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Musk Claims Social Security Pays 150-Year-Olds; COBOL Bug Likely Culprit

2025-02-15

Elon Musk claimed his DOGE team found Social Security beneficiaries around 150 years old. While this sparked debate, a likely explanation is a date calculation error in the system's outdated COBOL programming. Older COBOL versions use May 20, 1875, as a baseline; missing birthdates default to this date, creating the illusion of 150-year-old recipients. This highlights data handling issues with legacy systems and the importance of accurate data interpretation.

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(slashdot.org)
Tech Social Security

HP's webOS 'Eel': An Innovative OS That Never Was

2025-04-30
HP's webOS 'Eel': An Innovative OS That Never Was

While most of HP's tablet and phone plans were underwhelming, their software team was developing truly innovative designs. Codenamed 'Eel', the next major version of webOS aimed to expand on the 'card' metaphor introduced with the original Palm Pre. It combined 'card stacks' and 'responsive panels', allowing users to open links in new, separate cards on the left, slide them, or 'shear' them to different stacks. This offered flexible window sizing and grouping, managing well on both phones and tablets. It represented an innovative attempt to boost productivity, but ultimately, the project never reached its full potential.

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(www.theverge.com)
Development

LLM Randomness Test Reveals Unexpected Bias

2025-04-30

This experiment tested the randomness of several Large Language Models (LLMs) from OpenAI and Anthropic. By having the models toss a coin and predict random numbers between 0 and 10, researchers discovered a significant bias in their outputs, revealing they aren't truly random. For instance, in the coin toss experiment, all models showed a preference for 'heads,' with GPT-o1 exhibiting the most extreme bias at 49%. In the odd/even number prediction, most models favored odd numbers, with Claude 3.7 Sonnet displaying the strongest bias at 47%. The findings highlight that even advanced LLMs can exhibit unexpected patterns influenced by their training data distributions.

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(rnikhil.com)
AI Randomness Bias

Utamaro's Yamauba Series: A Balancing Act of Aesthetics and Taboo

2025-04-10
Utamaro's Yamauba Series: A Balancing Act of Aesthetics and Taboo

Kitagawa Utamaro's *Yamauba* series presents a paradoxical image of the Yamauba: untamed eyebrows and hair suggest her outcast status, yet fine robes and delicate features soften her monstrous origins. Some scholars interpret this as a way to subtly convey sensuality while evading censorship, pointing to a few images with exposed breasts. However, this interpretation overlooks the majority of the series, which aren't overtly erotic, and Utamaro's history of publishing more explicit works. His eventual punishment stemmed from political content, not explicitness, highlighting the complex censorship of the time and the delicate balance between artistic expression and societal taboos.

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(publicdomainreview.org)
Design Ukiyo-e Kitagawa Utamaro Art Censorship

Dissecting Pokémon Emerald: A Commentary on its Decompiled Source Code

2025-09-22

This book, "The Emerald Source Code Commentary," meticulously examines the source code of Pokémon Emerald, drawing inspiration from "A Commentary on the Sixth Edition Unix Operating System." Leveraging the decompilation work of PRET, it offers a unique perspective on the game's structure and implementation. While the original source code is unauthorized, the project created a new, decompiled codebase that perfectly recompiles to the official English ROM. This detailed analysis provides invaluable insights into the development of a classic game.

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(0xabad1dea.github.io)
Game

Tom Lehrer, Genius Satirist and Math Professor, Dies at 97

2025-07-28
Tom Lehrer, Genius Satirist and Math Professor, Dies at 97

Tom Lehrer, the renowned mathematical satirist known for his sharp wit and insightful songs like "Poisoning Pigeons in the Park," passed away at the age of 97. A Harvard prodigy who earned a math degree at 18, Lehrer later transitioned to a successful music career, lampooning marriage, politics, racism, and the Cold War. However, he eventually abandoned his musical pursuits to return to teaching mathematics at Harvard and other universities. Despite a relatively small body of work, his influence on subsequent musicians is undeniable. In 2020, he released his lyrics into the public domain, allowing free use of his work. Lehrer's life was a unique blend of academic brilliance and artistic genius.

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(www.cnn.com)
Misc

6GHz Spectrum: Wi-Fi's Future or the Next Auction Target?

2025-07-01
6GHz Spectrum: Wi-Fi's Future or the Next Auction Target?

The FCC's consideration of reallocating the 6GHz spectrum has sparked a debate about the future of Wi-Fi and spectrum auctions. Experts highlight the crucial role of 6GHz for Wi-Fi, promising significant speed and capacity improvements, supporting emerging applications like VR. However, this spectrum faces competition from satellite and mobile operators, with FCC Chairman Brendan Carr leaning toward allocating more frequencies to mobile carriers. With 6GHz Wi-Fi deployments just beginning, it's a prime target for reallocation, potentially impacting Wi-Fi's future significantly.

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(arstechnica.com)
Tech spectrum auction

PICO-8 Palette and Pixel Mapping Algorithm

2025-09-11

This code defines the 16-color palette of the PICO-8 game console and provides several color distance calculation methods (Euclidean distance, weighted RGB distance, HyAB distance and its variants), along with a function that maps image pixels to the closest palette color. It leverages NumPy for efficient color data handling and allows users to customize the distance function for different color matching strategies. This is highly useful for pixel art game development and image color quantization.

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(30fps.net)
Game

Hacking a Satellite Back to Life: The BEESAT-1 Resurrection

2025-01-04
Hacking a Satellite Back to Life: The BEESAT-1 Resurrection

In 2013, Technische Universität Berlin's BEESAT-1 satellite stopped sending valid telemetry data. Projected to remain in orbit for another 20 years, its recovery would unlock new experiments. However, the satellite lacked both telemetry and software update capabilities. This talk recounts the story of how, by combining space and cybersecurity expertise, the fault was diagnosed without telemetry, software updates were implemented without the existing feature, and the satellite was resurrected in September 2024. The journey involved overcoming significant hurdles, including working with 15-year-old software and hardware and devising a method to upload new software without the standard update mechanism. The presentation details the entire recovery process, highlighting the unexpected challenges and successes.

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(media.ccc.de)
Tech Satellite Repair

Procedural Textures with Simple Hash Functions: A Playground of Patterns

2025-04-18
Procedural Textures with Simple Hash Functions: A Playground of Patterns

This article explores the surprising complexity achievable with a simple hash function for generating procedural textures. The core is a concise equation: $(c_x x + c_y y + c_{xy} xy + c_{x^2} x^2 + c_{y^2} y^2) mod m < τm$. By tweaking parameters, a vast array of visually rich patterns emerges. The author delves into the mathematical underpinnings, explaining how different terms influence the resulting texture. An interactive playground allows readers to experiment and create their own designs, making this relevant to game development and digital art.

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(douglasorr.github.io)
Game procedural textures

Classic Outlook Turning into a CPU Hog: Microsoft Responds

2025-04-17
Classic Outlook Turning into a CPU Hog: Microsoft Responds

Microsoft has acknowledged that Classic Outlook is experiencing unexpectedly high CPU usage, spiking up to 30-50%, leading to increased power consumption. Users reported the issue as early as November 2024. While Microsoft claims to be investigating, the only workaround involves registry edits, a less-than-ideal solution for enterprise users. Some speculate this is a tactic to push users towards the newer Outlook client, despite its lacking features.

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(www.theregister.com)
Tech CPU Usage

JWT Turns 10: A Decade of Secure Token Standards and Future Outlook

2025-05-25

Ten years ago, the JSON Web Token (JWT) became RFC 7519, culminating a 4.5-year journey to create a simple JSON-based security token format and underlying cryptographic standards. JWT and its related specifications have seen widespread adoption, even exceeding the initial creators' expectations. However, ongoing work continues to update the specifications to address emerging threats and vulnerabilities, ensuring JWT remains secure for the next decade.

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(self-issued.info)
Development security tokens

Typographic Rivers: A Curious Case of Accidental Alignment

2025-05-19
Typographic Rivers: A Curious Case of Accidental Alignment

Have you ever noticed how sometimes the spaces between words in printed text coincidentally align to form vertical 'rivers' of whitespace? This phenomenon, most common in monospaced fonts with full justification, is generally avoided by typographers due to its distracting nature. The article cites a classic 12-line example discovered in 1988 and a collection from 1986, highlighting the intriguing randomness of this typographic quirk.

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(www.futilitycloset.com)
Design

Blitz: A Blazing-Fast, Zero-Cost CLI Framework for Zig

2025-05-25
Blitz: A Blazing-Fast, Zero-Cost CLI Framework for Zig

Blitz is a blazing-fast, zero-cost CLI framework for the Zig programming language. Build modular, ergonomic, and high-performance CLIs with ease. All batteries included. Inspired by Cobra (Go) and clap (Rust), Blitz offers modular commands and subcommands, fast flag parsing, type-safe support for various data types, and automatic help/version/deprecation handling. Get started quickly with a simple installation and intuitive API.

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(github.com)
Development

Erlang Agent: A Distributed Framework for OpenAI API

2025-05-09
Erlang Agent: A Distributed Framework for OpenAI API

A robust, distributed Erlang framework for seamless OpenAI API integration. Featuring built-in supervision trees, dynamic API client generation, and tool execution, it supports all OpenAI API endpoints and boasts fault tolerance, rate limiting, and streaming support. The hierarchical supervision tree ensures stability and reliability. Developers can easily register and execute custom tools and directly access the OpenAI API via simple function calls.

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(github.com)
Development Distributed Framework

Boom Supersonic: Revolutionizing Aerospace Design with Software Engineering

2025-08-12
Boom Supersonic: Revolutionizing Aerospace Design with Software Engineering

Boom Supersonic built the world's first independently developed supersonic jet, XB-1, with a team of just 50 people and a fraction of the traditional budget. They developed mkBoom, an in-house aircraft design software, embedding software engineers within hardware teams to automate design workflows and enable rapid iteration. mkBoom allows for comprehensive aircraft performance analysis and simulates flight tests of various design options. This approach optimized the design of the Overture supersonic airliner, significantly improving the passenger experience and enabling "boomless cruise."

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(bscholl.substack.com)
Tech supersonic aircraft aerospace design

Micron Unveils Trio of SSDs Targeting Diverse Markets

2025-08-03
Micron Unveils Trio of SSDs Targeting Diverse Markets

Micron announced three new SSDs aimed at different markets: the 9650 (PCIe Gen 6, TLC flash, focusing on speed), the 6600 ION (PCIe Gen 5, QLC flash, emphasizing high capacity up to 122.88TB), and the 7600 (PCIe Gen 5, TLC flash, prioritizing low latency). All three leverage Micron's latest Gen 9 276-layer 3D NAND, along with its own DRAM, NAND controller, and firmware. The 9650 boasts significantly improved performance thanks to its PCIe Gen 6 interface, while the 6600 ION caters to massive data storage needs with its enormous capacity, and the 7600 excels in low latency, ideal for AI and similar applications.

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(blocksandfiles.com)
Hardware

Webb Telescope Discovers Young Galaxy Resembling Early Milky Way

2024-12-21
Webb Telescope Discovers Young Galaxy Resembling Early Milky Way

NASA's James Webb Space Telescope has made a groundbreaking discovery: a galaxy nicknamed 'Firefly Sparkle,' existing around 600 million years after the Big Bang, with a mass similar to that of our own Milky Way in its early stages. This galaxy, magnified by gravitational lensing, showcases ten distinct star clusters, providing unprecedented detail about early galaxy formation. Researchers found the 'Firefly Sparkle' is actively forming stars, with its uneven distribution of star clusters indicating a future of mergers and growth. This discovery offers invaluable insight into the evolution of galaxies in the early universe.

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(science.nasa.gov)
Tech James Webb Space Telescope Galaxy Formation Early Universe

Perplexity's $34.5B Bid to Acquire Google Chrome: A Bold Move

2025-08-13
Perplexity's $34.5B Bid to Acquire Google Chrome: A Bold Move

AI search startup Perplexity has made a surprising $34.5 billion bid to acquire Google Chrome, significantly exceeding its own $18 billion valuation. This unsolicited offer comes months after Perplexity stated its intention to buy Chrome should the government force Google to divest. The move mirrors Perplexity's earlier attempt to acquire TikTok. While Perplexity claims full funding from investment firms and pledges over $3 billion in Chrome and Chromium development over two years, Google hasn't responded, and no court order mandates a sale.

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(www.theverge.com)
Tech

arXivLabs: Community-Driven Experiments on arXiv

2025-08-13
arXivLabs: Community-Driven Experiments on arXiv

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

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(arxiv.org)
Development

Alibaba's Qwen2.5-Max Challenges US Tech Giants, Reshaping Enterprise AI

2025-01-29
Alibaba's Qwen2.5-Max Challenges US Tech Giants, Reshaping Enterprise AI

Alibaba Cloud unveiled its Qwen2.5-Max model, marking China's second major AI breakthrough in less than a week, further rattling US tech markets and intensifying concerns about America's waning AI leadership. The model outperforms DeepSeek's R1 model and demonstrates competitive results against industry leaders like GPT-4o and Claude-3.5-Sonnet in benchmarks including Arena-Hard, LiveBench, and LiveCodeBench. Qwen2.5-Max's mixture-of-experts architecture allows for significant computational efficiency, having been trained on over 20 trillion tokens while using far fewer resources than traditional approaches. This efficiency could reshape enterprise AI strategies, potentially reducing infrastructure costs by 40-60%. However, considerations around data sovereignty, API reliability, and long-term support remain crucial for enterprise adoption.

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(venturebeat.com)
AI Enterprise AI

Code Formatting Solved in the 80s? The Case of DIANA and the Rational R1000

2025-09-08
Code Formatting Solved in the 80s? The Case of DIANA and the Rational R1000

In the 1980s, developers working on the Ada compiler used a Descriptive Intermediate Attributed Notation for Ada (DIANA) intermediate representation (IR) instead of plain text source code, effectively solving the code formatting problem. The compiler and IDE directly manipulated the DIANA tree, allowing users to customize the code display format without worrying about spaces or tabs. This enabled incremental compilation, refactoring, and fast integration. The author uses this example to reflect on how code formatting remains a problem for programmers today, encouraging exploration of more advanced solutions.

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(maxleiter.com)
Development

Finding Meaning in a Classic Mac: A Personal Tech History

2025-07-08
Finding Meaning in a Classic Mac: A Personal Tech History

The author's father loves classic cars, seeing them as symbols of a bygone technological era. The author, mirroring this, bought a 1989 Macintosh SE/30, not out of nostalgia for the machine itself, but to explore a period of computing he missed. This Mac serves as both a tribute to a past era and a symbol of the progress that has since been made, much like his father's beloved classic cars. The author plans to restore and occasionally use the computer, much as his father takes occasional drives in his classic automobiles.

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(blog.decryption.net.au)
Tech classic computer

OpenAI's Codex CLI: A Local AI Coding Agent

2025-04-16
OpenAI's Codex CLI: A Local AI Coding Agent

OpenAI launched Codex CLI, a local coding agent running from your terminal. Connecting OpenAI's models (including the new o3 and o4-mini) to local code and tasks, Codex CLI allows AI to write, edit code, and perform actions like moving files. This represents a step towards OpenAI's vision of an 'agentic software engineer'. Open source and lightweight, Codex CLI is supported by a $1 million API grant program for software development projects. While AI coding tools have inherent risks, Codex CLI offers a new approach to AI-assisted programming.

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(techcrunch.com)
Development

Scaling Customer Container Builds with the Depot API

2025-06-30
Scaling Customer Container Builds with the Depot API

Many SaaS platforms need to run code on behalf of their customers, presenting challenges in container building. This post demonstrates building tools with the Depot API to create isolated build environments for a multi-tenant SaaS platform. Using a Go client, you can create projects, manage project caches, retrieve build metrics, and logs. The Depot API leverages Buf.build, offering client libraries for various languages, making integration into existing infrastructure seamless. The article details creating, deleting, and resetting project caches, fetching build metrics and step details, ultimately enabling scalable and secure customer container infrastructure.

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(depot.dev)
Development container builds

Expert: The Elixir Language Server – Installation and Sponsorship

2025-08-29
Expert: The Elixir Language Server – Installation and Sponsorship

Expert is the official language server implementation for the Elixir programming language. Downloads are available for various operating systems. Place the executable in your $PATH. Editor-specific instructions are provided, along with instructions for downloading nightly builds using the GH CLI. Building from source requires Zig 0.14.1. The article concludes with information on corporate and individual sponsorship options. Expert is open-source under the Apache License 2.0.

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(github.com)
Development

Static Linking Nightmares: An SDK Provider's Lament

2025-07-22
Static Linking Nightmares: An SDK Provider's Lament

As an SDK provider, we're expected to offer both dynamic and static linking options. Static archives (.a) seem simple, but are fraught with peril. The linker's default behavior atomizes the archive, picking and choosing object files, potentially leading to bloated binaries and runtime crashes due to constructor/destructor ordering issues. While -Wl,--whole-archive helps, it forces inclusion of all library files, regardless of need. Namespace clashes within static archives also pose significant problems. To overcome these challenges, the author proposes a new "Static Bundle Object" (.sbo) file format. This would offer the symbol visibility guarantees of a shared object, avoiding many linking issues, even if it means sacrificing some potential binary size optimization. The author argues that a stable linking ecosystem is worth the trade-off.

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(medium.com)
Development

The Essence of Successful Abstractions: Isolating Complexity

2025-01-22
The Essence of Successful Abstractions: Isolating Complexity

In software development, complexity is unavoidable, but it can be contained. Chris Krycho argues that the key to successful abstractions lies in confining complexity to well-defined areas. He uses examples like Rust's borrow checker, which isolates the complexity of memory safety within its type system, and TypeScript, which illuminates and manages existing complexity through types. This mirrors the philosophy of microservices, where individual services remain simple while overall complexity is managed. The author posits that successful abstraction isn't about eliminating complexity, but effectively isolating and controlling it, thus improving development efficiency and code quality.

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(v5.chriskrycho.com)
Development Complexity Management

China's RoboTaxi Boom: Strict Regulations, Rapid Development

2025-04-15
China's RoboTaxi Boom: Strict Regulations, Rapid Development

China's robotaxi industry is booming, but under a strict regulatory regime. Unlike the US focus on Waymo, China boasts four major players: Baidu, Pony.AI, WeRide, and AutoX. A Ride AI conference highlighted the differences in regulation and user experience. Chinese authorities impose multi-stage approvals, from safety driver testing to eventual driverless operation. This contrasts sharply with the more relaxed US approach. Youtuber Sophia Tung's experiences riding various robotaxis revealed Baidu's 6th generation vehicle as the best, nearing Waymo's quality, while others lagged. While individual experiences offer limited insight, China's robotaxi progress is undeniable.

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(www.forbes.com)
Tech
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