Eric Hellman's tilde.zone post reveals a long-term project update: using the Mastodon web application requires enabling JavaScript, or alternatively, using a native Mastodon app. This suggests work on improving the web client or user experience for Mastodon.
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This article delves into the transcontinental Rationalist cult, the "Zizians," implicated in at least six murders since 2022. Following the charismatic leader "Ziz," who espouses a radical philosophy and eccentric theories of cognition, the group initially focused on AI safety and alignment. However, their beliefs morphed into violent actions, highlighting the dark side of the Rationalist movement and its potential for extremism. The article explores the cult's origins, the violence they committed, and the broader implications for the Rationalist community, raising questions about self-improvement gone awry.
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Our minds are like cluttered archives, struggling to organize information effectively. Writing acts as scaffolding, helping us build a clear framework for our thoughts. It forces us to untangle the chaos in our heads, piecing together scattered fragments into a coherent whole, revealing hidden biases and blind spots. Through writing, we can expand our mental horizons, expressing ideas more clearly and coherently than in face-to-face communication, offering even greater insight. Writing reveals the gaps in our understanding, helping us to understand ourselves and the world more deeply.
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NASA has developed GUARDIAN, a near real-time ionospheric monitoring software system that leverages Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) data from NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory's (JPL) Global Differential GPS (GDGPS) network to detect natural hazards. By analyzing ionospheric perturbations, GUARDIAN supplements existing early warning systems, particularly for tsunamis. Currently, it's the only system publicly providing multi-GNSS near real-time total electron content (TEC) time series data over the Pacific, significantly contributing to improved tsunami warning accuracy and timeliness.
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Glicol is more than just an image generator; it's a digital artist. Using unique algorithms and models, it transforms text descriptions into images with diverse styles and rich details. It goes beyond common image styles, producing stunning results with subtle user adjustments. Glicol heralds a new era in AI image generation, offering artists and designers unprecedented creative tools.
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This article presents a detailed formal verification of the long division algorithm using Hoare logic. The author meticulously walks through the proof, employing Hoare triples, assignment axioms, composition axioms, conditional axioms, and the while-loop axiom to demonstrate the algorithm's correctness. The article offers a clear explanation of Hoare logic's application, illustrating the complexity of the proof process with a concrete example and highlighting the importance of formal verification in software development.
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This 22-page, full-color zine, "DIY Web Archiving," empowers everyone to participate in preserving online content they value. Created by five authors, it provides a practical guide to web archiving, requiring no special expertise. Based on a November 2024 workshop, the zine explains why web archiving is crucial and how to do it. A full-color PDF and a poster version are available now, with a black-and-white version and printing instructions coming soon.
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TimeRetain is a free, privacy-focused time tracking tool currently in beta, requiring no sign-up. It's simple to use, offering tagging, powerful filtering, practical statistical insights, and easy export to CSV or PDF. Whether you're an employee, business owner, or student, track work hours, client calls, or study sessions with ease. Fine-tune entries with ballpark adjustments, and rest assured your data is stored securely in your browser.
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Wild is a linker designed for speed in iterative development. While incremental linking isn't yet implemented, it's already impressively fast. For production builds, more mature linkers like GNU ld or LLD are recommended. However, for development, Wild significantly speeds up build times, especially on x86-64 Linux systems. It supports statically and dynamically linked executables and shared objects, and has been tested with many popular crates from crates.io. Currently under development are features like incremental linking, support for other architectures, and more linker flags.
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NixOS's build reproducibility has long been a point of contention. While its functional package manager model contributes to build reproducibility, it doesn't guarantee bitwise reproducibility for all builds. A new research paper empirically studies Nixpkgs (NixOS's package collection) over six years, revealing a steadily increasing reproducibility rate—from 69% in 2017 to 91% in April 2023. The study also identifies prevalent causes of non-reproducibility, such as embedded dates, uname outputs, environment variables, and build IDs. These findings demonstrate that while Nixpkgs already achieves high reproducibility rates, there's room for improvement by addressing these low-hanging fruits. This research is crucial for increasing trust in the Nix substitution protocol and driving the development of distributed caching solutions based on build reproducibility.
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After a year of using Astral's uv, a Python project management tool, the author concludes it's a highly effective Pareto solution. uv is independent of Python itself, easy to install and use, and provides a pip and venv interface. It offers a unified way to install and run Python across platforms, resolving compatibility issues. uv boasts a strong dependency resolver, build capabilities, and convenient CLI tools, drastically increasing developer efficiency. While some limitations exist with legacy projects or restricted corporate environments, the author strongly recommends trying uv first due to its simplification of Python project management and development.
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Aptera successfully completed its first solar-powered road trip, driving over 300 miles on a single charge. The journey, undertaken in a near-production vehicle, showcased the car's capabilities across diverse terrains and weather conditions in the American Southwest. Even on overcast days, the vehicle received over 545 watts of solar input, minimizing the need for charging stops. This milestone validates Aptera's technology and signifies a step toward a sun-powered transportation future.
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After a pandemic-induced break, the author tried online job applications for the first time, only to be met with overwhelming disappointment. Nearly 1000 applications yielded almost no responses. This led him to conclude that online job platforms are largely ineffective, filled with scams and dead ends. He contrasts this with the far superior approach of networking, building a public profile, and directly contacting target companies. The author likens online applications to throwing a letter into the ocean; ultimately, he found his current job through his network.
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Lucy is a concise language for describing Finite State Machines (FSMs). It allows complex events, guards, actions, and destination states to be expressed in a single line. Nesting machines enables hierarchical FSMs. Lucy compiles to XState, a leading JavaScript FSM library, supporting all its core features. Written in C and compiled to WebAssembly, Lucy boasts a significant speed advantage (15x faster than its previous JavaScript-based compiler), making it ideal for JavaScript projects.
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Inspired by blogger Simon Willison, I've started a link blog to share interesting web links along with my personal comments and thoughts. Simon's blog is known for its AI content and high-quality links, where he adds personal insights and even code snippets, inspiring my approach to personal knowledge management and sharing. I used to struggle with the uniqueness and value of my posts, but Simon emphasizes the importance of consistent writing and accumulating work over time. My link blog will be a combination of public bookmarks and my commentary, aiming to enhance the reader's experience by adding context, connecting to related topics, and supplementing with background information or other sources.
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This project showcases an ESP32-based remote-controlled camera system that transmits live video streams over WebSockets and controls motors and servos. A Python server manages WebSocket communication and provides a web interface for viewing and controlling the ESP32 devices. It features automatic timeouts to reset motors and servos to defaults if no commands are received. The system supports multiple clients and is open-source.
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This article demonstrates a method for creating a cool hover animation effect using CSS. By cleverly combining an inverted radius shape, CSS variables, and `@property`, a smooth reveal animation is achieved where text gradually appears on hover. The code is concise and efficient, leveraging CSS masks and gradients for a visually stunning effect. This is a valuable CSS technique worth learning, suitable for developers with some CSS experience.
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Tramway SDK is a lightweight game engine challenging the 'Turbobloat' of mainstream engines like Unity and Godot. Developed over three years, it aims to bring 3D game development to older hardware. Using software rasterization, it eschews the need for a graphics card and runs on 15-year-old hardware, lowering the barrier to entry and reducing e-waste. It ditches node-based systems in favor of entity class inheritance and streamlined coding. Optional editors and whitespace-separated value configuration files simplify the workflow. Tramway SDK also includes an RPG framework, supporting level streaming and Quake/Source style entity interaction for easy open-world RPG creation. While still early in development, its lightweight nature and ease of use hold immense potential.
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This Stratechery interview features OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, detailing OpenAI's journey from a research lab to a consumer tech giant, and the unexpected success of ChatGPT. Altman candidly discusses OpenAI's business model shift, its relationship with Microsoft, views on AI safety and regulation, and the future of AGI. The interview also touches on OpenAI's open-source strategy, GPT-5 development, and the implications of AI across various industries. Altman believes a billion-user AI platform will be more valuable than cutting-edge models, hinting at potential alternative monetization strategies beyond advertising.
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The Tweede golf team encountered a frustrating bug in their embedded Rust software for the nRF9160 microcontroller, resulting in Error::NrfError(-22) when sending data to a server. After weeks of investigation, they traced the issue to the libmodem library's initialization function. A pointer to a stack-allocated configuration struct was used after the struct was destroyed, causing unintended writes to the shared memory region configuration and resulting in a data length of 0. Adding `black_box` and using watchpoints ultimately located and fixed the bug. The team highlighted the benefits of using Rust for embedded development to prevent such low-level errors.
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Learning Arabic can be challenging due to its complex alphabet and sentence structures. The website "Learn Arabic" offers a unique approach: start reading Arabic words and sentences without first learning the alphabet. It features 8261 Arabic words and 2625 sentences and phrases, each with detailed explanations and links to aid understanding. The site leverages the Arabic root system and word pattern associations to enhance memorization and comprehension. This innovative method makes learning Arabic easier and more engaging.
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This post dissects the inherent challenges of performing online schema changes in MySQL, particularly when dealing with tables linked by foreign key relationships. The author analyzes the limitations of existing tools like pt-online-schema-change and gh-ost, highlighting the complexities and risks involved in altering parent tables. Altering a parent table necessitates concurrent alterations of all child tables, creating a fragile process with minimal tolerance for errors. A single failure can lead to data inconsistencies or outages. The author concludes that online schema changes involving foreign key constraints on large tables are practically infeasible.
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Following the passing of owner Kevin Loch, the popular IP address lookup websites ip4.me, ip6.me, and several others will be shut down on April 1st, 2025. Inquiries regarding the purchase of these domains can be directed to [email protected].
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The Graphics Codex is an interactive learning resource for computer graphics, featuring 400+ cross-referenced equations and diagrams, 14 chapters on physically-based shading and rendering, and multi-platform programming projects with links to external API documentation. It serves as a reference, textbook supplement, or standalone learning guide, updated monthly. Topics range from ray tracing and shadow map shaders to the rendering equation and Fresnel equations, making it ideal for students and professionals alike.
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Imagine a QR code containing both payment and merchant information, allowing for payment completion without switching—that's the allure of the dual QR code. It cleverly combines static and dynamic codes; the former displays merchant information for easy identification and inquiry, while the latter is used for payment, ensuring transaction security and efficiency. This technology promises to streamline payment processes and enhance user experience. In today's mobile payment-centric world, dual QR codes may become the future trend in payment methods, transforming consumer habits.
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Balaji Srinivasan's new book, *The Network State*, envisions a new social contract powered by Web3 technology, proposing the creation of 'startup countries' via blockchain. These 'network states' would consist of highly aligned online communities crowdfunding territory globally, eventually gaining diplomatic recognition. Critics argue this model resembles an archipelago of 'privatopias', exacerbating inequality and suppressing democratic participation with its simplistic 'one-commandment' governance. Instead of fragmented network states, leveraging network technology to build a more inclusive and participatory network society to solve real-world problems is proposed as a more viable solution.
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In the 1970s, the rise of the Soviet Navy posed a significant threat to the US. To counter the emergence of powerful new Soviet warships, the top-secret Parcae satellite program was launched. Developed by the US Naval Research Laboratory, Parcae provided real-time location data on Soviet vessels, drastically reducing the time between signal interception and intelligence reporting to mere minutes. This near-instantaneous intelligence was crucial for military decision-making. Employing multiple satellites working in concert and advanced computer systems to process massive amounts of data, Parcae helped maintain the strategic balance during the Cold War. Its technology continues to influence modern satellite signals intelligence systems.
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For decades, mathematicians believed determining the total number of real numbers was an unsolvable problem. A new proof suggests otherwise. The article details how mathematicians Asperó and Schindler proved that two axioms previously considered competing foundations for infinite mathematics actually imply each other. This finding strengthens the case against the continuum hypothesis and indicates an extra size of infinity exists between the two that, 143 years ago, were hypothesized to be the first and second infinitely large numbers. While this result has generated excitement and debate within the mathematical community, the arguments surrounding the sizes of infinite sets are far from settled.
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A Colorado farmer has pioneered a sustainable model by integrating solar panels with his farm. His 3,276 panels power roughly 300 homes, while the land beneath them supports various crops and livestock, offering crucial shade during Colorado's hot summers. This 'agrivoltaics' approach not only boosts income but also protects soil and improves land use efficiency, offering a blueprint for climate change adaptation. However, challenges remain, including higher initial costs, increased land management demands, and a lack of policy support for agrivoltaics.
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This write-up details a 30-hour journey exploiting a heap overflow in Llama.cpp to achieve remote code execution (RCE). Llama.cpp's unique heap management system thwarted classic ptmalloc exploitation techniques. The author cleverly leveraged Llama.cpp's implementation logic, bypassing multiple security checks to achieve a heap overflow. Through intricate manipulations, RCE was gained. The article provides an in-depth analysis of the vulnerability details, mitigations, and the final exploitation, offering valuable insights for security researchers.
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