Friday, April 19, 2013

Myki still sucks

There have been a lot of people complaining about Myki -- overcharging or just not working at all.  I haven't had any serious problems... up until now.

I clicked through the barrier yesterday, said $8.?? remaining. Went home, said $2.?? remaining. it's $3.50 each way now. This morning, tried to get on train. Nope, balance $-2.??. What? Tried to check balance on machine; result history shows balance yesterday was $0.00.  Ha ha, funny joke, everybody laugh.  Oh well, I'll try to refill. No, machine broken.  It's been broken for a month.  I can't catch the train.

It's well past time for the state government to dump Myki. It's never going to work properly.  Tell Kamco to shove it, stop giving them money, and charge Vivian Miners with corruption.  Choose a local company to build a functional system. Hell, I'll do it.

Wednesday, April 03, 2013

hash-breaking difficulty

XKCD's Externalities comic includes a hash-breaking competition. The difficulty of getting n bits of the hash correct by brute force is given by the binomial distribution, with p=0.5 and n = 1024.

For the current leaders, here's how many combinations they had to try:

(number of wrong bits, 2**(this value) combinations tried)
 (329, 100.79292584868568),
 (330, 99.71264744849057),
 (331, 98.6387726772389),
 (332, 97.57129092599011),
 (333, 96.51019166667069),
 (334, 95.45546445125278),
 (335, 94.40709891093776),
 (336, 93.36508475534453),
 (337, 92.32941177170228),
 (338, 91.30006982404753),
 (339, 90.27704885242493),
 (340, 89.26033887209208),
 (341, 88.24992997272764),
 (342, 87.24581231764267),
 (343, 86.24797614299497),
 (344, 85.25641175700605),
 (345, 84.27110953918066),
 (346, 83.29205993952827),
 (347, 82.31925347778665),
 (348, 81.35268074264687),
 (349, 80.39233239097973),
 (350, 79.43819914706322),
 (351, 78.49027180181061),
 (352, 77.54854121199908),
 (353, 76.61299829949846),
 (354, 75.68363405049972),
 (355, 74.76043951474304),
 (356, 73.84340580474498),
 (357, 72.93252409502446),
 (358, 72.02778562132734),
 (359, 71.12918167984901),
 (360, 70.2367036264548),
 (361, 69.35034287589781),
 (362, 68.47009090103367),
 (363, 67.59593923203211),
 (364, 66.72787945558447),
 (365, 65.86590321410733),
 (366, 65.01000220494126),
 (367, 64.16016817954464),
 (368, 63.31639294268198),
 (369, 62.478668351606096),
 (370, 61.64698631523403),
 (371, 60.82133879331581),
 (372, 60.00171779559586),
 (373, 59.188115380966224),
 (374, 58.380523656611395),
 (375, 57.57893477714383),
 (376, 56.7833409437298),
 (377, 55.993734403204826),
 (378, 55.21010744717815),
 (379, 54.432452411125524),
 (380, 53.66076167346958),
 (381, 52.89502765464724),
 (382, 52.135242816163206),
 (383, 51.38139965962892),
 (384, 50.63349072578612),
 (385, 49.891508593514146),
 (386, 49.1554458788202),
 (387, 48.42529523381158),
 (388, 47.70104934564894),
 (389, 46.98270093547969),
 (390, 46.27024275735042),
 (391, 45.56366759709728),
 (392, 44.862968271213305),
 (393, 44.168137625691415),
 (394, 43.47916853484186),
 (395, 42.79605390008302),
 (396, 42.11878664870401),
 (397, 41.44735973259787),
 (398, 40.78176612696386),
 (399, 40.12199882897727),
 (400, 39.46805085642528),
 (401, 38.81991524630716),
 (402, 38.17758505339709),
 (403, 37.54105334876775),
 (404, 36.91031321827288),
 (405, 36.285357760986756),
 (406, 35.66618008759846),
 (407, 35.0527733187589),
 (408, 34.44513058337816),
 (409, 33.84324501687082),
 (410, 33.24710975934681),
 (411, 32.65671795374506),
 (412, 32.07206274390717),
 (413, 31.49313727258834),
 (414, 30.919934679402296),
 (415, 30.352448098697213),
 (416, 29.790670657359072),
 (417, 29.2345954725391),
 (418, 28.68421564930143),
 (419, 28.139524278187103),
 (420, 27.6005144326904),
 (421, 27.067179166643008),
 (422, 26.5395115115016),
 (423, 26.017504473534007),
 (424, 25.501151030898914),
 (425, 24.990444130613774),
 (426, 24.48537668540544),
 (427, 23.9859415704375),
 (428, 23.492131619908193),
 (429, 23.003939623512416),
 (430, 22.521358322760847),
 (431, 22.04438040714901),
 (432, 21.572998510168617),
 (433, 21.10720520515314),
 (434, 20.646993000949116),
 (435, 20.192354337404257),
 (436, 19.743281580662888),
 (437, 19.299767018258787),
 (438, 18.861802853994963),
 (439, 18.429381202599185),
 (440, 18.002494084143756),
 (441, 17.58113341821703),
 (442, 17.165291017833827),
 (443, 16.754958583070945),
 (444, 16.35012769441337),
 (445, 15.950789805795873),
 (446, 15.556936237323976),
 (447, 15.168558167657284),
 (448, 14.785646626037295),
 (449, 14.40819248394085),
 (450, 14.036186446339345),
 (451, 13.669619042542726),
 (452, 13.308480616606237),
 (453, 12.952761317276634),
 (454, 12.602451087453419),
 (455, 12.2575396531393),
 (456, 11.918016511852795),
 (457, 11.583870920474457),
 (458, 11.2550918824968),
 (459, 10.931668134646431),
 (460, 10.613588132845397),
 (461, 10.300840037477135),
 (462, 9.993411697920738),
 (463, 9.691290636315607),
 (464, 9.394464030516776),
 (465, 9.10291869619951),
 (466, 8.816641068069963),
 (467, 8.535617180136963),
 (468, 8.259832644998154),
 (469, 7.989272632092106),
 (470, 7.723921844866229),
 (471, 7.4637644968087855),
 (472, 7.20878428629177),
 (473, 6.958964370170051),
 (474, 6.71428733608102),
 (475, 6.474735173387996),
 (476, 6.2402892427099665),
 (477, 6.01093024397988),
 (478, 5.786638182973767),
 (479, 5.567392336253507),
 (480, 5.3531712144671495),
 (481, 5.143952523952513),
 (482, 4.939713126592324),
 (483, 4.740428997872683),
 (484, 4.5460751831011645),
 (485, 4.356625751746641),
 (486, 4.172053749870079),
 (487, 3.9923311506242825),
 (488, 3.817428802811137),
 (489, 3.647316377497421),
 (490, 3.481962312705135),
 (491, 3.3213337562096426),
 (492, 3.1653965064990928),
 (493, 3.014114951971893),
 (494, 2.867452008475686),
 (495, 2.7253690553216456),
 (496, 2.587825869942336),
 (497, 2.4547805614000517),
 (498, 2.3261895029957964),
 (499, 2.2020072642771202),
 (500, 2.0821865427960415),
 (501, 1.966678096026371),
 (502, 1.8554306739129727),
 (503, 1.748390952593668),
 (504, 1.6455034699074478),
 (505, 1.5467105633799099),
 (506, 1.4519523114577648),
 (507, 1.3611664788479745),
 (508, 1.274288466902354),
 (509, 1.1912512700738427),
 (510, 1.1119854395541857),
 (511, 1.0364190552822286)