Flashcard-style quiz on chemical elements covering symbol, atomic number, and electron configuration.
Every element answers to three identities: a symbol, an atomic number, and an electron configuration. This quiz turns those facts into flashcards: it shows one prompt, you recall the other facts from memory, and the card flips to reveal the answer so you can score yourself and repeat the ones you miss. The thing most people get wrong at first is that symbols are not abbreviations of English names: sodium is Na, potassium is K, iron is Fe, and tungsten is W, all inherited from Latin or German. The electron configurations add the real difficulty, because orbitals fill out of numerical order.
A concrete input and expected output from the current implementation.
Input
Carbon
Expected output
C | atomic number 6 | electron configuration 1s2 2s2 2p2
Carbon is the sixth element, so it has 6 protons and the symbol C. Its 6 electrons fill the lowest orbitals first: 2 in 1s, 2 in 2s, and the remaining 2 in 2p, which is written 1s2 2s2 2p2.
Cards run on a recall-then-reveal loop: the quiz shows one fact, such as an element name or a symbol, you commit to the rest from memory, and the card flips to show the answer. Because every card carries the same three facts - symbol, atomic number, electron configuration - the deck doubles as a compact study reference between quizzes.
A symbol is a one- or two-letter code with the first letter capitalized (Fe, Na, K). The atomic number is the proton count, which alone identifies the element. The electron configuration distributes the electrons across orbitals, written in full (1s2 2s2 2p6) or in noble-gas shorthand ([Ar] 3d6 4s2). Configuration is where the quiz gets genuinely advanced, because fill order does not follow row order.
Because symbols descend from Latin names, not English ones: potassium was kalium, so it is K, and P already belonged to phosphorus. The same history gives sodium Na (natrium), iron Fe (ferrum), silver Ag (argentum), gold Au (aurum), mercury Hg (hydrargyrum), and tungsten W (wolfram).
A half-filled d subshell is lower in energy than the configuration simple filling would predict, so one 4s electron drops into 3d. Copper does the same for a fully filled subshell: 3d10 4s1. These are the standard textbook exceptions, not errors in the quiz.
The example and behavioral notes were checked against the browser implementation. Standards and primary references below define the relevant format, formula, or platform behavior.
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