a problem to solve

[John Salerno]

mensanator at aol.com wrote:

> Well, I don't get the prize for most elegant.
> 
> But that's partly because I included the ooloop6
> function.

:: snip a bunch of scary code ::   :)

Wow, that's impressive. My solution looks a whole lot simpler than 
yours, but I certainly could not have done it without all your great 
help (the hex list, the formula, even the basic explanation of what 
needs to happen, i.e. Y needs to be 11111111111111111111).

Thanks for taking the time to work with me on this. I don't know if I 
would have ever finished it without your help -- and this thing has been 
haunting me for months. :)