Tell, don't show: QLOCKTWO gives time in plain English

huntsu

#1 – 6:26 AM August 20, 2009

Wouldn't "plain English" also include 12:30 or twelve thirty?

krylon

#2 – 6:33 AM August 20, 2009

Wow that is screaming for a DIY version.

krylon

#3 – 6:34 AM August 20, 2009

... a DIY version that doesn't use gibberish to fill in blank spots.

bazzargh

#4 – 7:43 AM August 20, 2009

Wonder what the most optimal grid would be? A bit of fiddling I got this 8x9 (missing out 'its' and 'oclock')... which I believe means I can undercut them by $552! I'm sure its possible to do better.

*QUARTER
*TWENTY*
TENFIVE*
PTOFSF*N
ATWOOIEI
S**UNVXN
TTHREE*E
TWELVE**
**EN****

bazzargh

#5 – 7:46 AM August 20, 2009

Of course my clock never shows 'seven', oops. Thats ok, I can hang it in the office. At seven I'm either in bed or in the pub.

Tommy

#6 – 7:55 AM August 20, 2009

That's more clever than I expected.

I want one that tells the time in Norwegian.

EFDisaster

#7 – 7:56 AM August 20, 2009

mine would have to replace the "to" with "of"
it drives people crazy, since I moved to the midwest, but I always say "ten of" or "quarter of" and not "ten to" or "quarter to"

schmod

#8 – 8:55 AM August 20, 2009

This has existed as a (highly customizable) screen saver for quite some time. I highly recommend it!

HeatherB

#9 – 10:01 AM August 20, 2009

It's a quarter to expensive

Anonymous Anonymous

#10 – 10:44 AM August 20, 2009

Too right HeatherB! I was just going to say it half past exorbitant!

Chrs

#11 – 10:51 AM August 20, 2009

@Bazzargh, they dumped it into the same row as "PAST" for compactness.

Rob Beschizza

#12 – 11:52 AM August 20, 2009

Yeah. It would actually be cheaper to buy a fancy monitor with a thin bezel, tape a netbook to the back and run the damned screensaver.

Or, you know, just make a copy and use an arduino to program some LEDs behind a glass sheet...

bop

#13 – 2:14 PM August 20, 2009

One of the first computer programs I ever wrote was one that told the time in plain Swedish in 1978. Nice to see that the rest of the world is finally catching up. It wasn't as beautiful as the Qlocktwo though.

guy

#14 – 9:13 AM August 21, 2009

Well, there goes my hope that fractional time would die with my parent's generation.

twelve. fucking. thirty.

Rickmccl

#15 – 10:04 AM August 21, 2009

Me too, I wrote a "vague clock" to display when I logged into VMS. Mine said things like "It's almost noon." "It's about half past one."
I love this thing and as soon as I put out the fire I lit in this immense pile of cash, I will walk over and buy one with a plastic grocery bag full of scorched singles.

@GUY - anyone who has to ask what time it is does not require precision, or they would have brought their own instrument. As long as there are 60 minutes in an hour, 12:30 will be one half of an hour past 12, handily abbreviated for easy speech as "half past 12." Go upload yourself, or NTP sync your implants, or something.

Anonymous Anonymous

#16 – 10:16 AM August 21, 2009

The "Its" light is gonna burn out first.