5 ms·

AI/Math Puzzle

48 points by markerz 2y ago

albert_e 2y ago
Haven't read past the problem statement to avoid spoilers. How difficult can it be to brute force this. (Try all possible domain names within a reasonable length) Take help from AI while you are at it.
- VladVladikoff 2y ago
  I think you might need api access to a nameserver to take that approach. because if you just throw 100,000,000 dns lookups at your default server they are going to throttle you.
  - Y_Y 2y ago
    Depending on what you understand by the term "prefix" you can dramatically shrink the search space without doing any thinking.
  - quuxplusone 2y ago
    As I understand it, yeah, there's a way to ask the .ai nameserver for its entire "zone" (the mapping from domain names to... everything else). That's a "zone transfer" a.k.a. "AXFR" request, which you can make by first locating a nameserver that knows about .ai: $ dig NS ai. Now you have the names of .ai's nameservers, and the glue records for some of them: ;; ADDITIONAL SECTION: v0n3.nic.ai. 107 IN A 199.115.155.1 v0n3.nic.ai. 107 IN AAAA 2001:500:a3::1 v0n0.nic.ai. 7 IN A 199.115.152.1 Now you ask that nameserver for a zone transfer: $ dig AXFR ai. @199.115.155.1 ...And it quickly says "no, not to you; I don't know you and so I'm not going to spend the bandwidth to tell you all that." ; <<>> DiG 9.18.30-0ubuntu0.22.04.2-Ubuntu <<>> AXFR ai. @199.115.155.1 ;; global options: +cmd ; Transfer failed. But hey, that's how you'd ask. Now, if you were on the nameserver's whitelist, you'd see the whole zone, and the answer to the blog's puzzle would be somewhere in there. (But note that the answer is also at the end of TFA; you don't have to solve it yourself if you don't want to.) I wouldn't use the words "API access" to describe "permission to make AXFR requests," but yeah, it's the same general idea: if you're not on the list, you can't do the thing. More than I care to know about AXFR: https://cr.yp.to/djbdns/axfr-notes.html https://cr.yp.to/djbdns/axfr-notes.html
    - tux3 2y ago
      You can usually also ask ICANN's CZDS service for a particular zone file, if you can give them a valid reason. But in this case, they don't seem to have the ai tld.
    - VladVladikoff 2y ago
      Thanks for this comment I found it very informative. :)
- vessenes 2y ago
  I think that “prefix” properly interpreted makes this a small search set.
NooneAtAll3 2y ago
log* is https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iterated_logarithm https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iterated_logarithm aka inverse of tetration
guy234 2y ago
this problem does not look remotely interesting
- drivebyhooting 2y ago
  Yep. Just some mechanical calculation.
deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
esomod 2y ago
o3-mini solved it https://chatgpt.com/share/67ee9b1c-57d4-8005-b7ec-16fceab1ff0a https://chatgpt.com/share/67ee9b1c-57d4-8005-b7ec-16fceab1ff...
- esomod 2y ago
  o1-pro also solves it https://chatgpt.com/share/67ee9bc0-2804-8005-85c3-2978e7a8ba9c https://chatgpt.com/share/67ee9bc0-2804-8005-85c3-2978e7a8ba...
- lqet 2y ago
  Looking at this, I do not understand how people can be bearish about LLMs.
  - Workaccount2 2y ago
    Because it is reassuring.
    - bl0rg 2y ago
      It is and it isn't. I've gotten so used to the promise of AI that I don't know if I'll ever be able to go back to imagining a "normal" future again. Of course it can all turn to fuck, but it's so much more interesting than dying at 85 in some home.
  - frakt0x90 2y ago
    Because this is just simple substitution of common math/CS functions.
  - riku_iki 2y ago
    One concern is that coding/logical puzzles are verticals where LLMs have lots of training data, they require small context window, and that's why they are doing well, but they don't necessary scale/generalize on other topics. For example I yet to see agents which would grab say Postgres codebase from github, and add untrivial features, send patch which is accepted.
  - 2y ago
munchler 2y ago
It's an ad for a search engine.
tasoeur 2y ago
exa.ai/givemeprize
timerol 2y ago
I solved this in the worst way. Took a (correct) guess at what was meant by prefix, and then brute-forced a dozen of them. Did you know that zetta.ai is also an AI company?
- markerz 2y ago
  All roads lead to Rome right?

48 points by markerz 2y ago

Haven't read past the problem statement to avoid spoilers. How difficult can it be to brute force this. (Try all possible domain names within a reasonable length) Take help from AI while you are at it.

VladVladikoff 2y ago
I think you might need api access to a nameserver to take that approach. because if you just throw 100,000,000 dns lookups at your default server they are going to throttle you.
- Y_Y 2y ago
  Depending on what you understand by the term "prefix" you can dramatically shrink the search space without doing any thinking.
- quuxplusone 2y ago
  As I understand it, yeah, there's a way to ask the .ai nameserver for its entire "zone" (the mapping from domain names to... everything else). That's a "zone transfer" a.k.a. "AXFR" request, which you can make by first locating a nameserver that knows about .ai: $ dig NS ai. Now you have the names of .ai's nameservers, and the glue records for some of them: ;; ADDITIONAL SECTION: v0n3.nic.ai. 107 IN A 199.115.155.1 v0n3.nic.ai. 107 IN AAAA 2001:500:a3::1 v0n0.nic.ai. 7 IN A 199.115.152.1 Now you ask that nameserver for a zone transfer: $ dig AXFR ai. @199.115.155.1 ...And it quickly says "no, not to you; I don't know you and so I'm not going to spend the bandwidth to tell you all that." ; <<>> DiG 9.18.30-0ubuntu0.22.04.2-Ubuntu <<>> AXFR ai. @199.115.155.1 ;; global options: +cmd ; Transfer failed. But hey, that's how you'd ask. Now, if you were on the nameserver's whitelist, you'd see the whole zone, and the answer to the blog's puzzle would be somewhere in there. (But note that the answer is also at the end of TFA; you don't have to solve it yourself if you don't want to.) I wouldn't use the words "API access" to describe "permission to make AXFR requests," but yeah, it's the same general idea: if you're not on the list, you can't do the thing. More than I care to know about AXFR: https://cr.yp.to/djbdns/axfr-notes.html https://cr.yp.to/djbdns/axfr-notes.html
  - tux3 2y ago
    You can usually also ask ICANN's CZDS service for a particular zone file, if you can give them a valid reason. But in this case, they don't seem to have the ai tld.
  - VladVladikoff 2y ago
    Thanks for this comment I found it very informative. :)
vessenes 2y ago
I think that “prefix” properly interpreted makes this a small search set.

NooneAtAll3 2y ago

log* is https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iterated_logarithm https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iterated_logarithm aka inverse of tetration

guy234 2y ago

this problem does not look remotely interesting

drivebyhooting 2y ago
Yep. Just some mechanical calculation.

deleted 2y ago

[deleted]

esomod 2y ago

o3-mini solved it https://chatgpt.com/share/67ee9b1c-57d4-8005-b7ec-16fceab1ff0a https://chatgpt.com/share/67ee9b1c-57d4-8005-b7ec-16fceab1ff...

esomod 2y ago
o1-pro also solves it https://chatgpt.com/share/67ee9bc0-2804-8005-85c3-2978e7a8ba9c https://chatgpt.com/share/67ee9bc0-2804-8005-85c3-2978e7a8ba...
lqet 2y ago
Looking at this, I do not understand how people can be bearish about LLMs.
- Workaccount2 2y ago
  Because it is reassuring.
  - bl0rg 2y ago
    It is and it isn't. I've gotten so used to the promise of AI that I don't know if I'll ever be able to go back to imagining a "normal" future again. Of course it can all turn to fuck, but it's so much more interesting than dying at 85 in some home.
- frakt0x90 2y ago
  Because this is just simple substitution of common math/CS functions.
- riku_iki 2y ago
  One concern is that coding/logical puzzles are verticals where LLMs have lots of training data, they require small context window, and that's why they are doing well, but they don't necessary scale/generalize on other topics. For example I yet to see agents which would grab say Postgres codebase from github, and add untrivial features, send patch which is accepted.
- 2y ago

munchler 2y ago

It's an ad for a search engine.

tasoeur 2y ago

exa.ai/givemeprize

timerol 2y ago

I solved this in the worst way. Took a (correct) guess at what was meant by prefix, and then brute-forced a dozen of them. Did you know that zetta.ai is also an AI company?

markerz 2y ago
All roads lead to Rome right?