AWS Labs MCP Server Suite: Boosting Your Development Workflow

2025-04-03
AWS Labs MCP Server Suite: Boosting Your Development Workflow

AWS Labs has released a suite of specialized MCP servers that bring AWS best practices directly to your development workflow. This suite includes a core server for managing other AWS Labs MCP servers, as well as servers for accessing Amazon Bedrock Knowledge Bases, analyzing AWS CDK projects, performing AWS cost analysis, and generating images using Amazon Nova Canvas. Each server has specific installation instructions, generally involving installing uv, Python 3.10, and configuring AWS credentials. Detailed documentation and API references are available on the official website.

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Development MCP Servers Dev Tools

Elegantly Solving the Problem of Anchor Links on Extremely Long Pages

2025-04-03
Elegantly Solving the Problem of Anchor Links on Extremely Long Pages

This article tackles the problem of anchor links failing to scroll to the correct heading on very long pages. The author explores several solutions, starting with simple padding adjustments, then shifting trigger lines, and finally employing a sophisticated approach involving virtual headings and an optimization algorithm. A cubic polynomial function ensures smooth transitions, addressing issues of layout and user experience. The optimal solution balances maintaining original heading positions with preserving section spacing, resulting in a robust and elegant solution for extremely long pages.

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Development

Nando's Launches a Questionable Face Cream

2025-04-03
Nando's Launches a Questionable Face Cream

Peri-peri chicken chain Nando's has launched a face cream called "Extra Creamy Face Cream." The cream contains black pepper, apple cider vinegar, oregano, and notably, a significant amount of garlic. User reviews describe the scent as "sulphuric." This brand extension has been met with widespread confusion and criticism, questioning the logic of connecting chicken with skincare.

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AV1: The Video Codec That Could (But Didn't Quite) Conquer the World

2025-04-03
AV1: The Video Codec That Could (But Didn't Quite) Conquer the World

AV1, a video codec developed by tech giants like Netflix and Google, promised superior efficiency and royalty-free licensing compared to its predecessors. Despite its technical advantages and strong backing, AV1's adoption has been slower than expected. Hardware limitations and higher decoding complexity have hindered widespread implementation, with major streaming services like Max and Peacock yet to fully embrace it. Even the royalty-free claim is disputed, with patent pools emerging and asserting rights. While giants like YouTube and Netflix are heavily invested, the path to universal adoption remains challenging, though AOMedia, the organization behind AV1, continues to push forward, developing its successor.

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TabSub: Serverless PubSub for Browser Tabs

2025-04-03

TabSub is a lightweight Javascript library for publishing and subscribing to messages between browser tabs using local storage. No server is required. It provides a simple API with `publish`, `subscribe`, and `state` functions. While not heavily tested for concurrency, small-scale tests showed promising results. TabSub is MIT licensed and available on Github. An example demonstrates syncing the playback state of two audio players.

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Development Local Storage

Mr. Beetle's Infidelity and Retribution: A Bug's Life Gone Wrong

2025-04-03
Mr. Beetle's Infidelity and Retribution: A Bug's Life Gone Wrong

Bored with his marriage, Mr. Beetle visits a nightclub and elopes with a beautiful dragonfly dancer. A vengeful grasshopper, however, films their affair and reveals it to Mrs. Beetle, leading to domestic violence and imprisonment. This darkly comedic tale satirizes marital infidelity and the cyclical nature of revenge, ending with a prediction of a less exciting future for the Beetle couple.

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arXivLabs: Experimenting with Community Collaboration

2025-04-02
arXivLabs: Experimenting with Community Collaboration

arXivLabs is a framework enabling collaborators to develop and share new arXiv features directly on the website. Individuals and organizations involved share arXiv's values of openness, community, excellence, and user data privacy. arXiv is committed to these values and only partners with those who adhere to them. Got an idea to improve the arXiv community? Learn more about arXivLabs.

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Development

Type: Hiring a Senior Software Engineer

2025-04-03
Type: Hiring a Senior Software Engineer

Type, an AI-native document editor backed by Y Combinator, is looking for a product-minded senior software engineer to join its small team in Brooklyn. The ideal candidate will have extensive experience building complex web applications, be proficient in React and TypeScript, and possess strong product intuition. Responsibilities include building advanced rich text editing features, collaborative editing capabilities, and LLM-based writing and editing tools. Competitive salary, stock options, and comprehensive benefits are offered.

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Development

Apple Releases CA-1M Dataset and Cubify Transformer for Indoor 3D Object Detection

2025-04-02
Apple Releases CA-1M Dataset and Cubify Transformer for Indoor 3D Object Detection

Apple has released CA-1M, a large-scale dataset for indoor 3D object detection, along with the Cubify Transformer (CuTR) model. CA-1M features exhaustively annotated 3D bounding boxes and poses. Two CuTR model variants are provided: one using RGB-D images and another using only RGB images. The dataset supports real-time detection using the NeRF Capture app and includes comprehensive instructions and code examples. Researchers can leverage this dataset and model to advance research in indoor 3D object detection.

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The Hidden Costs of Cheap Services: Are You Really Saving Money?

2025-04-02
The Hidden Costs of Cheap Services: Are You Really Saving Money?

Using the example of a friend buying a Wayfair bed frame, the author recounts a series of frustrating experiences stemming from low-cost services: incompetent assemblers, incorrect delivery addresses, and slow customer service. This leads the author to question the issues behind "cheap services:" low prices often mean worker exploitation, resulting in poor service quality and consumers ultimately paying more in time and effort. The article explores similar problems in the courier, pharmacy, and other industries and calls on consumers to focus on service quality rather than price alone, support local businesses, and choose companies that provide good working conditions, thus building a more positive consumption model.

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InitWare: A Lighter, More Modular, and Portable systemd Alternative

2025-04-03
InitWare: A Lighter, More Modular, and Portable systemd Alternative

InitWare is a lightweight service management suite aiming to be a systemd alternative. It boasts improved portability, modularity, and a clearly defined scope. Compatible with many systemd interfaces, it runs on NetBSD, GNU/Linux, and other modern BSD systems, functioning as both an init system and an auxiliary service manager. While all disclosed security concerns have been addressed, InitWare is still in alpha and should be used cautiously in production.

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nix-ninja: Incremental Builds with Nix

2025-04-03
nix-ninja: Incremental Builds with Nix

nix-ninja is an incremental build tool leveraging the Nix build system. It parses ninja.build files, generating a derivation per compilation unit, and uses content-addressed derivations for granular, Nix-native incrementality. It's compatible with the ninja CLI, supporting both local and Nix derivation execution. Currently experimental and reliant on unreleased Nix features, it already builds simple C++ examples and even Nix itself. Contributors are welcome; milestones 0.1.0 (correctness) and 0.2.0 (performance) are outlined.

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Development Incremental Builds

Reverse Engineering the Boot Process of a 90s AlphaStation 500

2025-04-03

The author acquired a broken AlphaStation 500 workstation and embarked on a journey to understand its boot process. The investigation centered around the SROM (Serial ROM), which contained eight multiplexed images selectable via jumpers. Using Python and Rust, the author extracted and decoded the SROM data, revealing Alpha machine code. Analysis revealed the CPU directly controls a serial port using internal processor registers for bit-banging. While the AlphaStation's boot issue remains unsolved, the process uncovered the unique boot mechanism of this vintage workstation.

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Hardware

Cracking a San Francisco Street AI Puzzle: The Hunt for a Hidden Reward

2025-04-03

A poster with a math puzzle leading to a reward website (“.ai/givemeprize”) appeared on a street in San Francisco. The puzzle involves an AI-related formula, including functions like argmax, softmax, log, and BusyBeaver. The final answer requires calculating a huge exponent and taking its SI prefix. The author attempted to solve it but got stuck on the value of BusyBeaver(4) and the meaning of log*. With help from others, the puzzle was solved, revealing the answer as "exa", but the reward website is now defunct.

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MIT Professor Unravels the Brain's Language Processing Mechanisms

2025-04-03
MIT Professor Unravels the Brain's Language Processing Mechanisms

From learning multiple languages in the former Soviet Union to becoming an associate professor of brain and cognitive sciences at MIT, Dr. Evelina Fedorenko dedicates her research to understanding the brain's language processing regions. Her work utilizes fMRI to precisely locate these areas, revealing their high selectivity for language and lack of overlap with other cognitive functions like music processing or code reading. Furthermore, she explores the temporal differences in processing across different brain regions, the development of language processing areas in young children, and uses large language models to investigate the plasticity and redundancy of the brain's language capabilities.

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zxc: A Powerful Terminal-Based Intercepting Proxy Built with Rust, Vim, and tmux

2025-04-03
zxc: A Powerful Terminal-Based Intercepting Proxy Built with Rust, Vim, and tmux

zxc is a terminal-based intercepting proxy written in Rust, leveraging the power of tmux and vim as its user interface. It provides robust capabilities for intercepting, modifying, and forwarding network requests. Supporting HTTP/1.1 and WebSockets, zxc features history logging, request replay, and addon integration (e.g., ffuf and sqlmap). Users interact via vim commands and keybindings, customizing interception rules and encoding/decoding requests and responses. Extensibility through custom addons allows for integration with additional tools.

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Development network proxy

Easy Bypass for Windows 11's Microsoft Account Requirement

2025-04-03
Easy Bypass for Windows 11's Microsoft Account Requirement

Microsoft is pushing for Microsoft account usage in Windows 11, but a newly discovered trick makes bypassing it easy. Previously, Microsoft removed the 'BypassNRO.cmd' script, but registry edits still worked. Now, a simpler method exists: during Windows 11 setup, press Shift+F10 to open a command prompt, type "start ms-cxh:localonly", and press Enter to create a local account, skipping the Microsoft account login. This method, being directly integrated into the system, is likely harder for Microsoft to remove than the previous script-based approach.

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Development Local Account

639-Year Organ Recital: John Cage's ORGAN2/ASLSP

2025-04-03
639-Year Organ Recital: John Cage's ORGAN2/ASLSP

Construction began in 2000 in a small East German town on an organ with a singular purpose: to perform John Cage's ORGAN2/ASLSP (1987) for precisely 639 years. The only instruction for the piece was to play 'as slowly as possible'. In 2001, the instrument finally ready, the world's longest organ recital began in St Burchardi church, Halberstadt, with a 17-month rest before the first chord. Recently, hundreds witnessed the latest chord change in this ongoing performance. A system of sandbags maintains pressure on the keys, eliminating the need for a human organist.

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Space Junk Crisis: Is it a ticking time bomb?

2025-04-03
Space Junk Crisis: Is it a ticking time bomb?

The European Space Agency's new short documentary, "Space Debris: Is it a Crisis?", highlights a concerning reality: millions of space debris particles, mostly from defunct satellites and rocket remnants, orbit Earth. The rise of satellite constellations exacerbates the issue, with collisions potentially disabling satellites and even posing a threat to Earth. The film notes that different orbits face varying risks, with communication, navigation, and climate monitoring satellites among the most vulnerable. While solutions are urgently needed, the documentary cautions against rushed approaches that may inadvertently create new problems.

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Resist Real ID: A Fight for Freedom

2025-04-02
Resist Real ID: A Fight for Freedom

Real ID, a federally mandated driver's license, is set to become mandatory. The author argues that Real ID demands excessive personal information, increasing the risk of identity theft and government surveillance. It essentially creates an internal passport, restricting citizen freedom. The author calls for a boycott of Real ID, deeming it a necessary act of defending liberty. The author suggests legislative action to halt its implementation, even advocating for a government shutdown if necessary.

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OpenBSD in Amsterdam: A Round Peg in a Square Hole

2025-04-02

The author's journey to connect an old laptop to the internet led to many failed attempts with various Linux distributions and other OSes, until OpenBSD finally worked. While known for its security and minimalism, OpenBSD presented a steep learning curve. Setting up a website proved challenging, like trying to fit a round peg into a square hole. The author ultimately succeeded in deploying their site using OpenBSD and shares their experiences, highlighting perseverance and the unexpected challenges of even the most secure systems.

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Development

EU Unveils ProtectEU: A New Internal Security Strategy

2025-04-02
EU Unveils ProtectEU: A New Internal Security Strategy

The European Commission launched ProtectEU, a new internal security strategy addressing evolving threats. Key aspects include bolstering Europol into a fully operational police agency, tackling lawful access to data and encryption (a controversial move), and improving intelligence sharing via the EU's Single Intelligence Analysis Capacity (SIAC). The strategy acknowledges existing shortcomings in situational awareness and implementation of cybersecurity laws. Success hinges on member states' political will and cooperation, given the historically sovereign nature of national security matters.

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Steam Deck: More Than a Handheld, a Symbol of Freedom

2025-04-03

The Steam Deck's success isn't due to exceptional battery life or top-tier performance, but rather its underlying philosophy: freedom and openness. Running a customized version of Arch Linux, it lets users install any software and even replace parts themselves. This contrasts sharply with closed mobile systems, showcasing respect for user autonomy. While Valve's libertarian approach has drawn criticism, such as silence on social issues and tolerance of gambling websites, the Steam Deck remains an excellent example of balancing commercial interests with user freedom. It has fueled the growth of the Linux gaming ecosystem, providing players with a more open gaming experience.

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AI-Powered Music Production: Seamless Ableton Live and Claude AI Integration

2025-04-03
AI-Powered Music Production: Seamless Ableton Live and Claude AI Integration

AbletonMCP seamlessly integrates Ableton Live with Claude AI via the Model Context Protocol (MCP), allowing Claude to directly control Ableton Live. Users can leverage natural language prompts to create tracks, modify instruments and effects, and control playback, significantly boosting music production efficiency. The project comprises two main components: an Ableton remote script and an MCP server. Installation is straightforward, supporting various commands such as creating synth tracks, adding reverb, setting tempo, and more. While limitations exist, such as complex operations needing to be broken down into smaller steps, this project undeniably opens new possibilities for AI-assisted music creation.

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Development

MathArena: Rigorously Evaluating LLMs on Math Competitions

2025-04-02

MathArena is a platform for evaluating large language models (LLMs) on recent math competitions and olympiads. It ensures fair and unbiased evaluation by testing models exclusively on post-release competitions, preventing retroactive assessments on potentially leaked data. The platform publishes leaderboards for each competition, showing individual problem scores for different models, and a main table summarizing performance across all competitions. Each model runs four times per problem, averaging the score and calculating the cost (in USD). The evaluation code is open-sourced: https://github.com/eth-sri/matharena.

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Prolog Planners from LLMs: A Surprisingly Effective Approach

2025-04-02

This paper explores using Large Language Models (LLMs) to generate Prolog planners, leveraging Prolog's combinatorial search capabilities. The authors argue that LLMs are better suited for translating natural language into Prolog than for planning directly. Their approach involves prompting an LLM to translate problem descriptions into Prolog code, which is then used by a Prolog engine to perform the planning. A detailed prompting guide is provided, focusing on generating state facts, action predicates, and check predicates. This approach bypasses limitations of LLMs in direct planning while utilizing Prolog's strengths in logical reasoning and combinatorial search. The method is shown to be effective on various toy planning problems.

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Development Automated Planning

Ace: Superhuman-Speed Computer Autopilot

2025-04-02
Ace: Superhuman-Speed Computer Autopilot

Ace is a computer autopilot that uses your mouse and keyboard to perform tasks on your desktop. It outperforms other models in a suite of computer use tasks and boasts superhuman speed. Trained on over a million tasks by software specialists and domain experts, Ace performs mouse clicks and keystrokes based on screen and prompts. While still under development and prone to occasional errors, its accuracy improves significantly with increased training resources. An early research preview is now available.

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AI

Indiana University Professor Under Investigation for Undisclosed Chinese Research Funding

2025-04-02
Indiana University Professor Under Investigation for Undisclosed Chinese Research Funding

Indiana University (IU) data privacy professor Xiaofeng Wang and his wife are under investigation for allegedly failing to disclose research funding received from China. The university began reviewing whether Wang received unreported funding months before the FBI raided two of the couple’s homes last week. A statement, purportedly written by a long-time collaborator, reveals IU contacted Wang in December about a 2017-2018 Chinese grant listing him as a researcher. The statement alleges IU was concerned Wang failed to properly disclose the funding to the university and in US federal grant applications. While Wang claims to have explained the situation, the investigation continues. The allegations involve research misconduct, including failure to properly disclose the principal investigator and not fully listing co-authors. Wang regularly collaborated with researchers at the Chinese Academy of Sciences' Institute of Information Engineering, but his publications show his primary funding came from US government agencies and corporations. No evidence currently suggests impropriety in the collaborations.

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MIT's Open-Source Secure Hardware Design Course: Attack and Defense, Hands-On

2025-04-03

MIT's open-source course, Secure Hardware Design (6.5950/6.5951), uniquely teaches students both how to attack modern CPUs and design resilient architectures. Students gain hands-on experience hacking real processors, learning state-of-the-art hardware attacks and defenses. The course, a culmination of years of work, uses a 'Think-Play-Do' philosophy. Students learn through lectures, interactive CTF-style recitations, and labs involving real hardware attacks (no simulators!). The capstone project challenges students to create a CPU fuzzer to discover bugs in real CPU RTL designs.

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Hardware
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