My husband was having a bad day at work the other day. He works in IT, so he contacted his manager with the following email, the actual content has been removed:
<rant>Description of lousy day here.</rant>
I have a passable understanding of HTML, having managed several websites a few years back, and so I know enough to find this amusing. Unfortunately, as we soon found out, the use of fake HTML is addictive and we had the following interchange:
Me:<rant>Everyone is using my stuff!!!</rant>
The Husband: The beauty of the rant tag is you don’t need the ‘!!!’ <rant>Everyone is using my stuff.</rant> It adds context.
Me: Wait, are you dissing my use of fake HTML?
The Husband: No, no, no… The point is that the tag takes a totally innocuous statement, i.e., “Everyone is using my stuff” and makes it so you read it with the intended ‘rant-voice’ in your head.
Me: <LOVE>You are an interesting fellow.</LOVE> <worry>Wait. Does that end the love.</worry>
The Husband: <romantic>Our Love will never end.</romantic> <giggle>Tee-Hee</giggle>
There was much debate as to whether Tee-Hee needed a giggle tag or not. What takes this from being a whimsical behind the scenes anecdote at GeekMom, is the fact that I keep using fake HTML tags in my head when having conversations with people. I brought this subject to my fellow GeekMoms and as it turns out, this is becoming somewhat of a thing among people of all degrees of HTML capability.
We’re getting ready to head to Seattle in a week or so. It’s only a couple of hours on the plane, but I always like to have a few tricks up my sleeve to keep Vivienne entertained. So I’m in the market for some new apps to play with. Whenever I do a little refresh like this, I always head over to the ever fabulous Moms With Apps. It’s a fantastic aggregator, and thus far, whenever I’ve grabbed something off their list, it’s been a winner.
In fact, I took a chance on an app they recommended and I am breathlessly in love with it. I say “took a chance” because it wasn’t cheap – most apps are anywhere from $.99 to $1.99 – but this one was $4.99 – a little pricey to just say, “let’s give it a go.” But I am 100% glad I paid the money for it. It’s worth it.
It’s called Tam & Tao in Numberland by Les Trois Elles and it teaches counting based on the Montessori method. It’s simply gorgeous – 10 different scenarios for the numbers 0-9, and each one has so many layers of detail and little easter eggs that just seem endless. Click on the girl and you count along with her, click on the boy and you’re transported to a drawing tablet where you can trace the number being featured, then try to draw it yourself freehand. Not to mention all the other secrets waiting to be discovered on every screen. Just the other day we were delighted to find that if you touch the stars in the “zero” screen, they sound a musical note and then wink out. It’s meant for ages 3-5, but Vivienne (who will be 2 in September) will sit with me and play it for quite a long time. And you can choose English, French or Spanish.
What are your favorite apps for toddlers? I’d like to know, and I’ll update more as I find them.
I enjoyed solving it and that reminded me of a time where I was teaching younger students (12 to 15 years old) and had once used ciphers as a way to teach languages (French, in my case).
It is quite obvious (at least for our geek readers) that one can use ciphers to teach math.
But simple shift codes such as Caesar Shift Cipher used in the GeekDad Challenge are about letters and words, and the way we had to decipher them before computer programs depended of our knowledge of language.
This activity was once designed for 12 years old students. I’m sure younger children can manage it, too. Or older children, if you increase the difficulty by choosing another language than their mothertongue.
The cipher was in French in my first version, I changed the examples to pick them in GeekDad challenge cipher.
Here was the challenge :
This puzzle is a list of encrypted words that all share a special distinction. Your job is to decrypt these words, figure out what’s special about these words and where they come from. There are a number of words in this paragraph count the words and you’ll have a good start. Remember the key is the words in this paragraph.
1. OZ CGY G VRKGYAXK ZU HAXT.
2. OT G NURK OT ZNK MXUATJ ZNKXK ROBKJ G NUHHOZ.
3. IGRR SK OYNSGKR
4. OZ CGY G HXOMNZ IURJ JGE OT GVXOR, GTJ ZNK IRUIQY CKXK YZXOQOTM ZNOXZKKT.
5. SGXRKE CGY JKGJ, ZU HKMOT COZN.
6. UTIK AVUT G ZOSK ZNKXK CKXK LUAX ROZZRK XGHHOZY, GTJ ZNKOX TGSKY CKXK – LRUVYE, SUVYE, IUZZUT-ZGOR, GTJ VKZKX.
7. UTIK ZNKXK CKXK LUAX INORJXKT CNUYK TGSKY CKXK VKZKX, YAYGT, KJSATJ GTJ RAIE.
8. OZ CGY ZNK HKYZ UL ZOSKY, OZ CGY ZNK CUXYZ UL ZOSKY
9. ZNK TOMNZ HKLUXK NK CKTZ ZU RUTJUT, XOINGXJ SGENKC CGY TUZ KTPUEOTM NOSYKRL.
10. SX. GTJ SXY. JAXYRKE, UL TASHKX LUAX, VXOBKZ JXOBK, CKXK VXUAJ ZU YGE ZNGZ ZNKE CKXK VKXLKIZRE TUXSGR, ZNGTQ EUA BKXE SAIN.
The first paragraph gave the key of the code (“The word “words” appears 6 times in the paragraph, 6 is the key to decrypt these clues using the good old Caesar Shift Cipher.”)
But what if you don’t have the key (which is the case in most spies stories) ?
Letter frequencies in English.
You’ll still be able to decipher the message. We’ll mainly use the method known as frequency analysis. You can decipher all substitution ciphers using that method, not only simple shift ones like Caesar’s. That will only take longer but will be more interesting, too, as you will need more than one confirmed hypothesis to decipher the text.
1. Look for single-letter words. Now, think about frequent single-letter words in the language you work with.
By example, in GeekDad challenge, you find G as one-letter word. Most frequent single-letter words in English obviously are “a” (the indefinite article) and “I” (the first person singular nominative pronoun). You’ll have to try both.
2. Do the same thing with two-letters and three-letters words. Be smart, remember to connect your results between them, remember to consider the place of the words in the sentence. It may confirm or infirm your 1# hypothesis.
By example, you will notice the frequency of OZ at the beginning of the sentences. Ask your geeklings to wonder: which two-letters words are more likely to be found at the beginning of sentences ? (In this case, the word happens to be “it”.)
If your #1 hypothesis was that G stood for “a”, you will notice two frequent three-words letters with a G : CGY and GTJ. Ask your geeklings to find frequent three-letters words like ?a? and a??. (In this case, the words are “was” and “and”.)
In French, you may observe the single letters just before an apostrophe, likely to be “l” or “j” or “d”.
You may use Word Frequency files as an help for your geekling. Such lists are usually boring, but here they will become wonderfully useful, a real spy’s tool.
3. Work with the letter frequencies in your encrypted message. The counting would be quite tedious and not really interesting so you can use this program. This other tool will also give you two-letters sequences, three-letters sequences…
Now you can show your geekling the letter frequencies in the language (s)he’s working with and let him/her try some hypothesis.
Letter frequencies in French
4. Be smart, remember ? When you have to decrypt a cipher, you sometimes have some clue of what it may be about. Use it to work faster.
With GeekDad Challenge, once you understood the sentence are famous novels beginnings, you could deduce some words without actually needing to decrypt them.
Now feel free to design some lovely ciphers of various difficulties (and in various languages) with your kids !
A few tools you might need or enjoy :
Need to change something from lowercase to uppercase? Count the letters, numbers, and punctuation? Remove spaces or add spaces at every X characters? This can help. Just type some text into the box and click on the links to change things around.
Lazy ? Want a program to encrypt a message for you ? This one even offers the possibility to use Sherlock Holmes’ Dancing Men or Bionicle alphabet to encrypt a message (as well as more standard substitution ciphers, of course).
Here’s another famous beginning (in English, I promise) using Dancing Men alphabet. Have fun decrypting it.
and of course Neal Stephenson, Cryptonomicon, the adventures of some World War II codebreakers and their modern day progeny.
Two other books I haven’t read but potentially of interest :
Ken Follett, The Key to Rebecca (1980), World War II spy novel whose plot revolves around the heroes’ efforts to cryptanalyze a book cipher with time running out.
Clifford B. Hicks, Alvin’s Secret Code (1963), a children’s novel which introduces some basics of cryptography and cryptanalysis (recommended for age 9-12). About this last one, you will enjoy this very geek dad/geek son review on Amazon by Dave Hicks :
I am the author’s son. I was about the same age as Alvin is in the book when my Dad wrote this. We both shared a fascination with codes and ciphers and spent time challenging each other, etc. This book grew out of that fascination. This is my favorite of my Dad’s many children’s books and remains a “good read” today. The field of cryptography has changed greatly with the advent of computers, but kids still enjoy protecting their secrets and trying to “crack” those of their friends. Although I may be a bit biased, I give this my highest rating!
One of the many nice things about working for G4 is traveling. Thanks to Attack of the Show and Ninja Warrior, my husband and I have been to Japan quite a few times – and this October we took our daughter (then 13 months) with us. Tokyo with a toddler in tow was just incredible. We met people we wouldn’t have otherwise met, saw the city in a completely different light, and had experiences we never could have expected.
For instance, I spent a good hour in the department store Isetan happily watching my daughter play with a little Japanese girl in a pool full of brightly colored nerf bananas. No language necessary!
No, I don’t know why they had a pool of brightly colored nerf bananas there, but add it to the list of why Tokyo is wonderful. So, so, so very wonderful.
My daughter was at this awesome stage where she was very smiley and friendly to strangers – so we’d get into elevators with these buttoned-up Japanese businessmen and she’d lean out of the stroller and say “HI!” and they would just melt. Everywhere we went we could hear people as they passed us saying “Kawaii!! Kawaii-ne?!” – which means “Cute! Cute, right?” – and I have to tell you, as her mother, that was VERY SATISFYING.
Anyway, by the time Christmas rolled around, we were going through some serious withdrawal. The Tokyo DT’s are not a pretty sight; sobbing over empty bags of Green Tea Kit-Kats and crumpled packages of Grape Mentos, trolling the local ramen places in Little Tokyo, listening to Capsule’s “Fruits Clipper” CD over and over, dressing like a gothic lolita – okay maybe it didn’t get THAT bad, but you understand me.
They’re wooden blocks that have the same look and feel of the classic ABC blocks, but instead, boast Hiragana characters and the Katakana equivalent. I’m not doing this definition justice, but essentially, Hiragana and Katakana are like syllables the Japanese use for words that have no Kanji to represent them. Hiragana is used for the traditional Japanese sounds and Katakana are used for words that the Japanese have borrowed from other languages. A good example of this is “towel” – which in Japanese is “taoru.”
They’ve also got a puzzle on one side, which I have no shame in telling you is REALLY HARD to figure out, and thus, VERY REWARDING to complete!
If you plan on teaching your child another language, or, uh, just like looking as though you are — these are a marvelous tool. They have them in a ton of different languages like French, Italian, Chinese, Korean – even Hieroglyphics. Baby shower gift: SOLVED.
I’m not planning on putting her in a toddler Japanese class anytime soon, but I figure, hey – she’s a sponge right now. Maybe she’ll soak these characters up, and one day find herself in Japan, surprised to realize she knows the department store OIOI isn’t said as if you were a British Ruffian, “Oi! Oi!” – but is pronounced, “Maru One.”