I haven't been active on the site in a looong time. I am happy to see so much disucssion around my first kata!

@cliffstamp: Thank you for jumping in and defending Mr. Dickens! It is appreciated.

@Voile: I welcome any suggestions you might have to make the problem better, keeping in mind that it is a beginner problem and that the math is simply the vehicle for the coding exercise. We could swap out the algebra for counting fruit, but where is the fun in that? ;) I prefer an interesting narrative. :)

Still bad design.

@cliffstamp: For the record, bad design is kata quality issue, and I won't bulge on this one. If you don't agree, go complain on the repo.

Added.

Description updated again when random strings of nonsense all passes the reference solution which is very basic. This is an ~8 kyu kata because of how restricted the inputs have to be to be parsed by the refernece solution.

Since this is a vital point to you, I'll make up a big imaginary scenario and add it to the description.

The specifications are part of an imaginary story, a guy on a key board, it is imaginary, they are made up, you can make up any you want :

• the machine malfunctions and sends no signal (undefined)
• the return message ("bad input") on an empty string is because the guy wants to know when the modem crashes

and so on for any specification you want.

It doesn't correspond to reality, it is modeling a fake situation with a set of arbitrary rules to test your ability to handle them.

Re-raising the issue below. Bad design is an issue.

it is just a specification

Bad specs are still an issue. By tomorrow you'll be saying "this kata requires intentionally bad specs but they're the specs, so it's not an issue". It is.

In typical algebra for beginners it is common to write things like 1x^1 to reduce cognitative load, however kata don't need to mirror ideal utility, they just need to pose problems useful to learning how to code.

Empty string is considered an error, because it was deemed to be an error, it isn't necessary to make up a back story, it is just a specification, however if you want one :

"Sometimes Mr. Dicken's modem fails and all his hard work is lost and the message is wiped ... oh noes! In this case (if you receive an empty string, null, undefined etc ...) return "Input Error" so Mr. Dicken's knows he has to try again!

Description updated.

You also need to account for any entry errors that Dickens might make

Either explain what is considered a mistake, or remove this requirement altogether.

raising issue about lack of random tests before this gets approved

Thanks, smile67! I will definitely check out your katas. I always love a good brain-teaser!!

Good kata, thanks! If you know math quite well (as you wrote), you can try my three math katas (new to JS? ...C# not?);-) One is easy, but the "LS" kata isn't solved since weeks:-)

Thanks for catching that. I had inserted some Example Test Cases, but they vanished for some reason.

Also, I am not sure how to create random test cases...