Using prime numbers to make better backgrounds • Hacker News Board

Re: Using prime numbers to make better backgrounds

#51

Post by endtime » Fri, Apr 08, 2011, 5:54 PM UTC

dmvaldman wrote: post #24

nadam wrote: post #5

Cool, but these numbers don't have to be primes. They just have to be coprimes (like (8,9)). The least common multiple of two coprimes 'a' and 'b' is a*b. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coprime

Not for the cicada example, but yes for the web aspect. In the cicada example the point is that one predator would evolve to align its boom cycle so that it had a common divisor with the cycle of the cicada. Since the predator's cycle is variable, it is evolutionarily optimal if the cicada only comes out every prime number of years.

Coprimality is still the relevant property. But if one number can be adjusted, then the only way to guarantee coprimality is for the other number to be a prime.

Re: Using prime numbers to make better backgrounds

#52

Post by wging » Fri, Apr 08, 2011, 7:18 PM UTC

endtime wrote: post #51

dmvaldman wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not for the cicada example, but yes for the web aspect. In the cicada example the point is that one predator would evolve to align its boom cycle so that it had a common divisor with the cycle of the cicada. Since the predator's cycle is variable, it is evolutionarily optimal if the cicada only comes out every prime number of years.

Coprimality is still the relevant property. But if one number can be adjusted, then the only way to guarantee coprimality is for the other number to be a prime.

Almost. Coprimality can never be guaranteed. If the numbers are p and q, with p prime and q being adjustable, just take q=p. Then they match up, showing that this barrier isn't enough.

The other relevant barrier we have is probably that a 6-year wasp has difficulty stretching its cycle by a factor of 3--much more difficult than a single year or two.

Re: Using prime numbers to make better backgrounds

#53

Post by xbot » Sat, Apr 09, 2011, 12:54 AM UTC

exch wrote: post #2

There's a typo in the title of the second 'chapter'. "That’s great. But wa/s/ has all this got to do with web design?"

Ah, well spotted. Fixed! Thanks for that.

Re: Using prime numbers to make better backgrounds

#54

Post by xbot » Sat, Apr 09, 2011, 12:59 AM UTC

prawn wrote: post #44

xbot wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hey guys, I actually mocked up a woodgrain test page while I was developing the article but I ended up preferring the lego and curtain examples. But if your interested: http://www.sitepoint.com/examples/primes/woodgrain.html It's not bad, but I don't think it's killer yet. I've got a very raw maze generation example somewhere if anyone's interested.

This is HN. Almost everyone's interested, so post away!

http://www.sitepoint.com/examples/primes/maze.html

The graphics are a bit nasty but the concept is works. There seems to be a diagonal pattern emerging, but a fourth layer would certainly break that.

Re: Using prime numbers to make better backgrounds

#55

Post by jeberle » Sat, Apr 09, 2011, 4:02 PM UTC

Why is it that "design" sites have the worst design? Yes, please be sure to destroy the page margins, and set a min width on the page so that I have to scroll horizontally to read the end of lines. Classic.

Re: Using prime numbers to make better backgrounds

#56

Post by gbog » Sat, Apr 09, 2011, 5:08 PM UTC

BrandonM wrote: post #15

This is the perfect Hacker News article. I learned something new and mathematically-interesting about the natural world, the author came up with a clever hack to enliven backgrounds, and we learn how to apply that to improve our own designs.

I dare to disagree. While learning about Cicadas and prime numbers is ok, its application to "enliven backgrounds" seems very futile to me. Hacking means breaking the rules, crack the black box, find new game changing ways to do things that will prove useful for a lot of people. Hacking is not about finding slightly vain design tricks.

In summary, this article is far from what I would upvote. A good indicator of the relative weakness of it is the few interesting comment it triggered.

In fact, some month ago I would come to HN, and read the comments, and find a lot of savoury meat for my curiosity hunger, without even bothering to get check the original article that was only the starting point of high-level exchanges of views on the matter.

PS: Recent articles seem to focus on visual design (pixels and colors), which is very surprising on a website that is so obviously anti-design...

Re: Using prime numbers to make better backgrounds

#57

Post by danohuiginn » Sat, Apr 09, 2011, 5:43 PM UTC

JonnieCache wrote: post #48

derefr wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's interesting that it's almost impossible to pin down a verbal guideline for what people should be submitting (besides "anything that gratifies one's intellectual curiosity") but pretty easy to point to a given article and say that, yes, this definitely is Hacker News. It'd be pretty awesome if we could have an HN that's just this sort of stuff (with a strong tendency toward false-negatives vs. false-positives—i.e…

You can filter the homepage for submissions with a minimum number of votes: http://news.ycombinator.com/over?points=200 HN has loads of hidden features. I suggest judicious use of google's search operators to find them all.

there's also http://news.ycombinator.com/best, for (iirc) the top articles in the past 7 days.

Somebody should really put together a guide to all these half-hidden features, either as a wiki or an individual effort.