Peckris

Sadly, as you correctly point out, the A=1, B=2, C=3, etc, Cipher is the flaw in this system. As it is possibly the most common, and perhaps well known, of all systems I would think. I have experimented using the same basic concept but changing the Cipher. To be honest the results were better as it would be much harder for anyone to figure out, but the complexity of actually creating the Password in the first place was at least doubled. I like the simplicity of it, as it is so easy to encode and decode, but that sadly is also its 'Achilles Heel.' lol I do like that idea of adding a non Alpha-Numeric Character in the way that you suggested, I will sit and have a play with that idea. In fact I do something similar in that I exchange the Vowels themselves for them. This does of course add an element of randomisation to the overall system but has the downside of a simple transpositon which would show a pattern if looked at closely enough. I sat with a pen and paper last night and devised a couple of new ideas for a basic yet secure way to create strong Passwords, but I will have to play with them a little longer to see how they develop. If I am honest, I do only use that system for Forums and various other Websites. I have a modified system for E-Mail, etc. So if it were to be 'Cracked' then all I would lose is a few Forum accounts, which is no great loss to me. They way that I think about it is that no 'Serious Hacker' would waste their time or effort in trying to 'Crack' a Forum Password as there would simply be no challenge in it for them. So as long as my Passwords are strong enough to keep the 'Average Joe' on their toes, then I do not worry at all. True enough. All my sensitive (i.e. financial) data is encrypted, and behind a password that is 44 characters in length ... that should take a good few millennia to crack

Strangely this basic principle is probably also true for any KG5 penny, it's just that we don't notice it. Most coins were collected from circulation either around the date of issue or much later on when they were likely to be withdrawn at any time. When was the last time you saw a GVF 1914? Yes, I agree. Though only for the series 1913 to 1921. There seem to be quite a few mid grade 1911 - 1912 protected behind high rims, and for some reason the 1922 - 1926 OE also turn up quite a lot in the VF range. (And from 1928 onwards, VF is very common for most dates) I simply can't see how this could be done objectively now that they are no longer circulating. What you will probably end up doing is monitoring the periodic release of hoards of so-called rare dates when the hoarder has got fed up holding on to them such as the roughly 4000 1925 halfcrowns sold at Noble earlier this year. The additional need to police ebay for recycled pieces (as this would presumably be a major source of data) would be a pretty thankless and probably impossible task given the quality of images provided. We are also talking about comparing pieces that in the main are common or less common with only a handful of real rarities found in the last 150 years. The amount of data would be mind boggling. Double counting is a big problem. A few years ago when I still listed things on ebay, I had to prove to someone that my contention of a particular Charles I shilling type being rarer than another was true. To prove to the person asking and to ensure I wasn't making a complete tit of myself, I redid the exercise. That required finding examples in general sales only, i.e. random sale data points. Named collections are out because if you use a person's collection as the basis for data, then that person is likely to have one example of each variety they can lay their hands on. Consequently you can easily end up with the erroneous conclusion that a coin which has 2 common varieties and one maybe unique error exists in the ratio of 1:1:1. Serious rarities aside, there isn't an easy way. Yes, I never thought it would be easy. But it does seem time that the 'deadweight inertia' of 1960s price ratios, which depended heavily on rarity vs common circulating dates, was adjusted. BU 1946 and 1949 threepences will always be rare, but I'm prepared to bet that 1946s in F are little scarcer than - say - 1939 or 1948, many of which would have been hoovered up in the meltdown. More so proportionately than the key dates. I wonder if a quick search for certain dates and denominations on eBay could be the first step in such a survey? Repeated monthly for a year, that might provide a snapshot.

You'll have to do swapsies

That is a very interesting way to create a secure password. Thanks for sharing it Peckris. Some years ago I used to work as Second Level Technical Support for a large ISP. It never ceased to amaze me when dealing with the Public, and some Co-Workers for that matter, how simple and basic their Passwords were. For example 'Cat' 'Pizza' or '12345' I did always encourage people to create a stronger password using letters and numbers as it was much safer than a simple word or number sequence. I did develop my own method to create secure Passwords. It is actually quite similar to the one that Peckris devised and explained above in the way that it works. Simply write down the letters of the Alphabet from A-Z. Then write the numbers from 1-26 beside each letter. A=1, B=2, C=3 etc. Then choose a word to encode, this can be a name, a place, a TV show or whatever you want it to be as long as you can remember it. For this example I will use PREDECIMAL Then count the letters of the word to see if they add up to an Odd or Even number. In this example the word has 10 letters so it is an Even number. Then to create your Password, because the word we have chosen is an even number, write each Odd letter as its letter and each Even letter as its relating number. (If your word is Odd then simply write each Odd letter as its related number and each Even letter as its letter. So PREDECIMAL would be P=Odd R=Even E=Odd D=Even E=Odd C=Even I=Odd M=Even A=Odd L=Even The Pasword for PREDECIMAL would be : p18e4e3i13a12 You can even make the first and last letters capital letters to make it harder to 'Crack.' The Password would then be : P18e4e3i13A12 It does sound quite a long winded way to create a Password, but if you try it a few times you will see how it works and be able to pick it up and understand it easily. I have found this to be a simple method to create a secure Password because as long as you can remember the word that you have chosen it is very easy to encode it or re-encode it if you forget the Password as you can simply run through the letters of the Alphabet and their related numbers in your head. I do use this method myself to create Passwords and I have never personally had any problems with it. I do only use this type of Password for Forums and other such Websites. For Websites which are more sensitive I developed a similar method which also incoporates Prime Numbers and an adapted Fibonacci Sequence. That's quite similar to my method, as you say Rob, and it does seem strong. It does have one slight flaw : the enciphering is less random as you use a code that is very common (A=1 etc), plus you convert every alternate letter, though which one you start with is not so predictable. One small addition might make it even stronger? Pick a non-alphameric character (!?"@£$%^&* etc) and add it before and after the first vowel that's not converted into a number. (Obviously it would be the same character each time, so you'd have to remember that!) This would help prevent 'reverse engineering' if someone found one of your passwords. But we're obviously both giving some thought to this!

It's not that much better than VF! Perhaps between VF and EF at most. I'd rate it a £250 - £300 coin.

agree the obverse is horrid, and at £450 too rich for my budget; so will have to stick to the one I have, GF Here's mine - no lustre, no hair, but otherwise as EF as they come Now for the good bit - it cost me fifteen quid as part of a large bronze penny lot from Warwick & Warwick in the late 90s :) Sigh, those days are well and truly over.

That's going a bit far Peter! A genuine VF 18KN should fetch £25 or so - there must be MANY collectors who want "above average" but can't afford EF or higher, and would cheerfully pay that. And I'd say the VF 1893 should at least be a few quid too. I think you're being too pessimistic. If you're not, then I will happily pay 99p to buy a GVF 1918KN off you Trouble is most KN's are from circulation and worth less than £1....I have also sold 1946 & 1949 3ds at 99p....back in the 70's they were worth more. Two points on that: 1. I agree there is a massive gap in the KN (and H) supply chain. There's a small but enthusiastically collected supply of high graders that fetch in the hundreds. But the vast majority - a glut even - are, as you say, from circulation and not very saleable, there's so many. But the gap is in the AVF to GVF grades, which are really really scarce. I wanted to upgrade to them a while back and NO-ONE had any. 2. As for the whole range of key dates, including those 3d bits - so many were pulled from circulation and subsequently sold by dealers in the late 60s, they are just not 'key' any more in my opinion. I've said it before, but I wish someone would attempt a modern census of coins from Victoria onwards : I think we would all be mildly surprised how non-rare some traditional rarities are compared to the so-called 'common' dates.

True! Though don't be frightened off by sets just because it "shortens the hunt". The 1887 set of silver appears at auction from time to time, and even so you might STILL need to track down one of the sixpences, plus all the bronze.

And if you use any obscure WORD that' in a dictionary, a dictionary run against your password will crack it fairly quickly. Ok, I'm now going to GIVE AWAY my (non) patented system that is foolproof (I believe). 1. Think up a pass phrase or long name that contains roughly half the letters of the alphabet (e.g. THE QUICK BROWN FOX ... but don't use that!!!) Commit this to memory and don't ever tell a soul or write it down. 2. Come up with something easy to remember, such as your name (e.g. "John Thompson") 3. Use the pass phrase, whose letters turn into numbers starting with 0 (T=0 H=1 E=2 Q=3 U=4 I=5 C=6 K=7 B=8 R=9 O=10 W=11 N=12 F=13 X=14 in the example I gave), to encipher your chosen password. Under that system, "John Thompson" converts to "J10112@0110mps1012" (I've used @ to represent the space, but you can pick any character) It sounds unwieldy, and is, the first few times you use it. The more you use it, the more you come to learn what the numbers are in your pass phrase and the process becomes instinctive. The great thing about it is, you can write down a password hint, e.g. "full name" and even someone who knows your name won't be able to crack what it converts to. And even knowing the length of your name won't help them, as some letters convert to two-digit numbers, so the length of the password won't be the same as the name. So, for the cost of slightly time-consuming conversion, especially when you first start using it, you will be able to write down strong password hints, secure in the knowledge that someone who understands the hint still won't be able to crack your password. And yes, I use this system. And no, you can't know what my pass phrase is!

Don't worry about that - you can see enough to make out fine detail in places, showing it is in near mint or mint condition. Don't risk breaking the pendant - if it's simply the standard shilling, you will have lost its major individual point of interest.

That's going a bit far Peter! A genuine VF 18KN should fetch £25 or so - there must be MANY collectors who want "above average" but can't afford EF or higher, and would cheerfully pay that. And I'd say the VF 1893 should at least be a few quid too. I think you're being too pessimistic. If you're not, then I will happily pay 99p to buy a GVF 1918KN off you

I won't give you an argentuman pver that!

MOJO Magazine - let's say the December issue - plops on the doormat at the very end of October or beginning of November, reports on things which happened mid-October at the very latest. Absurd.

OUCH! You've just told us that your passwords are all alphabetic. Hope you don't mind me saying so, but those are crackable pretty swiftly unless it is genuinely random garbage. Golden rule (from my experience in software) : • password should be long (11 characters or more is good) • they should be mix of letters and numbers, and maybe even non-alphanumeric characters too • they should not be used on all sites and everywhere you go • they should be changed unless you're absolutely 100% confident they aren't crackable OR they are for blogs and other unimportant sites I hope I haven't invited you to rearrange the following words into a well-known phrase or saying : "eggs" "don't" "grandmother" "teach" "suck" "your" "to".

That sounds an interesting and well thought-out strategy Rob. That will keep you going for quite a while. You'd need a penny to go with your Eliz II type 2 set, as 1954 doesn't have one (in our price bracket!) - you might factor in a very cheap 1967 set which would have the twin plusses of 1) giving you the penny and 2) being the last predecimal currency set too. UNC 1954 stuff will set you back a few bob but it will be a good investment. With 1902, you should be able to afford EF over time, as it's by far the most affordable date in a very difficult series. With 1920, make sure you go for the 'recut shallow portrait' from halfcrown down to shilling - that way you kill two birds with one stone : the alloy change, and the new obverse dies. With Victoria, a good start would be 1887, as the silver is by far the cheapest for that reign, and supplies are plentiful. Then after that, 1893 would be not too difficult (though with the added complication that you would have to add in the 1895 bronze not 1893, as that series begins in two separate years for different metals). Good luck, and good hunting

The coin is a jubilee head shilling, made of sterling silver, but if it is gold in colour, then its almost certainly been gold plated at some time. This date doesn't command very much value as many specimens were put away for the queen's golden jubilee. Also gold plating will detract for a true collector. The only caveat I would place on this is other forum members, who know more than I do, may be aware of specimens of this date struck in gold. None of my sources suggest this, but I am always aware that all sorts of strikings and specimens suddenly turn up on here and somebody may know something I don't. If so, I'm sure they will post any information for you. The weight might help indicate If it's just the standard shilling, and assuming it isn't gold plated (might just be the pendant glass) then it's in top condition. Don't get too excited - it's also the commonest Victorian silver coin. But still worth £25 to £50 in that condition. And worth having, for interest.

You'd need to be a cockney to understand that one. Got you Threepenny bits, gits, right?

Without seeing any pictures then its impossible to tell Quite so. Condition is EVERYTHING. As a rough guide : the 1918KN in 'average' condition (you can see all the legend on both sides, but ONE PENNY is getting a bit blurry, you can't see the entire flag detail on Britannia's shield, the fingers on her trident hand aren't distinct and separate any more) is worth between £2 and £5. In 'Mint' condition, it's worth between £1000 and £2000. Your 1893 is worth from £1 (it's more than a flat disc: you can just about make out the legend and Britannia; Victoria is a little more than a silhouette), up to between £100 and £200 in near Mint condition. So you see - pictures are essential.

A little harsh perhaps! (Your first sentence, that is ) But as a generalisation, it's got a lot of truth in it. I do quite like the last reverse for Geo VI sixpences (especially in BU), the ship halfpenny reverse, the Eliz II shilling reverses, and the original decimal designs for 10 pence and 50 pence, as well as quite a few of the £1 and £2 reverses. But that's about it really. The nadir being the commemorative 50 pences and £5 coins, which must rival the Geo VI florin for general awfulness.

Define "recognised"! 1887 and I have exchanged views, pictures, and expertise (his more than mine), and the upshot is that it should appear in an upcoming book he hopes to write on the subject. We both agree that it is a previously unknown variety. However,getting other people interested is a MAJOR task. When you consider some members of this forum have orgasms over a nearly-disappeared half colon, you would think there would be more enthusiasm really. It only goes to prove the old adage "MY variety is interesting and endlessly fascinating. Yours? Pah."

I can see where you're coming from - it's true that I have a type of nearly every machine age currency denomination (silver and copper/bronze), and that means I have only two George VI florins, one silver, one cupro-nickel, as I think it's a pretty awful design. On the other hand I love bronze pennies and have the main dates in EF or better going back to 1887 and most of the "usual suspect" varieties in at least GF; so that's a definite date run. But I'm beginning to love early milled more, which makes things more expensive unless I keep my sights slightly lower. It also means going for the commoner types, which is of course one big advantage of type collecting. I don't have to yearn after 1860 copper for example. But your last sentence does sum it up really.

I just got in. 22:18

One really good thing about the Lumix is its Optical Image Stabilisation - very good.

Too true! I was just thinking today, that a type collection of William III would involve MORE coins than a date run, unless the date run included all the main types and varieties

For what its worth, my 1997 and 2004 editions of Seaby/Spink don't show anything special about the 1890M sovereign, so it must be identified in later editions. Or it's an error. Here is what the 2005 edition lists : 3867A (standard issue) 1887M normal 1889M extremely rare 3867B (DG closer to crown) 1887M 1888M 1889M 1890M all normal So if the 1890M was suddenly discovered to be rare, what about the 1889M ?