Word division and computer lockouts
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Random storefront in Taiwan:
Sorry this is belated. I've been having computer problems — passwords, user names, codes, etc. Once you're locked out, you can't try again for a specified period of time. Each time you try and fail, the amount of lockout time is punitively increased until it's an unconscionably long period. When you try to start all over, they want your new password to be long and complicated and arbitrary, but won't let you see what you're typing in — just a bunch of dots.
Woe was me!
Selected readings
- "Words in Vietnamese" (10/2/18)
- "Homophonophobia" (2/7/15)
- "Words in Mandarin: twin kle twin kle lit tle star" (8/14/12)
- "Words, morphemes, collocations, characters" (7/3/25)
[Thanks to Neil Kubler]
Barbara Phillips Long said,
December 31, 2025 @ 11:15 am
Arbitrary grids and spacing can be useful in graphic design. I wish I could recall the actual title, but there was some one-word title where the word in all caps looked odd when traditionally kerned — maybe an A followed by a V or something similar. The designer’s solution was to space the letters more widely.
An editor I once worked with received a Christmas card from a graphic designer with the following alphabetical grid on the front:
A B C D E
F G H I J
K M N O P
Q R S T U
V W X Y Z
We puzzled over this for a while before realizing the message was a pun — “no L.”
Philip Taylor said,
December 31, 2025 @ 12:34 pm
I like the "No L", Barbara, but am ashamed to confess that it was only after attending Midnight Mass this year, where the priest stressed the meaning of "Emmanuel" that I finally learned what it meant, which then motivated me to investigate what "Christ" means. Two new meanings added to my mental lexicon, and it's not even 2026 yet !
But as regards the Taiwanese CHR-IST-MAS word-division, that did not strike me as anywhere near as bad as the inconsistent kerning/letter-spacing in "MA S".
cervantes said,
December 31, 2025 @ 12:53 pm
When I lived in Boston, an educational institution in my neighborhood advertised itself as the
MASS
ACH
HUSE
TTTS
College of Art.
Not sure what the point was supposed to be.
Philip Taylor said,
December 31, 2025 @ 1:30 pm
An extra "H" and an extra "T" ? Weird … But glad that it was a College of Art and not of Spelling.
Daniel Barkalow said,
December 31, 2025 @ 1:33 pm
It's a good thing they include the ruby on that unusual character; it's pretty unfamiliar and surprising that it's pronounced "Merry". (I assume that's what they're trying to evoke with that arrangement, although not seriously.)
Philip Taylor said,
December 31, 2025 @ 2:50 pm
What am I failing to see, Daniel ? What ruby, which unusual character ?
charles antaki said,
December 31, 2025 @ 3:00 pm
I remember a publicity campaign for Barcelona tourism (in maybe the 90s?), which used a design by the (then) highly fashionable designer Javier Mariscal:
BAR
CEL
ONA
link
In Catalan: bar, sky, wave.
charles antaki said,
December 31, 2025 @ 3:08 pm
Apologies – this link should work:
Mariscal
Victor Mair said,
December 31, 2025 @ 3:29 pm
@Philip Taylor:
I think that Daniel is treating "Merry" as ruby for
CHR
IST
MAS
as a character.
Michael Vnuk said,
December 31, 2025 @ 7:08 pm
Philip, the 'inconsistent kerning/letter-spacing in "MA S"' only exists because you are trying to impose kerning. To me, the 9 letters are in a 3×3 grid and each letter is centred within its own space. It may not be the way you would do it, but it is perfectly 'consistent' for the pattern. Also, as I understand it, positioning letters in similar grids is the usual practice for many East Asian writing systems, so what you see was probably just the obvious choice for whoever created it.
Duncan said,
December 31, 2025 @ 11:46 pm
Re long new passwords:
For most new passwords, here I consistently type them into my password-manager (where I can see it, along with username, etc) first, make sure it's saved (close and reopen the password manager if unsure), then select/copy it, paste it into something else (say my run dialog) to confirm it's pasting what I think it is since I can't see what gets pasted in the actual password dialog… and only THEN paste it into whatever I'm setting up a password for (where I can paste it into the confirmation too, because I've already verified it via paste somewhere I can see it).
Then, for passwords I want to define as of sufficient value, I do so by ensuring I have updated backups sufficient to define the value of the data appropriately. (I often say a sysadmin's first rule of backups is that the value of data isn't defined by mere claims, but by the number of backup copies of it you consider it worth making — no backup copy == tempfile data! And the second is a (would-be) backup isn't a backup until it's tested as usable for recovery.)
Of course that doesn't work for the password on the password-manager itself, nor on the user account from which I run that password manager… but both of those are local to my own device, and I type them in often enough to quickly find they are in "motor-memory".