LifeWiki talk:Did you know

Numbers off

Did you know that ... the numbers are off by one from Did you know/21 on? Is that intentional? This is confusing; it should at least be explained in the instructions. Micromegas (talk) 00:41, 11 March 2018 (UTC)

They look fine to me, all the way from 1 to 91. Can you take a screenshot (please put it on Imgur or so, not on the LifeWiki) showing the issue you're seeing? Apple Bottom (talk) 09:41, 11 March 2018 (UTC)

Oh, we don't need a screenshot - just a snippet from the source shows it:

...

# [[LifeWiki:Did you know/19]]: {{LifeWiki:Did you know/19}}

# [[LifeWiki:Did you know/20]]: {{LifeWiki:Did you know/20}}

# [[LifeWiki:Did you know/21]]: {{LifeWiki:Did you know/22}}

# [[LifeWiki:Did you know/22]]: {{LifeWiki:Did you know/23}}

...

From 21 on, the number in the link before the colon is different from that in the transclusion. (Sorry, I realize it was confusing that I referred to the source view, not realizing that the processed view shows yet another series of numbers from the numbered list.) Micromegas (talk) 07:56, 12 March 2018 (UTC)

To prevent such misalignments, it might be a good idea to create a template, so that the number has to be entered only once. Micromegas (talk) 07:58, 12 March 2018 (UTC)

Thanks, fixed.~ Apple Bottom (talk)

Suggestions

• 9: 2009 was 12 years ago. Maybe replace with the p23 in 2019?
• 14: Add "finite"; there's an infinite p9 worker bee.
• 20: We know the number now, right? It's about 190,000.
• 26: update
• 27: with so many types now, this one should be outright deleted
• 38: SMOS gets at least second place
• 42: 2014 was 7 years ago; might want to remove it
• 43: same issue as #42
• 45: update
• 54: remove; there are still four 16-bit p2s that have been unsynthesized
• 61: remove; it was really only relevant when it wasn't former
• 78: Has this been proven? If so, remove "known"
• 90: remove; isn't this obvious?
• 91: There are two known p53s with a central reaction, although they still require Snarks on the edges/corners.

To add (some of these can take the numbers that get deleted):

• Goldtiger997 RRO
• that the period-21 glider gun is the seventh smallest gun in bounding box and the lowest odd true period glider gun, but was not discovered until 2021?
• that an SMOS was discovered in 2021?
• that B35/S23 and B36/S23 are not explosive, but B37/S23 is?
• that several symmetric medium- and high-period oscillators were found via soup search in 2018, and even more were found by a Python search program in 2021?
• that Karel's p177 is the highest-period elementary oscillator with no external support?
• that Rob's p16, despite having only 21 cells and fitting in a 9×8 bounding box, was only discovered in 2020, and by soup search?
• that the minimum one-cell thick solid line that emits escaping gliders has 56 cells?
• that the smallest oscillators of period 3, 4, 8, and 15 all have exactly 12 cells?
• that a solid 83×83 square produces four unixes at the corners?
• that there is no known strictly volatile period-4 oscillator?
• that hitting a pre-block with a glider can output a LWSS or MWSS?
• that a specific configuration of two ponds and two blocks recover back to their original positions when sparked in a certain way, allowing for period multipliers?
• that the clock is almost 5,000 times rarer than the toad despite both having 6 cells and fitting in a 4×4 bounding box?
• that the quadpole is more common than the tripole?

HotdogPi (talk) 14:14, 23 August 2021 (UTC)

My notes say I've added all but two of these:

• that several symmetric medium- and high-period oscillators were found via soup search in 2018, and even more were found by a Python search program in 2021?
• that a specific configuration of two ponds and two blocks recover back to their original positions when sparked in a certain way, allowing for period multipliers?

The first one I'd like to qualify better somehow, like "more than X symmetric higher-period oscillators", but 2021 is still going on. And then I want to compare and contrast with other search methods like Nicolay Beluchenko's and Jason Summers' RandomAgar searches, but then it's all getting too big for a did-you-know post -- at least unless we have a LifeWiki article or a blog post to link to that gives more of the details.

The second one I have a similar objection to: if something is important enough to mention in a did-you-know, then it's probably important enough to have its own article page, and then we can link to it.

Thoughts? Of course I don't really object to those last two did-you-knows being added, I just didn't actually do it myself. Dvgrn (talk) 22:21, 7 September 2021 (UTC)

DPL-related suggestion

Previously, User:Ian07 suggested listing DYK entries with DPL along the lines of

{{#dpl:namespace=LifeWiki|titlematch=Did you know/%|format=,\n*[[%PAGE%]]: |include=*}}

However, the results will be sorted lexicographically instead of numerically, so it goes 1, 10, 100, 101, etc. How about prepending some zeroes to the indices, for example 1 → 001, 10 → 010, etc ? (Three-digit numbers will be enough, I think) GUYTU6J (talk) 02:26, 7 November 2021 (UTC)

Why are the lines displayed on the main page always consecutive?

I feel like it would be better if each one was randomised, as there are several sets of consecutive lines that are very similar (for example, today there are 3 about heisenburps). --Galoomba (talk) 00:37, 18 April 2023 (UTC)