Okay, so, I was trying to do this thing called “fantasy dark horse,” and let me tell you, it was a bit of a wild ride. First, I had to figure out what this whole URL encoding thing was all about. Turns out, it’s basically a way to make those messy, weird-looking website addresses readable and safe for computers to handle. Like, changing spaces to “%20” and stuff like that. Pretty neat, huh?
So, I started looking into this “URL decoding” thing, which is basically the opposite – turning those coded URLs back into normal text. I stumbled upon this idea of finding some kind of tool or method to do it automatically. I mean, who wants to decode that stuff by hand, right?
Then, things got a little sidetracked. I was checking out some sites about daily fantasy sports. You know, those places where you can win some cash by picking the best players? It got me thinking about the whole “fantasy” aspect and how it related to my original task. I decided to look into other meanings of the word, and it led me to a video game called “My Horse & Me,” which is all about horse show jumping. I guess it was the part about girls and horses that made me go there. Funny how the internet works, right?
Anyways, back to the decoding. I found this online tool, a free one, which was super handy. It basically took those encoded URLs and made them look normal again. But I wanted to do more. My main goal was to make an application that could identify, decode, and then use that information somehow.
I was also studying for something else and reviewing flashcards. This got me thinking about how our brains remember things, and how it might be related to the process of figuring out which parts of an encoded URL were important. Maybe I could use something like flashcards to help me develop a program that would recognize the patterns in encoded URLs, or even the patterns in the decoded text itself? Could there be a way to identify certain words, like “fantasy” or “horse”?
I kept digging, and I found this thing called “The Drowned City,” which is an expansion for some card game. This got me thinking about games in general, and how they often involve decoding clues or solving puzzles. I also stumbled upon a plugin developers checklist to critique their plugins. This is really useful to me. That was cool, but not exactly what I was looking for.
Finally, I went back to playing “My Horse & Me”. I realized that the game involves a lot of training and learning, just like what I was trying to do with my URL decoding project. I mean, you have to train your horse to jump, and I was trying to train a program to decode URLs. I also spent a lot of time in the training mode, and I felt like I could probably do something similar with my program. Maybe I could design it to go through a “training” phase where it learns to recognize different parts of an encoded URL? The championship mode made me think about testing, and how important it would be to properly test my program once it was finished.
Here’s what I ended up doing:
- Searched for tools and methods about URL encoding and decoding.
- Explored different meanings of the word “fantasy” to better grasp the name of my project.
- Played a horse-themed video game to get inspiration and think of the problem from a different perspective.
- Used an online URL decoder tool to understand how it worked.
- Considered using flashcards to develop a program that recognizes patterns in encoded or decoded URLs.
- Researched games and plugins, looking for clues or ideas that could help me.
- Designed a “training” mode for my program to learn how to decode URLs, inspired by the training mode in “My Horse & Me”.
- Planned to test my program thoroughly, just like the championship mode in the game.
It was a long and winding road, but I think I made some good progress on this “fantasy dark horse” thing. Still a lot of work to do, but hey, that’s half the fun, right?
