roblog

Wedding gift message character restrictions

While buying a wedding gift using the Bloomingdale's gift registry, I decided to collect my thoughts about an aspect of these stores that I find infuriating: They all make it as difficult as possible to write a gift message. 

Over time, on sites like Bloomingdale's and Macy's, I've seen one or more of the below restrictions on gift messages:

  • You must separate your message into lines.
  • Each line is limited to a certain number of characters.
  • Punctuation is stripped from your message.
  • Your message is converted to ALL CAPS.

Today, my gift message needed to be separated into three lines, and each line had a limit of 45 characters. (At least they had Javascript that stopped you when you got to the 45 so I didn't have to count myself.) That's just 135 characters to work with--less than a tweet. And, of course, you only get all 135 if each of your lines happen to end at exactly the 45 character mark.

I saw a "live chat" button and decided to vent a little. I wasn't expecting any sort of real response, and indeed, my expectations were met.

Deborah C:  Welcome to Macy's live chat service! What can I help you with today?
Customer:  Why do sites like yours always have the line-by-line character limit (in this case it's limited to 45 characters per line)?
Deborah C:  I'm so sorry for any inconvenience .
Deborah C:  that is all they allow for message.
Customer:  Right, I realize that, but it seems such a strange and arbitrary restriction. If you need a limit, why not just have a limit on the total number of characters?
Deborah C:  I do apologize.
Deborah C:  Do you have any additional questions I may answer for you?
Deborah C:  I'm so sorry. As there has been no response, I will be closing our Chat session. If we can assist you in the future, please do not hesitate to contact us again. Have a great day!

 

 

Setting "User Interaction Enabled" in XCode 4

I was trying to turn off "User Interaction Enabled" in a UIImageView. I happened to be on the third tab of the settings for the object. I saw the "User Interaction Enabled" checkbox (near the bottom of the first screenshot), but unchecking it didn't work. What I didn't notice was that the header for that section of settings is "Accessibility". I finally found that the (identically named) setting I wanted is actually under the fourth tab near the bottom (see second screenshot). Tricksy.

 

(download)

Saving a few cents on BART SFO trips

When traveling from San Francisco proper to SFO on Bart, you can save 50 cents if you have the Bart-enabled Muni monthly pass. The trip I'm on right now--from Powell station to SFO--normally costs $8.10. But if instead of taking an SFO train from Powell, you take a Daly City train to Balboa Park (free with your pass because it's within San Francisco), and then switch to the SFO train, it only costs $7.60.

Note that as long as you do this only if the Daly City train is coming before the SFO train, it doesn't increase your commute time. When you get to Balboa Park, check the displays for when the next SFO train is coming. I like to make sure I have at least two minutes to get upstairs, exit the turnstile, reenter the turnstile, and then get back downstairs to the trains.

If for some reason you don't think you can make it, just get off the Daly City train and wait for the SFO one. You won't save the 50 cents, but at least you won't miss your flight.

Amazon Review Spam

Leslie Valiant, newly announced winner of the 2010 Turing Award, recently wrote a book called Circuits of the Mind. I headed over to Amazon to see what people have said about his new book. The one "review" that's there is really just some content lifted from Valiant's book, with no actual opinions expressed. This was curious, though, since the review's author is listed as a "Top 1000 Reviewer". I clicked to see his other reviews. He's written a ton, but all of them (or at least the first two pages of them) follow the same basic format:

5 stars

<A sentence or so of bio>

Here are some quotations from the book:

<one or more quotations from the book>

Clearly these aren't helpful as reviews, but it seems their creator has probably invested a decent amount of time making these. There's got to be an angle here, but I don't know what it is.

 

Santa's Lil' Zombies

Mark and I wrote a new game called Santa's Lil' Zombies. The story goes like this: something went terribly wrong up in the North Pole (aka "Nopo") and the elves were infected with stuff that makes ordinary elves turn into zombies. You, with your trusty snowball blaster, have to take down these little monsters in order to save Christmas.  More info over at http://santaslilzombies.com, or you can try out the demo right here:

I was surprised with the "coin-flip" probability that Giants win series

Floating around the internet today is the stat that 61% of world series game 1 winners go on to win the world series. (Interestingly, 84% of the last 13 have gone on to win it, but I'm not looking at that fact right now.)

I was curious what the probability of this happening is, if I assumed a simple model where each game in the best of 7 series is a fair coin flip. I expected that the probability would be much lower than 61%. Why? Because I assumed that the psychological advantage combined with whatever skill advantage is implied by the team having won the first game would lead to a much higher chance of those first winners (the Giants, this year) winning the whole thing.

But, I was surprised to find that the probability is 0.66.

Giants-rangers