Disappearing Minus Signs! - A Warning Tale

[+Kilroy Woz Ere]

Hi there,

I recently attempted a Multi Cache (GC3DH5V) in Mojacar Spain.

As I was taking some friends, new to geocaching, I printed out the cache details which I had copied and pasted from my PC to hopefully keep them interested.

I use Google Chrome which has an auto translate facility which I used.

The FINAL CACHE LOCATION  showed as N 37.08.C (BD) (E+C)

                                                                           W 001.51 (FBE) (E+A) (BD)

We went to the 6 locations, duly found the answers to A to F, but when we tried to decipher the formula for the co-ordinates it made no sense at all.

We sadly finally gave up and I returned to my PC to see if I could find where I had gone wrong. To cut a long story short, when I went to the cache details again I asked Chrome Translate to "Show Original". 

Now the FINAL CACHE LOCATION became N 37.08.C (B-D) (E+C)

                                                                            W 001.51 (F-B-E) (E+A) (B-D)

 

i.e ALL THE MINUS SIGNS HAD BEEN REMOVED BY TRANSLATE

 

This made the solving so much more obvious!

 

So, firstly; A warning; If your Browser uses Translate, ensure important details haven't been "Lost in Translation" !!!

Secondly; Is this issue worthy of a bug note?

Thanks for listening.

Kilroy Woz Ere!

[+hzoi]

17 hours ago, Kilroy Woz Ere said:

So, firstly; A warning; If your Browser uses Translate, ensure important details haven't been "Lost in Translation" !!!

 

I've seen the same translating multis around Europe.  I don't know why math formulas would change, but they do.  So I always have to check.

 

17 hours ago, Kilroy Woz Ere said:

 Secondly; Is this issue worthy of a bug note?

 

Maybe.  But without Google disclosing to the developers here how the translation software/algorithms/imps* work, I don't know what Groundspeak could to to avoid it.

 

 

 

 

 

 

*Hey, you never know.  For all we know, Google uses Discworld technology for this.

 

Edited February 28, 2019 by hzoi