Today is Tuesday 4th April and the first day back after a long Easter weekend with many of us suffering from excessive chocolate consummation.
In keeping with the Easter theme, this article offers 5 Virtual Easter eggs to you…
A virtual Easter egg is a hidden message, joke or feature, contained within a computer program, internet Website or video game. The phrase Easter egg is thought to have been invented by the home video game console manufacture Atari, after they were shown a secret message on their game Adventure. At that time, Atari did not credit any of its authors for their work. The creator of Adventure, Warren Robinett, included a hidden message in the game, which was pointed out to Atari. It displayed the words “Created by Warren Robinett” and it took up a full 5% of the storage space on the game cartridge. Upon seeing the message, Atari drew a parallel to the Easter egg hunt performed by children, where decorated eggs are hidden in various places for them to find, and to the Russian imperial family’s tradition of offering elaborate, egg-shaped, jeweled creations containing hidden surprises and the phrase “Virtual Easter Egg” was born.
On a Google homepage, enter “Google Gravity” as the search phrase and click “I’m feeling lucky”. The resulting page will redisplay the standard Google homepage, before the various elements collapse under the apparent strain of gravity. Not only can these individual elements be played with and thrown into the air by clicking and dragging, the search box is still operational. Type in any search term and hit the search button – the results will then appear and also fall down under the influence of gravity.
On a Google search page, enter “do a barrel roll” and click search. Watch and admire before the list of results is shown as usual.
Search for “tilt” in a Google homepage. The results are shown as usual, but in a different manner. This is especially impressive on a high screen where the maximum number of results is displayed on one page.
On a Google homepage, enter “find chuck Norris” and click “I’m feeling lucky”.
To end with, a nod to the late, great Douglas Adams – type “answer to life the universe and everything” and click the search button.