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bootc-image-builder: Craft Bootable Disk Images from Containers

2025-06-28

bootc-image-builder: Craft Bootable Disk Images from Containers

bootc-image-builder is a powerful tool for creating disk images from Fedora/CentOS bootc containers or derivatives. It supports various image types (qcow2, AMI, ISO, etc.) and allows customization of users, filesystems, kernel parameters, and more. Using Podman and QEMU, users can easily build and run virtual machines. This guide details its usage, options, and advanced configurations such as creating AMIs on AWS and customizing the Anaconda installer.

(github.com)

Development disk image

Critical Hurricane Forecasting Data to be Cut, Threatening Accuracy

2025-06-28

Critical Hurricane Forecasting Data to be Cut, Threatening Accuracy

Sensors aboard Defense Meteorological Satellite Program (DMSP) satellites will cease providing crucial microwave data to the National Hurricane Center and other non-Department of Defense users by June 30th, significantly impacting hurricane forecast accuracy. This data allows for viewing a storm's internal structure, especially changes to its eye and eyewall, giving forecasters hours of advanced warning of rapid intensification. The reasons for the shutdown remain unclear but may be related to security concerns. While NOAA claims to have alternative data sources, experts worry this could lead to 6-12 hour delays in hurricane forecasts, potentially devastating for Pacific storms and dangerous for mariners.

(www.scientificamerican.com)

Tech hurricane forecasting meteorology

Rust's Weird Expressions: Pushing the Type System to its Limits

2025-06-28

Rust's Weird Expressions: Pushing the Type System to its Limits

This article delves into some extreme and seemingly paradoxical expressions within Rust's powerful type system. By dissecting examples from the `weird-expr.rs` test file, such as the creative use of `return true`, nested loops and `break` statements, and a deep understanding of type inference and coercion, the article explains their validity in Rust. These are not bugs, but rather showcases of Rust's flexible type system and expressive power, demonstrating its robustness in handling edge cases.

(www.wakunguma.com)

Development

The 14-Year-Old Who Shaped the Mac Calculator

2025-06-28

Chris Espinosa, a 14-year-old Apple employee, played a pivotal role in the Macintosh's development. Tasked with documenting Quickdraw, he built a calculator program. Steve Jobs initially disliked it, but Espinosa's innovative solution—a customizable 'Steve Jobs Roll Your Own Calculator Construction Set'—impressed Jobs and became the iconic Mac calculator for years, lasting until OS 9.

(www.folklore.org)

Development

Meta's New AI Feature: Accessing Unpublished Photos Raises Privacy Concerns

2025-06-28

Meta's New AI Feature: Accessing Unpublished Photos Raises Privacy Concerns

Meta is testing a new feature that accesses users' unpublished photos on their camera roll to generate content suggestions, such as collages or themed albums. While Meta claims it's not currently training its AI models on these photos, its user agreement allows analysis of photo content and metadata, with the right to retain and use this information. This raises privacy concerns, especially after Meta acknowledged using publicly posted content since 2007 to train its AI models. Although users can opt out, Meta's data retention policies remain opaque, with some users reporting unauthorized AI-powered restyling of their photos.

(www.theverge.com)

Tech

Reinforcement Learning: Powering the Rise of Agentic AI in 2025

2025-06-28

Reinforcement Learning: Powering the Rise of Agentic AI in 2025

Early attempts at AI agents like BabyAGI and AutoGPT in 2023, while initially hyped, faltered due to large language models (LLMs) struggling with multi-step reasoning. However, mid-2024 saw a turnaround. Advances in reinforcement learning enabled a new generation of AI agents capable of consistently completing complex, multi-step tasks, exemplified by code generation tools like Bolt.new and Anthropic's Claude 3.5 Sonnet. Reinforcement learning, through trial-and-error training, overcomes the compounding error problem inherent in imitation learning, allowing models to remain robust even with unseen data. Techniques like OpenAI's RLHF and Anthropic's Constitutional AI automate feedback, further boosting reinforcement learning's efficiency. DeepSeek's R1 model showcased the remarkable potential of models "self-teaching" reasoning through reinforcement learning. In short, advancements in reinforcement learning are the key driver behind the surge in agentic AI in 2025.

(www.understandingai.org)

AI

SymbolicAI: A Neuro-Symbolic Framework for LLMs

2025-06-28

SymbolicAI: A Neuro-Symbolic Framework for LLMs

SymbolicAI is a neuro-symbolic framework blending classic Python programming with the differentiable programmability of LLMs. Its modular design allows easy extension and customization, enabling users to write their own engines, host them locally, or interface with tools like web search and image generation. Core concepts are Symbol objects (syntactic and semantic) and contracts (ensuring code correctness via decorators). SymbolicAI supports numerous primitive operations and integrates with neuro-symbolic engines like OpenAI and Anthropic via APIs, along with tools such as Wolfram Alpha and search engines. A priority-based configuration system simplifies management.

(github.com)

Development neuro-symbolic

c4wa: A Minimalist and Efficient C to WebAssembly Compiler

2025-06-28

c4wa: A Minimalist and Efficient C to WebAssembly Compiler

c4wa is a compiler that translates a subset of C into WebAssembly. Unlike other compilers, it generates minimalistic and well-optimized WebAssembly code without any glue, embedded libraries, or overhead. It's fully compatible with any WASM runtime out of the box. c4wa supports loops, conditionals, structs, arrays, pointers, and other typical C features, and can output readable WAT format code. It strikes a balance between the higher-level convenience of C and the low-level efficiency of WebAssembly, offering developers a new way to write performant WebAssembly code.

(github.com)

Development

TarFlow: Transformer-based Normalizing Flows Achieve SOTA Image Likelihood Estimation

2025-06-28

TarFlow: Transformer-based Normalizing Flows Achieve SOTA Image Likelihood Estimation

Researchers introduce TarFlow, a novel normalizing flow model leveraging Transformers and masked autoregressive flows. TarFlow efficiently estimates density and generates images by processing image patches with autoregressive Transformer blocks, alternating the autoregression direction between layers. Three key techniques boost sample quality: Gaussian noise augmentation during training, post-training denoising, and an effective guidance method for both class-conditional and unconditional generation. TarFlow achieves state-of-the-art results in image likelihood estimation, significantly outperforming previous methods and generating samples comparable in quality and diversity to diffusion models—a first for a standalone normalizing flow model.

(machinelearning.apple.com)

AI

1800-Year-Old Roman Fresco Unearthed in London

2025-06-28

1800-Year-Old Roman Fresco Unearthed in London

During excavations at The Liberty development site in London, archaeologists have unearthed and painstakingly reconstructed the largest-ever collection of painted Roman plaster, dating back at least 1,800 years. The fragments, discovered scattered among the rubble, reveal the decorative wall of a high-status Roman building. Featuring rare yellow hues, graffiti, Greek lettering, and possibly a fragment of the artist's signature, the fresco offers invaluable insights into Roman art, life, and culture.

(www.thisiscolossal.com)

Tech Roman fresco London archaeology

A Decade of Pomological Watercolors: From FOIA Request to Global Phenomenon

2025-06-27

A Decade of Pomological Watercolors: From FOIA Request to Global Phenomenon

Ten years ago, a blog post advocating for the release of the US government's Pomological Watercolor Collection – a trove of over 7,000 fruit and specimen paintings – sparked a movement. The author's initial FOIA request led not only to the online availability of the high-resolution scans, but also to a decade-long journey of unexpected discoveries. From learning Python to build upload tools, creating social media bots to share the images, and even producing merchandise, the project's impact has grown exponentially. The collection has been featured in books, academic papers, and popular media, highlighting the power of persistence and the unexpected rewards of following one's curiosity.

(parkerhiggins.net)

Misc

British Airways Pilot Annual Flight Hours

2025-06-27

British Airways Pilot Annual Flight Hours

This article details how British Airways pilots log their annual flight hours. It explains the roles of pilots (Pilot in Command PIC, Pilot 2 P2, PIC Under Supervision PICUS, etc.) and how, according to British Airways Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs), responsibilities are shared between the Captain and First Officer during a sector. For example, during descent, the First Officer will fly the approach until 1000ft AGL, then the Captain takes over for landing. All approaches are monitored approaches.

(jameshard.ing)

Misc flight hours British Airways pilot roles

ZubanLS: A Blazing-Fast Python Language Server Built in Rust

2025-06-27

In 2012, the author created Jedi, a widely used Python autocompletion library. However, its speed limitations became apparent. In 2020, the author rebuilt from scratch using Rust, resulting in ZubanLS, the first truly fast Python language server after five years of dedicated work. ZubanLS targets professionals needing precision, reliability, and speed, addressing longstanding issues in tools like Mypy and Pyright by prioritizing performance without sacrificing features. Support for Django, go-to-definition, completions, and other LSP features is in progress. The initial 2025 release might not be perfect; feedback is welcome to shape future development.

(zubanls.com)

Development

Apple Updates App Store Policies to Comply with the Digital Markets Act

2025-06-27

Apple Updates App Store Policies to Comply with the Digital Markets Act

Apple has updated its App Store policies in compliance with the European Union's Digital Markets Act. Developers in the EU can now promote their digital goods and services to alternative platforms (websites, app stores, or in-app web views). This change introduces new fees: an initial acquisition fee, a store services fee, and a Core Technology Commission (CTC). Apple plans to transition from the Core Technology Fee (CTF) to the CTC for digital goods and services by January 1, 2026, across all distribution channels. Furthermore, Apple is updating the iOS and iPadOS user experience to facilitate the installation of apps from developers' websites or alternative app marketplaces.

(developer.apple.com)

Tech

Formula E Gen4: 804 hp Electric Beast on the Horizon

2025-06-27

Formula E Gen4: 804 hp Electric Beast on the Horizon

The upcoming Formula E Gen4 car boasts a massive power upgrade, jumping from 470 hp to a staggering 804 hp, nearing the power of F1 cars. Despite the significant power boost, energy efficiency remains a key focus, with regenerative braking reaching 700 kW. Williams Advanced Engineering is out, replaced by Italian battery supplier Podium Advanced Technologies, and Bridgestone takes over tire supply from Hankook, introducing high and low-downforce wing configurations. Performance will sit between F1, F2, and IndyCar; while not matching F1's cornering prowess, the Gen4's 800+ hp and AWD will deliver blistering acceleration out of corners. Testing has already seen speeds of 210 mph (338 km/h).

(arstechnica.com)

Tech Formula E Electric Racing

Echo Chamber Attack: A Novel Jailbreak for LLMs

2025-06-27

Echo Chamber Attack: A Novel Jailbreak for LLMs

An AI researcher at Neural Trust has discovered a novel jailbreak technique, dubbed the 'Echo Chamber Attack,' that bypasses the safety mechanisms of leading Large Language Models (LLMs). This method uses context poisoning and multi-turn reasoning to subtly guide models towards generating harmful content without explicitly dangerous prompts. By planting seemingly innocuous prompts that build upon each other across multiple turns, the attack gradually shapes the model's internal state, leading to policy-violating responses. Evaluations showed success rates exceeding 90% on several models, highlighting a critical vulnerability in current LLM safety.

(neuraltrust.ai)

AI

NASA's Space Game Dream: From Moonbase Alpha to the Fall of Starlite

2025-06-27

NASA's Space Game Dream: From Moonbase Alpha to the Fall of Starlite

NASA once attempted to promote space exploration through gaming, collaborating with game studios in 2009 to develop the lunar base simulator, Moonbase Alpha. The game unexpectedly gained popularity due to its unique DECtalk speech synthesis system, with players creating various songs, becoming a viral phenomenon. However, the subsequent ambitious space MMO, Starlite: Astronaut Academy, ultimately failed due to funding issues and internal conflicts, leaving behind a story filled with regret.

(www.spacebar.news)

Game

Blazing Fast Mandelbrot on a Homemade 8-bit CPU

2025-06-27

Blazing Fast Mandelbrot on a Homemade 8-bit CPU

A team successfully rendered a Mandelbrot set on their custom-built 8-bit PJ5 CPU, achieving surprisingly fast results—under 3 seconds! This speed is attributed to 16 registers, single-cycle instructions, and a hardware 8x8 multiplier. They're also developing a fast ROM board to replace the current FPGA and plan to improve the display, audio, and input devices. 18 months of work culminates in this impressive feat.

(pj5cpu.wordpress.com)

Hardware 8-bit CPU Mandelbrot Set

A Lisp Adventure in the Dead Waters of C

2025-06-27

This article explores the power of Lisp's abstractions and the limitations of C, using a C-like language. The author analyzes function parameter evaluation strategies, highlighting how C's pass-by-value mechanism restricts control over function parameters, preventing the implementation of flexible conditional statements and loops like Lisp's if, while, and cond. The article further delves into advanced features like closures and runtime function creation, unavailable in C, ultimately concluding on C's shortcomings in extensibility.

(mihaiolteanu.me)

Development

Higher IQ Correlates With More Accurate Predictions and Better Decision-Making

2025-06-27

Higher IQ Correlates With More Accurate Predictions and Better Decision-Making

A University of Bath study reveals a strong link between higher IQ and more accurate predictions. Individuals with higher IQs (top 2.5%) make significantly fewer forecasting errors than those with lower IQs (bottom 2.5%), more than double the inaccuracy. This research, using data from the English Longitudinal Study of Aging (ELSA), focused on predicting life expectancy. The study controlled for lifestyle, health, and genetics, highlighting the independent impact of intelligence on probabilistic reasoning and decision-making across various life aspects, from finances to health choices. The findings suggest that clearer communication of probabilities in areas like finance and health could improve decision-making for individuals prone to forecasting errors.

(phys.org)

AI Decision-Making Prediction

Linux Community: Fortress of Freedom or Cage of Exclusion?

2025-06-27

A blog post sparked a heated debate about inclusivity within the Linux community. The author shared a condescending and exclusionary comment criticizing their use of "Linux" instead of "GNU/Linux" and accusing them of trying to "dumb down" the system. The author counters that true "freedom" shouldn't come at the expense of marginalized groups, highlighting serious accessibility flaws in the Linux ecosystem. This ignited a discussion about community culture, the importance of inclusivity and accessibility, and respect for those who contribute to improving the system.

(fireborn.mataroa.blog)

Development

zenta: Terminal-Based Mindfulness for Coders

2025-06-27

zenta: Terminal-Based Mindfulness for Coders

zenta is a terminal-native tool designed to help programmers maintain focus while coding. It guides users back to the present moment through simple breathing exercises, without the need for tracking or metrics. A single command, `breath` or `breathe`, initiates short or longer breathing sessions, aided by pure visual animations and calming quotes. The `reflect` command facilitates a gentle daily review. zenta advocates for genuine mindfulness, not gamification, emphasizing presence over productivity hacks. It supports multiple operating systems and is open-sourced under the MIT license.

(github.com)

Development

North American Rail System Restructuring: A 1977-2021 Chronicle

2025-06-27

This article chronicles major changes to the North American Class I railroad system from 1977 to 2021, a period marked by numerous mergers, acquisitions, and corporate restructurings. From the bankruptcies of railroads like the Chicago, Milwaukee, St. Paul and Pacific to the rise of CSX and Norfolk Southern, and the eventual merger of Burlington Northern and Santa Fe, the article details the dramatic reshaping of the North American rail landscape and the rise and fall of numerous railroad companies. These events fundamentally reshaped the North American rail transportation network, laying the groundwork for the system we see today.

(en.wikipedia.org)

Tech mergers

BQN Matrix Multiplication Performance Optimization: Cache Blocking and Divide and Conquer

2025-06-27

This article explores optimizing large matrix multiplication performance using the BQN language. The author first uses a simple square partitioning method to effectively utilize cache, achieving a speedup of about six times. Then, a Strassen algorithm based on a divide-and-conquer strategy is introduced and experimentally shown to achieve up to a 9x speedup on large matrices. The article also compares the performance impact of different block sizes and nested tiling strategies, concluding that the performance limit of a pure, single-threaded BQN implementation has essentially been reached.

(panadestein.github.io)

Development

Blazing Fast Fibonacci on the GPU with Thrust

2025-06-27

Blazing Fast Fibonacci on the GPU with Thrust

This blog post demonstrates how to perform incredibly fast Fibonacci sequence calculations using GPU programming and the NVIDIA Thrust library. It starts by explaining the scan algorithm, then shows how to use scan operations in Thrust for simple addition and multiplication, extending this to matrix operations. Finally, it illustrates calculating Fibonacci numbers efficiently via matrix operations and the scan operation, using modulo arithmetic to avoid integer overflow. The author calculates F99999999 (mod 9837) in just 17 milliseconds on an NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 Mobile GPU.

(veitner.bearblog.dev)

Development GPU computing Fibonacci sequence Thrust library

The Hobbit in Five Celtic Languages: A Publishing Milestone

2025-06-27

The Hobbit in Five Celtic Languages: A Publishing Milestone

Welsh publisher Melin Bapur has compiled all current Celtic language editions of J.R.R. Tolkien's classic, *The Hobbit*, including the recently released Scottish Gaelic translation, *A' Hobat*. This marks a significant achievement in bringing the story to a wider Celtic audience, with only the Manx Gaelic version remaining untranslated. The Welsh translation, *Yr Hobyd*, released in 2024, uniquely uses the 18th-century Welsh Coelbren y Beirdd runes instead of Anglo-Saxon runes, adding a distinctly Welsh flavor. The publisher highlights the value of translating familiar books in encouraging wider readership and providing invaluable resources for language learners.

(nation.cymru)

Misc The Hobbit Celtic Languages Translation

UK's F-35A Purchase: Nuclear Deterrent, Logistical Headache

2025-06-27

UK's F-35A Purchase: Nuclear Deterrent, Logistical Headache

The UK government announced the purchase of 12 nuclear-capable F-35A fighter jets to bolster NATO's deterrent. However, these new jets are incompatible with the RAF's refueling tankers, creating a logistical challenge. The F-35A offers extended range and payload but lacks the short takeoff and vertical landing (STOVL) capability of the F-35B, meaning it can't operate from aircraft carriers. This purchase reinstates a nuclear role for the RAF, but faces integration and logistical hurdles. Some experts see it as a stopgap measure until the next-generation Tempest fighter enters service.

(www.theregister.com)

Tech

Cache Locality and Array Summation Performance: A Surprising Experiment

2025-06-27

This article explores the impact of array element order on summation performance through experimentation. The author compares sequential and random access methods, finding that random access performance drastically degrades when array size exceeds cache capacity, while sequential access remains relatively stable. Experiments also investigate memory-mapped files and cross-platform differences, revealing that OS handling of memory-mapped files significantly impacts performance. The conclusion: sequential access is optimal for large array summation, while larger-than-memory data requires more efficient algorithms and data reading strategies.

(samestep.com)

Development cache locality

Space Data Centers: The Dream of a Single Launch vs. Harsh Reality

2025-06-27

Space Data Centers: The Dream of a Single Launch vs. Harsh Reality

Starcloud claims a single 100-ton Starship launch could build a 40 MW space data center (SDC) for $8.2M. This analysis reveals this is infeasible, requiring up to 22 launches. Solar arrays need 4 launches, thermal management 13, and server racks 5. Starcloud drastically underestimates launch costs, rendering their economic comparison to terrestrial data centers unrealistic. This highlights the immense engineering challenges and high costs of space data centers, urging a more realistic techno-economic analysis.

(angadh.com)

Tech Space Data Center Launch Costs

Viking Navigation: No Maps, No Compass, No Problem?

2025-06-27

Viking Navigation: No Maps, No Compass, No Problem?

A modern-day explorer recreated a Viking-age sea voyage, suggesting Vikings may not have relied on navigational tools like maps, compasses, or sextants. Months at sea revealed their reliance on 'mental maps' – a maritime cultural mindscape passed down through generations of sailors – supplemented by myths associated with coastal landmarks. Thousands of years of coastal navigation rendered advanced instruments unnecessary.

(arstechnica.com)

Tech Seafaring

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