To Taste

Explanation:
The imprecision of recipes is often a source of frustration to culinary novices, especially the more analytically-minded. Cueball expects a recipe to provide instructions precise enough that by following them carefully, a cook can create a dish exactly as the recipe author intended. Unfortunately, exact replication is impossible in cooking because of the natural variation of ingredients as well as differences in equipment. In addition, most home cooks lack the tools needed to make precise measurements, such as scales and thermometers. Thus, a recipe for strawberry smoothies might read "add sugar to taste " because the recipe-writer can't specify precisely how ripe the strawberries are to begin with. In addition, a smoothie recipe would typically specify imprecise quantities of fruit such as "1 banana" or "1 cup of strawberries" (much less precise than specifying the weight). Thus, it is impossible for the cook to determine the correct amount of sugar without actually tasting the drink.
The instruction "to taste " can also be used for ingredients that alter a simple aspect of the food's flavor, such as sweetness , sourness , saltiness or bitterness without affecting the quality of the overall dish. Individual preferences can vary wildly and it's not possible for a recipe's author to predict how much the reader will want. Specifying any exact amount in these cases will inevitably lead to the food being too bland for some, while being too strong for others.
In this comic, Cueball is shown as having no idea how to cook (or having a ridiculously large sweet tooth), and the suggestion that he is going to add large crates of sugar to a small pot is, of course, silly. This would ruin the dish, as whatever was in the pot would be drowned out by the sugar. Alternatively, he could simply bring in enough sugar to make sure he will not run out of this particular ingredient before it reaches the correct level of sweetness for his taste. This too would display a complete lack of understanding about what it is to cook; even a beginner cook should be able to logically deduce that this is far too much sugar.
Another possible explanation would be that Cueball plans to add as much sugar as possible to the dish and eat it, so that he can sue the recipe book's writer for any ill effects he receives as a result. Needless to say, this would be a complete waste of effort - he would probably lose the lawsuit, and even if he won and received compensation money, he would not be able to enjoy it thanks to his ill health.
The title text is Randall's (and Cueball's) personal comment on what he thinks a recipe should do to fulfill his needs. If he knew how much of each ingredient would be appropriate for a given dish, then he would not need the recipe in the first place. The title text actually scolds the recipe for being imprecise. In his view, mixing in imprecise or "use your own judgment" language makes it less of a "recipe" for the dish, and thus less suitable for those looking for the specific instructions to make the dish because they either have no cooking experience, feel they don't have the expertise to make their own decisions, or simply want to follow clearly defined steps without any decision making required.
This is the second comic this week that concerns one of the basic condiments for food, and also regards one of the five basic tastes . The first one, about salt, was 1637: Salt Mine . Lately Randall has made several food related comics .
This is the official transcript of 1639, as of May 9, 2019, valid for 1637: Salt Mine .
[Three women and a (stick) figure stand in a salt mine. There's a control panel with two benches in the centre, and two piles of salt to the right. Two figures are talking, and two are shovelling salt into their mouths.] Woman 1: So you've build this particle detector in a salt mine to block out cosmic rays? Woman 2: Yes. That is definitely why. Woman 3 and figure: <<Homf nomf nomf>>
[Cueball is standing near a stove holding a pot just above it. He is looking away from the stove, reading the recipe from a piece of paper he is holding in the other hand.] Recipe: ...And add sugar to taste.
[Cueball has placed the pot on the stove looking at it while holding the paper down along his side.] Cueball: ??
[Cueball leaves the pot and stove to walks off-panel left with the recipe.]
[Cueball returns backing up to the stove with a dolly loaded with three crates, labeled "sugar". The bottom crate is still not fully inside the panel and the first letter cannot be seen.] Sugar Sugar ugar


Super Bowl Context

Explanation:
White Hat tries to make normal conversation with Cueball about the recent (at the time of comic publishing) American football game, Super Bowl 50 .
When asking Cueball if he watched the game, Cueball begins with a simple Yes , but then continues to add the contextual fact that about a third of the US population watched the event, which is an incredibly high percentage in today's media landscape . And according to Cueball this fraction is increasing , despite media fragmentation . Thus, even though there are today more and more different ways to watch news, sports and other entertainment, the Super Bowl continues to gain more viewers every year.
It turns out that Cueball has a problem. He cannot just reply to a simple question without trying to put the conversation into some kind of context which does not necessarily have anything to do with the question asked, or at least not with the expected answer. From White Hat's reply it is obvious that he has had conversations like this with Cueball before, as he asks if they could just talk without your weird need to give context for everything?
Cueball feels the need to disseminate any information he finds interesting, even in trivial conversation. Normally people like to have context-free conversations [ citation needed ] and White Hat invites Cueball to try to fit in with normal people's conversational style.
Cueball apologizes and agrees to try, but even though he really tries hard, with his fists clenched and White Hat encouraging him to just reply normally to a question about the rumored retirement of Peyton Manning , he cannot stop himself from including context in his reply again. White Hat probably wanted Cueball to join in such minimal-context speculation. But, failing miserably again, White Hat finally gives up, and suggests they should try another conversation in a year, when Cueball might have learned to talk about the Super Bowl without context (hence the title).
This time he goes off on a tangent about Peyton as a mammal , and then adding the process of aging and mentioning two reasons for this (which are not well understood). The first he mentions is accumulation of damage , which includes mutations that can lead to diseases such as cancer . The other process he mentions is timed factors which includes telomeres . These have been linked to biological aging because of the shortening of telomeres at each cell division ; when telomeres become too short, the cells die (and so do mammals).
To cap it off, he mentions that retiring is a recent concept. But this only makes sense when compared to how long there have been mammals, not compared to how long there have been sports and games, where people could be too old, and thus need to retire long before they would die from old age. Before humans began to enjoy things for fun, the concept of retiring made no sense. You worked/fought for a living, until you got too old and died.
Cueball in this comic may represent Randall , as much of xkcd is spawned from, or occasionally poking fun at, his own hyper-analytical tendencies. And it is also common knowledge that Randall is not very interested in sport, though there are several xkcd comics about American football . The year before this one he made another comic in relation to the final, and in this comic, 1480: Super Bowl , he even mentions the fact that he does not know much about sports in general . So this is the second year in a row a comic has been released in conjunction with the Super Bowl final. But before 2015, there has only been one other comic like this, which was in 2006 with 60: Super Bowl .
The title text continues the joke with Cueball replying to the old anti-humor joke: " Why did the chicken cross the road? " Cueball replies with a preposterous amount of information instead of the cliched simplistic answer: "To get to the other side."
Cueball begins with the origin of chickens . They are believed to be descendants from domestication of the Red junglefowl , which occurred at least five thousand years ago in Asia, as Cueball correctly explains. Before there were chickens, there could not be one crossing a road. It also couldn't be called "crossing the road" without a pavement . The first development of paved roads was in the city of Ur in the ancient Sumerian civilization about 4000 BC (6000 years ago) (also partly explained in Cueball's reply).
As a trivial note, this comic is a rare instance of White Hat not being the fall guy for the joke. But already in his next discussion with Cueball ( 1657: Insanity ) he was again the butt of the joke.
[White Hat and Cueball are walking together.] White Hat: Did you watch the Super Bowl? Cueball: Yes, like a third of the country. Cueball: A fraction that is steadily increasing despite media fragmentation.
[White Hat stops and Cueball turn towards him.] White Hat: Can't we just talk without your weird need to give context for everything? Cueball: Sorry. I'll try.
[As White Hat asks Cueball another question Cueball bunches his hands into fists. He is clearly struggling.] White Hat: Sounds like Peyton Manning's probably going to retire. Cueball: Yes, I... ...It... White Hat: C'mon, you can do it... Cueball: He...
[Cueball spreads out his arms a little as he replies with two long sentences, while White Hat walks away from him.] Cueball: —Mammals like Peyton age via a process that involves both the accumulation of damage and poorly-understood timed factors. Cueball: Yet the concept of retirement itself is surprisingly recent... White Hat: Okay, good try. Maybe next year.


Hot Dogs

Explanation:
A common staple of trite comedy is "why do hot dogs come in packages of ten but hot dog buns in bags of eight?" The phenomenon is mildly frustrating for the consumer, as it often leaves leftover food. The most sinister result is the subsequent purchase of more buns, followed by more hot dogs, followed by more buns, over and over again until forty total hot dogs have been eaten (in a cycle similar to that shown in 140: Delicious ).
The actual reason for the mismatch between hot dogs and buns, according to both Karl Smallwood and Cecil Adams , is that meat packers like things that come in pounds and bakers hate things that come in tens. Nonetheless, some smaller companies are starting to offer bags of ten buns, and several brands of hot dogs sell in packages of eight.
Here, Cueball attempts to raise the question as he is standing with a package of hot dogs in one hand and a bag of buns in the other hand (presumably for their dinner), but a person offscreen interrupts him mid sentence and mentions condoms instead of buns. Cueball mulls the subject over in his mind, and when he realizes his friend is putting hot dogs in condoms, he is promptly grossed out.
The title text makes it clear that Cueball's new found association of hot dogs with sexual activity , has put him totally off the idea of eating any of them this evening, and he suggests ordering pizza , which he then can hope will not be used for this similar ( NSFW ) comparisons … Cueball also asks that he and his friend never discuss this conversation again, due to the situation's awkwardness and uncomfortable subject matter.
The style of the conversation with Cueball asking, someone answering and Cueball saying Eww is similar to a situation in the game comic 1608: Hoverboard where a giant ant queen inside the Destroyer is provoking Cueball in the same way by talking about laying eggs like this:
Cueball: What's up? Ant queen: The usual. Poopin' out ants. Cueball: Eww.
[Cueball is standing in the frame holding a bag and a package of hot dogs.] Cueball: Hey, why do hot dogs come in packages of ten- Offscreen: -But condoms come in strips of six? I know, right?! Cueball: ...Eww.


Gravitational Waves

Explanation:
Megan , Cueball , and Ponytail are observing the results from a gravitational wave detector (see details below ). This comic came out on the day that the first direct observation of gravitational waves was publicly announced on 2016-02-11. The actual event was recorded five months before on 2015-09-14, but it was not reported publicly before they were sure it was a real signal. It seems that Randall knew in advance about this announcement because this comic was published on a Thursday , not following the normal publish schedule, to coincide with the announcement , and there were no other comics released Friday that week. (The altered schedule could be viewed as a meta-reference to the warping of spacetime .) That scientists knew there might be an announcement on the way, and more details for the interested can be seen in these two videos from Space Time : Have Gravitational Waves Been Discovered?!? and LIGO's First Detection of Gravitational Waves! (See also their follow up The Future of Gravitational Waves ).
This is the second time within a month that a new astronomical announcement (of something discovered months before the actual announcement) has resulted in a related comic. The first being 1633: Possible Undiscovered Planets .
From the patterns in the gravitational waves detected by this instrument, it might be possible to guess the nature of the event (e.g. two bodies with dissimilar masses circling a fixed point, two bodies with equal mass circling each other, collision of two massive bodies, etc.). It might also be possible to triangulate the location of the event. Based on these two facts (the location and nature of the event) we might be able to determine which astronomical bodies caused this event (and the status of those bodies afterwards). Thus, it provides an additional medium to observe the universe in addition to telescopes observing all kinds of electromagnetic radiation . This new medium might enable us to observe properties that we couldn't observe with the rest of our observation instruments.
However, the scientists in this comic appear to be receiving more than the expected signals from black hole collisions, they also receive gravitational spam messages , such as invitations from Linkedin , a mortgage offer, and an announcement of a social meet-up, rather than observing astronomical events (see table below ).
There is also a joke on the social meet-up's use of the word local group because the ' Local Group ' is also the technical name for the group of galaxies containing the Milky Way .
It is not clear if these so-called "events" are causing gravitational waves to be generated or if something, perhaps an alien civilization, is encoding spam messages in gravitational waves. It is plausible that aliens are using gravity waves to encode their messages, as we do something similar with electromagnetic waves to encode and send our messages. However, it would take an extremely advanced civilization to achieve gravity wave encoding. It requires the controlling of orbits and oscillations of super-massive bodies like the Sun, or more likely bodies ten times more massive than it. For example, the first event detected, both in this comic and in real life, was a merger of two black holes of roughly 30 solar masses each.
The title text makes the speculation, that something is sending spam encoded in gravity waves, seem more plausible, as it follows up with a joke that the message senders have gone to such a length that they caused the most energetic event recorded ever (perhaps on the scale of a few supernovae or black hole collisions). One of the scientists is so impressed with this effort that he suggests that they actually post a reply, but one of the other person declines with a " Nah "! (As you should always do with spam, else you will just encourage the sender by making it clear that there actually is a receiver on this address.) Randall may have been referring to the fact that the detected event had a power output equal to 50 times that of the entire visible universe.
In 1365: Inflation gravitational waves are also mentioned.
A gravitational wave detector is a device used to measure gravitational waves, small distortions of spacetime that were first predicted by Albert Einstein in 1916. Gravitational waves are ripples in the spacetime fabric itself.
In layman terms, a gravitational wave is like moving a stone through water while partly submerged. It will cause waves on the surface of the water as it moves through it. These waves will spread away from the center of disturbance and as they move, they will cause the water molecules to oscillate around their mean positions. Similar waves are created in the space-time fabric when two celestial bodies interact with each other. If you concentrate on an area of the fabric far away from the point of disturbance, it can be observed that if the wave causes compression in one direction, it'll cause expansion of the fabric in the other. See this page for nice animations.
Note that anything with a mass will cause a gravitational wave. Just as waves created by small stones are tiny in comparison to waves created by huge rocks in water, the waves from humans moving around will be tiny compared to the waves created by celestial bodies. Also, the bigger the body, the stronger the wave and the farther away it can be detected. That is why we can only detect gravity waves from heavy bodies like black holes or neutron stars but not from us moving around.
Now, let's consider spacetime fabric as a thin rubber sheet. If you mark any two points on this sheet and stretch or compress it along the axis joining those two points, the relative positions of these points with respect to their neighboring points do not change, but the distance between them changes.
LIGO (Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory) is a large-scale physics experiment designed to detect this compression/expansion, and it was LIGO who discovered the signal that caused this comic. (For a very detailed description of what the team at LIGO did and the history behind see this 90 minutes feature Gravitational Waves: A New Era of Astronomy Begins from the 2016 World Science Festival).
Two facts need to be remembered to easily understand the experiment. First, the speed of light (c) is constant and the speed of an object is the distance moved divided by the time taken to travel that far. Second, gravitational waves cause opposite effects (compression and expansion) in directions perpendicular to each other. At LIGO, an experiment is set up where two perpendicular long tunnels are constructed with apparatus to emit and detect laser beams. The beam from a laser is split into these two tunnels. After going through the tunnel and back again a few times the beams are brought back together. The lengths of the tunnels are set up in such a way that, in the absence of gravity waves, destructive interference between the two combined beams causes them to cancel one another out, resulting in the detector observing zero light intensity. When the gravitational wave passes through earth, one of the tunnel is expected to expand while the other is expected to compress. Due to the difference in lengths, the destructive interference is incomplete and the detectors will be able to detect the presence of light. This observation can be concluded as "detection of the gravitational wave passing through".
[Cueball, with arms up, is standing behind Megan who has her hands at her mouth, and who in turn is standing behind Ponytail, who is sitting in front of a large computer console with a screen, a keyboard, and several items on the side (presumably lights and labels). Three wires lead away from the console out of the image to the right.] Megan: The gravitational wave detector works! For the first time, we can listen in on the signals carried by ripples in the fabric of space itself!
[Larger panel with the same setting in the middle, but both Cueball and Megan have taken their arms down. More of the wires from the console can be seen to the right. The computer lists six events:] Computer: Event: Black hole merger in Carina (30 M ☉ , 30 M ☉ ) Computer: Event: Zorlax the Mighty would like to connect on Linkedin Computer: Event: Black hole merger in Orion (20 M ☉ , 50 M ☉ ) Computer: Event: Mortgage offer from Triangulum Galaxy Computer: Event: Zorlax the Mighty would like to connect on Linkedin Computer: Event: Meet lonely singles in the local group tonight!


Degrees

Explanation:
Cueball is being asked by a friend for the temperature . While he is checking his smartphone for the weather, he begins pondering what unit he should use when answering the question. (See below for Cueball's reasoning .)
In the US (where Cueball and Randall are from), the temperature scale used in daily life is Fahrenheit .  However, most of the rest of the world uses Celsius in daily life, and even in the US it is commonly used for science. This is also why Randall has previously made the comic 526: Converting to Metric . There are also people who wish the US to change to the metric system, although some of them still wish to keep the Fahrenheit scale as mentioned in 1982: Evangelism
The Celsius scale is from the metric system . Though this system has been officially sanctioned for use in the US since 1866, it is not frequently used in daily American life (except for some things, like liter bottles of soda), although it is the preferred system for trade and commerce according to the Metric Conversion Act of 1975. The US remains the only industrialized country, and one of few countries period, that does not use the metric system for every day measurements, and in which official government documents and signage do not enforce metric units. The unit degree Celsius or °C is an accepted derived unit from the International System of Units (SI units) used in science (which again is the modern form of the metric system). The SI unit of temperature is the kelvin , but this temperature scale is linearly related to the Celsius scale, which is why Celsius can be derived from it. The Fahrenheit scale is from the US customary system and the (British) imperial system . The unit is degree Fahrenheit or °F, and the relation to the Celsius scale is not easy to find in a mental calculation. The relations are: [°F] = [°C]×9⁄5 + 32 or [°C] = ([°F] − 32)×5⁄9. (For this exact reason Randall has previously made a helpful table for these situations in 526: Converting to Metric .)
Unlike most areas of measurement, where the metric system is widely considered superior, there is considerable debate about the relative merits of Fahrenheit vs. Celsius. Cueball weighs up the benefits of both scales, but fails to find a solution he can live with, and since he feels he has to give his friend an answer now, he panics and gives the answer 0.173 radians .
Radian is the standard unit of angular measure, used in many areas of mathematics. An angle's measurement in radians is numerically equal to the length of a corresponding arc of a unit circle . It has no units and is denoted with the superscript c , but more commonly rad , lest it be confused with angular degrees . One radian is an angle of approximately 57.3 degrees. Angular degrees is a system used to measure angles in geometry , and although it too uses the symbol ° and the word "degrees", it has nothing to do with temperature measurements of any sort.
Thus, this answer is unhelpful and the joke is that traditionally both geometric angles and temperature are measured in "degrees", but there is no connection between the two.
The title text indicates that Cueball's friend still wants to know whether the answer is in radians Fahrenheit or radians Celsius, which, despite being a silly way to express temperature, would actually enable the friend to get some meaning out of the reply. But this just takes Cueball back to the problem he failed to solve in the first place of choosing one scale in preference to the other, so suddenly he announces has to go and runs off without ever clarifying what he meant. This result is probably because he is afraid of being a bad friend according to his very last point regarding Fahrenheit: Valuing unit standardization over being helpful possibly makes me a bad friend.
The answer Cueball gives of 0.173 radians corresponds to a geometric angle 9.91° (0.173 × 360° / 2π ). If this were "radians Celsius" it would be 9.91 °C corresponding to 49.8 °F and if it were "radians Fahrenheit" it would be 9.91 °F corresponding to -12.3 °C. Given the temperatures in Massachusetts (where Randall lives) when this comic came out, the day after Valentine's Day 2016, Cueball was probably giving his answer in radians Fahrenheit.
International standard Degrees Celsius is derived unit in the SI system of units used to measure temperature in most countries today. Using the SI system would allow Cueball to be easily understood in most countries and is by far the most recognized system, but it is not the most commonly used in the United States, his presumed location in the comic. Helps reduce America's weird isolationism The United States uses its own set of units, including degrees Fahrenheit, called the United States customary system (similar but not equal to the imperial system), in contrast to most of the rest of the world, which uses the SI system. The US's system of units is therefore considered "weird" as it makes the US different from most of the world, but previous efforts to convert the US to the SI system have failed. Cueball evidently believes that by using SI units, he will help to eventually convert the US to the SI system, bringing considerable trade and tourism benefits and reducing confusion when dealing with foreigners. Nice how "negative" means below freezing On the Celsius scale, the freezing point of water at standard atmospheric pressure (101.325 kilopascals) is very close to 0 °C, and any temperature below that is below the freezing point. The Fahrenheit scale uses different points of reference (using a water/ammonium chloride chemical reaction for the lower calibration, while the upper calibration is set such that water freezing and water boiling are 180 degrees apart), and as a result the freezing point of water is a less memorable 32 °F. Physics major loyalty Cueball is apparently a physics major, like Randall, and SI units are more commonly used for scientific work (as the kelvin scale is sometimes used in physics and other sciences), even in the US. By using the Celsius scale in casual conversation, he would show his loyalty to the system used by actual physicists. Easier to spell "Celsius" is generally considered to be an easier word to spell than the German surname "Fahrenheit" (at least this is the case for Cueball, but not necessarily for those who more commonly use Fahrenheit than Celsius). In this case the word is being spoken and the point is not immediately relevant, but part of the joke is that Cueball is overthinking things and worrying about the general use of the word when an answer is needed in this specific case. We lost a Mars probe over this crap The Mars Climate Orbiter disintegrated in Mars' atmosphere because Lockheed used US customary units instead of the contractually specified metric units. This had nothing to do with temperature scales, but was the use of the unit pound-seconds where newton-seconds should have been used. This was a great and tragic loss for science in general, Mars exploration in particular, and thus also for Randall who has shown deep interest in any kind of space exploration, especially regarding Mars (mentioning many Mars probes in his comics so far).
0 °F to 100 °F good match for temperature range in which most humans live In the context of air temperature, 0 °F and 100 °F correspond to "just about as cold as it gets" and "just about as hot as it gets" in temperate zones, thereby making Fahrenheit a useful temperature scale for weather reporting where most people live. By contrast, in Celsius a range of common temperatures in temperate zones is -20 °C to 40 °C, which is a less intuitive range for those used to the Fahrenheit scale. Rounds more usefully (70's, 90's) An argument sometimes heard for the continued use of Fahrenheit temperatures is that each 10 degrees change is meaningful in how we feel the temperature. Thus, it is convenient to talk about the temperature being in the 70's today, or in the 90's, etc. Since the Celsius degrees are almost twice as large, a similar statement about the temperature being in the 20's or 30's is not as useful, unless more precision is added by using phrases like low 20's or high 30's. However, this seems likely to be more a matter of which scale you are used to using than anything inherent in one scale or the other. Unit-aware computing makes imperial less annoying If you need to constantly convert between imperial and SI measurements in your head, or even between different imperial units (e.g., ounces and pounds), it gets annoying and is a strong argument for everyone using metric measurements all the time. But when it is easy to get the temperature - or any other measurement - reported in whatever units you want just by selecting the units you want your computer to report, then the annoyance is minimized, and the arguments for why we should stop using a familiar scale are weakened.  Note that Cueball is looking at his smart-phone to get the current temperature. As many Americans, Randall is confusing the United States customary system with the imperial system used in most of the rest of the English speaking world. In both systems temperature is measured in degrees Fahrenheit. SI prefixes are less relevant for temperatures One of the nice things about SI measurements is how the same basic unit scales by factors of 10 with common prefixes - e.g., kilometer, millimeter, kilogram, milligram, etc.  Imperial measurements don't have this feature - you don't talk about long distances as kiloinches or small weights as millipounds. But, we generally don't use multiple units for atmospheric temperature (millidegrees or kilodegrees), so this argument for using SI measurements for length, mass, volume, etc., isn't as applicable for temperature scales. Fahrenheit is likely more clear in this context The fact that Cueball is having this conflict at all implies that the conversation is taking place in America, presumably between Americans. Given that, and given that the discussion is about the weather, the typical assumption is that temperatures will be given in Fahrenheit, unless specified otherwise. An answer in Fahrenheit is therefore likely to be easily understood, while an answer in Celsius risks being confusing, or even incomprehensible. Valuing unit standardization over being helpful possibly makes me a bad friend The final thing Cueball considers is to question why he would give an answer that attaches more value to promoting standardization of units when all his friend wants to know is whether it is cold or warm outside. Wouldn't it be more friendly to just answer the question the way his friend will find most convenient? This is probably the reason he ends up not giving any real answer, as giving the answer in Celsius would make him a bad friend. Giving the answer in panic in radians makes him a weird friend, which might or might not be preferable to being a bad friend.
[Cueball is looking at his smartphone while a friend calls to him from off-panel. Cueball is thinking as indicated with a thought bubble.] Off-screen voice: Hey, what's the temperature outside? Cueball (thinking): Should I give it in °F or °C?
[Zoom in on Cueballs head with a list of reason to use Celsius above him:] Degrees Celsius International standard Helps reduce America's weird isolationism Nice how "negative" means below freezing Physics major loyalty Easier to spell We lost a Mars probe over this crap
[Same view of Cueballs head, but wider frame to accommodate a broader a list of reason to use Fahrenheit:] Degrees Fahrenheit 0°F to 100°F good match for temperature range in which most humans live Rounds more usefully (70's, 90's) Unit-aware computing makes imperial less annoying SI prefixes are less relevant for temperatures Fahrenheit is likely more clear in this context Valuing unit standardization over being helpful possibly makes me a bad friend
[Cueball is holding his smartphone down while thinking as indicated with another thought bubble floating at the top. He then speaks and gets a reply from his off-panel friend.] Cueball (thinking): Crap, gotta pick something. Uhh... Cueball: ...0.173 radians. Off-screen voice: I'll just go check myself


Stargazing

Explanation:
This is the first comic in the Stargazing series. It was followed by 2017: Stargazing 2 two and a half years later and 2274: Stargazing 3 four years later.
This comic opens on Megan as the host for a stargazing TV show, or  simply a stargazing tour. She claims to be a doctor in astronomy though her remarks, however enthusiastic, may call this into question. (Originally the host was suspected to be a spoof on Brian Cox , see below , but at some later point Randall changed his official transcript thus making the host female rather than male as in the original version, see the trivia section below. Thus now the host is clearly Megan, which it could not have been originally when the host was described as a man by Randall).
Throughout the comic the host's tone and choice of words becomes increasingly unprofessional, referring to most of the stars as "shitty," personifying them based on different astronomical observations, and providing little useful information on the study of stars or how they work.
It seems that this is not an isolated issue as the television host mentions that people keep asking her whether or not she is a real astronomer.
The host also continuously glosses over the arguably less exciting portions of a typical presentation on astronomy sharing only what she sees as "the good stuff." This penchant for only caring about something if it is interesting extends past astronomy as well as the host is too bored when reading the dictionary to look up the meaning of astronomer.
The comic derives much of its humor from the absurdity of the host's comments on various astronomical bodies. Although not technically incorrect, the way she presents the information is far from informative. (See details below on the host's observations ).
One of her observations regards the fact that Sirius is a binary star , a system where two stars orbit each other. So even though it is the brightest star as seen from Earth we only really see one of them, as the other is, to quote the host, "not even trying". Sirius A is "large" and "bright" main sequence white star, while Sirius B is a white dwarf with a little under half the mass, 0.49% the radius and only 0.22% the luminosity of Sirius A.
Andromeda is the largest galaxy in our Local Group . It is 220,000 light years across and contains a trillion stars. Humans have difficulty conceptualizing distances of this scale. Suffice to say that it is very large. [ citation needed ]
Betelgeuse is the 9th brightest star visible from earth. One of its prominent features is its visible redness. Within the next million years (or maybe only 100,000 years) it is expected to explode as a supernova , which will certainly be a spectacular sight. It could happen anytime now, and the host hopes it will be in her lifetime.
In the title text it is mentioned that the Sun is also a star and of course is much brighter than Sirius seen from Earth, and thus Sirius is technically not the brightest star in our sky (although it is in the night sky). The title text sarcastically encourages the audience to raise that obvious but irrelevant point (a standard joke when people mention bright stars) instead of asking a more interesting, informative, or fruitful question, when there are so many to ask regarding astronomy.
See also 1371: Brightness and 1342: Ancient Stars . Saying cool things about space to make people like you is mentioned in 1746: Making Friends .
Here is a list of the host's observations:
The comic could be a reference to BBC's Stargazing Live , which Brian Cox has appeared in since 2011. If drawn in xkcd style he would likely look like Megan. He has a PhD in high-energy particle physics , but not astronomy. The newest season of the show aired during January 2016 just a month before this comic's release. Brian Cox has also been the presenter of several other science programs, especially such as the Wonders of the Solar System , Wonders of the Universe and Wonders of Life . Originally the host was described as male in the official transcript (see trivia below, making this seem more likely. for some reason Randall changed the host to female in the transcript later. Very strange, but for sure when he was male, it was obviously a Brian Cox spoof.
It could also be a reference to Jack Horkheimer 's PBS shows Star Hustler and Star Gazers . Horkheimer, however, does not at all look like Megan, and he died 6 years ago. But he was not a doctor in astronomy, only getting into it when he started volunteering at the Miami Museum of Science's planetarium. He ended up writing shows for the planetarium and the PBS series developed from there. He rarely covered facts about the night sky that couldn't be found in any basic reference (possibly because the show was aimed at children and non-astronomy buffs), although he did get more in-depth about current astronomical events such as Comet Hale–Bopp .
[A thin panel with Megan as a TV-host is holding her hands up. She is drawn in white on a black background. Behind her is an audience drawn in faint gray lines consisting of Hairy (to the left) and two Cueball-like guys and Ponytail (seen in a rare full face position) to the right of the host. One of the Cueball-like guys is partly hidden behind the host.] Host: Welcome to stargazing, with your host, me. Host: I'm a doctor or whatever.
[Same scene as before but in a broader panel, and the host is now holding only one hand up with a finger pointing up. The audience is the same four people, but now Hairy has moved further to the left in the panel to make room for a Megan-like woman also to the left of the host.] Host: I'm not gonna waste your time on the shitty stars. Host: Just the good stuff. Host: Honestly half of 'em just look like dots.
[A frame-less drawing with a zoom out showing the group of six people in black silhouette on a white background. Part of the ground beneath them is shown as a black pool. The host is pointing up with one hand. The people have been rearranged, so left of the host is now a Cueball-like guy and a Megan-like woman, and to the right is the other Cueball-like guy, then Ponytail (seen from the side as usual) and Hairy. All are looking up following the host's directions.] Host: This is Sirius. It's the brightest star in our sky so it's in charge. Host: It's really two stars but one of them is barely even trying. Host: This is Andromeda, it's too big to think about, so let's not.
[Zoom in of the host's upper body, again drawn in white on a black background. She is looking right gesturing with one arm raised, and the other still pointing up with a finger stretched out. Her audience is no longer shown.] Host: That red stars is Betelgeuse. It's gonna explode someday. Host: Can't happen soon enough, as far as I'm concerned. I- Host: Holy shit did you see that meteor!?! Host: Space is awesome!
[Same scene as the previous panel, but the host has turned towards left looking at someone in the audience (not shown) who speaks off-screen. She has taken both her hands down for the first time.] Off-screen voice: Are you sure you're an astronomer? Host: People keep asking that, so I finally tried to look that word up in a dictionary, and wow is that book ever boring. No thank you. Off-screen voice: But- Host: Space!
(Inverse color panel - white on black) [A television host in the foreground, speaking toward the reader. A group of other people are in the background behind them.] Host: Welcome to Stargazing, with your host, me. I'm a doctor or whatever. [She continues to talk.] Host: I'm not gonna waste your time on the shitty stars. Just the good tuff. Honestly half of 'em just look like dots. (Normal color panel - black on white) [A shot from far away of the host standing in the center of the group of people watching her, she points to the sky.] Host: This is Sirius. It's the brightest star in our sky so it's in charge. It's really two stars, but one of them is barely even trying. This is Andromeda. It's too big to think about, so let's not. (Inverse color panel) [Close-up on the host gesturing toward the sky behind her.] Host: That red star is Betelgeuse. It's gonna explode someday. Can't happen soon enough, as far as I'm concerned. I-- HOLY SHIT DID YOU SEE THAT METEOR?!?! Space is awesome! [The host speaks to someone out of panel.] Other: Are you sure you're an astronomer? Host: People keep asking that, so I finally tried to look that word up in a dictionary, and wow is that book ever boring. No thank you. Other: But-- Host: SPACE! The original official transcript with male host is included here below (correcting a typo with a missing "s" in "stuff" and formatting to look like our normal transcripts): [A television host in the foreground, speaking toward the reader. A group of other people are in the background behind them.] Host: Welcome to Stargazing, with your host, me. I'm a doctor or whatever. [He continues to talk.] Host: I'm not gonna waste your time on the shitty stars. Just the good stuff. Honestly half of 'em just look like dots. [Normal color panel - black on white. A shot from far away of the host standing in the center of the group of people watching him, he points to the sky.] Host: This is Sirius. It's the brightest star in our sky so it's in charge. It's really two stars, but one of them is barely even trying. This is Andromeda. It's too big to think about, so let's not. [Inverse color panel. Close-up on the host gesturing toward the sky behind him.] Host: That red star is Betelgeuse. It's gonna explode someday. Can't happen soon enough, as far as I'm concerned. I-- HOLY SHIT DID YOU SEE THAT METEOR?!?! Space is awesome ! [The host speaks to someone out of panel.] Other: Are you sure you're an astronomer? Host: People keep asking that, so I finally tried to look that word up in a dictionary, and wow is that book ever boring. No thank you. Other: But-- Host: SPACE!


Toasts

Explanation:
A toast is a ritual in which a drink is taken as an expression of honor or goodwill. The term may be applied to the person or thing so honored, the drink taken, or the verbal expression accompanying the drink. Thus, a person could be "the toast of the evening," for whom someone "proposes a toast" to congratulate and for whom a third person "toasts" in agreement.
The comic is based on the quote Champagne for My Real Friends, Real Pain for My Sham Friends which, though often attributed to the painter Francis Bacon or to Tom Waits , is a toast dating back to at least the nineteenth century. It is also the entire title of a song , the ninth track on From  Under the Cork Tree , a 2005 album by Fall Out Boy .
The comic plays on a permutation structure between two words (a type of chiasmus ), yielding puns with various effects.  In this comic eight persons drink a toast for their "real friends" and then for some other type of "friends". For the real friend they wish them to have one specific thing. This something is a word (X-Y) that can be split up in two meanings (X and Y), where one of them are then put in front the word friend, to explain what type of friends they are now toasting (often a bad/false type of friend) and then these friends get a wish for having what the word that are left of the original word means: "X-Y for my real friends and real Y for my X friends"
The first example is a typical toast, in Champagne, where this word can be split in the two phonetically similar words Sham and Pain, and the sham friends then get pain. Below all examples (including the ninth from the title text) are listed with explanation for all words. In some cases the word may actually refer to a drink (like the first with champagne), so that the first word is not something wished for the real friends, but the drink that is in the glass (these have been mentioned below). But for other toasts there is no such drink in existence, and the first word is the thing the toaster wishes for the real friends.
[There are two rows of 4 panels each. Each panel shows a different person offering a toast. Each one has some kind of drink in one hand which they hold up.]
[First row panels:] [Cueball holding up a wine glass to the right:] Cueball: Champagne for my real friends and real pain for my sham friends!
[Blondie holding up a regular glass to the left:] Blondie: Pseudopods for my real friends and real pods for my pseudo-friends!
[Megan holding up a drinks glass to the right:] Megan: Petticoats for my real friends and real coats for my petty friends.
[A "brunette" woman (i.e. similar hair but less dark than Megan) holding up a normal glass with a small umbrella in it to the right:] Brunette woman: Loosestrife for my real friends and real strife for my loose friends!
[Second row panels:] [Hairbun holding up a wine glass to the left:] Hairbun: Ladybugs for my real friends and real bugs for my lady friends!
[White Hat holding up a regular glass to the right:] White Hat: Single-payer for my real friends and RealPlayer for my single friends.
[Ponytail holding up a regular glass to the right:] Ponytail: Tumbleweeds for my real friends and real weed for my Tumblr friends!
[Beret Guy holding up a wine glass to the left:] Beret Guy: Fauxhawks for my real friends and real hawks for my faux friends!


Twitter Bot

Explanation:
A Twitter bot is a program that can post automatically to Twitter . Although Twitter bots can be very elaborate, a lot of people write simple bots for fun that simply engage in automated wordplay.
Cueball thinks he'll write a Twitter bot, figuring out it won't be too hard. The web searches he makes tell what happens next, i.e. the bot balloons in complexity until it starts following its own goals and Cueball no longer has any control over its actions.
This comic examines how a seemingly simple task can often balloon in complexity if all of the requirements are not understood, while at the same time presenting the stereotypical scenario where an unassuming idea results in the accidental creation of malevolent AI , which then attempts to destroy humanity.
The story, as told by the web searches, is as follows:
[Cueball is sitting at a desk using a laptop, his thoughts shown above in a thought bubble. A search query is shown in a frame to indicate what Cueball has searched for with the search button below in gray text:] Cueball (thinking): I want to make a Twitter bot. I bet it's not too hard. Query: How to write a Twitter bot Search
[Cueball is now holding the laptop on his lap, a series of search queries are shown.] Query: Python Twitter library Search Query: Machine learning Search Query: Cloud hosting Search
[Cueball has placed the laptop back on the desk.  More search queries are shown, each one more ominous than the previous.] Query: Bot troubleshooting Search Query: Locked out of EC2 instance Search Query: Bot changed own password? Search
[Cueball is shown wearing a small backpack and typing on his smartphone while jogging to the right. various noises coming from left and right seem to imply that chaos has begun to erupt around him. The loudest noise is in a ragged frame to the left, coming from off-panel left, it is between the first and second query. Also between these but to the right are other sounds coming from off-panel right.] Query: How to fight a bot Search Noise off-panel left: Boom Noise off-panel right: Pew Pew Pew Query: Cheap flights Australia Search
On March 23, 2016, a month after the release of this comic, Microsoft released the Twitter bot Tay causing many controversies and was shut down only 16 hours after its launch. It's unknown if some people at Microsoft were inspired by this comic.


Diacritics

Explanation:
A diacritic (or a diacritical mark) is a glyph added to a letter. The main use of diacritical marks in the latin script is to change the sound-values of the letters to which they are added, typically vowels .
Cueball is writing an e-mail (maybe for a job application) and notes in the mail that he attaches his résumé , or curriculum vitae . The word résumé uses two e s with an acute accent so they look like this: é.
While diacritics can be common in several languages, English is an example of a language that rarely ever has any at all. This occurs to such an extent that words and expressions borrowed from other languages (such as "résumé" or "piñata") are frequently written in English with the diacritics omitted, as in "resume" or "pinata". As Cueball/ Randall is a native English speaker, it is thus natural that he often forgets (or just doesn't bother) to add these diacritics, hence the title of the comic. When he occasionally remembers them, for instance when he types a word where he knows they should be included, like résumé, he then makes up for all those he must have forgotten since last time he thought of it, and thus adds a whole bunch at once. This reason is somewhat nonsensical.
Randall may be poking fun at people who use Zalgo , a form of spam where people continuously spam diacritics in chat messages. For example:

T̯̙̻̼̠͕̙̬̬̜̼̊ͥͦͬͤ̇̎̆̌ͭ͢͠͡o̡̲̩̟̲̬̰̪̜̝͙̺̦̙͍̳ͬͯͯ͋͒̍ͨ̓̇́̚̚̕ ̸̢̬̘̦͕̯̱̜̲̼̤ͬͧͤͨǐ̷̷̯̼̝̹̫ͪ̀̋̿̄̓n͎͍͕̜͎̺̯͈̼̩̣̥̬̿͂ͩ͂ͮ̔̆͡͞ͅͅv̴̨̙̼̤̼͙͖̫̖̺̹̠̹̦́͌͑̓̆̂ͯ̑̈̏ͭo̢̫̲̙̺̬̤̲̳ͨ̐ͦ̽͛ͮ͛́͂ͣ͂ͮ͆͑̍̀ͯ̕͟k̵̨̫̙̤͙̹̫͚͈̪͇͓͈̫̬̥͕̱͎̜̉̔ͬͭͦ̓͐ͫ̋̋ͥ̋̀̕͟è̢̛̟̞͇̘̤̼̮̤͍͚̫̤͚̰͑͋͐̀̏ͣ̏ͬ̒̌͌́̚͘͝ ̶̧̮̗̣̫͇̦͎̮̤̗͙̗̳͎̺͆̉̈ͭ̽̈́̌̽ͥ̾͑̀̚̚͘͟ͅͅt̸͓͉̩́̓̓ͮ̇̈̆ͣ̀ͪͬ͑̅ͣ̍h̸̸̡̧̟̣̤̺͔̘̞̦̖͖̣̺̱̜͔̗̫̰ͧ͑̐̂ͥ̄̃̂̄́͋ͨ͑̓̆͋̚ͅȇ̡͇͎͎̩̮̟̖̖̤̦̜͍̱̇ͨ̃̈́̄̑ͦͭ̚͞ͅ ̛̼̤̟̩̦̻̤̙̥̬̠̩̙̙̱͚͕ͫ͐̏ͥ̄ͧͧͭ̔̆͐̋͘h̶̵̜̤͓̹̰ͣ̄͗́́i̝͕̘̗͉͚̰͓̮͕̣͒̂̒ͨ̽ͫ̎ͪͦ́̕͝ͅv̧̙̞̣̳͍̟̖͚̻̝͈ͧ͊ͫ͋ͩͫ̍͋̏̽ͤ̀͝͞ͅẻ̢͓̣̰͔̟͎̥̻̤̲̟̣̜̄̈́̌͛̌̄͢͞ͅ-̨̡͆̓̌̎̉̑҉͚̝̗m̨̛͎̬͉̯̽ͥͫ̇ͦ̒̿̎́͒́̚͡͠ỉ̧̡͖͙̙͕͔̲ͩ́ͣ͐ͧ͑̊̾̒͑̅͗̊́̎̚n̠̮̜̝̜̤̰̻̘͖̦͚̼ͫ̄͐͗ͣ́͢͜d̡̛̳͕̬̫̯̩͕̰̖̟̲͕͙ͭ̅̓ͥ͛ͨ͒ͯ͌̚ͅͅ ̟̜̳̫͕̺͎̺̲̗̋̐̀͛͑̅̅͛̾̈́̀̚͞͠r̸̯̥͚̟̰͉͎͓̖͉͂̎̅̐ͫͧ͛ͯ͜ḛ̤̳͓̩͉̲̣̠͍͔̗̦̬̱̯̈́̎͂̆ͥͩ͟p̘̜̥̠̜̥̘̲̮̹̤̪̦͕͇͓̽ͧ͒͗ͣ̿̆̄̑͞r̴͓̼̺̰̹͙͉̦͚̞̤͕̭̦̈́ͫ̔̂̓̆̒͗͛̿̑̉̿̓ͤ̏̇̀̚͘͘͢é̴̢̛̖̗̖̤ͧ̽͑ͨ̒̌̍ͭ̑̋̃̒ͫ̀͡ş̶͉͚̠̠͇͓̬̙͚̖̝͓͕̤̟́̂̏ͧͩ͌͑͐ͣ͌͌̄̾̿ȩ̢͈̗̝͍ͨ̒͗ͭ̔̈͆ͫ̔ͨ̈́́̊ͣ̃̎̀͝͝n̸̟͔̺̠̺̓̑̏͐ͩͬ̏̈́̌͒́̏ͥ̌̍͊ͧ̀̚͜͞͞tͮ̾͒̇̐ͩ͆̓ͣ҉̢̤͖̩͕̬̮͚͙̖͕̬̘̙͘͠ͅĩ̡̬̙̙̯̩͋̋̄n̡̡̳̻̞͓̗̹̪̜̘̰̠̟͈̮̲̳̜̊̐͌ͣ̍̒̽ͩͫ͌ͦ̚͝g̵̎̓́̃ͮ̍̏̈̄ͧ̈́̐̔̏ͤͭͨ҉̛̘̰̘̟̬̝̰̜̗̼ͅͅ ̸̦̞͓̟͉̫͔̦̰̝͈̩̳̞̼̮̩̬͕̿ͩ͗̂̌̐ͭ͟͞c̳̻͚̻̩̻͉̯̄̏͑̋͆̎͐ͬ͑͌́͢h̵͔͈͍͇̪̯͇̞͖͇̜͉̪̪̤̙ͧͣ̓̐̓ͤ͋͒ͥ͑̆͒̓͋̑́͞ǎ̡̮̤̤̬͚̝͙̞͎̇ͧ͆͊ͅo̴̲̺͓̖͖͉̜̟̗̮̳͉̻͉̫̯̫̍̋̿̒͌̃̂͊̏̈̏̿ͧ́ͬ̌ͥ̇̓̀͢͜s̵̵̘̹̜̝̘̺̙̻̠̱͚̤͓͚̠͙̝͕͆̿̽ͥ̃͠͡.̔̈́ͤͣͪ̅̎̄̽ͩͪ͛̓̂̂̑͒҉̤͍͔̲̣̜͕̺͕͇̖͓̺̦̺́̀͢

Which reads (without the diacritics) as 'To invoke the hive mind representing chaos.'
The first diacritic is a macron over the i in "find". In English, this modifies a vowel to be "long". The second diacritic is the normal acute accent for the e in résumé, to make it an é which does belong in résumé . However, the third diacritic he uses is an umlaut on the u making it into ü, which is not part of the word. Ü typically represents the close front rounded vowel /y/, pronounced similar to the <ee> in "See" but with rounded lips. Ü can be found in languages such as German and Turkish ; however,  in French ü is not used in this way since the diacritic-less u already represents this sound. German has a word spelt as Resümee , but the meaning is not the same but rather conclusions or abstracts.
Cueball then goes all in on the last e which, like the first e, is supposed to have an acute accent. This e has a cedilla (as in ȩ), a ring (as in e̊), three acute accents, and is topped off by a breve (as in ĕ). In total, six  diacritics are used on this e alone.
Some languages—notably Vietnamese— can use more than one diacritic per letter , but usually only two (for example, ṏ). This is because in Vietnamese diacritics can serve two functions: the aforementioned modifying sound values as well as to indicate tone .  Using multiple diacritics in the comic's fashion makes little sense though it is reminiscent of (the aforementioned) Zalgo text .
There are also three acute accents over the last period. Diacritics over punctuation is not something that is ever used.
So for a word that is supposed to have two diacritics, Cueball uses eight, plus three for the period.
In the title text "not my forté" is supposed to mean that it is not one of Randall's strength or talent. However, to obtain this meaning forte should not have an acute diacritic over the e, thus proving Randall's point that it is not his forte to use diacritics. This is a form of hyperforeignism , where people spell loan words or use pronunciations that they believe is more faithful to the language it comes from instead of the "English" one, even though the "English" one is actually more correct. Due to its similarity with other words from French such as café, some people believe that forte is also spelled with a diacritic on the ending E (also note that the word was independently borrowed twice: from French as "a strength" and from Italian as a musical term. Neither usage requires diacritics).
The title text may be a reference to the what if? released a week before this comic, Fire from moonlight , in which note 9 reads, "My résumé says étendue is my forté" (with the same error on "forte"). It is possible that noticing his mistake was the inspiration for this comic. Also étendue can be written without the accent as etendue and the meaning is only written on this page in the Wiktionary. It means  property of the light in an optical system which makes sense in the context of the note. However, it means something different in French where it either refers to size or range as a noun or as a verb is the past participle of étendre meaning stretch or spread. The most correct way of writing the sentence he tried to write would only have involved the accent on résumé: "My résumé says etendue is my forte." Thus again making it clear that Randall has it right when he writes: "Using diacritics correctly is not my forté."
If there actually has been someone who corrected Randall's mistake in the what if?, then there could be an extra pun hidden in the title. Those who criticized Randall's use of accents, would thus become dia critics !
Comic 1209: Encoding also references an absurd use of diacritics, and later a possible movie called Combining Diacritical Marks was mentioned in 1857: Emoji Movie , a direct reference to this comic.
[Cueball sitting in front of his lap top typing. The text above him is the one he is typing. The last word résumé has too many diacritics. The u has an umlaut (as in ü) and the last é has no less than six diacritics; a cedilla below (as in ȩ), a ring above (as in e̊ ), then three acute accents above the ring (as in é), and finally they are topped off by a breve (as in ĕ). In addition, find is spelled fīnd with a macron over the i . Also, the last full stop has three accents "´" above it:]
Cueball (typing): Attached please fīnd my résümȩ̊́́́̆.́́́
[Caption below the panel:] I usually leave out diacritics when I type, so I make up for it by occasionally adding a whole bunch at once.


Famous Duos

Explanation:
In popular culture (the term is loosely used in this case) there are many famous duos , such as Calvin & Hobbes (six-year-old boy and his toy tiger, from the cartoon strip with the same name) or David & Goliath (famous past King of Israel and giant, Biblical characters from the Book of Samuel in the Old Testament ). (See the trivia section regarding an on-line list of duos).
In this table, Randall describes a fictional parallel universe where the same names are used in different combinations — instead of Calvin, it is now Thelma (from the movie Thelma & Louise ) who is paired up with Hobbes, and Calvin is instead paired off with the King, from Anna and the King . In all cases the one mentioned first on the list is also mentioned first in our universe, so it is always of the form Calvin and the King, never Calvin and Anna. There are 24 duos, and all 48 partners are mentioned (they go through four cycles ). (In the title text of 1644: Stargazing from the week before this comic, there is an indirect reference to parallel universes/ multiverse ).
The humor of this comic comes from the ridiculousness of the pairings, and the reader's imagination of the stories that are created with the pairs. See the whole list of real duos as well as the list of alternative duos below, with more detailed explanations.
In the title text, alternative movie Romeo and Butt-Head is mentioned, the fifth entry on the list. This is a combination of the famous Shakespeare play Romeo and Juliet and Beavis and Butt-Head . Romeo and Juliet has been filmed many times; most recently in Romeo + Juliet from 1996 with Leonardo DiCaprio and Claire Danes in the leading roles. Butt-Head is the less stupid one (of the very stupid duo) from the animated TV series Beavis and Butt-Head (and a film ). As Romeo and Juliet is one of the best known love stories and Butt-Head is one of the most disgusting teens ever depicted on the big screen (only overtaken by Beavis ), the combination could create disturbing pictures in people's heads (especially in the heads of anyone who may identify themselves with Juliet).
In the alternative universe, when this movie was released, it got the best possible review of two thumbs up from the critics Siskel and Oates . Gene Siskel was paired with Roger Ebert , when they reviewed movies as the famous duo Siskel and Ebert . They were widely known for the "thumbs up/thumbs down" review summaries, with their best combined review being Two Thumbs Up , one from each of them. Coincidentally, or perhaps not, they actually gave Beavis & Butthead Do America Two Thumbs Up .
In the alternative universe Siskel and his partner gives the film a (surprising) two thumbs up, but Ebert has been replaced with Oates. This is a reference to John Oates of Hall & Oates , a famous American musical duo from Philadelphia.
There also exists a comedy duo named Garfunkel and Oates , formed by Riki Lindhome and Kate Micucci, who chose the "Garfunkel and Oates" name by combining the second names from both Hall & Oates and Simon and Garfunkel (the latter duo is mentioned in the main comic). Although this exact combo would not be possible in the xkcd version, as the "real universe" combo takes the second names from two duos rather than the first name from one and the second name from another (as in this comic), there may definitely be a deliberate reference to this group as well which has taken the parallel universe idea into our universe.
[Caption above the panel:] Famous Duos in a nearby parallel universe
[A list with 24 duos with a gray “and" between the two names (in one case it is a “met") and three times there is a gray word before (once) or after (twice) the names. The list is centered with the “and" in the middle disregarding the length of the names on each side:]
Thelma and Hobbes When Harry met Bullwinkle Batman and Louise Antony and Robin Romeo and Butthead Bonnie and Ted 's excellent adventure Pinky and Clyde Simon and Goliath Beauty and Luigi Beavis and the Beast Rocky and Delilah Abbot and Cleopatra Dr. Jekyll and Ashley Olsen Samson and Pumbaa Butch Cassidy and Mr. Hyde Bill and Sally 's Bogus Journey David and Costello Sherlock Holmes and Silent Bob Jay and Dr. Watson Anna and the Brain Calvin and the King Timon and Garfunkel Mary-Kate and the Sundance Kid Mario and Juliet
Ranking (on 2016-02-28) of famous Duos Rank Duo Index 2 Batman and Robin 3 8 Holmes and Watson 18 11 Simon and Garfunkel 8 22 Thelma and Louise 1 23 Pinky and The Brain 7 24 Hall and Oates 26 Title text 31 Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid 15 35 Calvin and Hobbes 21 41 Jay and Silent Bob 19 46 Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde 13 71 Abbott and Costello 12 79 Beauty and the Beast 9 85 Antony and Cleopatra 4 99 Beavis and Butt-head 10 106 Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen 23 110 Romeo and Juliet 5 206 Rocky and Bullwinkle 11 N/A When Harry Met Sally... 2 N/A Samson and Delilah 14 N/A Bill & Ted 16 N/A David and Goliath 17 N/A Anna and the King 20 N/A Timon and Pumbaa 22 N/A Mario and Luigi 24 N/A Siskel and Ebert 25 Title text


Pipelines

Explanation:
This comic follows a similar idea to the what if? " Niagara Straw " from three days before this comic's release, where the entire water flow over Niagara Falls is imagined to be funneled through a straw (i.e. 7 mm diameter), with disastrous results.
In this comic Randall imagines what size pipes are necessary to carry US domestic production/consumption of various fluids if the flow rate were fixed at 4 meters per second. Randall notes that "many pipes would overlap", owing to the fact that consumption of one item as corn syrup would be due to the production of one of the others, in this case soda pop (another example, than the previous one which is actually mentioned in the comic, could be gasoline which is produced from petroleum ).
The top panel is in actual size (something Randall often jokes about, like in the very next released what if? " Eat the Sun ", where he shows part of the sun in actual size in the 2nd picture, but in this comic he actually means it). This means that if you look at the image in actual size (or measure lengths in the full size image) then the measured diameter is the diameter Randall has calculated the pipe should be, based on his data for the consumption of these substances.
In the second panel the pipes are too big for his drawing. To indicate the scale he has both inserted a woman ( Blondie ) and the top panel has been shrunk down to indicate how much larger the bottom panel is (this is similar to the link between the panels in 980: Money ). Using the size of the top panel and the smaller insert, it can be found that the scale is 20:1. The woman is 9 cm tall in the image, which makes her 180 cm — 5 feet 11 inches — in "real life". The pipe next to her for gasoline would have a diameter of 2.2 m.
Since the caption at the top mentions both fluid produced and consumed in the US it becomes very difficult to find out which number Randall uses. For instance the consumption of wine in the US and the production of wine in the US is not necessarily the same as wine is both imported and exported. Should there then be two pipes? Unlike similar comics (like Money mentioned above) there are no references for where Randall has the data for this comic.
As usual with xkcd, the absurdity — and improbability — of routing the entirety of each fluid through a single pipe at any point is the source of humor. Randall appears to assume that all of the fluids would flow at a similar speed to typical water mains (4 meters per second). This is, of course, unrealistic, given the wide range of pipe size and fluid viscosity. Running water through a pipe of that size would be trivial (such speeds are typical), but forcing a material like Silly Putty through a tube that tiny at similar speeds would be implausible. And, as the comic points out, some of the materials are effectively solids at room temperature. Many examples are just plain zany (e.g. saliva may be a reference to another what if? " Saliva Pool "). Nonetheless, the table gives a good visual representation of the comparative usage rates. Note that at the bottom of the last panel there is a much larger pipe for the tap water used by the public. This should, perhaps, be unsurprising, as water is used a far higher rate than any other substance that we produce or transport. All substances are listed below in the table .
The title text refers to a possible future based on the idea of this comic in which all the pipes with the above-mentioned fluids will actually lead into the same hole as shown in the top right panel. This hole will then be the bowl of a giant blender that mixes all these substances together to a smoothie . The future people will then just come up to this blender and get a bucket full of this mix each day. In reality, this would be an impractical method of getting all of the fluids. Setting the logistical considerations of such a setup aside, this would mean that ketchup and salsa, both intended for human consumption, would be mixed with fluids which are harmful to humans, such as windshield wiper fluid.
Note: "Soup" has been left out, and it might have been expected in this comic due to the similarity to this system with Beret Guy 's use of a "soup outlet" as an entrepreneur in 1293: Job Interview . It is probably a larger pipeline than salsa and possibly even ketchup. However, there are many different varieties of soups, and most soup is probably not bought finished, both very good reasons to not include it in the chart. But still the idea of having a soup outlet is very similar to this comic.
[Caption above the first main panel, to the left of a smaller panel to the right:] The size of the US’s Pipelines if each fluid produced or consumed in the US has to be carried by a single pipe Assuming they all flowed at the same speed of about 4 m / s Note: Many pipelines would overlap (eg. soda/corn syrup)
[There is a small panel to the right showing three gray pipes of different sizes leading out over a large hole in the ground. Only a part of the hole can be seen at the bottom left part of the panel, but it curves around indicating it is a large circular hole. The pipes are supported by small legs beneath them and from the end of all three thick liquids are squirting out and down into the hole. The first pipe is by far the largest; the liquid from it is white, but not as white as the background. The second pipe is by far the smallest squirting dark red liquid and the final rightmost pipe is in between and squirts our light brown liquid. Each pipe is labeled. The label on the smallest cannot be read properly, but from the info gained in the next panel it can be inferred for certain what it says (and this is indicated here below):] [Large pipe (white)]: Mayo [Small pipe (dark red)]: Nail polish [Medium pipe (light brown)]: Maple syrup
[Below is a large panel with a caption at the top. And below this there are twenty circles in different sizes and with different color (or even texture). Each circle is labeled, for the five smallest the label is outside, in one case with an arrow indicating where the label belongs. The rest has the label inside. The text is in black except for four of those with text inside, but with red of black color. Here the text is white. The labels are indicated by color and size, going roughly from top left in reading order based on the position and size of circles not of position of the text:]
Actual size (When viewed on a typical computer screen) [Medium green blue and white spiral]: Toothpaste [Tiny dark red]: Nail polish [Big light blue with white specks]: Windshield washer fluid [Very tiny purple]: Silly putty [Medium light green]: Shampoo [Large dark yellow]: Honey [Very small blood red]: Donated blood [Tiny black]: Vanilla [Big red]: Ketchup [Medium dark red with chunks of in different green and lighter red colors]: Salsa [Small white]: Sunscreen [Very small light green]: Personal lubricant [Very tiny gray]: LCD liquid [Medium off-white]: Mayo [Very small black]: Printer ink [Small light brown]: Maple syrup [Small light green]: Conditioner [Medium yellow]: Mustard [Large light green]: Liquid soap [Big olive green]: Olive oil
[The panel just described is indicated to fit into a small rectangle at the top left of the next panel below. There are four lines ending at the four corners of this small rectangle, two of these are going to the two bottom corners and the other two ends on the lower part of the panel just above the small rectangle. They are indicated to go under the panel and would hit the two top corners if extrapolated. The 11 largest circles are clearly seen, but most of the other circles can also be noted. The colors are the same but any features in the original circles as well as the labels are gone. The part of the black top frame of the next panel below is faded out to gray in between the section cut off by the two lines going to the bottom corners of the panel above. This rectangle indicated the increasing size compared to the first panel above.]
[Apart from the insert mentioned above, the second panel follows the same layout, but with 22 circles with even larger range of sizes. The panel is more than twice as long as the first panel. Blondie is drawn at the top of the panel just left of the middle. Her hair is close to the top, just below the line going to the right corner above. There are two medium-sized and five smaller circles to her left and one small close to her head and one huge circle to her right. Her feet are less than a third down this panel standing on top of the next row of circles. In the bottom half of the panel there is a giant circle which almost touches the left side of the panel. There are smaller circles above it and down along the right side. One last circle is to the left almost at the bottom. At the very bottom is a slightly curving line to indicate a much much larger blue circle that only graces the panel (no. 23). There is a small green fish in this water to the left of the label. Below the labels are again listed as above. One label has a foot note. But it is written directly beneath the circle in which it is referenced. So it will be written together with the label on the next line. There is also one case with an arrow used to indicate where the label belongs.]
[Medium dark gray]: Coffee [Very tiny gray]: Peanut butter [Very small gray with black specks]: Ice cream [Very small yellow with white specks]: Cheese [Large brown with white fizzing]: Soda [Tiny White]: Acetone [Tiny gray]: Liquor [Huge dark yellow]: Gasoline [Tiny White with blue and orange specks]: Yogurt [Big white]: Milk (cow) [Large light blue]: Bottled water [Small white]: Sugar [Large light gray with white specks]: Saliva [Very small light yellow]: Wine [Very small orange]: HFCS [Very tiny white]: Milk (human) [Gigantic dark gray]: Petroleum [Medium dark red with black texture]: Meat (mostly solid) [Small white]: Glass* *Solid at room temperature [Medium light brown]: Beer [Small gray brown]: Tea [Large gray]: Cement [Gracing bottom of panel light blue, with a fish inside]: Public water


Baby

Explanation:
Cueball (possibly representing Randall ) is uncomfortable about talking with couples who present their baby to him (here represented by Megan and another Cueball-like guy holding a baby in a blanket). Because he never knows what to say, he has many strange thoughts and/or reasonable questions, that shouldn't be mentioned in front of happy parents showing off their precious baby for the first time. See the table below for his thoughts.
Cueball's thoughts of what he didn't say includes the awkward You sure did make that , the plain strange What brand is it? , and interesting musing about science, which has nothing to do with this baby, So do they learn words... , and even rating someone's baby: ★★★★☆ Great baby ! Some of the thoughts are quite true, like It doesn't really look like you since you're not a baby.
In the end he manages to make a comment about how cool the baby is, and immediately regrets this, as he just realized he has squandered the chance to say something meaningful and instead has come out with something quite inane.
In the title text he continues his thoughts again, going in the scientific direction with a question regarding how a child grows. Does it get tall first and then put on weight? (i.e. widen). This is a valid question which has no general answer. (See more in the table below). But he is not serious, as he also wonders if the child will reach full width before getting taller.
Randall was 31 at the time of the release of this comic. As far as this page and Wikipedia informs, at the time of writing, he has no children, although he is married. However, given his age, it is highly likely that many of his friends are having babies during these years, so he will probably often get into the depicted situation. Therefore, it is highly likely that the comic is based on his own experience, and that it is indeed Randall depicted as the thinking Cueball.
Having problems with small talk is a recurring theme in xkcd (see 222: Small Talk ), even something as simple as talking about the weather can be a problem (see 1324: Weather ). This comic is the third in less than a month were Cueball has issues with this; the first two were 1640: Super Bowl Context and 1643: Degrees .
There has previously been a "plural" version of this comic called 441: Babies , here Cueball also manages to say something better left unsaid, even if it was about his own baby.
[Cueball is standing in front of a family consisting a Cueball-like guy holding a newborn baby, with spiky hair, in a blanket and Megan. Cueball is thinking lots of thoughts about what to say to the couple upon seeing their baby for the first time. There is thus a huge thinking bubble in the top of the panel above the characters. Everything in this bubble has been crossed out like taking a pencil and drawing lines on top of the text, but it can still be read. After using all this time thinking, Cueball finally decides what to say, only to immediately regret this as can be seen in a small thought bubble below his spoken line, which is between the huge and the small bubble.] Cueball (thoughts that are crossed out): Wow, it's getting so big! Unlike most babies, which stay the same size forever. Hi! I'm talking to a baby! What brand is it? Wow, definitely much smaller than a regular person! You sure did make that. ★★★★☆ Great baby. It doesn't really look like you since you're not a baby. So do they learn words one at a time alphabetically or can you pick the order or what? I hope it does a good job. Cueball: Wow, that's a really cool baby! Cueball (thinking): Dammit.
[Caption below the panel:] I can never figure out what to say about babies.


Robotic Garage

Explanation:
In some cities, automated parking systems (aka robotic garages) are used to reduce the amount of space needed to store cars, as opposed to traditional parking buildings. The robotic system eliminates the needs for ramps and circulation/reversing areas. Normally, they work by having the user drive their car onto an elevator and get out, after which the elevator lifts or lowers the car into a compact storage space. Here Cueball drives up to what he believes to be a garage of this type operated by Black Hat . However, instead of an elevator carefully moving it into a storage space, a robotic claw simply picks up the car and dumps it in a bin of cars.
This type of parking option will not only break the car, but also make it impossible to take out if the car is at the bottom, hence the cars are stacked .
Cueball reacts quite well to this treatment of his car when Black Hat tells him that later they just dump out the bin (full of cars) and he can then pick his own out from the pile. (Maybe he knows Black Hat well enough not to try to argue with him?) This is of course not possible with such heavy objects. [ citation needed ] Cueball continues to be benign about this absurd situation, which becomes even more absurd when he asks if Black Hat could at least make sure his car is not at the bottom (when it is dumped out with all the other cars). But Black Hat falls back on his excuse "Robots aren't magic," implying that such a feat is beyond the realm of possibility. It would, of course, be quite possible to prevent the damage that Cueball fears if they were using a normal automated parking system.
In the title text he at least gives Cueball an option: he can borrow an axe, if it is really important for him to get the car out from the pile. Although in this situation, an axe would be a nearly useless tool (which, knowing him, is most likely Black Hat's intent), only allowing Cueball to laboriously hack through any other car that lies in the way on top of his own; and still it would not help much, because if his car is at the bottom, it will be even more destroyed than from just being dumped into the bin to begin with.
This is just one of many situations where Black Hat has an evil or just mean/crazy plan in progress. It's for instance not the first time that Black Hat has treated other people's car with great disrespect, although in 562: Parking , the guy with the car had it coming!
[Black Hat points left while talking to Cueball inside his small car.] Black Hat: Just pull onto the receiving platform. Cueball: Cool-I've always wanted to try one of these futuristic robotic garages.
[Cueball has driven the car onto a platform in front of a stop to the left. He is just walking of the platform towards Black Hat.]
[Zoom out reveals a robotic crane arm, that sits on top of the stop from the previous panel, which turns out to be a huge platform for this robot arm. The robotic arm picks up the car with its two fingers and lifts it into the air with a finger on the hood and the other below the car. Black Hat and Cueball look on.] Cueball: Um.
[This panel pans over to the center of the robotic arm, to reveal a large bin with a label to the robots left. The robot arm holds the car almost straight up in the air, but over the bin.] Label: Cars
[The robotic arm open up to release the car which crashes down into the bin, a sound already emanating from it when the rear end of the car (with one wheel still showing) is still visible.] Car: Crunch Label: Cars
[Zoom back to Black Hat and Cueball standing at the end of the empty platform.] Black Hat: We'll dump out the bin when you get back and you can pick out your car from the pile. Cueball: Can you at least make sure it's not on the bottom? Black Hat: Look, robots aren't magic.


Conditionals

Explanation:
This comic is about the many different uses of conditional statements in human languages, such as those marked by the English word "if". The most obvious kind of conditional is a statement about conditions and consequences (i.e. causality ). An expression such as "If A, then B" amounts to asserting that, if A is true, then B is also true is called conditional probability :
This kind of simple conditional statement is the most common case, and has been adapted for use in computer programming and formal logic. But consider the following statement:
This kind of "bleached conditional" doesn't at all assert that, if the left statement is true, the right one needs to be true. Rather, it's just a way of introducing the right statement (taken as novel) by comparing it with the left one (taken for granted). "As everyone knows, Seattle is always rainy, right? Well, Beijing is smoggy just as often".
So conditionals in language are more varied than those of conditionals when used in logic or programming . Another kind of linguistic conditional is as follows:
No one would understand this statement as meaning "if you want biscuits, they'll magically pop up in the sideboard". The if-clause ("if you want some") doesn't specify the conditions in which the then-clause ("there are biscuits") is true. Rather, it describes the conditions in which it's relevant . We can paraphrase it as: "If you want biscuits, then you'll be interested in knowing that there are some in the sideboard". If A is true, then it's relevant for us to talk of B. This construction is known to linguists as relevance conditionals , or "biscuit conditionals", due to J.L. Austin's discussion based on the example above.
The humor in the comic is based on the difference between simple conditionals and relevance conditionals. Cueball gets a chat message on his phone to a social event: "I'll be in your city tomorrow if you want to hang out." This is an everyday relevance conditional, with a meaning like: "if you want to hang out, then it's relevant for you to know that I'll be in your city tomorrow".
However, Cueball interprets it as a simple conditional, just as in formal logic. Under this interpretation, the message amounts to a claim that, if it's true that Cueball wants to hang out, then it's also true his conversation partner will be in his city. Cueball is willfully forcing this interpretation, due to his belief that simple conditionals are the only "proper" ones. That is, he's being a pedant . A pedant is a person who is excessively concerned with formalism, accuracy, and precision.
Under this deliberate misreading, if it's true that Cueball wants to hang out, then we automatically know the other person's location. But if Cueball does not want to hang out, we don't know anything about their location; they could be in the city or anywhere else. Since the person is only "guaranteed" to be in the city if Cueball wants to hang out, he asks them where they will be if he doesn't.
The other person then makes an excuse to drop their invitation, apparently tiring of his pedantry. Hence in the caption Cueball/ Randall observes that being pedantic with regard to conditionals is likely to make your friends disinclined to hang out with you. So he tries not to be pedantic about it.
In the title text, the initiator of the conversation presents another "If A, then B" conditional: "If you're done being pedantic, we should get dinner". In most contexts, this kind of "If you're done being X" utterance marks relevance conditionals. Cueball assumes so, and answers "You did it again!". But the reply is "No, I didn't." Which means that this time they're actually using a simple conditional; because, if Cueball isn't done being a pedant, then they think it's a bad idea to have dinner together. And since Cueball was not finished being pedantic about conditionals, then the last no, would probably also end up being a no to having dinner.
The title text (and partly the subject of the comic) is literally a reference to 725: Literally , if you know what I mean.
[Cueball is shown texting on a phone with a friend. Above him in light gray rectangles with indentations pointing left are the two text messages from his friend, and between them in dark a gray rectangle with an indentation pointing right is Cueball's message.] Friend (text): I'll be in your city tomorrow if you want to hang out. Cueball (text): But where will you be if I don't want to hang out?! Friend (text): You know, I just remembered I'm busy.
[Caption below the panel:] Why I try not to be pedantic about conditionals.


United States Map

Explanation:
The comic is a map with the (rough) outline of the mainland of the United States of America . At first it looks like the real map, but actually all the states have been shuffled around in it. It seems that Randall took all of the states (minus Alaska and Hawaii , the two states that are not part of this map and are only mentioned in the title text, see below), and then reassembled them in the style of a jigsaw puzzle, with the end result being a map with a similar outline to the original unaltered mainland state map . They can thus be reassembled into the real map as can be seen here (see also the trivia section ).
Previously Randall has played with the shapes of the United States in 1079: United Shapes . In that map he did two separate drawings for Michigan with a mitten in the lower part and an eagle in the upper part . Once again in this version he has split Michigan in two, the lower main part, the mitten just labeled Michigan , is on the west coast on part of California's location, but the upper part is located on the east coast over New York's location and has been labeled MI (upper) . So even without Hawaii and Alaska, there are 49 "states" in this map, consisting of 47 states plus the two halves of Michigan. In the table below all 49 states in the map has been listed to indicate where the puzzle pieces have been moved to.
It seems at a first glance that the names have been written on the states as they would appear in a normal map, and that they have all then been rotated with the rotation of the states. But this is not the case for all states. For instance it seems like Utah has hardly been moved at all, and with the name written normally this may be intentionally to deceive the readers. Because Utah has been turned upside down, and according to how for instance Texas , clearly turned upside down, has its name written upside down as well, Utah should thus also have been written like that.
It seems likely that this could be a trick by Randall, to see if anyone spots that Utah has actually been moved. But it could of course be a mistake, as seems more likely with Montana where the same "error" has occurred, but since this state has been moved far from its real position there would be no sport in doing so (see the trivia section ). Of course there is the possibility that "Utah" was on purpose and Montana by mistake. With 47 of 49 ending up rotated as expected on the map and only two exactly upside down, there can be no doubt that it was on purpose that the names in general have been written according to the states rotation. Note that for instance the state California has been rotated, but in a way so the text is written normally. But due to the direction of the state, it is normal to write the name tilted down along the state, which just coincidentally ends up being rotated normal in the position it has in the comic.
California has thus only been pushed down the length of the west border of the US (and thus rotated accordingly) so the top part still overlaps with the bottom part California, but also covers the bottom part of Arizona and New Mexico . Other states that likewise haven't been moved a lot include Maine which has only been rolled left (i.e. turned upside down) to just outside its normal position. Colorado has been moved up a state to where Wyoming usually is, and Wyoming has then just been shifted right, still covering part of its original position. But both have been turned 90 degrees, whichever way would be impossible to say for these rectangular states, but the text, if you dare believe in that, seems to indicate they have been turned counter clockwise. Wisconsin has only been shifted down below its usual position but then turned upside down.
The title text mentions how it would be unfair to use a blank version of this shuffled-up map as a quiz for knowledge of U.S. geography (the link is to such a map created by a user of this site); most people recognize states primarily by their relative locations, not their shape (and especially not their shape after being rotated). It also suggests a corresponding mean trick to play if you include Alaska and Hawaii, which are not present in the comic itself, namely to interchange the volcanic island of Hawaii (consisting of 8 main islands and hundreds of smaller ones) with those of the Aleutian Islands , also a chain of volcanic islands (14 large and 55 small) that partly belongs to the US and partly to Russia. The island extends from the Alaska Peninsula . It would thus be possible to even make it difficult to correctly name these last two states, even though it would be obvious to begin with that it must be the two not belonging to the mainland.
[A white map with an outline that closely resembles that of the mainland of the United States of America with gray all around the black border. But on closer inspection most of the states do not look right. The 48 mainland states are all there, however, with their name or abbreviations written on them as a label in gray text. But they have all been shuffled around and then reassembled as a jigsaw puzzle in the same shape as USA. The name labels for most of the states have been rotated, often to follow the new rotation of the state in the map. So some are written upside down or have been rotated 90 degrees clockwise or counter clockwise or even somewhere in between. One state, Michigan, has even been split up in two so there are 49 instead of 48 labels. For the states that have been named only with state abbreviations the full name is written in brackets behind the transcript of the abbreviation. Here below all the states are listed approximately in columns going from the top left and down and then moving right to the next column across the map. Any rotation of the text from normal is noted in brackets behind the name.] Ohio [Upside down] Georgia [Upside down] Michigan [Upside down – but only bottom part] MD [Upside down - Maryland] California [Text not rotated, but state is rotated counter-clockwise] Kansas [Upside down] Pennsylvania [Rotated clockwise] Oklahoma [Rotated clockwise] New Mexico Nebraska [Upside down] South Dakota Colorado [Rotated counter clockwise] Wyoming [Rotated counter clockwise] Utah [Text normal, but state is upside down, i.e. the text is upside down in the state] Alabama MA [Rotated counter clockwise – Massachusetts] Virginia [Rotated counter clockwise] Arizona [Rotated counter clockwise] Washington [Rotated counter clockwise] Montana [Rotated clockwise - but the state is rotated counter clockwise, i.e. the text is upside down in the state] New York Minnesota [Upside down] Texas [Upside down] CT [Rotated clockwise –Connecticut] Missi- ssippi [Rotated clockwise - text split with hyphen] Nevada Idaho [Rotated clockwise] South Carolina [Rotated counter clockwise, by more than 90 degrees, but the state is rotated exactly 90 degrees] Missouri [Upside down] Wisconsin [Upside down] Kentucky  [Rotated clockwise] North Dakota [Rotated clockwise] Florida [Rotated counter clockwise, by more than 90 degrees, but the state is rotated exactly 90 degrees] North Carolina [Rotated clockwise] Indiana RI [Label below in the ocean –Rhode Island] Oregon [Rotated clockwise] Iowa Tennessee [Upside down] Illinois Maine [Upside down] NH [New Hampshire] MI (upper) [Rotated 45 degree counter clockwise – Michigan but only upper part] Arkansas NJ [New Jersey] Louisiana [Rotated 45 degree counter clockwise - but the state is rotated exactly 90 degrees] West Virginia [Rotated 45 degree clockwise] DE [Rotated counter clockwise – label to the right in the ocean – Delaware] VT [Upside down –Vermont]


Universal Install Script

Explanation:
Most users of computers today are used to simple, easy installation of programs. You just download a .exe or a .pkg , double click it, and do what it says. Sometimes you don't even have to install anything at all, and it runs without any installation.
However, when things are more "homebrew", for example downloading source code, things are more complicated.  Under Unix-like systems, which this universal install script is designed for, you may have to work with "build environments" and " makefiles ", and command line tools. To make this process simpler, there exist repositories of programs which host either packages of source code and the things needed to build it or the pre-built programs. When you download the package, it automatically does most of the work of building the code into something executable if necessary and then installing it. However, there are many such repositories, such as " pip " and "brew", among others listed in the comic. If you only know the name of a program or package, you may not know in which repository(ies) it resides.
The install.sh file provided in the comic is a shell script , which attempts to fix this problem by acting as a "universal install script" that contains a lot of common install commands used in various Unix-like systems. This script in particular is interpreted by the Bourne Again Shell (Bash), which is denoted by the #!/bin/bash in the first line. In between each of the install commands in the script is the & character, which in POSIX -compatible shells (including Bash , a popular shell scripting language) means it should continue to run the next command without waiting for the first command to finish, also known as "running in the background". This has the effect of running all the install commands simultaneously; all output and error text provided by them will be mixed together as they are all displaying on the screen around the same time.
The script accepts the name of a program or package as an argument when you run it. This value is then referenced as "$1" (argument number 1). Everywhere the script says "$1", it substitutes in the name of the package you gave it. The end result is the name being tried against a large number of software repositories and package managers, and hopefully, at least one of them will be appropriate and the program will be successfully installed. Near the end, it even tries copying the source code from an online source and then runs several commands which compile/build the program.
All in all, this script would probably work; it runs many standard popular repository programs and package managers, and runs the nearly-universal commands needed to build a program.  Most of the commands would simply give an error and exit, but hopefully the correct one will proceed with the install.
One of the more subtle jokes in the comic is the inclusion of apt-get and sudo apt-get in the same script. Good unix practice dictates never logging in as root; instead you stay logged in as your normal user, and run system admin accounts via sudo program name . This prevents accidental errors and enables logging of all sensitive commands. A side effect of this, however, is that an administrator may forget to prefix their command with sudo , and re-running it properly the second time. This is a common joke in the Linux community, an example of which can be found at this viral tweet which shows a humorous workaround for the issue.
Since Randall's script does not use sudo for any but the apt-get command, there are two possibilities: the script itself was run via the root user or via sudo, in which case the sudo apt-get is not needed, or the script was run as a normal user, in this case the commands may install a local (as opposed to system-wide) version depending on local conditions. For instance npm will install a copy of the package under $HOME/.npm and pip would work as long as the user is working in a virtualenv (which is standard practice for Python developers).
Sudo has also been used both by Randall in 149: Sandwich and by Jason Fox to force Randall to let him appear on xkcd with 824: Guest Week: Bill Amend (FoxTrot) .
The tool curl downloads files from the network (e.g., the Internet). For example, curl http://xkcd.com/ downloads and displays the xkcd HTML source. The pipe | in the script attaches the output of the command before the pipe to the input of the command after the pipe, thus running whatever commands exist in the web content. Although this "curl|sh" pattern is a common practice for conveniently installing software, it is considered extremely unwise; you are running untrusted code without validation, there may be a MITM who modifies the code you receive, or the remote system could have been hijacked and the code made malicious. Most local package managers (e.g. apt , yum ) offer digitally-signed packages that thwart this problem. You can find many examples of software providers suggesting a curl|sh solution at curlpipesh
There appears to be a bug with the & at the end of the "git clone" line; since a git repository typically contains program source code, not executables, it may have been intended to retrieve the source code with git and then compile and install the program in the next line. In this case, the single & should be replaced with &&, an operator that will run the second command only if the first one has completed successfully. This plays into a second bug on the "configure" line, where the placement of the & means that only the "make install" command will be run asynchronously after the "configure" and "make" steps have finished in sequence (though this would likely fail due to a lack for write permissions unless it was run with sudo). To make success as likely as possible, the two lines should be like this or script should be executed twice:
Since all commands are running in the background, any command that requires user input will stop and wait until brought to the foreground. A common request would be for a database password, or if it is allowed to restart services for the installation. This could lead to packages being only partly installed or configured. (See more about using "yes" below.)
The title text mentions the possibility that the same program may be in multiple repositories, so in this case, the script will download and install several versions, or it may fail on a number of repositories, in which case usually nothing bad happens. Since all the commands come from different operating systems, versions, or distributions, it is not very likely that more than one will work (with the exception of pip/easy_install and the two forms of apt-get) or even exist on the same system. It mentions that adding a way of automatically saying "yes" to questions asked during the different repository-fetching programs' running, by making them read input from another program that writes a (nearly) endless stream of "y"s, could simplify things further. This would not work for any curses-based menus, or to answer any more complicated questions. Adding 2>/dev/null to a command redirects the second output stream (the "error stream") to the null device driver, which discards all writes to it, meaning errors (the package not existing) will not be sent to the screen.
[In the panel is a shell script which, unusual for xkcd, uses only lower case. At the top the title of the program is inlaid in the frame, which has been broken here.] Install.sh
#!/bin/bash
pip install "$1" & easy_install "$1" & brew install "$1" & npm install "$1" & yum install "$1" & dnf install "$1" & docker run "$1" & pkg install "$1" & apt-get install "$1" & sudo apt-get install "$1" & steamcmd +app_update "$1" validate & git clone https://github.com/"$1"/"$1" & cd "$1";./configure;make;make install & curl "$1" | bash &