bug#33803: gomoku demotivational messages

bug#33803: gomoku demotivational messages

[Daniel Vianna]

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From: dmlvianna@gmail.com
To: bug-gnu-emacs@gnu.org
Subject: 26.1; gomoku demotivational messages
--text follows this line--

* Start of message

Gomoku made my 6 year old child cry.

I hope you take it seriously. I am introducing my child to programming
by letting him play games in emacs. He loves snake. He understands that
programs are just instructions (like Lego instructions) that the
computer must follow to do things. And now he found Gomoku.

I believe emacs should be an inviting environment for users. And gomoku,
albeit hard, should not punish people from using it. But it does. All
its messages are demotivational. I think this detracts emacs from the
core GNU value of helping your friends to learn.

Yes, I did what I was supposed to do in order to cheer him up. I told
him not to believe on what the computer was saying (that "trying didn't
help him much.") I told not to trust the computer.

Is that the message you would like GNU to send to budding computer
users?

I am thankful for emacs. I hope it keeps getting better. That's why I
wrote this. Regardless of changes being made to the messages, I'm going
to show him the source and hopefully this will still serve as a lesson
in programming.

Kind regards,

Daniel Vianna.

* End of message


In GNU Emacs 26.1 (build 1, x86_64-pc-linux-gnu, GTK+ Version 3.22.30)
 of 2018-12-01 built on localhost
Windowing system distributor 'The X.Org Foundation', version 11.0.11906000
Recent messages:
Let me think...
Your move?
Let me think...
Your move?
Let me think...
Your move?
Let me think...
Your move?
Let me think...
I won...  Playing first did not help you much!

Configured using:
 'configure
 --prefix=/nix/store/p9pi161yslb7gnmw77c3r08wx9lmg3bh-emacs-26.1
 --with-modules --with-x-toolkit=gtk3 --with-xft
 CFLAGS=-DMAC_OS_X_VERSION_MAX_ALLOWED=101200'

Configured features:
XPM JPEG TIFF GIF PNG RSVG SOUND DBUS GSETTINGS NOTIFY LIBSELINUX GNUTLS
LIBXML2 FREETYPE M17N_FLT LIBOTF XFT ZLIB TOOLKIT_SCROLL_BARS GTK3 X11
MODULES THREADS LIBSYSTEMD

Important settings:
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/nix/store/6ykjgzh208hm7j3zqwbysckfckpkvhbi-emacs-packages-deps/share/emacs/site-lisp:
  value of $LANG: en_AU.UTF-8
  locale-coding-system: utf-8-unix

Major mode: Gomoku

Minor modes in effect:
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  auto-encryption-mode: t
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  line-number-mode: t
  global-visual-line-mode: t
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Features:
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mailcap let-alist magit-files magit-refs magit-status magit magit-repos
magit-apply magit-wip magit-log which-func imenu magit-diff smerge-mode
diff-mode magit-core magit-autorevert magit-process magit-margin
magit-mode git-commit magit-git magit-section magit-utils crm
magit-popup log-edit message rmc puny dired dired-loaddefs format-spec
rfc822 mml mml-sec epa derived epg gnus-util rmail rmail-loaddefs
mm-decode mm-bodies mm-encode mail-parse rfc2231 rfc2047 rfc2045 mm-util
ietf-drums mail-prsvr mailabbrev mail-utils gmm-utils mailheader
pcvs-util add-log with-editor async-bytecomp async shell pcomplete
comint ansi-color ring server company pcase flycheck json map find-func
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custom widget hashtable-print-readable backquote dbusbind inotify
dynamic-setting system-font-setting font-render-setting move-toolbar gtk
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Memory information:
((conses 16 566265 24794)
 (symbols 48 45888 3)
 (miscs 40 48 114)
 (strings 32 139006 3067)
 (string-bytes 1 4118036)
 (vectors 16 70655)
 (vector-slots 8 1131524 24442)
 (floats 8 389 311)
 (intervals 56 837 107)
 (buffers 992 12))

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bug#33803: gomoku demotivational messages

[Eli Zaretskii]

> From: Daniel Vianna <dmlvianna@gmail.com>
> Date: Wed, 19 Dec 2018 18:52:28 +1100
> 
> Gomoku made my 6 year old child cry.

Maybe we could have a child-mode in Gomoku, which would substitute the
messages with something more encouraging.

bug#33803: gomoku demotivational messages

[Eli Zaretskii]

[Please use Reply All to keep the bug address on the CC list.]

> From: Daniel Vianna <dmlvianna@gmail.com>
> Date: Thu, 20 Dec 2018 08:05:20 +1100
> 
> Well... I feel discouraged too. As an adult.

I believe that depends on personal preferences.

> I understand the code is supposed to be terse an easy to interpret. Just making the messages more
> encouraging would be great.

I'm quite sure the original messages were written with an explicit
goal to tease the human player.  It could be detrimental when the
player is young and this is his/her first experience with playing
games with computers.

> Another potential improvement would be to count how many moves were made leading to the end of the
> game. As it stands, Gomoku displays only how many games were won/lost. It doesn't take into account that
> the player might be making progress in terms of dragging the game longer until the algorithm wins.
> 
> I believe the aim of any piece of elisp should be to encourage the user to keep improving.
> 
> I'm not confident in elisp myself. Should I have a go at it?

If you can propose the changes to the messages and/or the places where
you think a move count will be useful, please do that, in plain
English, using the source line numbers to specify the location of each
change.  Changes in Lisp, if they are more than a dozen lines, will
require that you assign the copyright to the FSF, which involves
filling and sending a simple form with information about your changes.

Thanks.

bug#33803: gomoku demotivational messages

[Francesco Potortì]

>Gomoku made my 6 year old child cry.
...
>I am thankful for emacs. I hope it keeps getting better. That's why I
>wrote this. Regardless of changes being made to the messages, I'm going
>to show him the source and hopefully this will still serve as a lesson
>in programming.

If you can show the sources, I think you can turn a bad experience into
a good one!  Just look at the messages, and change them, then have your
child play again with the new messages you wrote together :)

bug#33803: gomoku demotivational messages

[Douglas Lewan]

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From: Eli Zaretskii <eliz@gnu.org>
> If you can propose the changes to the messages and/or the places where
> you think a move count will be useful, please do that, in plain
> English,....
This sounds to me like a perfect opportunity for customization.

-- 
,Doug
Douglas Lewan
+1 (908) 720-7908
Give me "assloads of config" over "some other person thought they could decide what I like" any day. - Szmo, on reddit, 2017 Sep 05


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bug#33803: gomoku demotivational messages

[Paul Eggert]

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Thanks for the bug report. I installed into the master branch the attached 
patch, which I hope prevents similar problems in the future. I didn't implement 
a move-counter; perhaps someone else can volunteer to do that, if they have the 
time.

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From 8167316fd6406adbeb8fe91db9ee59e2f47bddb0 Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001
From: Paul Eggert <eggert@cs.ucla.edu>
Date: Thu, 27 Dec 2018 21:55:01 -0800
Subject: [PATCH] Improve motivations in gomoku messages

* lisp/play/gomoku.el (gomoku-terminate-game):
Don't make six-year-old children cry (Bug#33803).
---
 lisp/play/gomoku.el | 28 ++++++++++++++--------------
 1 file changed, 14 insertions(+), 14 deletions(-)

diff --git a/lisp/play/gomoku.el b/lisp/play/gomoku.el
index 6ce2750f86..32b29b70f4 100644
--- a/lisp/play/gomoku.el
+++ b/lisp/play/gomoku.el
@@ -656,48 +656,48 @@ gomoku-terminate-game
     ((eq result 'emacs-won)
      (setq gomoku-number-of-emacs-wins (1+ gomoku-number-of-emacs-wins))
      (cond ((< gomoku-number-of-moves 20)
-	    "This was a REALLY QUICK win.")
+	    "I won...  I hope you like the game as you get better.")
 	   (gomoku-human-refused-draw
 	    "I won...  Too bad you refused my offer of a draw!")
 	   (gomoku-human-took-back
-	    "I won...  Taking moves back will not help you!")
+	    "I won...  It's OK to take back more moves next time.")
 	   ((not gomoku-emacs-played-first)
-	    "I won...  Playing first did not help you much!")
+	    "I won...  Use C-c C-b to take back a move on second thought.")
 	   ((and (zerop gomoku-number-of-human-wins)
 		 (zerop gomoku-number-of-draws)
 		 (> gomoku-number-of-emacs-wins 1))
-	    "I'm becoming tired of winning...")
+	    "I won...  It might be time take a break before trying again.")
 	   ("I won.")))
     ((eq result 'human-won)
      (setq gomoku-number-of-human-wins (1+ gomoku-number-of-human-wins))
      (concat "OK, you won this one."
 	     (cond
 	      (gomoku-human-took-back
-	       "  I, for one, never take my moves back...")
+	       "  For a bigger challenge, play without taking moves back.")
 	      (gomoku-emacs-played-first
-	       ".. so what?")
-	      ("  Now, let me play first just once."))))
+	       "  Congratulations!")
+	      ("  For a bigger challenge, let me play first."))))
     ((eq result 'human-resigned)
      (setq gomoku-number-of-emacs-wins (1+ gomoku-number-of-emacs-wins))
-     "So you resign.  That's just one more win for me.")
+     "I see that you resigned.  Better luck next time.")
     ((eq result 'nobody-won)
      (setq gomoku-number-of-draws (1+ gomoku-number-of-draws))
      (concat "This is a draw.  "
 	     (cond
 	      (gomoku-human-took-back
-	       "I, for one, never take my moves back...")
+	       "  For a bigger challenge, try without taking moves back.")
 	      (gomoku-emacs-played-first
-	       "Just chance, I guess.")
-	      ("Now, let me play first just once."))))
+	       "Wow, that was a long game.  We both played well.")
+	      ("  For a bigger challenge, let me play first."))))
     ((eq result 'draw-agreed)
      (setq gomoku-number-of-draws (1+ gomoku-number-of-draws))
      (concat "Draw agreed.  "
 	     (cond
 	      (gomoku-human-took-back
-	       "I, for one, never take my moves back...")
+	       "  For a bigger challenge, try without taking moves back.")
 	      (gomoku-emacs-played-first
-	       "You were lucky.")
-	      ("Now, let me play first just once."))))
+	       "Good game.")
+	      ("  For a bigger challenge, let me play first."))))
     ((eq result 'crash-game)
      "Sorry, I have been interrupted and cannot resume that game...")))
   (gomoku-display-statistics)
-- 
2.17.1

bug#33803: gomoku demotivational messages

[Daniel Vianna]

Wow. That was inspired. Thank you!

-- 
Daniel Vianna

> On 28 Dec 2018, at 4:59 pm, Paul Eggert <eggert@cs.ucla.edu> wrote:
> 
> Thanks for the bug report. I installed into the master branch the attached patch, which I hope prevents similar problems in the future. I didn't implement a move-counter; perhaps someone else can volunteer to do that, if they have the time.
> <0001-Improve-motivations-in-gomoku-messages.patch>