Useless Eggs?

We all like to find “hidden treasures”. Surely you know, that on DVD movies, sometimes are hidden features and I don’t mean the “deleted scenes”. But did you know, that they are also used in the technology industry?

Software developers have their own sense of humor. For “normal persons”, meaning those who are not very deep in technology and their specific geek-terms, it is looking like an own universe very often. Lots of the humor is connected with Science Fiction literature, movies, series and Chuck Norris. This means that many of the jokes are only understandable with the background knowledge. 

In these circles, nobody is surprised if someone says: “So long and thanks for all the fish” instead of “Good Bye”. Another thing is, that lots of them are fluent in Vulcan, Romulan and Klingon (tlhIngan Hol Dajatlh´a´) , can quote all Star Wars and Star Trek movies, including the series of the last one and know the meaning of the magic number 42.

According to those interests it is not a big surprise that they love computer sciences and mainly working in this sector. To show, that they are not that “geeky” and “nerdy” they often programm hidden treasures in their programs or websites, so called “Easter Eggs”. Their fan club expects those and does high research and tests to find them. So Google and Facebook does. The search engine and also the Social Network have their own sense of humor, sometimes useless but mostly very amusing.

Language Settings are not Easter Eggs

So is it possible to change the language settings into not “usual” ones, e.g. Bork! Bork! Bork!  (guess who is this!), Pirate, Elmer Fudd , Klingon, Hacker, Mirror, PigLatin, etc.

But none of those are real “easter eggs”. They are just special language features, or help you, to exclude specific generic results. For example if you go to Linux Google and start a search for “Microsoft” you would get the Linux based results and not generic results like the company itself. So you can say that if you want to search for freeware, for a Linux based system without worrying about Microsoft software, you should use this kind of search.

Alternatively if you search for the government of Canada, with the “Uncle Sam” version of Google,  you wouldn’t get the results which you usually get from google.com: the government homepage of Canada. In that case, it is only useful if you only want to be shown pages related to American content.

I will admit the Easter Bunny, they had for Easter 2000, could probably be considered as one. But the defination (according to google) of an Easter Egg is:

# A hidden program or feature in a webpage.
bcn.boulder.co.us/volunteer/training/class/webgloss.html

# A hidden feature, picture, or sound clip found in nearly all pieces of software. Easter eggs can be a hidden mini game, a funny picture of the development crew, or simply a programmer’s name. Easter eggs are also found in DVD movies, so look out for them in the menus.
www.playstationpro2.com/dictionary.html

# A hidden “surprise” in a program or Web site, such as a message or an extra level in a computer game.
www.compulabel.com/index.asp

# A surprise feature which is not apparent, but when clicked on does something special. Sometimes takes the form of an extra level in a game or an animation message of some kind. Programmers sometimes bury Easter Eggs in their programs or web sites to add extra depth and challenge users to find them. They are messages, sound effects, or graphics emitted by a program in response to a set of keystrokes or commands, intended as a joke or to display program credits. Easter Eggs are sometimes imbedded into the object code of a program and are intended to be found
www.uta.edu/infosys/e_comm/terms/term_e.htm

# A hidden, undocumented program sequence built into a program that only activates when you press the right keys. They are often funny, and are often used to introduce the team that developed the program.
www.ukorbit.com/computer-glossary.htm

# A cute little message or useless function programmers hide inside their software’s user interface. Clicking on a hotspot or typing in a password can trigger an Easter Egg.
www.metromemetics.com/thelexicon/e.asp

So lets have a look at the real “hidden treasures”. Google has plenty of them.

Google Map Search

In the map search check out the route between Japan and China. Along with the usual detailed – and useful -  instructions, number 42(!) on the list tells ‘Jet ski across the Pacific Ocean’.  It is not the first time this type of joke has cropped up on Google and you are also told to use a kayak at number 15, if you want to get from San Francisco to Tokio. Sadly Google doesn’t give tips about where we should leave the gas for the jet ski or  luggage, food or water and what to do if there is a shark attack?

To see a photo in Google Maps titled with “Not Iraq”, shows a tank with the hint “Tank Crossing” you need to fill the coordinates 51.110444,1.511351  in. Corn circles you can find at 45.123785,-123.113962 and also at 37.401437,-116.86773. A pink rabbit is shown at 44.244273,7.769737.

For all of the female readers: we don’t have a problem to park in!
Have a look at 52.069207,4.313986 (the wall!) But also the fans of KFC (37.384650,  11.545298), Ford (42.302284,-83.231215) and Coca Cola (-18.529225,-70.25002) will be satisfied. And if you like to see parked airplanes in a neighborhood, have a closer look at 48.825183,2.1985795.

Talk to a real Marsian!

With Google Earth  you can have fun, too. With a Flight Simulator, you can activate with STRG + A, you are able to fly over the surface of the Earth.

A few years ago Google inserted a joke so that viewers who zoomed in close to the Moon’s surface found it transformed into a piece of holey cheese.

With Google Earth you can also explore the Mars by selecting View –> Explore –> Mars. Then search for “Meliza” and you will be taken to this Martian and can have a conversation with it.

In Ninja-Mode with Google Reader

But not only in the maps are the hidden treasures:
If you are an old school gamer, then you will recognize this to be the legendary Konami code. Just for fun, try entering the “Konami code” in the google reader. Just in case you don’t know them, the commands (using your arrow keys and keyboard), up + up + down + down + left + right + left + right + b + a and the reader truns into “ninja mode”. Just repeat these commands to “undo” this feature.

When is the time of pi?

The iGoogle skins have also plenty of their own Easter Eggs. The selection of the themes, which changes during the day, have a secret that’s revealed at 3:14 AM PST every single day. It’s almost certainly no coincidence that “3.14″ are the first three digits of pi.

With the “Loch Ness Theme” that the mysterious monster will show up every day at this specific time. At “City Scape” UFOs will fly over and in the “Tea House” the Yokai from Japanese folklore will show up, a galleon sailing along in “Hong Kong”, a cartoon monster makes a brief appereance in “Sping Scape”, the number pi is in the sky of “Sweet Dreams”, a snow tiger is shown in “Aja Tiger,” pumpkins are in “Autumn,” a spider in “JR” and the Northern Lights put on a show in both “Winter Scape” and “Holiday Village.”

A pretty cool one is Gmail Custom Time. Here you can select when an email should be have send. Any email you send to the past appears in the proper chronological order in your recipient’s inbox. So don’t be ever afraid again, to forget any anniversary, Google will help you out with it!
While put Google Chrome into “incognito mode”, Google tells you this doesn’t affect the behavior of other people, especially “Surveillance by secret agents” and “People standing behind them”.

Google knows the answer

In the search itself are also funny things hidden.

• Rather than typing your search query, Google MentalPlex reads your thoughts as you stare into the MentalPlex circle.
• Search for ascii art  and Google’s logo  turns into it and search result for the “number of horns on a unicorn“  is one, right?
• It also knows the name of the “Worst Band in the World” and “Where are my socks” while pushing the  “I’m feeling lucky” button.
• If you enter the word Google into a mobile phone it spells out 466453. Try entering 466453.com   into your address bar, and guess where you come out.
• The saying ”once in a blue moon” refers to a period of time in which something doesn’t happen that often. Technically, it’s when there are two full moons appearing in one calendar month. When this is goggled, the search eginge gives the actual period of time  in which a blue moon appears – about once in every 32 months.

Google also knows the “answer to life the universe and everything“.  But the search of “Where is Chuck Norris” and pushing “I’m feeling lucky” says “Google won’t search for Chuck Norris because it knows you don’t find Chuck Norris, he finds you.”

And there is a last one for the real geeks of us:
Type in the term “Recursion” and search for it. Google will display “Do you mean ‘Recursion’?”, click on this link. Google will now display “Do you mean ‘Recursion’?”
Recursively!