Short stories
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- Dalva Golden White Colheita 1952
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Re: Short stories
We should start a thread where trivial questions could be asked with a quizmaster who relinquishes the quiz once his question has been answered...
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- Dalva Golden White Colheita 1952
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Re: Short stories
I was just shoehorning in the winner of a six word short story competition into this thread. I know it's seven words. It should of course go; "no taxidermist loved his daughter more".PhilW wrote:No, but I'm intrigued to hear your explanation as to why that could have been the answer?LGTrotter wrote:Is it; "the taxidermist never loved his daughter more"?
The answer, once known, will be clear and unambiguous (aside from the pun!).
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- Dalva Golden White Colheita 1952
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Re: Short stories
Seems like time for another clue; SACD are the initials of an author, BUT his Christian name does not begin with an S.
Re: Short stories
Sir Arthur Conan Doyle?
Links to where I spent a significant amount of term time as a late teenager.
Links to where I spent a significant amount of term time as a late teenager.
"The first duty of Port is to be red"
Ernest H. Cockburn
Ernest H. Cockburn
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- Dalva Golden White Colheita 1952
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Re: Short stories
Yes, which should give away the rest of the answer being the title of a story he wrote...DRT wrote:Sir Arthur Conan Doyle?
- djewesbury
- Graham’s 1970
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Re: Short stories
The Sign of The Four?
Daniel J.
Husband of a relentless former Soviet Chess Master.
delete.. delete.. *sigh*.. delete...
Husband of a relentless former Soviet Chess Master.
delete.. delete.. *sigh*.. delete...
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- Dalva Golden White Colheita 1952
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Re: Short stories
The correct story; The ideal answer would have been "The sine of the four", since sine(4)=-0.7568024950..... or in short -0.7568.djewesbury wrote:The Sign of The Four?
Daniel's turn.
(oops, no, wrong thread)
- djewesbury
- Graham’s 1970
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Re: Short stories
Yes. I get that. But really, Phil…
SACD was a neighbour of my grandfather (REOJ) for a while.
![Laughing :lol:](./images/smilies/icon_lol.gif)
SACD was a neighbour of my grandfather (REOJ) for a while.
Daniel J.
Husband of a relentless former Soviet Chess Master.
delete.. delete.. *sigh*.. delete...
Husband of a relentless former Soviet Chess Master.
delete.. delete.. *sigh*.. delete...
Re: Short stories
I was confused by this:
Which is just close enough to 221B that I was trying to figure out that (non-existent) pun.PhilW wrote:229° would be the relevant one, but I'm really not sure it will help you to know this, unless you realise something else...
Glenn Elliott
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- Dalva Golden White Colheita 1952
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Re: Short stories
Well I'm glad we got that cleared up. It would have preyed on my mind.
Re: Short stories
PhilW’s new signature says “SAWPSBGXWWCPCQHBQZWJZTKRKR”. I have no idea, but if it is an acronym then the ‘QZW’ might be worthy of focus.
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- Dalva Golden White Colheita 1952
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Re: Short stories
Nobody seems to have picked up the challenge; perhaps it is too obscure. It is a cryptogram; I will say no more for now, since clues would likely make it too easy, but will reveal the answer early in the new year and replace with something else then, if it is not solved before.jdaw1 wrote:PhilW’s new signature says “SAWPSBGXWWCPCQHBQZWJZTKRKR”. I have no idea, but if it is an acronym then the ‘QZW’ might be worthy of focus.
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- Dalva Golden White Colheita 1952
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Re: Short stories
For anyone interested, this was in fact a Vigenere cipher, which when decoded would have revealed the text "PM key to PhilW on TPF for reward", the key being "Dom Luis I Porto" (all case-insensitive). If decoded, the sender of the first correct answer would have received a bottle of VP from me (a G70 to be precise). The cryptogram was carefully constructed to be difficult but not impossible for users of this forum; ask me about it sometime if you are interested in further details.PhilW wrote:Nobody seems to have picked up the challenge; perhaps it is too obscure. It is a cryptogram; I will say no more for now, since clues would likely make it too easy, but will reveal the answer early in the new year and replace with something else then, if it is not solved before.jdaw1 wrote:PhilW’s new signature says “SAWPSBGXWWCPCQHBQZWJZTKRKR”. I have no idea, but if it is an acronym then the ‘QZW’ might be worthy of focus.
Re: Short stories
I did wonder if it was a cipher like that, but couldn't figure out any way of trying to crack it. Seeing the answer, I suppose it would not have been too wild to guess that PORT might appear in the key, and to just move PORT along to different positions in the key and look at what answer that produced.
With PORT in the correct position in the key, the plaintext would have been "hilw" and "ewar". Even then, if I'd spotted that p went before "hilw" and d went after "ewar", I'd then have found these letters from the key *******IPORTO. Would I ever have figured out the DOM LUIS part? Very doubtful!
Edit: and as I think about it, I would not have easily been able to get the "ewar" text, as I could not be sure of the key length...
Not so easy I think!
Re: Short stories
The key is of length 13; the ciphertext (cyphertext?) of length 26. Assuming a wide range of plain texts, that might not be crackable even in theory. Letters 1 and 14 are same distance (modulo 26) from each other as in ciphertext. With even a little uncertainty about length of key, did we really have enough information?
And ‘Vigenère’ has an accent.
Edit: absence of repetition defeats Kasiski examination:
And ‘Vigenère’ has an accent.
Edit: absence of repetition defeats Kasiski examination:
Code: Select all
SAWPSBGXWWCPC
QHBQZWJZTKRKR