Android App development proved harder than I thought, and I didn’t want to phone it in, so this is very unfinished. Still, since I really like my idea and plan to continue working on it, I’ll share what I have so far.
My project is a messaging app called Rebus Chat that automatically converts typed messages to Rebus puzzles like the one below, and sends them that way.
Even the usernames and the buttons like “back” will be images rather than text. All the images will come from The Noun Project. A mock-up of the design I was thinking is below (can you guess all the messages?)
I really like this idea, because it reminds me of the puzzlehunts I love to participate in, and requires a little tricky but fun thinking to decipher each message. To convert text to Rebus, here is the pipeline I had in mind (mostly unimplemented):
- Strip out punctuation/capitalization/etc.
- Try to correct spelling errors (I am looking for an existing tool to help me do this; if I can’t find one then any “words” that don’t parse as words jump to the last bullet)
- Split everything into syllables (this will be done using Rita). We only care about pronunciation here, so “Where are you” could just as well be “Wear arr ewe”.
- For each syllable, if one interpretation of it is as a (non-abstract) noun, look it up in The Noun Project and use that picture (if multiple noun interpretations, use the most common one–there are tools for ranking words based on popularity)
- If a syllable still doesn’t have a picture, try combining it with neighboring syllables to see if it makes a two-syllable noun (if so, use that image).
- If that doesn’t work, try near rhymes.
- If there still isn’t anything, then I’m not sure what to do. Some words/phrases just aren’t 100% Rebus-able (eg. “Relevant Job Experience”–what should that even look like?). I have thought of a few options:
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- Option 1: Use “word math,” like R + (elephant) for “relevant” or (smile) – S for “mile.” This seems pretty hard to do programmatically, at least robustly, and there will still be words that don’t work. Like “the.”
- Option 2: Just put those parts in as text, like “(eye) (half) the relevant job experience”. It will be as Rebus-ified as possible, and still a bit of a puzzle to decipher, but not purely images, which is too bad since I like the all-images look.
- Option 3: Just remove those parts, keeping only what can be Rebus-ified. This might turn “I have the relevant job experience” to “(eye) (half)” and then… nothing. That’s no good, because it loses important content. However, maybe in the case of just small words (a/the/and) it’s okay. This could perhaps be fused with Option 2, then?
- Option 4: Prompt the user before the message gets sent, marking that word as un-rebus-able and encouraging them to try something else. This is a little clunky and less smooth from a UI perspective, but might result in the best Rebuses.
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I am leaning towards Option 2, but would be interested in hearing your opinions on this. I really do want to make this a reality, because I think it could be super fun and it really is time I learn Android App development.