The SolidWorks Geek

The No Experience Required Geek Treasure Hunt is now over. Thank you to everyone who played. I must apologize for the late announcement but I have been preparing for the release of SolidWorks 2010: No Experience Required. I have added a detailed description of the book and its chapters over on the companion site if you are interested.

Now enough with the shameless self-promotion…on to the winners. I am happy to announce that we actually had five readers find the hidden link. I’d have to say that I was really surprised that my hints were actually pretty easy. If you didn’t figure out the clues and locate the link, don’t worry I will tell you what each clue meant. I will also leave the link where it is so you can see if you can find it still.

Who Found the Link?

Before we move onto the answers to the clues, lets see who actually found the link. Don’t worry if you didn’t find the link and couldn’t get a copy of the book, there still may be another chance later to win a free copy. But lets not keep you from buying one anyway. It doesn’t hurt to have two copies.

Here are all the readers who located the hidden link in order of winners:

1. Ausdell Hadaway, Canada

2. Matthew Lorono, California

3. Deepak Gupta, India

4. Brian Titus, California

5. Ali Kuran, Canada

What the Heck Did They Mean?

Like I said, I didn’t want the clues to be too easy but I didn’t want them to be impossible. For some, no more then a couple of clues were needed to find the link but for others…eyes crossing and plenty of cursing was pretty much all there was. So what did they actually mean anyway? I must admit I was reaching on a few of these but they were just too damn fun to pass up.

Clue #1: I live near the centers

This refers to an image that is located near the link. I won’t say what the image is, just in case some are still looking.

Clue #2: I just got back from a Chinese restaurant and they called me a rat!

Some don’t like to think of rats when they are eating Chinese food but this is actually a clue about the year of the post that contains the link. The year that the post was written during the year of the rat on the Chinese zodiac.

Clue #3: I will keep track of the witness, he is right down there.

This is another reference to an image near the link. This time the image is located below where the link can be found.

Clue #4: 28 weeks later was not a real zombie movie

This was actually one of my favorites because I am a huge zombie fanatic. If you were able to figure out the year with clue #2, then you will be able to figure out what week the post was created. The post that contains the link was published on the 28th week of the year determined by clue #2. And no, 28 Weeks Later was not a real zombie movie…they were not dead.

Clue #5: Six degrees of birthday cake

I admit that this was a hard clue, but it had to be since it gives you the exact date that the post was published. This one actually refers to the date of Kevin Bacon’s birthday. If you remember the game “Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon”, then you might have guess that.

Clue #6: Why is it so teeny?

This one just sounds soooooo wrong. I am actually referring to a couple of comments that were made on the post. When I first published the article I was still trying to get a comment system that worked. At the time I had a commenting system that only showed a postage stamp size window for entering in comments and a couple of readers posted comments about the size of the window…nothing else…

Clue #7: The first part of the feature was the best.

The post that contains the link was had the word “Feature” in the title and was the first part of a two part article.

Clue #8: Why 14 1/2 meters?

This is actually one of the ones that I was reaching. I needed one more clue and this one gave more information about the topic of the article.  ”Why 14-1/2 meters” refers to ASME Y14.5m which is the topic of the article. Told you I was reaching.

Clue #9: I like Tuesdays.

At the time that the article was written, I was still doing “Standards Tuesdays.” The post that contains the link was one of the original “Standards Tuesdays” articles.

Clue #10: I wish I could extend my stay but I’ll just end up interfering.

This is actually a clue as to the exact sentence that contains the link. Key words in the clue are in the same sentence in the post.

Clue #11: X marks the spot.

This last one was the easiest. The “X” refers to the letter in the sentence that contains the link.

Knowing is Half the Battle

Know that you know what the clues means, you can quickly figure out where the link was located. I hope you had fun. I am thinking of what to do for a future contests. So if you have any ideas please let me know and if you like this one, let me know as well. We just might have to revisit this contest at a much later date.