10 ms·
Brilliant building of software. Less than brilliant copy. I would change Black plays; checkmate in one! This is a chess CAPTCHA. Click on the board to m
by edw519 14y ago
Brilliant building of software. Less than brilliant copy.
I would change
Black plays; checkmate in one!
This is a chess CAPTCHA.
Click on the board to make your move,
and prove you are human.
to
This is a chess CAPTCHA...
To prove that you are human,
click on a black piece, then
click on the only destination
square that will checkmate.
I really don't mean to nitpick, but took me a minute to figure out what to do. Sometimes the thing that makes the biggest difference for us programmers is not our communication with our compiler but our communication with our users.
Great job. Thanks to you, I just announced I won't be ready for brunch for another half hour. <Refresh> Sigh.
- ornicar 14y agothanks for the feedback, I will apply the suggested change soon.
- bambax 14y agoPlease don't! The original is better and gets the point accross faster than the suggested change.
- shawn-butler 14y agoIgnore the feedback. Original copy is better. It is interesting because you can't really A/B test the response time with the different text, since the response time includes the human processing time of the chess problem.
- carbocation 14y agoSure you can. You're just adding two (probably normal-ish) distibutions: the distribution of human response times for processing the chess move, and the distribution of human response times for parsing the instructions.
- disgruntledphd2 14y agoHuman response times are almost never normally distributed. They can't be, as a matter of fact as negative response time is an impossibility. In any case, they are typically long tailed and weird looking. Not normal, at least in my experience of working with them
- carbocation 14y agoYou are right, of course, and I knew I was going to regret the use of even the toned-down term "probably normal-ish". The question is whether the one can meaningfully ask which text is faster to parse, despite the "noise" the comes from the time to actually perform the chess move. I suspect the answer will be 'yes'.
- shawn-butler 14y agoI think the answer will be 'no' as solving a chess problem is a learned skill and not as innate as reading and understanding text and the time delta of comprehension between two similar text passages << time to solve chess problem distributed between users of low and high skill.
- carbocation 14y agoWhy would the distribution of user skill differ across test groups? There's no reason it should. The expected time to solve the puzzle itself would be the same across both groups.
- andrewflnr 14y agoI would just recommend clarifying "click" to "click on the piece to move and the destination square" or something to that effect.
- deleted 14y ago[deleted]
- xtracto 14y agoAre you lichess creator? Just wanted to congratulate you for the great peace of software you got there. IMHO is one of the best multi-player chess platforms out there. It is so straightforward and UX is amazing. The "analyze game" link after the end of the game is also very good. Even though I am only a ~1200 ELO player, I play almost daily and enjoy your platform a lot :)
- Inversechi 14y agoSome of the captures I have noticed more than one solution, perhaps modifying the suggested words even further is required.
- niggler 14y agoThe original copy is better than your proposal: you get to the checkmate point, which is the essence of the captcha, at the very end. The way it was originally laid out, it's clear that you are looking for checkmate in one, while in your copy it seems acceptable to click any black piece.
- mich41 14y agoBlack plays; checkmate in one! What can be more clear than this? If anything, I'd prefer to have the king I'm supposed to checkmate standing on a red field to make it easier to spot.
- niggler 14y agoAre you supposed to "click-drag" or "click the piece then the cell"? How about on iOS ? My point is that, while the one-liner captures the idea of the captcha, the summary doesn't explain how to actually execute.
- mich41 14y agoSo add a short explanation at the end. Starting with "Hey, let's solve a CAPTCHA because I'm not sure if you are a human" and burying information which side the user is supposed to play somewhere in the middle of the text would make it a major PITA.
- davidroberts 14y agoI like the original wording because it is exactly how chess problems are typically introduced. I'm not sure the usefulness of this anywhere beyond a chess - related site, but I agree - - it's absolutely brilliant! I wish I had thought of it.
- yen223 14y agoOr how about: A CAPTCHA appears before you, in form of a chessboard to prove, that you're a real user, and not a computer, by checkmating WHITE in one move.
- hk__2 14y agoI would change "a real user" with "a real user who doesn’t use a screen-reader". That’s less funny, but more accurate.
- mich41 14y agoOut of curiosity: are there any known blind chess players? I guess it would be quite hardcore.
- yen223 14y agoNot sure about blind, but blindfold chess is a thing: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blindfold_chess http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blindfold_chess
- wtn 14y agoRay Charles.
- Samuel_Michon 14y ago"Charles played chess using a special board with holes for the pieces and raised squares." [1] "Are there any blind chess masters in the world? Have there been any throughout history? Yes. Al Sandrin, who died a few years ago, was an USBCA member who was a master." [2] [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ray_Charles http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ray_Charles [2] http://www.americanblindchess.org/faq.html http://www.americanblindchess.org/faq.html
- wuest 14y agoThere are blind go players, so I assume blind chess players also exist.
- denysonique 14y agoI don't see there any need for a change Black plays; checkmate in one! This is the most obvious form for chess players; universally used throughout many chess quiz books.
- mpyne 14y agoUh, if it's a CAPTCHA intended to be usable by those who know chess as opposed to those who actually play chess then yes, they should probably ask for what they actually want instead of saying something that will lead the user to the right assumption. Of course if it's really "CHESS player CAPTCHA" then I could be way off...
- andrewmunsell 14y agoIt's on a chess website, so yes, it's for chess players.
- derleth 14y agoChess players who can see.
- RaphiePS 14y agoPerhaps it was designed in part to keep newbies out.
- hsmyers 14y agoNo need. Given the demographic targeted, the current text is sufficient (possibly overly wordy at that) and regards the question of how to move, they are used to interfaces far worse than this---they will figure it out. I suppose that you could claim that as part of the puzzle :)
- strickjb9 14y agoI disagree. Use the clearer set of instructions. Do not leave confusing instructions in place just because the target demographic can decipher them while others are left in confusion.
- redxaxder 14y agoIf we want the captcha to be accessible outside the target demographic, we should scrap the whole chess thing as well.
- mratzloff 14y agoWhen writing instructions for users who might see the instructions frequently, putting an introduction like that, especially with the locally-relevant data buried, is not helpful. Instead, their terse instructions, written in a familiar and easily-parsable format are ideal. Placing a "What is this?" link afterward that opens[1] to more detailed instructions is how you should approach this. [1] Through whatever mechanism is most appropriate for your audience. I'd suggest a tooltip by default.
- drostie 14y agoI will just point out that the first example I was given was a chess CAPTCHA which had two checkmates, so it is not a case of "the only destination square that will checkmate" -- there may be two moves.
- hkdobrev 14y agoBTW, the sentence "Black plays; checkmate in one!" is popular with giving such chess quizzes in various chess books, magazines etc. Probably this is the reason to start with this.
- dougk16 14y agoI would change "human" to "biological entity"...we should not exclude extraterrestrials from the target audience...this is at the risk of offending non-biological (and probably also extra-terrestrial) entities, but they would presumably render all captchas obsolete anyway.
- billforsternz 14y agoMy only complaint with the wording is the use of unnecessary technical jargon. Why use the word "captcha" ?
- deleted 14y ago[deleted]
- gbog 14y agoI, too, prefer the first version, mostly because of the suspension (...)
- vlad 14y agoWhile I think both version of the text would work, I think it's worthwhile to go over some reasons why the suggestion could actually be less clear than the original. 1) The two most important pieces of information (player color and goal) became separated from each other; 2) The third piece of information (number of moves) went missing; 3) The player's color became hidden in the middle of the paragraph instead of the first word; 4) The player's goal disappeared to the end of the paragraph, instead of in the first sentence after player color; 5) The original has a clear and unambiguous goal for both new and regular users, while the alternative became very verbose, especially for returning users. 6) Usability is about the target audience, and the target audience is chess players, not software developers. 7) In contrast to how the founders want to position the brand, a very watered down, a newbie-friendly CAPTCHA could alienate experts from the site, and an expert-friendly CAPTCHA could alienate beginners. To the OP: Since you have an established chess community, you should be asking them if they have a strong opinion rather than blindly taking advice from Hacker News :)
- nilkn 14y ago"checkmate in one!" seems fairly clear to me.