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Updated: Introduction to Programming Languages Textbook

2025-09-24

Professors Jaemin Hong and Sukyoung Ryu from KAIST have released an updated version of their textbook, "Introduction to Programming Languages." This introductory book covers fundamental programming language concepts, including syntax, semantics, type systems, and interpreter/type-checker implementations. The authors encourage its use by anyone learning or teaching these concepts and acknowledge the contributions of students and teaching assistants. The latest edition features typo corrections and reduced page margins.

(hjaem.info)

Development

Cerabyte Secures Western Digital Investment for 5000-Year Data Storage

2025-05-12

Cerabyte Secures Western Digital Investment for 5000-Year Data Storage

German data storage startup Cerabyte announced it has received strategic investment from Western Digital, accelerating development of its groundbreaking ceramic-based data storage technology. Boasting a 5000-year lifespan and potentially yottabyte-scale capacity, Cerabyte's technology has undergone extreme testing, proving resilient to heat, water, radiation, and more. Aiming for sub-$1/TB storage by 2030, this partnership promises to bring commercially viable, ultra-long-term data storage solutions to market.

(www.tomshardware.com)

Tech ceramic storage

LLMs: Manipulating Symbols or Understanding the World?

2025-06-04

LLMs: Manipulating Symbols or Understanding the World?

This article challenges the prevailing assumption that Large Language Models (LLMs) understand the world. While LLMs excel at language tasks, the author argues this stems from their ability to learn heuristics for predicting the next token, rather than building a genuine world model. True AGI, the author contends, requires a deep understanding of the physical world, a capability currently lacking in LLMs. The article criticizes the multimodal approach to AGI, advocating instead for embodied cognition and interaction with the environment as primary components of future research.

(thegradient.pub)

AI Embodied Cognition

CSS Zoom vs. Scale: Understanding the Difference

2025-02-21

CSS Zoom vs. Scale: Understanding the Difference

This article explores the key difference between the `zoom` and `scale` properties in CSS. While both can scale elements, `zoom` recalculates the page layout, unlike `scale`. This means using `zoom` affects the layout of other elements, whereas `scale` only changes the element's size. A CodePen example demonstrates the difference, encouraging further exploration.

(css-tip.com)

Development

arXivLabs: Experimenting with Community Collaboration

2025-04-20

arXivLabs is a framework for 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 only partners with those who uphold these values. Got an idea to enhance the arXiv community? Learn more about arXivLabs.

(arxiv.org)

Development

container: Lightweight Container Tool for Apple Silicon Macs

2025-06-09

container: Lightweight Container Tool for Apple Silicon Macs

container is a Swift-based tool for creating and running Linux containers on macOS as lightweight virtual machines. It's OCI-compliant, allowing you to pull and run images from any standard container registry and push built images. It leverages new features in macOS 26 Beta 1 and has networking limitations on macOS 15; upgrading is recommended. Download the installer from the GitHub releases page and use uninstall-container.sh for removal. User data can be preserved during uninstallation.

(github.com)

Development

From Random Streaks to Recognizable Digits: Building an Autoregressive Image Generation Model

2025-06-08

From Random Streaks to Recognizable Digits: Building an Autoregressive Image Generation Model

This article details building a basic autoregressive image generation model using a Multilayer Perceptron (MLP) to generate images of handwritten digits. The author explains the core concept of predicting the next pixel based on its predecessors. Three models are progressively built: Model V1 uses one-hot encoding and ignores spatial information; Model V2 introduces positional encodings, improving image structure; Model V3 uses learned token embeddings and positional encodings, achieving conditional generation, generating images based on a given digit class. While the generated images fall short of state-of-the-art models, the tutorial clearly demonstrates core autoregressive concepts and the building process, providing valuable insights into generative AI.

(tunahansalih.github.io)

AI

Microsoft Aims to End USB-C Chaos: Windows 11 Update Promises Consistent Functionality

2025-06-02

Microsoft Aims to End USB-C Chaos: Windows 11 Update Promises Consistent Functionality

Microsoft is tackling USB-C port inconsistencies with an updated Windows 11 Hardware Compatibility Program (WHCP). The initiative ensures all USB-C ports will consistently support data, charging, and display functions. Additionally, USB 4 40Gbps ports will fully support both USB4 and Thunderbolt 3 peripherals. Microsoft states that certified Windows 11 laptops and tablets with Windows 11 24H2 already adhere to these rules. This should eliminate user frustration and ensure consistent functionality across all USB-C ports.

(www.tomshardware.com)

Tech

Supreme Court Weighs Fate of $8 Billion Telecom Subsidy

2025-03-26

Supreme Court Weighs Fate of $8 Billion Telecom Subsidy

The Supreme Court is hearing a case that could determine the fate of an $8 billion annual subsidy for phone and internet services in schools, libraries, and rural areas. The Universal Service Fund, which is funded by a tax on phone bills, is challenged on constitutional grounds. While both liberal and conservative justices expressed concern over the potential consequences of eliminating the fund, some justices questioned the level of authority delegated to the FCC and its reliance on a private administrator. A decision is expected by late June, with significant implications for tens of millions of Americans.

(apnews.com)

Tech Supreme Court Subsidy Telecommunications

I Built the PS1 Backwards Compatibility Emulator for the PS2

2025-02-08

I Built the PS1 Backwards Compatibility Emulator for the PS2

A Sony Computer Entertainment engineer recounts his experience developing the PlayStation 2's PS1 backward compatibility. Initially tasked with emulating the PS1's sound hardware, his work became obsolete when the chip was integrated into the PS2. Unexpectedly, he was then assigned to emulate the PS1's graphics processor, a significant challenge. He successfully completed the task, enabling most PS1 games to run on the PS2 and contributing significantly to its launch success. This became the most important and proudest achievement of his career.

(freelansations.medium.com)

Game

Loki's Structured Metadata: A Logistical Nightmare

2025-03-19

Grafana Loki, often touted as 'Prometheus for logs,' initially adopted a data model similar to Prometheus. However, this proved disastrous for system logs (syslog or systemd journal). Unlike Prometheus, Loki stores each label value set separately and lacks log compaction, leading to cardinality explosions. To address this, Loki introduced 'structured metadata,' but as of version 3.0.0, it remains underdeveloped. Structured metadata labels aren't treated as regular Loki labels, requiring different query syntax. Migration from existing labels is complex and potentially catastrophic, with the risk of unintentionally creating high-cardinality labels. Upgrading requires caution, migrating existing data is incredibly expensive, and careful consideration is crucial before using it in new projects.

(utcc.utoronto.ca)

Development system logs

NIST-F4: A Clock More Accurate Than the Age of Dinosaurs

2025-04-30

NIST-F4: A Clock More Accurate Than the Age of Dinosaurs

NIST's new cesium fountain clock, NIST-F4, is one of the world's most accurate timekeepers. If it had been running since the dinosaurs roamed the Earth, it would be off by less than a second today. This breakthrough in atomic clock technology will help calibrate official US time and contribute to the global Coordinated Universal Time (UTC), ensuring accuracy in critical systems like finance, telecommunications, and transportation. The achievement solidifies NIST's leading role in precision timekeeping.

(www.nist.gov)

Tech time measurement

Google Kills Off Android Instant Apps

2025-06-13

Google Kills Off Android Instant Apps

Google is sunsetting its Android Instant Apps feature in December 2025. This feature allowed users to try parts of an app without a full installation from the Play Store. Low developer adoption is the likely culprit, as creating the smaller, instant-enabled app versions required significant effort. While designed to improve user experience by offering faster app access and reduced storage needs, the high development overhead proved unsustainable.

(www.androidauthority.com)

Development Instant Apps

The Pragmatist's Guide to Functional Programming: Macro over Micro

2025-04-14

This essay argues against a purely micro-level application of functional programming principles in imperative languages. While acknowledging the benefits of functional programming, the author contends that obsessively replacing for loops with maps and reduces without addressing higher-level architectural concerns often yields minimal gains or even negative results. The true value lies in adopting macro-level principles like managing mutation, simplifying architecture, and strengthening type systems. The author advocates for a pragmatic approach, prioritizing architectural design and code quality over strict adherence to functional micro-styles, suggesting a portfolio of 80/20 solutions often surpasses a single 100/100 approach.

(jerf.org)

Development

Linguistics: Debunking the Myth of Inuit Snow Words

2025-05-20

Linguistics: Debunking the Myth of Inuit Snow Words

The long-standing claim that Inuit languages have numerous words for snow has been a subject of debate. A new study uses computational linguistics to not only confirm the richness of Inuit vocabulary for snow but also reveals similar patterns in other languages, such as Samoan for lava and Scots Gaelic for oatmeal. Researchers analyzed bilingual dictionaries of over 600 languages, finding that lexical preferences reflect a culture's prioritization of certain concepts. However, the study also highlights the limitations of dictionary data, suggesting future research should incorporate real-world language use for a more comprehensive understanding of the relationship between language and culture.

(www.scientificamerican.com)

Tech vocabulary

Critical O2 UK VoLTE Flaw Leaks User Location

2025-05-17

A security researcher discovered a critical vulnerability in O2 UK's VoLTE implementation. IMS signaling messages reveal users' IMSI, IMEI, and cell ID, allowing trivial geolocation. Despite contacting O2, no response or fix has been implemented. This affects all O2 VoLTE users and persists even with VoLTE disabled, as the last connected cell is still revealed.

(mastdatabase.co.uk)

Tech

Meta's AI Gamble: Reshaping Global GDP?

2025-05-05

Meta's AI Gamble: Reshaping Global GDP?

Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg envisions AI as the key to boosting Meta's core advertising business and significantly increasing advertising's share of global GDP. Meta's massive AI investment isn't just about better ad targeting; it encompasses business messaging, Meta AI, AI devices, and enhanced user experiences. This ambitious strategy positions Meta to challenge Google Search, Apple's iPhone, and ChatGPT. While some investors remain skeptical about the ROI, early results are promising, with a new Reels ad model boosting conversion rates by 5% and nearly a third of advertisers using AI creative tools.

(finance.yahoo.com)

Tech

My Tiny Server vs. the AI Data Scraping Horde

2025-05-31

The author's personal website was hit with a massive data scraping attack, primarily from large tech companies like Amazon, Facebook, and OpenAI. Initially, resource consumption spiked, overwhelming the server. Using monitoring tools Zabbix and Loki, the author identified the problem and, by analyzing Nginx logs, pinpointed numerous malicious IPs and user agents. Ultimately, the author implemented a blacklist of user agents and IP address bans using Nginx configuration and Fail2Ban, effectively stopping the attack and restoring the website's functionality.

(lambdacreate.com)

Development server security

Truss to Launch 'Uncensorable' Social Media Platform This Summer

2025-04-18

Truss to Launch 'Uncensorable' Social Media Platform This Summer

Former UK Prime Minister Liz Truss plans to launch an "uncensorable" social media platform this summer, aiming to combat what she calls the "deep state." Announced at CPAC in Washington, where she declared Britain to be in a "Dark Age," the platform promises uncancellable free speech, a counter to what Truss describes as "the West's war against itself." While details remain scarce, Truss confirmed a summer launch, promising further updates soon.

(www.thetimes.com)

Tech Liz Truss

RPG in a Box: Game Creation Made Easy

2025-05-14

RPG in a Box empowers users to create games and interactive experiences without any programming or modeling skills. This intuitive tool features a voxel editor, map editor, visual scripting, dialogue system, camera controls, UI customization, item system, and sound effect generator. Export your creations to standalone Windows and macOS games, making it easy to share your work with others.

(rpginabox.com)

Game

iPhone Air Teardown Reveals Clever Design to Avoid 'Bendgate'

2025-09-23

iPhone Air Teardown Reveals Clever Design to Avoid 'Bendgate'

iFixit's teardown of the new iPhone Air reveals a unique design. Key components, including the logic board, are clustered at the top, while a large battery occupies most of the phone's body. Interestingly, this battery is identical to the one in Apple's MagSafe battery pack, and they're interchangeable. This design mitigates the 'Bendgate' issue seen in previous thin iPhones by placing the less resilient logic board away from stress points and utilizing a more robust battery.

(arstechnica.com)

Hardware iFixit teardown battery design

NYC Secret Service Busts Massive SIM Farm: The Weird Hardware Inside

2025-09-24

NYC Secret Service Busts Massive SIM Farm: The Weird Hardware Inside

The Secret Service's recent takedown of a massive SIM farm in NYC has revealed bizarre hardware. These devices, called SIM banks or gateways, hold hundreds of SIM cards, enabling mass texting and calling. While some legitimate uses exist (network testing, marketing), they're predominantly used for spam, scams, and harassment. The devices, costing thousands of dollars each, highlight the scale of such operations and the challenges in combating them. The discovery near a UN meeting underscores the potential threat to telecom systems.

(tedium.co)

Tech SIM farm Secret Service

NAB Pushes for ATSC 1.0 Sunset, Full Next Gen TV Rollout

2025-03-15

The National Association of Broadcasters (NAB) petitioned the FCC for a clear nationwide transition plan to fully deploy Next Gen TV (ATSC 3.0). The proposed two-phased plan includes modernizing regulations to boost consumer access and innovation. NAB highlights Next Gen TV's superior picture quality, immersive audio, and interactive features, but argues outdated regulations hinder progress. The plan calls for top 55 markets (70% of US population) to transition by February 2028, with remaining stations following by February 2030. This enables enhanced picture/sound, interactive apps, hyper-local programming, and new datacasting capabilities.

(www.broadbandtvnews.com)

Tech Broadcasting

Washington State Law Sparks Church-State Showdown Over Confession Confidentiality

2025-05-09

Washington State Law Sparks Church-State Showdown Over Confession Confidentiality

A new Washington state law requiring clergy to report child abuse confessions to authorities has ignited a clash between the Catholic Church and the state government. The Church argues the law violates religious freedom and doctrine, infringes on the sanctity of confession, and threatens excommunication for priests who comply. Supporters contend it's a crucial step to protect minors. The Department of Justice is investigating whether the law infringes on First Amendment religious protections. This conflict highlights the tension between religious freedom and the state's duty to protect children, and its outcome could impact similar laws nationwide.

(www.newsweek.com)

Misc religious freedom legal conflict

Alien Languages: Stranger Than We Imagine

2025-05-12

Alien Languages: Stranger Than We Imagine

Fictional alien languages, like the Heptapod language in Arrival, while bizarre, share surprisingly similar underlying structures to human languages. This prompts philosophical reflection on the "space of possible languages": true alien languages might be far stranger than we've imagined, constructed in ways radically different from human tongues. The article explores four levels of language: signs, structure, semantics, and pragmatics, analyzing how alien languages might differ in each. This includes using non-human sensory modalities (smells, electrical impulses), possessing unique grammatical structures, and even lacking the concept of 'meaning' as we understand it. Preparing for truly alien languages requires abandoning anthropocentrism and actively exploring the possibilities of language. This is not only crucial for potential extraterrestrial contact but also for a deeper understanding of our own language and cognitive abilities.

(aeon.co)

AI alien language philosophy of language

Chatbots as Internet Gatekeepers: A Recipe for Disaster

2025-05-29

Putting an untrusted AI chatbot between you and the internet is a disaster waiting to happen. The author uses the Browser Company's Dia browser as an example, highlighting the risks: AI could recommend affiliated products, paid promotions, or even be manipulated with customized content. This mirrors how companies like Google, Amazon, and Microsoft prioritize their own products, behavior that, while not illegal, creates information bias and manipulation. Even more concerning is the potential for ideological manipulation, which AI will make more efficient and harder to detect. Relying on a chatbot is like relying on a butler for all your news and communication; convenient initially, but ultimately leading to manipulation or worse.

(macwright.com)

AI chatbots

TU Delft's Autonomous Drone Beats Human Champions in Historic Race

2025-06-04

TU Delft's Autonomous Drone Beats Human Champions in Historic Race

A team from TU Delft won the A2RL Drone Championship in Abu Dhabi, a race pushing the limits of physical AI. Their drone, using a single camera and innovative deep neural network training, outperformed 13 autonomous drones and even human champions. This achievement, unlike previous AI victories in virtual settings, happened in a real-world, high-stakes competition. The efficient and robust AI developed has broad applications in robotics, from self-driving cars to search and rescue operations.

(www.tudelft.nl)

Tech Drone Racing

Don't Sell Space on Your Home Server!

2025-04-13

Don't Sell Space on Your Home Server!

A tech worker from a medium-sized hosting company details the perils of turning your home server into a makeshift cloud service. The article highlights the need for additional hardware, faster internet, public IPs, a secure location, legal protection, and robust billing systems. It also stresses the challenges of handling customer support, data backups, security vulnerabilities, and compliance with regulations like GDPR and CCPA, along with mitigating risks like DDoS attacks and data breaches. Instead of risking legal and financial repercussions, the author suggests using excess computing power for personal needs, sharing with friends, or donating cycles to research projects.

(grumpy.systems)

Development home server risks

JWST Shatters Records Again: Oldest Galaxy Ever Discovered

2025-06-04

JWST Shatters Records Again: Oldest Galaxy Ever Discovered

The James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) has once again broken its own record, detecting the galaxy MoM z14, a cosmic marvel existing a mere 280 million years after the Big Bang—13.52 billion years ago. This discovery surpasses expectations, as scientists didn't anticipate JWST finding such ancient galaxies at this stage of its mission. MoM z14 boasts a redshift of z=14.44, exceeding the previous record holder, JADES-GS-z14-0 (z=14.32). Researchers determined MoM z14 is about 50 times smaller than the Milky Way and detected emission lines indicating the presence of nitrogen and carbon, suggesting a young galaxy with a rapidly increasing star formation rate. This discovery hints at the possibility of even older galaxies in the early universe waiting to be found.

(www.space.com)

Tech

Nextcloud Accuses Google of Deliberately Crippling its Android Files App

2025-05-13

Nextcloud Accuses Google of Deliberately Crippling its Android Files App

European software vendor Nextcloud has accused Google of deliberately crippling its Android Files application, which boasts over 800,000 users. The issue centers around the 'All files access' permission, necessary for the app's file synchronization functionality. While Google offers privacy-focused alternatives, Nextcloud argues these are insufficient. Google revoked this permission in 2024, effectively breaking the app on the Play Store. Nextcloud believes this is part of a larger pattern of anti-competitive behavior by Big Tech, citing slow-moving regulatory processes and the lack of recourse for smaller companies. The app remains functional on F-Droid.

(www.theregister.com)

Development Anti-competitive

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