
The Toughest Developer Puzzle Ever - pavel
http://www.toughestdeveloperpuzzleever.com/begin/
======
astrodust
I think the puzzle is why they used ASP.

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Retric
I think the puzzle demonstrates they are idots, and the fact they are idiots
is why they use ASP.

    
    
      http://toughestdeveloperpuzzleever.com/tdpe2/step1.aspx
      obvious ?
      http://toughestdeveloperpuzzleever.com/tdpe2/step2.aspx
      looking at the source it uses: Assets/Images/step3.png
      Change that to Assets/Images/step2.png
      stepthree.asp
      http://toughestdeveloperpuzzleever.com/tdpe2/stepthree.aspx
      hey it's Morse code !!! ...
    

This has next to nothing to do with being a developer. But it's easy to create
and far harder to solve so hey why not...

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daleharvey
as evidenced by a lot of the people in this thread, the first few answers may
seem obvious in hindsight but 1. they need to warm people up for the puzzle,
2. everything seems obvious in hindsight, its very easy for smart people miss
simple thing.

calling them idiots for making the first few questions easier and for using
asp is miles away from what I see hacker news as, bit sad to see this upvoted.

~~~
jasonlotito
Indeed, I'm on 14 at the moment, and having a blast with this. Some really
interesting riddles.

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Retric
Thanks, that's what I was looking for they are _riddles_ and not puzzles.

With programming for any given _puzzle_ there are thousands of equally valid
solutions. However, a _riddle_ has only one fairly arbitrary solution.

EX: I am thinking of a sweet number between 1 and 10. What is it? A: It's pie!
Get it because it's _a sweet number_...

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fondue
I feel dumb that I'm stuck on level 2. I assume it's a form submission ...

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what
Me too. Tried base64 decoding the viewstate value, looked like garbage to me.
Also tried changing the stuff in formbox to inputs, no luck. Anyone get passed
step 2?

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Titanous
Yeah, I'm on level 8, which is where is starts getting hard.

EDIT: Got it. That was fun.

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ttol
level 8 is fun. reminds me of picture books when i was younger

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PaulJoslin
Yeah I'm on 8. Then I realised I was at work and I should really save it for
later.

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watty
Ahhh stuck on 8 too... what is the fox symbol? It's killing me!!

I recognized it... FoxPro

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aidenn0
I'm totally stuck on level 13. It's been a breeze so far (fortunately my wife
wears "uggs" that one took me a minute to figure out, it would have been
impossible before I met her).

I'm guessing from the title it has to do with the CSS, but the CSS just looks
odd, I'm not even sure why the text is showing up with display:none

[edit] okay I found something hidden in the stylesheet but no clue what it
means

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trafficlight
I see the stylesheet weirdness but I can't figure out what they are referring
to.

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mcknz
looks like someone found notpron. <http://www.deathball.net/notpron/>

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sjf
Yeah, and <http://www.pythonchallenge.com/>

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kmak
I'm working on the language math. Seems to take quite a bit of time just
looking things up!

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watty
Completely stuck on 15... the movie "Homegrown" fits but there must be
another...

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zepolen
Is 14 any way programming related or is my hunch correct and I've got to find
an album which has all those songs in it?

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watty
Not programming related.

Hint: track #, band name

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tbrooks
Someone has already posted a cheat sheet:

[http://allaroundgeek.blogspot.com/2010/06/toughest-
developer...](http://allaroundgeek.blogspot.com/2010/06/toughest-developer-
puzzle-ever-2.html)

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ssayles
Submitted the correct pass phrase for 5, but stumped as to what to do next.
I'm assuming the 404 is supposed to happen?

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retube
Yes, I have same issue - unless it's a dummy error....

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Timmy_C
Check out the .NET and ASP version numbers.

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Kilimanjaro
Save the clues, maybe you need them at the end

t-h-i-s ...

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kmak
You need them in one of the earlier puzzles.

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powrtoch
Stuck on level 10... feel stupid because it seems no one else has gotten stuck
on level 10.

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grandpa
Yngvghqr naq ybatvghqr

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Keyframe
This is fun, I'm on 7 now - was easy until now. Might as well get a coffee.

edit: OK, 8 is really tough.

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tvon
I haven't figured out what two things in 8 are supposed to be.. at least the
obvious thing doesn't make sense in that context...

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Keyframe
I got stuck on 8, here is what i got so far:

(Ruby-Ru) + (FoxPro-Kung Fu Panda-XX)+

(Python-K-T-(hay-A)) + S

(CD-PHI-XX) + (JAVA-XX-J) +

(XX+H-(G))+Te+R+XX

where XX is what I don't know

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watty
FoxPro - Po - Fox

It's an "ugg" not a boot!

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chaosprophet
Phew, thanks for that. You just saved me from wasting away the rest of my
night. Head smacking moment when I got the final answer.

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lincolnq
Hint on the calculator words one? I think I solved them all but it won't let
me past.

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jasonlotito
The riddle was given in a certain way. The answer is expected in the same
manner.

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ciab
Yep stuck on 16 - I can find my way to blind alley's show room - but then
what?

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what
Stuck on 9. Think I'll stop before I lose my whole day.

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chaosprophet
hint: You might want to do some image manipulation.

another hint: After 8, this is really really simple.

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what
I guess 8 killed my brain. Figured it has something to do with the image, but
I'm stumped.

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chaosprophet
Okay, another hint: data URIs.

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what
OK 9 is just dumb. Opened the image in vim.

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powrtoch
19? Anybody?

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bshep
I'm stuck on 18 :(

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grandpa
Yeah, that's a tricky one. Try <http://phonespell.org/> and look for patterns.

