Featured Posts in Games

Top 10 Awesome Things You Can Do With the Underused Gadgets You Already Own

In Lifehacker Top 10, Repurpose, Repurposed, Clever Uses, Gadgets, Tech, Technology, Computers, Smartphones, Ipod, Ipod Touch, Iphone, Phones, Voip, Skype, Laptops, Tablets, Digital Photo Frames, Hard Drives, Multiple Monitors, Ethernet, Keychains, Diy, Games, Gaming, Game Consoles, Nintendo, Nes, Tv, Television, Cables, Routers, Wireless Audio, Streaming Music, Radio, Headphones, Headsets, Audio, Sound, Feature, / 14 April 2012 / 0 comments

If you're a fan of technology, chances are you've retired a few gadgets over the years and they're sitting in a box in your closet. Today's the day to dig out your leftovers and start thinking about what you can do to let them live and breathe again. Here are ten of our favorite ideas to get you started.

10. Repurpose Your Old Computer in Many, Many Ways

Repurposing an old computer is awesome but it's obvious, so let's get this one out of the way first. There is so much you can do. Laptops can become tablets, desktops can become powerful storage devices, and much more. Old computers are just slow computers with an outdated selection of ports, less storage and RAM, and generally paltry graphics cards. All you need is something else that has those minimal requirements and there's plenty you can do. Web servers, media centers, retro arcades, a kitchen computer that can get a little messy because it's old and you don't care,

9. Create Audio-Visual Mixes for Parties with a Digital Photo/Media Frame

The digital photo frame is something we've all gotten as a gift or bought with hopes that it was going to take us into the future of photo displaying. In the end, I think most of us feel like we were sold storage box filler. If you actually use a digital picture frame, you get the added bonus of paying more money for it for the rest of time. These things draw a reasonably large amount of power for something nobody is looking at most of the time, especially considering their analog predecessors—you know, normal picture frames—don't have that downside and can still display whatever photo you want. I could go on complaining about the downsides of spending tens of dollars on one of these basically pointless devices, but let's not and focus on the positive instead.

You don't want to be running your digital picture frame 24/7 (unless you love paying for wasted energy), so your best bet is to start looking at the thing as a device for specific events. Instead of loading it up with photos, stock your frame's internal storage (or SD card) with art that you like. If it can play video, put music videos on it or just find some awesome motion graphics on Vimeo (that's what I did). Hook it up during a party and you've got something cool to display (instead of photos of your tame vacation to Southern Florida). If it handles audio, too, hook up some speakers and you'll essentially have an audio-visual party mix.

8. Make a Clock, Smartphone Stand, or Laser Show with a Dead Hard Drive

What can you do with a dead hard drive? A lot, apparently. For example, you can turn it into a laser light show projector, make a steampunk clock, or turn it into a smartphone stand. Hard drives, even when dead, always seem like such a substantial thing to throw away. Instead, just make something cool and let it's spirit live on against the wall, on your desk, and in your heart.

7. Lose an Old Laptop, Gain a Second Monitor

Yeah, yeah, we've technically looked at things you can do with an old computer but those were all things that didn't involve taking them apart and actually turning them into new things. If you've got an old laptop that you never use but wouldn't mind having a second display for your desktop computer (or newer laptop), you're in luck! This Instructables post will teach you how to take your laptop apart and make the display usable with another computer. You could even use the bottom half of your laptop to do any of the old computer uses we mentioned earlier. It's a win-win.

6. Create the Best Keychain Ever with Old Cables

While old cables are nice to have around in case you need them someday, there isn't much you can do to repurpose them into something better. Nonetheless, there is one really awesome option: the Ethernet cable keychain. (See the photo to the right if you're not sure why this is so awesome). Technically you could do this with other types of cables, but Ethernet has the distinct advantage of being both thick and locking into its port. Other cables might not hold the weight of your keys or stay in quite as well.

5. Turn Your Nintendo Entertainment System, Controllers, and Games into Several Awesome New Gadgets

The Nintendo Entertainment System (NES) will live on forever as so many different items. You can turn it into a DVD player, make a game cartridge a wireless router, repurpose a controller as an MP3 player or remote control. If you're not ready to part with your NES, you can also just give it an upgrade and, therefore, a bit more life. Just don't let it go to waste.

4. Use Those Unused Ports on Your TV to Charge Your Phone, Set up a Security Camera, and More!

The ports on the back of your TV are often under-appreciated. Most of us plug in an HDMI box or two and call it a day, but the old school ports (and even some newer ones) let you do all sorts of neat things. The service USB port on most flatscreens is one of the most fun, allowing you to power all sorts of USB devices. This means you can plug in backlighting, or charge your smartphone or game controller. Video out ports can output what's on your television to another monitor or device so you can view from multiple locations or record what you're watching. A port or two on your television can probably host live video input from a camera you own, which can work as a makeshift security monitor or even a fun display at a party. For a whole bunch of ideas, and a primer on all the ports you've got, check out this post.

3. Turn Your Router into a Wireless Radio

Although I've been with the same router for four years now (aww), before I decided to settle down with my DD-WRT-ed LinkSys 310N I went through routers like toilet paper. If I hadn't given them all new homes before learning I could turn one of them into a wireless radio, I'd have done that in a heartbeat. Although this is one of the more complex DIY projects you can take on, it's also one of the coolest. Just check out the video to the left to learn how it's done. It's definitely a weekend project, but when you're done you'll have a wireless radio for the price of a router you weren't even using.

(Pssst! If that's not your style, try this bonus option: turn your router into a home automation server.

2. Use a Mobile Device as a Dedicated VOIP Phone

iPod touches make great iPhones when you add Skype, or any other VOIP service, to their array of apps, but any old device will do. Even if you've got a tablet you're not using anymore it can make a great phone (if you add a headset). Just keep it around the house and you've got a great makeshift home phone line (especially when you get Google Voice involved). Tablets also make great video conferencing devices (assuming they're sporting cameras). If you'd rather not sell yours because it isn't worth much anymore, use it solely for communication. It's remarkably helpful if you don't get great (or any) cellular service in your home.

1. Upgrade Your Crappy Headphones

When you're spending under $50 on headphones you're generally not going to get the greatest pair, but there is a lot you can do to make them worth far more than their price tag. Replacing the drivers yourself can net you audiophile-level sound on the cheap. You can also splice them with a headset to give them a few extra superpowers or even turn them into a noise-isolating headset (in some cases). If you've got a crappy pair and some time, these upgrades will give you a better sound and features without the associated cost.
Take a Break and Play Some Video Games This Weekend

In Weekendhacker, Video Games, Gaming, Fun, Weekend, Relaxation, Games, Hardware, Overclocking, Ios, Android, Windows, Smartphones, Voip, Skype, Laptops, Tablets, Digital Photo Frames, Hard Drives, Multiple Monitors, Ethernet, Keychains, Diy, Games, Gaming, Game Consoles, Nintendo, Nes, Tv, Television, Cables, Routers, Wireless Audio, Streaming Music, Radio, Headphones, Headsets, Audio, Sound, Feature, / 13 April 2012 / 0 comments

Productivity may be our main focus here at Lifehacker, but that doesn't mean we don't like to kick back with a good video game once in a while (after all, they're more than just an entertaining time sink). This weekend, take a break and de-stress with some of your favorite games (and some tweaks to make them better).

Break Out the Ol' Console

Okay, it doesn't necessarily have to be old, but the quickest way to get up and running (or shooting, or slaying, or portal gunning) is with a good old fashioned console and controller. Of course, there are any number of things that could get in your way. Those controllers can wear out pretty quickly, for example. If your buttons are feeling a little unresponsive, try fixing them with aluminum foil. Of course, for more complicated controllers—like those of the Rock Band/Guitar Hero persuasion—you may need to do a little more work. Though while you're at it, you could give your controllers a bit of extra modding, like this vented fan that keeps your controller from getting too sweaty.

If you've really got the DIY bug, you can do a little modding of the console itself, too. Nintendo consoles are particularly hackable, with the Wii allowing you to back up and play your games from an external drive, and the Nintendo DS letting you play all your games from one cartridge. Consoles like the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 are a bit less hackable, but that doesn't mean you can't combine them in one computer case to create the ultimate gaming machine, now does it?

Lastly, if you want to go retro, be prepared for setbacks—a lot of those old consoles just don't work like they used to. If your old NES or Genesis has bitten the dust, you can always just get those games on your PC or mobile device, complete with CRT filters to make them feel just like they used to. You could even turn your kickass XBMC media center into a video game console, and convert your old NES or SNES controller to USB—though it'd be a lot easier to just get a USB gamepad or USB adapter instead. And, if you just aren't ready to say goodbye to your old console, you can give it new life by turning it into a cool, retro DVD player or something similar. Photo by Pedro Aznar.

Beef Up Your Gaming PC for Superior Performance

Consoles are great for a lot of things, but PCs give you the most configurable game experience possible, so if you're of a PC person, you better take advantage of it. You don't have to build a whole new PC to get a good experience, though you may have to upgrade the hardware, since software tweaks can only do so much. If you're looking to upgrade, check out our part lists for the best $600 and $1200 computer you can buy, as well as the video card benchmarks over at Anandtech to get the most bang for your buck. And, if you want to make one last ditch effort to save your dying video card, you can try sticking it in the oven before you go spending money on a new one.

While software tweaks won't dramatically change your experience, they can give you a bit of a boost, which is great if your games are just on the wrong end of playable. The best thing you can do is overclock your video card, which is easy to do with a program like MSI Afterburner or EVGA Precision. You can also overclock your processor, which won't necessarily help as much, but can still increase performance in games that have a lot of things going on on the screen. If you're using a low-powered computer running something like an Atom, you'll definitely want to overclock it for the best performance possible.

If you're looking to have a little LAN party without carrying your tower over to your friend's house, it's worth mentioning the power of a VPN. It'll let you game with your friends from home as if you were all on the same LAN—no need to deal with that game's online services and other annoying players. Be sure to grab a good gaming headset too, so you can all talk to each other.

Lastly, if you're still feeling retro, you can play a lot of retro PC games on modern hardware with tools like DOSBox or ScummVM.

Find Some New Games for Free or Cheap

If your current crop of games is starting to feel a little stale after a weekend marathon, you might be thinking it's time to grab some new ones. Of course, you could head to GameStop to buy a brand new game, or you could play some free ones from one of these great resources (Linux users are especially lucky on the "free" front with places like Penguspy offering so many free games). You can also trade in your used games without even leaving the house, and use that traded money to shop strategically for cheap games. Of course, stores like Amazon and Steam often have lots of sales and free games, too, so be sure to check them out.

Got any other gaming hacks, tricks, or just games you're looking forward to playing this weekend? Share them in the comments below.

A Better Strategy for Hangman

In Games, Analytics, Words, Statistics, Fun, Relaxation, Games, Hardware, Overclocking, Ios, Android, Windows, Smartphones, Voip, Skype, Laptops, Tablets, Digital Photo Frames, Hard Drives, Multiple Monitors, Ethernet, Keychains, Diy, Games, Gaming, Game Consoles, Nintendo, Nes, Tv, Television, Cables, Routers, Wireless Audio, Streaming Music, Radio, Headphones, Headsets, Audio, Sound, Feature, / 05 April 2012 / 0 comments

A Better Strategy for Hangman There's no easy way to say it. You've probably been playing Hangman wrong your entire life.

In its purest form, hangman is a word game played between two people. One person selects a secret word, and the other tries to determine the word by guessing it letter-by-letter.

The player with the secret writes a series of dashes, one representing each letter in the solution. Initially, no information is known about the target word, other than its length.

The solver calls out letters, one-by-one. If a called letter appears in the solution, all occurrences in the solution are filled in.

A Better Strategy for Hangman

If the letter does not appear in the solution, the secret writer adds one element to a drawing of a gallows (complete with a stick man).

A complete rendering takes eleven moves.

If the hangman drawing gets completed (eleven incorrect letters), then the secret writer has won. If all letters of the word are revealed before this happens, then the solver wins.

As a young person, when you first started to play the game, you probably called out random letters. Once you got a hit of a couple of letters, it helped you narrow down the solution.

Next, you probably graduated to calling vowels first, having learned that (just about*) all words contain at least one vowel (or the letter ‘Y').

* The very complete word dictionary I'm using for this exercise contains 172,806 words. Only twenty of these words do not contain any vowel, or the letter ‘Y' e.g. CWM, TSKTSK, PSST, PHPHT and BRRR.

(I counted just 121 words with that do not contain any of the letters 'AEIOU', so the number that use just 'Y' as a vowel is 101).

Enlightenment: Guessing the First Letter

Next, you probably graduated to learning that not all letters are used equally. It's rare that the letter ‘Q' appears in a word, whereas ‘T' is used a lot more often.

Once you get just a couple of letters of in a hangman puzzle, the game becomes easier. The solution set is drastically reduced, and skills like pattern matching and word knowledge become important. It's crucial to get that first letter in the puzzle as soon as possible. Which letter should you guess first?

Code, Cyphers and Secret Writing

A Better Strategy for Hangman Growing up you probably invented or used your own substitution cypher (where each letter is replaced by a different letter or symbol). A classic example is the Pigpen Cypher. Messages encoded in a simple cypher are pretty easy to crack because the same letter always is always represented by the same symbol. If you solved a lot of puzzle cyphers, then you probably learned and used the letter ordering below.

Ordering of letter frequency in English language:

ETAOIN SHRDLU CMFWYP VBGKQJ XZ

The sequence above represents the usage order of letters in the English language, with the letter ‘E' being the most common letter, followed by the letter ‘T', all the way down to the letter ‘Z', the least commonly used.

So, the first letter we should guess when trying to solve a hangman is the letter ‘E', right?

Since ‘E' is the most popular letter in English text, it will have the highest probability of being in our word, right?

Wrong!

First mistake

Yes, the ordering above is an accurate portrayal of the frequency of usage of letters in English text, and if we were examining English text it is what we should be using …

… But, we're not looking at pages of text, we're looking at isolated words.

A Better Strategy for Hangman

English text is full of words that are used very frequently: THE, OF, AND, A, TO, IN, IS, YOU, THAT, IT …

A frequency table of letter usage based on English text is biased because of the substantial presence of these common words.

(About one-third of all printed English material is made up of the top 25 occurring words. The most popular 100 words make up approximately one-half of all printed English!).

Because we're trying to guess a naked word in isolation the above frequency distribution is not appropriate. It's distorted.

First Refinement

Instead, what we need to look for is the incidence of letters in the words in our dictionary, not the incidence of letters in all English text.

A Better Strategy for Hangman

This will give a much better probability estimate for the frequency of letters because it will be unbiased by the frequency of common words.

We can further refine this strategy and do a little better. Since we're happy if we hit one, or many, letters in our target word we do not want to double count frequency if there is more than one of the same letter in a word. Instead of counting the occurrences of all the letters, we count the number of times a letter is present (one or many) times in each word. Essentially giving a count of, if we select a letter, the number of words that this letter is present in.

We can then sort this list based on the probabilities (count of the number of words that letter is present in). Here are the results:

ESIARN TOLCDU PMGHBY FVKWZX QJ

There's a noticeable difference. Here, again, is the distribution based on frequency in English text (for comparison).

ETAOIN SHRDLU CMFWYP VBGKQJ XZ

Whilst 'E' is still the most popular letter, the next most popular (based on number of words in the dictionary that contain it), is 'S' and not 'T'. 'T' has been relegated to seventh ordinal position (60.13% of all words in my dictionary have a letter 'S' in them, but only 48.23% of them have a letter 'T').

Next in popularity come two more vowels 'I' and 'A' ('O' having moved further back). 'R' occurs significantly more often in isolated words than it does when biased by the frequency in everyday text.

The ordering of vowels is now 'E I A O U' instead of 'E A O I U'

Interestingly, the least likely letter is now 'J' instead of 'Z'. (There are just 2,463 words in the dictionary that contain the letter 'J' cf. 4,592 with the letter 'X' and 7,028 containing the letter 'Z').

Now that we know the chances of a letter being in any word we can use this new table to select our guesses, right?

Wrong!

Don't Forget About the Length!

The above distribution has been calculated for all the words in the dictionary. But remember, when playing Hangman, we know the length of the word we are trying to guess. This allows us to further refine our searching.

Below is a table showing the popularity of letters in dictionary words grouped by the length of those words. The most popular letters are at the top of the table, and the the least popular letters at the bottom. To the left are the shorter word lengths, and to the right are the longer ones.

Length of Word
	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	11	12	13	14	15	16	17	18	19	20
#1	A	A	A	A	S	E	E	E	E	E	E	E	I	I	I	I	I	I	I	I
#2	I	O	E	E	E	S	S	S	S	I	I	I	E	E	E	E	E	S	E	O
#3		E	O	S	A	A	I	I	I	S	S	S	N	T	T	T	T	E	T	E
#4		I	I	O	R	R	A	A	R	R	N	N	T	S	N	S	N	T	O	T
#5		M	T	I	O	I	R	R	A	A	A	T	S	N	S	N	S	O	N	R
#6		H	S	R	I	O	N	N	N	N	R	A	A	A	O	A	O	N	A	S
#7		N	U	L	L	L	T	T	T	T	T	R	O	O	A	O	A	R	S	A
#8		U	P	T	T	N	O	O	O	O	O	O	R	R	R	R	R	A	R	N
#9		S	R	N	N	T	L	L	L	L	L	L	L	L	L	L	L	L	L	C
#10		T	N	U	U	D	D	D	C	C	C	C	C	C	C	C	C	C	C	L
#11		Y	D	D	D	U	U	C	D	D	U	P	P	P	P	P	P	P	P	P
#12		B	B	P	C	C	C	U	U	U	D	U	U	U	U	U	U	M	M	H
#13		L	G	M	Y	M	G	G	G	G	P	M	M	M	M	M	M	U	U	U
#14		P	M	H	P	P	P	M	M	M	M	D	G	D	D	H	H	H	H	M
#15		X	Y	C	M	G	M	P	P	P	G	G	D	H	H	D	D	D	D	Y
#16		D	L	B	H	H	H	H	H	H	H	H	H	G	G	Y	G	G	G	D
#17		F	H	K	G	B	B	B	B	B	B	Y	Y	Y	Y	G	Y	Y	Y	G
#18		R	W	G	B	Y	Y	Y	Y	Y	Y	B	B	B	B	B	B	B	B	B
#19		W	F	Y	K	K	F	F	F	F	F	V	V	V	V	V	V	V	V	Z
#20		G	C	W	F	F	K	K	V	V	V	F	F	F	F	F	F	Z	F	V
#21		J	K	F	W	W	W	W	K	K	K	Z	Z	Z	Z	Z	Z	F	Z	F
#22		K	X	V	V	V	V	V	W	W	W	K	X	X	X	X	X	X	X	K
#23			V	J	Z	Z	Z	Z	Z	Z	Z	W	K	K	W	W	Q	Q	K	X
#24			J	Z	X	X	X	X	X	X	X	X	W	W	K	Q	W	W	J	J
#25			Z	X	J	J	J	Q	Q	Q	Q	Q	Q	Q	Q	K	J	K	Q	Q
#26			Q	Q	Q	Q	Q	J	J	J	J	J	J	J	J	J	K		W

There are so many fascinating things to point out about this table that I don't know where to start!

There are only two words with one letter!
There are no two letter words containing the letter C, Q, V or Z.
From one to four letter words, the most popular letter is A
For five letter words it changes to S, then from six to twelve it is the letter E. From thirteen letters onwards, the most likely letter to be in a word is the letter I.
The letter A starts off as the most popular vowel, but by the time words grow to 15 letter long, it has been relegated to fourth most common vowel.
There is no word in the English lanaguage that is 18 letters long and contains the letter J. Similarly, there is no twenty letter word which contains the letter W.
T is the most popular consonant in three letter words, and falls in popularity in mid-length words before regaining its popularity at fourteen.
Z is never the least popular letter.
O falls in popularity in mid-length words.

… plus much more …
Here is the same table again with a splash of color highlighting the vowels.

Length of Word
	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	11	12	13	14	15	16	17	18	19	20
#1	A	A	A	A	S	E	E	E	E	E	E	E	I	I	I	I	I	I	I	I
#2	I	O	E	E	E	S	S	S	S	I	I	I	E	E	E	E	E	S	E	O
#3		E	O	S	A	A	I	I	I	S	S	S	N	T	T	T	T	E	T	E
#4		I	I	O	R	R	A	A	R	R	N	N	T	S	N	S	N	T	O	T
#5		M	T	I	O	I	R	R	A	A	A	T	S	N	S	N	S	O	N	R
#6		H	S	R	I	O	N	N	N	N	R	A	A	A	O	A	O	N	A	S
#7		N	U	L	L	L	T	T	T	T	T	R	O	O	A	O	A	R	S	A
#8		U	P	T	T	N	O	O	O	O	O	O	R	R	R	R	R	A	R	N
#9		S	R	N	N	T	L	L	L	L	L	L	L	L	L	L	L	L	L	C
#10		T	N	U	U	D	D	D	C	C	C	C	C	C	C	C	C	C	C	L
#11		Y	D	D	D	U	U	C	D	D	U	P	P	P	P	P	P	P	P	P
#12		B	B	P	C	C	C	U	U	U	D	U	U	U	U	U	U	M	M	H
#13		L	G	M	Y	M	G	G	G	G	P	M	M	M	M	M	M	U	U	U
#14		P	M	H	P	P	P	M	M	M	M	D	G	D	D	H	H	H	H	M
#15		X	Y	C	M	G	M	P	P	P	G	G	D	H	H	D	D	D	D	Y
#16		D	L	B	H	H	H	H	H	H	H	H	H	G	G	Y	G	G	G	D
#17		F	H	K	G	B	B	B	B	B	B	Y	Y	Y	Y	G	Y	Y	Y	G
#18		R	W	G	B	Y	Y	Y	Y	Y	Y	B	B	B	B	B	B	B	B	B
#19		W	F	Y	K	K	F	F	F	F	F	V	V	V	V	V	V	V	V	Z
#20		G	C	W	F	F	K	K	V	V	V	F	F	F	F	F	F	Z	F	V
#21		J	K	F	W	W	W	W	K	K	K	Z	Z	Z	Z	Z	Z	F	Z	F
#22		K	X	V	V	V	V	V	W	W	W	K	X	X	X	X	X	X	X	K
#23			V	J	Z	Z	Z	Z	Z	Z	Z	W	K	K	W	W	Q	Q	K	X
#24			J	Z	X	X	X	X	X	X	X	X	W	W	K	Q	W	W	J	J
#25			Z	X	J	J	J	Q	Q	Q	Q	Q	Q	Q	Q	K	J	K	Q	Q
#26			Q	Q	Q	Q	Q	J	J	J	J	J	J	J	J	J	K		W

OK, so our strategy should be to find the column corresponding to the number of letters in the target word, and start calling down the letters from the top until we get a hit, right?

Wrong! (Though now we're a lot closer to an optimal strategy!)

Conditional Probability

What went wrong? How come the above search strategy is not the optimal?

Well, the above table gives us the distribution of letters based on independent events. They show the relative probability of a letter being in a word. But, if we guess a letter and it is not in the solution, this reduces the set of possible words. Are you with me?

Let me give an example: If we have a six letter word, our first letter to guess should be 'E'. If the letter 'E' is not in the solution, we should not necessarily try the letter 'S' next (which is what the above table implies)!

Yes, 'S' is the second most likely letter for all words, but we already know that our target word does not contain a letter 'E', so we need to recalculate the probabilities for the next most likely letter based on six letter words that do not contain this letter. (In fact, if there is no 'E' in a six letter word, the next letter to suggest should be an 'A', not an 'S').

We can continue this recurssion. Each time, if we don't get a match, we remove all possible words that don't contain that letter (and all previous suggested letters), and then look for the most popular letter in the remaining set.

Results

Here are the final results of these calculations. These charts tell you what order to call letters, based on length of the word, to maximize your chances of getting your first hit.

Number of letters	Optimal calling order
1	A I
2	A O E I U M B H
3	A E O I U Y H B C K
4	A E O I U Y S B F
5	S E A O I U Y H
6	E A I O U S Y
7	E I A O U S
8	E I A O U
9	E I A O U
10	E I O A U
11	E I O A D
12	E I O A F
13	I E O A
14	I E O
15	I E A
16	I E H
17	I E R
18	I E A
19	I E A
20	I E

There are some interesting take aways from these results:

The most challenging (least deterministically obvious) words to guess are three letter words. It can take up to ten guesses before getting a letter on the board!
With less than three letters, it gets easier (there are less possible words), and with more than three letters it becomes less likely there will be any words that you cannot find a letter for quickly.
For five letter words, the best first guess is the letter S. This is the only time a consonant is the most likely first guess letter.
For four letter words, the first non-vowel guess is an S, followed by B and then F (remember, these are only called if all preceeding letters have failed to hit).
No row contains more than ten guesses, and since a Hangman game takes eleven fails to lose, it is impossible to come up with any English letter word that will fail at Hangman without a single letter appearing on the board (assuming the optimal search strategy above is followed).
A should only be your first guess if the word length is four or less letters. If five letters, go for S first. Between six and twelve letters try E and above that you should call I.

Carrying On

The above analysis (finding our first letter) is easy to render in table form because there are only two choices: We either miss, or we hit. If we miss, we simply try again. Once we've hit a letter or two, however, things get too complex to display in table format. e.g. "Show me the next best letter to guess for eight letter words that have do not have an 'E' or 'I', but have an 'A' and a 'T'!" We'd have a stack of tables reaching up to the ceiling for all combinations of letters present or not, and their positions!

Computers are far better at filtering and sifting through databases. Once a first letter has been found, this knowledge (letters not present, letter found and the position of this letter), massively reduces the solution set of possible words. Tools like SQL and regular expressions can be quickly applied to find all possible words that match the comb filter built up.

Pre-computed tables are only fine up to a point, after that, they become unmanageable. To paraphrase a famous quote:

"Battle plans are excellent up until the first shot is fired!"

If you enjoyed this article, you might enjoy some others about Yahtzee, Battleship, Chutes & Ladders, Risk, Candyland, or Darts.

A Better Strategy for Hangman | DataGenetics Blog

Nick Berry is UK native living in Seattle. Educated as a rocket scientist and aircraft designer, he went on to found and sell a software company, work for Microsoft's Casual Gaming division, and head up customer analytics for RealNetworks' GameHouse.

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Type Connection Teaches You How to Pair Fonts in Your Designs by Sending Them on Dates

In Design, Teach Yourself, Games, Fonts, Publishing, Web Design, Games, Hardware, Overclocking, Ios, Android, Windows, Smartphones, Voip, Skype, Laptops, Tablets, Digital Photo Frames, Hard Drives, Multiple Monitors, Ethernet, Keychains, Diy, Games, Gaming, Game Consoles, Nintendo, Nes, Tv, Television, Cables, Routers, Wireless Audio, Streaming Music, Radio, Headphones, Headsets, Audio, Sound, Feature, / 30 March 2012 / 0 comments

Type Connection is a game that teaches you how to pair certain types of fonts together based on certain characteristics, and you learn by sending two different typefaces on dates. First you pick a font, then a date strategy, and finally a partner. If it works out you'll learn why your choices were good. If you fail, you'll be told why and sent back to try again.

You start with a few choices between popular serif and sans-serif fonts—a distinct difference you'll learn early on in the game (if you don't already know). All the fonts are noticeably different so whichever you choose will lead to a different kind of pairing. Whether you fail or succeed in creating a happy couple, you'll end up with plenty of information about your choices and learn a little bit more about pairing typefaces in your designs. All the fonts and pairings are designed to teach broader principles through specific examples, and you can play again to make different choices and learn more. Even if you happen to be pretty good at pairing your typefaces, it's worth failing to learn why certain choices don't work. The information you'll learn from failures of font love can be just as valuable.

Overall, Type Connection is a cute and clever way to teach you quite a lot of useful information about how different fonts and type styles affect your designs. If you're looking to learn from scratch or just brush up your skills, it's a really fun (and free) way to do it.

Type Connections | via Swissmiss