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Why Apprenticeships Trump Classrooms

2025-08-14

Why Apprenticeships Trump Classrooms

This article argues that apprenticeships are superior to classroom learning. Apprenticeships emphasize hands-on learning through 'learning by doing' and 'learning by watching,' overcoming the disconnect between theory and practice common in classrooms. The author highlights that humans primarily learn through observation and practice, while classrooms focus on abstract theories, hindering knowledge transfer. Many theories are also inherently flawed, making practical experience more reliable. The article suggests learners should start with specific goals, build theory on practice, and immerse themselves in expert practice ecosystems to improve learning efficiency.

(www.scotthyoung.com)

Misc apprenticeships knowledge transfer

Google Mocks Apple's Year-Long Siri AI Upgrade Delay

2025-08-05

Google Mocks Apple's Year-Long Siri AI Upgrade Delay

Apple promised a major AI-powered Siri upgrade for iPhone 16 users via Apple Intelligence last year, but a year later, the upgrade is still missing, prompting Apple to pull related ads. Seizing the opportunity, Google's latest Pixel 10 ad subtly mocks Apple's delayed “soon-to-arrive” AI features, suggesting users switch phones. The ad, released on YouTube and X, teases the Pixel 10 launch on August 20th. Reports indicate Apple's delay stems from issues with Siri's hybrid architecture. Apple's software chief, Craig Federighi, confirmed they're working on a significantly improved Siri.

(www.theverge.com)

Tech Apple vs Google

Sirius: A GPU-Native SQL Engine 10x Faster

2025-06-29

Sirius: A GPU-Native SQL Engine 10x Faster

Sirius is a GPU-native SQL engine that seamlessly integrates with existing databases like DuckDB via the Substrait standard, requiring no query rewrites or major system changes. In TPC-H benchmarks at SF=100, Sirius achieves approximately a 10x speedup over existing CPU query engines at the same hardware cost, making it ideal for interactive analytics, financial workloads, and ETL jobs. Currently supporting DuckDB and soon Doris, with more systems planned. Installation options include AWS images, Docker images, and manual installation. While under active development, Sirius demonstrates impressive performance, ushering in a new GPU era for data analytics.

(github.com)

Tech GPU database SQL engine performance boost

Hackers Hide Malware in DNS Records

2025-07-22

Hackers Hide Malware in DNS Records

Hackers are hiding malware in domain name system (DNS) records, a location largely untouched by most security defenses. This allows malicious scripts to fetch binary files without triggering antivirus software, as DNS traffic is often overlooked. Researchers from DomainTools discovered this technique being used to host a malicious binary for Joke Screenmate malware. The binary was converted to hexadecimal, split into chunks, and hidden within TXT records of subdomains. An attacker can retrieve these chunks via seemingly innocuous DNS requests, reassemble them, and convert back to a binary. This method becomes increasingly harder to detect as encrypted DNS lookups like DOH and DOT gain wider adoption.

(arstechnica.com)

Tech

Solved: The Sum-Free Sets Conjecture

2025-05-25

Solved: The Sum-Free Sets Conjecture

A seemingly simple mathematical problem—the sum-free sets conjecture—has baffled mathematicians for decades. The conjecture explores whether, within any set of integers, there exists a large subset where the sum of any two numbers in the subset is not also in the subset. In 1965, the renowned mathematician Paul Erdős posed the question, providing a lower bound. Despite many attempts to improve upon it, progress remained stagnant until February of this year, when Oxford graduate student Benjamin Bedert finally solved the problem, demonstrating that any set of integers contains a large sum-free subset, significantly larger than previously estimated. Bedert's proof cleverly combines techniques from diverse mathematical fields, offering new approaches to similar problems. This achievement is hailed as a major breakthrough in mathematics.

(www.quantamagazine.org)

Misc sum-free sets

AMD Unveils Next-Gen Handheld Gaming CPUs at CES 2025

2025-01-07

AMD Unveils Next-Gen Handheld Gaming CPUs at CES 2025

At CES 2025, AMD revealed its next-generation handheld gaming PC chipset: the AMD Zen 2 Extreme, along with the lower-specced Z2 and Z2 Go. The Zen 2 Extreme boasts an RDNA 3.5 GPU, while the Z2 and Z2 Go utilize RDNA 3 and RDNA 2 respectively. This family of APUs aims to lower handheld prices while boosting battery life and performance, targeting devices like the Lenovo Legion Go. AMD also launched its Zen 5-based "Fire Range" HX3D processors for gaming laptops, featuring 3D V-cache technology for enhanced performance and lower temperatures.

(www.ign.com)

Hardware Handheld Gaming

AI Music Generation: Convenience vs. Creativity

2025-01-31

AI Music Generation: Convenience vs. Creativity

The success of AI music company Suno sparks a reflection on the role of AI in artistic creation. The author, a Stanford professor, questions Suno's claim that AI can easily solve the tedious parts of music creation, arguing that the challenges and difficulties inherent in the creative process constitute the meaning and value of art. Using his own experiences and teaching practices as examples, he illustrates the importance of the creative process and calls for the preservation of human active creation in the age of AI, avoiding a purely consumerist culture.

(hai.stanford.edu)

AI music creation

Bio-Based Plastic Production: A Breakthrough Using Engineered E. coli

2025-03-19

Bio-Based Plastic Production: A Breakthrough Using Engineered E. coli

Researchers genetically engineered E. coli to produce biodegradable polymers. The process allows for control over the ratio of amino acids and other chemicals in the polymer and boosts yield through enzyme addition. While not perfect—impurities and lower production rates remain—the work highlights the potential of bio-based manufacturing for sustainable plastic alternatives.

(arstechnica.com)

Tech biomanufacturing biodegradable plastics

Chernobyl Radiation Crashed a Soviet Rail System

2025-08-20

In the 1980s, programmer Sergei encountered mysterious crashes on an SM-1800 microcomputer at a Soviet rail station. The system, used for routing trains, would randomly fail at night. Investigation revealed the crashes only occurred when processing livestock from northern Ukraine and western Russia. Suspecting Chernobyl radiation, Sergei confirmed his theory: high radiation levels flipped bits in the SM-1800's memory. The Soviet government mixed contaminated and uncontaminated meat to avoid waste. Upon discovering this, Sergei immediately filed immigration papers. The computer crashes resolved themselves as radiation levels dropped.

(beza1e1.tuxen.de)

Tech

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.

(www.forbes.com)

Tech

The Heartbreaking Story Behind the 1948 '4 Children for Sale' Photo

2025-05-06

The Heartbreaking Story Behind the 1948 '4 Children for Sale' Photo

A shocking 1948 photograph of a Chicago couple selling their four children sent shockwaves across America. The story behind the image is far more tragic than the picture itself. The unemployed father abandoned the family, leaving the mother unable to cope, resulting in the children being sold separately and experiencing drastically different fates. The youngest child was adopted by a strict but kind couple, leading a relatively stable life; while two others were treated as slaves by their buyers, enduring abuse and hardship. Years later, surviving siblings reunited, recounting their harrowing past and expressing deep resentment towards their mother. This story exposes the desperation and helplessness of lower-class families in 20th-century America, reflecting the shortcomings of child protection at the time.

(allthatsinteresting.com)

Misc social news child abuse family tragedy

Blood Droplet Drying on Inclined Surfaces Reveals Novel Cracking Patterns

2025-05-01

Blood Droplet Drying on Inclined Surfaces Reveals Novel Cracking Patterns

A new study unveils asymmetric deposits and cracking patterns formed during the drying of blood droplets on inclined surfaces. Gravity's influence on red blood cell distribution leads to thicker deposits and coarser cracks on the downhill side, contrasting with the uphill side. This research is significant for forensic bloodstain pattern analysis, as surface tilt and droplet size significantly alter the resulting patterns, potentially leading to misinterpretations if ignored.

(phys.org)

Tech blood drying cracking patterns

1930s US Public Health Posters: From Milk to Syphilis

2025-01-07

1930s US Public Health Posters: From Milk to Syphilis

This article explores the fascinating world of 1930s American public health posters. Funded by the government, these posters promoted public health awareness and reflected the social landscape of the time. From promoting everyday health practices like drinking milk and brushing teeth to serious warnings about syphilis and cancer, including treatment options, the posters covered a wide range of topics. They served not only as public health tools but also as unique artistic expressions of their era, pioneering modern graphic design.

(worldhistory.substack.com)

Design Public Health Poster Design

Speed as Magic: How Fast Software Changes Our Lives

2025-07-31

This article explores the significance of speed in software. Fast software not only improves development efficiency—think code deployment in seconds, AI-powered code completion, and real-time streaming—but also transforms user behavior and delivers a smoother experience, reducing cognitive friction. Examples like Raycast, Superhuman, and Mercury illustrate the 'magic' of speed. The author argues that speed implies simplicity and focus, requiring complex background processes to present a clean interface. While current AI applications prioritize capabilities over performance, future optimization will be key, unlocking new applications and possibilities, ultimately changing how we live.

(www.catherinejue.com)

Development

Echidna's Enhanced Symbolic Execution: A New Era in Smart Contract Security Testing

2025-08-23

The Echidna team has integrated enhanced symbolic execution into its fuzzing tool, significantly boosting smart contract security testing capabilities. The new functionality includes two modes: verification mode, used to prove the correctness of stateless tests; and exploration mode, which combines fuzzing to identify assertion failures in scenarios involving state changes. This functionality requires no additional code and provides stronger security guarantees on top of existing fuzzing, already showing promise in real-world testing. Challenges remain, such as handling loops and dynamic data structures, but the potential is significant.

(gustavo-grieco.github.io)

Development smart contract security

HackerOne Cracks Down on AI-Generated Bug Reports

2025-05-06

HackerOne Cracks Down on AI-Generated Bug Reports

Bug bounty platform HackerOne is cracking down on the influx of low-quality, AI-generated security reports. The platform's leadership states that these reports are effectively a DDoS attack, wasting valuable time and resources, with no demonstrably valid AI-assisted reports yet submitted. Going forward, all reporters will be required to disclose AI usage, with stricter vetting for AI-assisted submissions.

(www.linkedin.com)

Tech

A Programmer's Intro to Integer Partitions and Compositions

2025-05-18

A Programmer's Intro to Integer Partitions and Compositions

LeetArxiv's new series, "What Every Programmer Needs to Know about Enumerative Combinatorics," starts with Chapter 1: an introduction to integer partitions and compositions. This article uses an accessible approach, guiding programmers through these concepts via observation and pattern recognition. C code is provided to generate weak compositions, efficiently enumerating them using binomial coefficients and binary search.

(leetarxiv.substack.com)

Development

Next.js's Openness Challenges and Netlify's Response

2025-03-27

Next.js's Openness Challenges and Netlify's Response

Netlify delves into the challenges posed by Next.js, including the lack of adapter support hindering other platforms from providing the same experience as Vercel, insufficient documentation for serverless deployments, and numerous undocumented behaviors. These issues force platforms like Netlify to invest heavily in reverse engineering and testing to offer complete functionality. The article advocates for increased openness in Next.js and details Netlify's strategies, such as proactive automated testing and participation in initiatives like OpenNext, to address these challenges.

(www.netlify.com)

Development Openness

Open-Source Morpho: Revolutionizing Soft Material Shape Optimization

2025-03-13

Open-Source Morpho: Revolutionizing Soft Material Shape Optimization

Researchers at Tufts University have developed Morpho, an open-source software designed to tackle shape optimization problems for soft materials. Unlike traditional software that excels with rigid materials, Morpho simulates the response of soft materials like biological tissues, engineered tissues, and shape-shifting fluids under force. This is crucial for applications such as designing artificial hearts, heart valves, and robotic materials mimicking human soft tissue. Morpho's ease of use and broad applicability are revolutionizing the field of soft material design.

(now.tufts.edu)

Development soft materials shape optimization

Millions of Users' Privacy Exposed by Secret Browser Extension

2025-07-10

Millions of Users' Privacy Exposed by Secret Browser Extension

A security researcher uncovered multiple browser extensions (Chrome, Edge, and Firefox) secretly collecting users' web activity data and sending it to a third party, MellowTel. These extensions access unknown websites, posing a significant threat to user privacy. The collected data included sensitive information like medical records, financial documents, and trade secrets. While some extensions have been taken down, many remain active. This incident echoes the 2019 Nacho Analytics case, highlighting the security risks of browser extensions.

(arstechnica.com)

Tech

Lightweight Durable Execution: The DBOS Transact Open-Source Library

2025-02-03

Lightweight Durable Execution: The DBOS Transact Open-Source Library

Traditional durable execution relies on external orchestrators like AWS Step Functions, adding complexity to development and deployment. DBOS Transact is a lightweight open-source library that integrates durable execution into the program itself, eliminating the need for external orchestrators. It achieves durable execution by persisting the program's execution state in a Postgres database, allowing automatic recovery to the point of interruption even if the program crashes or restarts. DBOS Transact also provides additional features such as durable sleep, durable messaging, and durable queues, further simplifying the development of reliable, stateful programs.

(www.dbos.dev)

Development

The Deck: Offline Multiplayer Card Games Aggregator

2025-02-08

The Deck: Offline Multiplayer Card Games Aggregator

The Deck is an offline multiplayer card game aggregator written in Dart and Flutter, solving the problem of missing cards during game nights. It designates one device as the 'table,' allowing all players to see the cards in real-time for an immersive experience. The open-source project welcomes contributions and provides detailed instructions for building and releasing on iOS and Android, along with troubleshooting common issues.

(github.com)

Game Card Games Multiplayer

Radio Connects: ARRL Field Day

2025-06-29

Radio Connects: ARRL Field Day

Over 31,000 amateur radio operators (“hams”) across the US and Canada participate in ARRL Field Day each year on the fourth weekend in June. This event combines a picnic, campout, emergency preparedness practice, and informal contest, showcasing amateur radio's role in connecting people, emergency communication, and STEM education. Participants set up radio equipment in remote locations, making contacts with other stations and demonstrating the value of ham radio to the public. It's also a great opportunity for hams to make friends, learn new skills, and give back to their communities.

(www.arrl.org)

Tech ARRL Field Day emergency communication

Google's Honest (and Uncommon) Take on Pixel's Water Resistance

2025-08-22

Google's Honest (and Uncommon) Take on Pixel's Water Resistance

Google's advertising materials surprisingly admit that no phone is truly waterproof or dustproof. While Pixel phones may boast an IP68 rating upon leaving the factory, this protection degrades over time due to wear, damage, or drops; liquid damage voids the warranty. This unusual transparency highlights the often-blurred line between marketing and reality in the mobile industry.

(www.theverge.com)

Tech phone waterproofing Google Pixel marketing transparency

AI Surveillance: Pandora's Box for Democracy?

2025-09-21

AI Surveillance: Pandora's Box for Democracy?

The State Department's new "Catch and Revoke" social media surveillance program, using AI to review tens of thousands of student visa applicants' social media footprints for signs of terrorism, highlights the intertwined dangers of AI, surveillance, and threats to democracy. The article argues that while AI offers the promise of predicting and controlling behavior, it accelerates existing trends, blurring lines between public and private data, and enabling the use of personal information for decision-making. While AI can be beneficial, the lack of restrictive controls poses a significant risk to democracy. Data trading and surveillance capitalism exacerbate these dangers, pushing private information into the public sphere and weaponizing it. The author emphasizes that AI's accuracy doesn't mean understanding individuals; rather, it categorizes them, erasing uniqueness and threatening the originality celebrated in democracy. The piece calls for stringent controls, similar to those governing nuclear energy, to prevent AI misuse and preserve democratic freedoms.

(thebulletin.org)

AI

Implementing State Machines in PostgreSQL for Data Integrity and Advanced Analytics

2025-05-08

This article demonstrates how to implement a finite-state machine (FSM) in PostgreSQL to manage order statuses. By creating an order events table, a state transition function, and a custom aggregate function, the author builds a system that ensures valid order state transitions and prevents invalid operations. Critically, this approach also unlocks advanced analytics capabilities, such as tracking order state history and generating daily order status reports, which is invaluable for applications with large datasets. The author uses an order management system as an example, detailing the implementation steps and showcasing how to leverage the system for data analysis. The resulting system offers both data integrity and powerful analytical tools.

(felixge.de)

Development

Pompey's Theatre: A Monument to Power and the Dawn of Roman Entertainment

2025-03-10

In 55 BC, Pompey the Great inaugurated Rome's first permanent theatre, a lavish spectacle marking the city's burgeoning entertainment culture. The massive structure, seating 15,000, wasn't merely a building; it was a testament to Pompey's military achievements and political prowess. Its grand opening featured gladiatorial combats, elaborate plays (including a lavish production of Clytemnestra, subtly echoing Pompey's own triumphs), and displays of his vast wealth. While seemingly generous, Pompey's theatre served as a powerful tool for political control, a prime example of 'bread and circuses'. Its significance extended beyond Pompey's lifetime, becoming the site of Caesar's assassination in 44 BC.

(www.historytoday.com)

Misc Pompey theatre

Denmark Deploys AI-Powered USVs to Bolster Baltic Sea Security

2025-06-29

Denmark Deploys AI-Powered USVs to Bolster Baltic Sea Security

Amid rising maritime tensions in the Baltic Sea, Denmark has invested $60 million in four AI-powered unmanned surface vehicles (USVs) called 'Voyagers.' These solar and wind-powered vessels, equipped with advanced sensors and AI data analysis, can autonomously operate for months, conducting surveillance, combating illegal fishing, and protecting critical underwater infrastructure. This deployment is part of a larger Danish defense technology investment aimed at enhancing situational awareness in the Baltic and North Seas, responding to incidents like the Nord Stream pipeline sabotage. USV manufacturer Saildrone is establishing its European headquarters in Copenhagen.

(www.euronews.com)

Tech USVs Defense Tech

Supercharge Your Java Projects with Rust: A Practical JNI Integration Guide

2025-05-18

Supercharge Your Java Projects with Rust: A Practical JNI Integration Guide

This article explores integrating Rust code into Java projects to boost performance and efficiency. It details using JNI (Java Native Interface), handling memory management, logging, and asynchronous calls. The open-source project rust-java-demo showcases packaging platform-specific Rust libraries into a single JAR, unifying logs, and mapping Rust errors to Java exceptions. It also explains using CompletableFuture to handle asynchronous Rust function calls, preventing Java thread blocking.

(medium.com)

Development

Knowing Within a Week: A Senior Engineer's Career Reflections

2025-06-12

Knowing Within a Week: A Senior Engineer's Career Reflections

A seasoned engineer shares her years of experience: within the first week of every new job, she intuitively knows whether it's the right fit. This intuition isn't always accurate, but proves remarkably reliable in the long run. She illustrates this with several examples, highlighting the importance of value alignment for managers, who must invest themselves fully, not just their output. Finally, she uses the 'chicken and pig' analogy to differentiate managers from engineers: engineers are 'involved', managers are 'committed'.

(charity.wtf)

Development professional development

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