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Things in my life have changed. I am now in a much larger focus on Java. I am still a huge fan of TDD and Test First, but I guess that is a religious thing so I will try to contain my zeal.

Initially the challenges were intended as small problems that should be in the 1-3 hour at most. As well, I focused towards Python and the problems I was using to learn the particular concepts I was working on at the time. Since my shift to Java I am less interested in some of the finer concepts and more interested in general issues. So even though I might find a solution that uses a whole pile of chained references interesting, its solution in some other language may not be nearly as interesting to you :)

I will try to be better about posting more often. Unless I find people aren't interested, in which case I won't waste the bandwidth :)

Tried a today, was pretty fun. @namark thanks for recommending these! I expect I’m gonna spend a lot of hours on these in the next few weeks.

I just boosted the last that I had posted from over a year ago.

I still think this is an interesting problem to solve. I have yet to attack it myself, but am definitely considering it. I have recently been doing a bunch more smaller exercises, and perhaps can post a few of those. Though I haven't necessarily written them, I have found them fun to do.

I do have some ideas, but for now I am waiting to see if anyone is even still interested in the puzzles anyway.

Okay, here's one with a story :) Let's see if this is entertaining enough :D

Here is a problem that involves being jerk.

You receive a parking ticket and decide to pay in the least
convient way possible... change. This decision comes to mind
because the tickets are in strange amounts because they use
the cents portion for some kind of internal encoding.

You decide to pay all in pennies but when you start to collect
them someone informs you that although change will be accepted,
if the counts of coins exceed the quantities required for a wrapper
then you must roll them.

US Coinage count to a roll
0.01 = 50
0.05 = 40
0.10 = 50
0.25 = 40
0.50 = 20
$1.00 = 25 (small) or 20 (large)

Question 1.
How many rolls and free coins of each can you provide to pay your
$100.37 ticket in order to use the highest count of unrolled coins?

Considering that a ticket can cost anywhere from $1.00 to $250.00.
You start telling everyone else about your plan and they decide to
play too, so you calculate how they should pay as well.

For example, 45 pennies 21 nickles for a $1.00 ticket might be
pretty obnoxious :).

Question 2. Which fine amount (in that range) would allow you to
provide the highest number of unrolled coins?

Question 3. The parking authority figures out what you are doing
and decides to change things up by hiring you. Your job is to
determine the best fine values to get paid in the least amount of
unrolled coins. What are those amounts what are those amounts (still
within that range of $1.00 to $250.00)

Just to clean it up a little, and add some more entertainment.

Okay, here's one with a story :) Let's see if this is entertaining enough :D

Here is a problem that involves being jerk.

You receive a parking ticket and decide to pay in the least
convient way possible... change. This decision comes to mind
because the tickets are in strange amounts because they use
the cents portion for some kind of internal encoding.

You decide to pay all in pennies but when you start to collect
them someone informs you that although change will be accepted,
if the counts of coins exceed the quantities required for a wrapper
then you must roll them. You also figure out that collecting all
these coins is a bit of a nuisance for you. So your goal is to
reduce the overall number of coin rolls while maximizing the
number of free (or unrolled individual coins).

US Coinage count to a roll
0.01 = 50
0.05 = 40
0.10 = 50
0.25 = 40
0.50 = 20
$1.00 = 25 (small) or 20 (large)

Question 1.
How many rolls and free coins of each can you provide to pay your
$100.37 ticket in order to use the highest count of unrolled coins
while using the least number of rolled coins?

Considering that a ticket can cost anywhere from $1.00 to $250.00.
You start telling everyone else about your plan and they decide to
play too, so you calculate how they should pay as well.

To make things a little more interesting, you show up at a city council
meeting and propose that because of the time involved in processing
unrolled coinage that the parking authority should, rather than
bother with unrolled coins, all unrolled coins they collect should
just be donated to the city coucil's general fund. They pass this
unanimously.

For example, 45 pennies 21 nickles for a $1.00 ticket might be
pretty obnoxious :).

Question 2. Which fine amount (in that range) would allow you to
provide the highest number of unrolled coins?

Question 3. The parking authority figures out what you are doing
and decides to change things up by hiring you. Your job is to
determine the best fine values to get paid in the least amount of
unrolled coins. What are those amounts what are those amounts (still
within that range of $1.00 to $250.00)

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Okay, so if anyone is interested, here is a first pass at Java Swing version of Conway's Game of Life.

I am seeking hard critical responses with suggestions for improvement to make it more Java-esque or Java-licious or otherwise unlike someone who has been programming in C/C++ for 30 years just trying to learn new syntax.

I am also open to corrections to obvious bone-head or ham-fisted mistakes.

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I need some Java friends / mentors / co-learners

So I have been hired onto a company whose current intended strategy is to move away from all c/c++ replacing it with Java micronaut. They will be encouraging and assisting with training. (The specifics of which are yet to be determined)

Bring on the imposter syndrome :)

No question, just sharing insecurities.

Been a while, just saying hi! People are talking about leaving FB and Twitter and so far all I hear them say is they are going to Parlor or Gab. SMH...

@freemo Other than manually, is there a mathematical way to calculate the "clues" for the "Einstein" or "5 houses" style puzzle?

@ssokolow

Even if you do not agree with my absolute disgust of most modern phone designs, you have to agree that they are not(and were not) designed for any other purpose than suiting and driving pop culture, in particular not designed for taking photos comfortably and reliably in extreme circumstances. The market is driven by people who buy the new shiny, without any consideration of utility. That's the main point of one minor sub-point you decided to focus on.

I don't see any deep rooted disagreement. In case my, perhaps, abrasive manner of writing is draining you emotionally, I apologize.

@Absinthe

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