracted anyway because I posted it in the wrong section! :( Can you admins move this to the right section? :) Again I'm sorry it was not purpose.

Posted: Wed Jun 22, 2011 10:30 pm
by CodeX
I don't think that really had a clear point but I guess you don't want to be a "hacker" (i.e. the popular malicious image) but you want to become a programmer (even though you didn't explicitly mention it), in which case there isn't much 'teaching' on here, you may want to look at some of the posts along the lines of "new to programming", "what is the best programming language" and "what should I learn". You can learn just about all you need to know about any programming primarily from tutorials and sometimes manuals when all else fails. You may want to start off looking at Visual Basic, JAVA, Python or PHP

Posted: Thu Jun 23, 2011 6:42 am
by yeni_ceri
Thank you for the help Codex. In exchange I'm going to give you guys something I thought just now!
You know I am afraid that anyone can solve Mortal Coil and you should remove it immediately. I heard that a math science called topography can be applied to mortal coil. Each square should have an even number of squares next to it. If a square has an odd number of squares next to it, then that square will be either the start or end point.
Well I don't understand about topography. Many people do not. But even like that I think you're screwed! Because I played Mortal Coil before, so many times I couldn't count it. I just didn't called it mortal coil, I called it Ice Dungeons on Pokemon. Pick up a VBA, and go play pokemon ruby! If you reach the Ice Gymn trainer you will find something just like Mortal Coil. But more simple of course! So all it takes is a pokemon player with half a brain... Do you understand me Codex?
Edit: Well I said I dont want to harm others not directly. But I didn't said it I don't want to cheat for myself... It is in that cheating that I need help...

Posted: Thu Jun 23, 2011 1:55 pm
by Adzeye
It's not cheating...some puzzles simply have a definite "solution". Runaway Robot's being fairly obvious, but Crossflip and Oneofus can essentially be represented as mathematical problems (which have been researched before - hence why so many people have done all the levels). Even if you know it you still have to apply it and clearly for Mortal Coil, given that people have scores varying for all ranges, it's not that obvious to do. Bricolage and Modulo are also versions of existing problems.

Posted: Thu Jun 23, 2011 2:33 pm
by yeni_ceri
Adzeye that edit was about why I am here. I do not want to learn to harm other (not directly). I want to learn how to cheat. For example cheating the ratio in a tracker is for my own benefit is not good for the community yet it is good for me, since most private trackers are hard as hell to seed. So I keep a good ratio, I download whatever I want to, but nobody notices so whatever... Maybe I was caught out of context, is that mean of "cheating" that I meant it was my answer to Codex... But yeah I agree with you... But yeah thanks I'm learning a lot just in the first day.

Posted: Thu Jun 23, 2011 7:16 pm
by yeni_ceri
http://www.hacker.org/forum/viewtopic.php?t=169

Ok, I read this and I got myself more or less into the spirit...
Now I can define exactly what I want to do... I want to cheat the system if needed, maybe help out, maybe create something... What I don't want to do is to make people loose their money or their possessions, their fun, etc etc... And that's exactly why I am here!

Posted: Sat Jun 25, 2011 12:15 am
by MrTerry
well the meaning of this site (so far i know) is, that u learn how to solve (or just get an anwer) to given challenges by extending ur knowledge of pc/programming.
Even if its called HACKER.org and the common interpretation for the word "hacker" is some mad guys behind a pc to harm others, thats not the meaning of this site....
try out the challenges for urself and u ll understand what i mean.... btw
for mcoil .... the ice dungeon from pokemon isnt the same as this... since there u can cross ur path for example ....

and just by comparing to the pokemon version u make a BIG mistake itself!
well a 10x10 grid is somewhat easy to solve....even by hand.... but what woudl you do by an 30x30 grid? or 100x100 ? thats not something u can solve by looking for start-end-points... naive versions of computer solvers doesnt even reach lvl 50!
I think u REALLY underestimate this.
btw topography? u sure? doesnt u mean graph theory? thats more like it ^^

and for bigger grids just looking for every possibility isnt enough.... u have to look for heurisitcs for example!

EVERY challange (also those puzzles) have a solution which can be found if u know for what u are looking for. But actually solving it is another story!

Posted: Sun Jun 26, 2011 2:39 pm
by yeni_ceri
Tell me how do I work on heuristics? I mean I do I interpreter a heuristic? Hell, I don't even studied heuristics in my life! How can I learn heuristics and how I can learn to interpreter heuristics?
As I said I am here to learn!

Edit: I haver a better question how I learn to solve? How do I learn to find solutions.

Posted: Sun Jun 26, 2011 9:13 pm
by Adzeye
By trying different puzzles :wink: . You could start by writing a brute-force solver. It won't get you very far, but will give you the general idea. Then, add stuff to that program, try to eliminate solutions trees early on. You should solve some problems by hand too to get used to the puzzle and to get a feel of when what kind of moves creates an unsolvable board.

It's not something that you study in a book, since heuristics are unique to the given puzzle.

Posted: Mon Jun 27, 2011 1:41 am
by yeni_ceri
I see we have a word for that here, actually a very unique word: "desenrascanço".

http://portuguesefordummies.blogspot.co ... scano.html

I think this is better than heuristics ^^. Actually I applied this very concept to enter here, I had no plan! I simply touched a random square and started circling, when I saw the solution I just followed it. I didn't remember "pokemon" until I was in. But thanks for the help!

Edit: Actually, this word has a similiar to the word "improvise", except improvise implies that you have something to work with, in this case I had not. Just my brain actually. Actually I was very very close to study a bit of topography LOL.

Posted: Sat Jul 02, 2011 9:50 am
by MrTerry
well even a "good enough" solution is sometimes hard to find.... ^^

u should really consider for now to solve 50 or more of the challenges before u try out to solve mortal coil or so..... i still think u are clearly underestimating this site! ^^
We all can google and link to a site where we believe is valuable information, but if it is really a proper approach is a different story