General Puzzle Help

[+BaylorGrad]

Don't worry--I'm not asking about a specific puzzle.

 

I have noticed that a good number of puzzle caches in my area and in other areas simply have a picture on the page and nothing else. I realized recently that often the picture is a distraction--useless information to guide you away from the true answer.

 

So with that in mind, what would you check if you saw simply a picture on a cache page?

 

Here's the few things I can think of:

 

- Source code

- User's profile

- All of the logs

- Any additional pictures

 

Anything else?

[+mpilchfamily]

Check the image for the cords to be encoded onto the background. Open it in photo shop and go to File and File Info to view any additional information. Some times the cache location is embedded in the image there. Or the image is Geotagged.

[+WeightMan]

Sometimes the dimensions of the photo are the last three digits of each of the coords.

[knowschad]

Google EXIF data and steganography.

[+NYPaddleCacher]

Don't worry--I'm not asking about a specific puzzle.

 

I have noticed that a good number of puzzle caches in my area and in other areas simply have a picture on the page and nothing else. I realized recently that often the picture is a distraction--useless information to guide you away from the true answer.

 

So with that in mind, what would you check if you saw simply a picture on a cache page?

 

Here's the few things I can think of:

 

- Source code

- User's profile

- All of the logs

- Any additional pictures

 

Anything else?

 

Although I have seen cache pages which *looked* like it was simply a picture, but the photo turned out to be a red herring, more often than not the photo is integral to solving the puzzle. There are a few approaches I've used when it looks like a photo on the cache page might contain the coordinates or be a part of the puzzle.

 

Look at the source code. I've seen puzzles which used the file name of the photo to represent the digits in the coordinates. Look at where the image is hosted. There may be some things one can do with images hosted elsewhere that are not allowed if they're hosted on the Groundspeak server.

 

One of the somewhat common methods of using an image on a web page is the addition of an imagemap. Essentially, it allows you to specify specific regions in an image as "hot spots". There was a recent post of an example where one would roll the mouse over portions of the image to display bits of text (this is a cow, here is a fence,...the cache is located at NNNNNNN). Look for imagemap tags in the source code. One of the cleverest examples I've seen was a cache page which used an image of a star map. If you placed the cursor over a specific star it would play an audio stream. The audio stream contained the next piece of the puzzle.

 

If you don't see anything in the source code, there might be some sort of steganography involved. There are numerous methods of using steganography (the art of embedding information in a image...though an audio stream or other digital format can be used) so doing a web search on the term to learn about some of the approaches and tools available to extract hidden information is a good general approach. One of the tools I use frequently is simply the "strings" command. The strings command is a basic unix command (though there are windows versions) which displays strings in a binary file. Sometimes just running the command on an image will expose a string which contains the coordinates or something that might lead you in the right direction.

 

Still another approach is to create an image that is actually readable as an image or as a compressed archive (zip) file. Just changing the file extension from .jpg to .zip and trying to open it with a tool like winzip or pkunzip will tell you if this approach was taken.

 

Generally, once I've exhausted those strategies I'll start looking at something else on the page but if there is an image included on a puzzle cache page that's usually where I start.

[+roziecakes]

Nypaddlecacher provides an excellent response; it's true, there's often more to the picture than meets the eye!

[+niraD]

Some image formats allow transparency or animation. If there are transparent regions, then view the image with different backgrounds showing through. If there is animation, then view all the frames.

 

If you find an image map, then it may help to use keyboard navigation instead of the mouse. This allows you to tab from one hotspot to the next, rather than "scrubbing" the image with the mouse pointer looking for hotspots.

 

Sometimes, the image isn't actually part of the puzzle. It may be a red herring. It may be a clue to the theme of the puzzle, but not part of the puzzle itself. Even when the image is part of the puzzle, the puzzle may be in what is depicted in the image, rather than the image file itself.

 

Other useful resources include:

Puzzle Solving 101 Series (bookmark list)

Puzzle Shortcuts Series (bookmark list)

Solving Puzzle Caches (online article)

How Do I Solve All These $@! Puzzle Caches? (tutorial-style puzzle cache)

Puzzle FUNdamentals (archived event cache) and the Puzzle FUNdamentals resources on the GeocacheAlaska! education page

The GBA's Puzzle Cache FAQ (for puzzle designers, but useful for understanding how puzzle caches work)

[+power69]

Don't worry--I'm not asking about a specific puzzle.

 

I have noticed that a good number of puzzle caches in my area and in other areas simply have a picture on the page and nothing else. I realized recently that often the picture is a distraction--useless information to guide you away from the true answer.

 

So with that in mind, what would you check if you saw simply a picture on a cache page?

 

Here's the few things I can think of:

 

- Source code

- User's profile

- All of the logs

- Any additional pictures

 

Anything else?

Still another approach is to create an image that is actually readable as an image or as a compressed archive (zip) file. Just changing the file extension from .jpg to .zip and trying to open it with a tool like winzip or pkunzip will tell you if this approach was taken.

how exactly do you CREATE one of those?

[+dfx]

how exactly do you CREATE one of those?

 

Simple file concatenation. JPG files are recognized by their header, while ZIP files are recognized by their footer. The command-line "copy" command in Windows can be used to create such files (copy /b picture.jpg + archive.zip output.jpg)

Edited April 23, 2011 by dfx

[+Corfman Clan]

how exactly do you CREATE one of those?

 

Simple file concatenation. JPG files are recognized by their header, while ZIP files are recognized by their footer. The command-line "copy" command in Windows can be used to create such files (copy /b picture.jpg + archive.zip output.jpg)

Now why'd you have to go tell him that. Yeah, maybe he doesn't live near you, but he lives near me.

[+fizzymagic]

You can often tell a lot about a puzzle from the image format of an image. GIF files are lossless (the pixels are exactly the same as the original) but it is limited to 256 total colors. PNG files are also lossless but can be 24-bit color, as can BMP files (but those are pretty rare anymore).

 

JPEG files have lossy compression, which means that the pixels in the reconstructed JPEG image are not the same as those in the original. JPEG color reconstruction is also lossy, which means that the colors in the JPEG image are not exactly the same as those in the original. In particular, there are certain colors that cannot appear in a JPEG image, period!

 

GIF files and some PNG files have a "palette" of colors, and more than one palette entry can actually be the same color. So even though that picture might appear to be completely black, if it is GIF or a PNG, then there could actually be an image there.

 

Technically, EXIF data can be in JPG and PNG images, but it is much more common in JPGs. I use a nice little Firefox extension (unsurprisingly called "EXIF Viewer") to view the EXIF information.

 

I also highly recommend Tineye, which is an image search engine that finds images similar to the one you give it. I've found it invaluable for finding the original versions of pictures on puzzle cache pages.

 

I mostly use Paintshop Pro for image analysis and editing, but Photoshop is good and The GIMP is capable, although its user interface sucks. There are also good image processing libraries for programmers; ImageMagick is good for Perl and PIL is great for Python.

[+NYPaddleCacher]

how exactly do you CREATE one of those?

 

Simple file concatenation. JPG files are recognized by their header, while ZIP files are recognized by their footer. The command-line "copy" command in Windows can be used to create such files (copy /b picture.jpg + archive.zip output.jpg)

Now why'd you have to go tell him that. Yeah, maybe he doesn't live near you, but he lives near me.

 

At least now you know one of the methods you can try to detect if file concatenation was used. The method dfx described is easily discoverable doing a google search. In fact, using an internet search engine is probably one of the most best tools available for general puzzle solving. There's a local cacher that creates a lot of puzzles and most of them will involve doing a internet search on a phrase or concept expressed in the cache page. Often it's difficult to determine what to use as search terms but if you hit the right combination it often leads you to a site that was used as the basis for the puzzle.

[+power69]

how exactly do you CREATE one of those?

 

Simple file concatenation. JPG files are recognized by their header, while ZIP files are recognized by their footer. The command-line "copy" command in Windows can be used to create such files (copy /b picture.jpg + archive.zip output.jpg)

Now why'd you have to go tell him that. Yeah, maybe he doesn't live near you, but he lives near me.

Don't worry. i've never been able to get that to work without the zip being corrupt. pkzipfix doesn't work either. I always figured a specialized program made them.

[+dfx]

Don't worry. i've never been able to get that to work without the zip being corrupt. pkzipfix doesn't work either. I always figured a specialized program made them.

 

Does this one work for you? It was created just as I described.

[7rxc]

Don't worry. i've never been able to get that to work without the zip being corrupt. pkzipfix doesn't work either. I always figured a specialized program made them.

 

Does this one work for you? It was created just as I described.

Works fine for me out here... I was reading one of the many pages on this subject, and there was something about some people having problems with it, but I don't recall what. Also that there are other methods to do it. was also able to read your exif stuff. Got to go look it up on GE. Also want to try that on a puzzle I was stumped on...hmm

 

Doug 7rxc

[+power69]

Don't worry. i've never been able to get that to work without the zip being corrupt. pkzipfix doesn't work either. I always figured a specialized program made them.

 

Does this one work for you? It was created just as I described.

nope. "unexpected end of archive" error.

the image works though.

[+Don_J]

Don't worry. i've never been able to get that to work without the zip being corrupt. pkzipfix doesn't work either. I always figured a specialized program made them.

 

Does this one work for you? It was created just as I described.

nope. "unexpected end of archive" error.

the image works though.

 

Open it in a hex or text reader. You'll see the his message at the end.

[+A & J Tooling]

Try taking an image editor like inkscape and play with the colors, hue, etc. A clue could of been written with a vector imaging software in a certain color and then covered up in the rest of the colors.

[+power69]

Don't worry. i've never been able to get that to work without the zip being corrupt. pkzipfix doesn't work either. I always figured a specialized program made them.

 

Does this one work for you? It was created just as I described.

nope. "unexpected end of archive" error.

the image works though.

 

Open it in a hex or text reader. You'll see the his message at the end.

I see blah.txt but nothing useful

What am i missing here? I thought this would be about taking a jpg and renaming to zip and opening an archive which doesn't seem to be working.

-

What puzzle authors should avoid is solutions that only work on certain configurations or certain versions of archival software.

[+NYPaddleCacher]

Don't worry. i've never been able to get that to work without the zip being corrupt. pkzipfix doesn't work either. I always figured a specialized program made them.

 

Does this one work for you? It was created just as I described.

nope. "unexpected end of archive" error.

the image works though.

 

Open it in a hex or text reader. You'll see the his message at the end.

I see blah.txt but nothing useful

What am i missing here? I thought this would be about taking a jpg and renaming to zip and opening an archive which doesn't seem to be working.

-

What puzzle authors should avoid is solutions that only work on certain configurations or certain versions of archival software.

 

It's also unreasonable to expect that *every* version of archival software will work. I once did a puzzle which employed a "book cipher" which required you to look up the page number, line number, and word number in a specific book. As there were multiple editions of the book a specific version of the book as indicated by an ISBN number was required to solve that portion of the puzzle.

[+dfx]

nope. "unexpected end of archive" error.

 

Odd. What are you using the unpack the zip file?

 

blah.txt is the name of the file contained within the zip file btw. Doesn't mean anything in itself.

 

What puzzle authors should avoid is solutions that only work on certain configurations or certain versions of archival software.

 

Actually it's a fully valid zip file. If some software fails to unpack it, it's the software at fault, not the file.

Edited April 25, 2011 by dfx

[+Don_J]

nope. "unexpected end of archive" error.

 

Odd. What are you using the unpack the zip file?

 

blah.txt is the name of the file contained within the zip file btw. Doesn't mean anything in itself.

 

What puzzle authors should avoid is solutions that only work on certain configurations or certain versions of archival software.

 

Actually it's a fully valid zip file. If some software fails to unpack it, it's the software at fault, not the file.

 

If anything, I would expect Winzip to open it. It doesn't.

[+power69]

nope. "unexpected end of archive" error.

 

Odd. What are you using the unpack the zip file?

 

blah.txt is the name of the file contained within the zip file btw. Doesn't mean anything in itself.

 

What puzzle authors should avoid is solutions that only work on certain configurations or certain versions of archival software.

 

Actually it's a fully valid zip file. If some software fails to unpack it, it's the software at fault, not the file.

 

If anything, I would expect Winzip to open it. It doesn't.

7zip and winrar don't either.

if i had to guess id say the server tried to optimize the file and zapped the zip.

[+NYPaddleCacher]

 

Anything else?

 

Another thing I've seen was a puzzle cache which was started such that it contained a trackable item. That TB was owned by a sock puppet account. The profile page for that account contained the actual puzzle.

[+Capt. Bob]

nope. "unexpected end of archive" error.

If anything, I would expect Winzip to open it. It doesn't.

7zip and winrar don't either.

if i had to guess id say the server tried to optimize the file and zapped the zip.

 

I was able to open the hidden file using WinRAR 4.0 (32 bit)

 

1. Copy "test.jpg" to the Desktop

2. Change name to "test.zip"

3. Startup WinRAR and open "test.zip"

4. Open "blah.txt"

[+Don_J]

nope. "unexpected end of archive" error.

If anything, I would expect Winzip to open it. It doesn't.

7zip and winrar don't either.

if i had to guess id say the server tried to optimize the file and zapped the zip.

 

I was able to open the hidden file using WinRAR 4.0 (32 bit)

 

1. Copy "test.jpg" to the Desktop

2. Change name to "test.zip"

3. Startup WinRAR and open "test.zip"

4. Open "blah.txt"

 

Interesting. Winrar 3.51 will not open it.

 

I'm curious, does blah.txt have any text in it? I created one of these files on my computer using Winzip and the copy command. Winzip would not open up the file, but when I viewed the jpg in a text editor, I could see the actual text of the zipped file, at the end of the file.

[+Capt. Bob]

nope. "unexpected end of archive" error.

If anything, I would expect Winzip to open it. It doesn't.

7zip and winrar don't either.

if i had to guess id say the server tried to optimize the file and zapped the zip.

 

I was able to open the hidden file using WinRAR 4.0 (32 bit)

 

1. Copy "test.jpg" to the Desktop

2. Change name to "test.zip"

3. Startup WinRAR and open "test.zip"

4. Open "blah.txt"

 

Interesting. Winrar 3.51 will not open it.

 

I'm curious, does blah.txt have any text in it? I created one of these files on my computer using Winzip and the copy command. Winzip would not open up the file, but when I viewed the jpg in a text editor, I could see the actual text of the zipped file, at the end of the file.

 

Yep, there's quite a bit of text about the startup of Groundspeak. If you view the file with a NotePadII or a hex editor you will only see the title "blah.txt" and the Local file header 50 4B 03 04 which is the start of the compressed text and 50 4B 05 06 is the end of the directory. The numbers 50 4B (read backwards (little-endian numbers) are FK for FKzip.

[+Don_J]

nope. "unexpected end of archive" error.

If anything, I would expect Winzip to open it. It doesn't.

7zip and winrar don't either.

if i had to guess id say the server tried to optimize the file and zapped the zip.

 

I was able to open the hidden file using WinRAR 4.0 (32 bit)

 

1. Copy "test.jpg" to the Desktop

2. Change name to "test.zip"

3. Startup WinRAR and open "test.zip"

4. Open "blah.txt"

 

Interesting. Winrar 3.51 will not open it.

 

I'm curious, does blah.txt have any text in it? I created one of these files on my computer using Winzip and the copy command. Winzip would not open up the file, but when I viewed the jpg in a text editor, I could see the actual text of the zipped file, at the end of the file.

 

Yep, there's quite a bit of text about the startup of Groundspeak. If you view the file with a NotePadII or a hex editor you will only see the title "blah.txt" and the Local file header 50 4B 03 04 which is the start of the compressed text and 50 4B 05 06 is the end of the directory. The numbers 50 4B (read backwards (little-endian numbers) are FK for FKzip.

 

I see. The reason why I could read my text with the editor is because it was simply a set of coordinates, and Winzip didn't apply any compression to it. I upgraded to Winrar 4 and it did in fact open the test file.