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Positron: The Next-Gen Open Source IDE for Data Science

2025-08-19

Positron: The Next-Gen Open Source IDE for Data Science

Posit PBC has launched Positron, a free, next-generation Integrated Development Environment (IDE) for data science. It seamlessly integrates data exploration and production workflows, supporting both Python and R equally. Key features include interactive notebooks, plotting tools, integrated data app workflows, and a built-in AI assistant. Built on Code OSS, Positron supports VSIX extensions for enhanced customization.

(posit.co)

Development

Guile-Swayer: Scripting Sway/i3 with Guile

2025-08-19

Guile-Swayer: Scripting Sway/i3 with Guile

Tired of Sway/i3's configuration limitations? The Guile-Swayer project offers a powerful solution, allowing you to fully control the Sway/i3 window manager using the Guile scripting language. Developed after migrating from StumpWM to Wayland, this project replicates StumpWM's flexibility and customization. Guile-Swayer lets you bind keys to execute Guile code, subscribe to Sway events and react to them, retrieve Sway information, and more. It includes modules like workspace-grid for grid-based workspaces, workspace-groups for cross-monitor workspace grouping, and which-key for Emacs-like keybinding hints. With Guile-Swayer, create a highly personalized and efficient window management environment.

(github.com)

Development

Mastering Attention: Crafting Effective Prompts for LLMs

2025-08-19

Mastering Attention: Crafting Effective Prompts for LLMs

This article delves into the attention mechanism of Large Language Models (LLMs) and how to leverage it through carefully crafted prompts. It explains that LLMs don't read sequentially like humans, instead weighting relationships between all tokens simultaneously. Prompt structure, therefore, is more impactful than word choice. The article contrasts structured and unstructured prompts, illustrating how a step-by-step approach guides the model's reasoning. It simplifies the attention mechanism: calculating each word's influence on others to generate output. Heuristics for effective prompts are offered: prioritizing key information, using structured formatting, employing personas, and avoiding vagueness. The article concludes by emphasizing the economic benefits of efficient prompting—saving engineer time, improving efficiency, and reducing costs.

(alexchesser.medium.com)

Development

Limitations on Applying Code Review Suggestions

2025-08-19

Limitations on Applying Code Review Suggestions

This article lists various limitations encountered when applying suggestions in GitHub code reviews. These include scenarios such as no code changes made, the pull request being closed, viewing only a subset of changes, only one suggestion per line allowed, applying to deleted lines, suggestions already applied or marked resolved, suggestions from pending reviews, multi-line comments, and the pull request being queued to merge. It also notes that some actions are currently unavailable.

(github.com)

Development

Geotoy: Open-Source 3D Modeling Tool Showcases Stunning Artist Portfolio

2025-08-19

Geotoy, a completely free and open-source 3D modeling tool by Casey Primozic, is showcased through a stunning portfolio of 3D models created by artist ameo. The collection includes a diverse range of creations, from a 3D Hilbert curve and shingles to a temple, maze, spring, fractal terrain, torus knot, dandelion, power line, woven structures, roots, bumpy sphere, abstract hourglass, birdbath, concrete tetrapod, terraced floating island, extruded clay bowl, advanced shader props, superellipse dominos, and even a Dark Souls-inspired tree. This impressive display highlights Geotoy's capabilities and ameo's artistic talent.

(3d.ameo.design)

Design

UK's Age-Verification Loophole: VPNs Enable Minors to Bypass Porn Filters

2025-08-19

UK's Age-Verification Loophole: VPNs Enable Minors to Bypass Porn Filters

England's children's commissioner is urging the government to address a significant loophole in its new online safety regulations: the use of VPNs by minors to circumvent age restrictions. A recent report reveals a concerning number of young people accessing pornography before age 18, despite the implementation of mandatory age checks for commercial porn sites. The surge in VPN usage post-regulation highlights the ineffectiveness of current measures. While the government claims no plans to ban VPNs, it intends to collaborate with providers to implement robust age verification, potentially impacting the privacy and security of legitimate users, including schools relying on VPNs for secure access to internal systems. This move represents a significant challenge in balancing child safety with online freedoms.

(www.theregister.com)

Tech

The AI Adoption Gap: Why 95% of Enterprise Pilots Fail

2025-08-19

The AI Adoption Gap: Why 95% of Enterprise Pilots Fail

A new MIT report reveals a stark reality: while generative AI holds immense promise, most enterprise initiatives aimed at rapid revenue growth are failing. Only about 5% of AI pilot programs achieve significant revenue acceleration; the vast majority stall, yielding minimal impact. The research highlights that the problem isn't the AI models themselves, but rather a 'learning gap' in enterprise integration. Successful AI deployments hinge on strategic tool selection (purchasing from specialized vendors and building partnerships boasts a 67% success rate), empowering line managers to drive adoption, and choosing tools that deeply integrate and adapt over time. The report also underscores the prevalence of 'shadow AI' and the ongoing challenge of measuring AI's impact on productivity and profit.

(fortune.com)

Tech Enterprise Adoption

UK Debt Yields Surge, Echoing 2022 Crisis Fears

2025-08-19

UK Debt Yields Surge, Echoing 2022 Crisis Fears

Yields on long-term UK government bonds have surged, exceeding their US counterparts for the first time this century, sparking concerns about the UK's fiscal situation. The 30-year UK gilt yield hit 5.61%, 68 basis points higher than the US equivalent. This widening gap reflects growing investor apprehension. The UK faces long-term structural economic challenges, high inflation, slowing growth, and rising unemployment. The upcoming inflation report is crucial; hotter-than-expected data could push yields higher and potentially trigger another 2022-style pension crisis.

(www.coindesk.com)

Tech UK Gilts

My Browser Odyssey: From Arc to Dia to Zen Browser

2025-08-19

My Browser Odyssey: From Arc to Dia to Zen Browser

I was a devoted Arc browser user, loving its powerful keyboard shortcuts and multi-profile functionality. However, its developer, The Browser Company, pivoted to the AI-powered Dia browser, abandoning many of Arc's strengths. Dia, while incorporating AI features, sacrificed usability and privacy, forcing me to search for an alternative. Firefox, while functional, lacks a polished user experience. Ultimately, I found Zen Browser, a Firefox-based browser with Arc's clean, fluid interface and powerful customization, solving Firefox's multi-profile management issues. It's become my new favorite. I even believe Mozilla should acquire the Zen Browser team to improve the user experience of Firefox.

(werd.io)

Development

A 1Hz Clock from Three Candles: Reversing Millennia of Optimization

2025-08-19

A 1Hz Clock from Three Candles: Reversing Millennia of Optimization

For millennia, candlemakers have strived for flicker-free candles. However, when three candles are bundled together, they surprisingly begin to oscillate naturally at ~9.9Hz, a frequency primarily determined by gravity and flame diameter. The author ingeniously uses a wire suspended in the flame to sense capacitance changes caused by ionized gases, detecting this frequency and dividing it down to 1Hz. The result? A 1Hz clock built with a simple microcontroller and an LED, powered by the flickering of three candles.

(cpldcpu.com)

Hardware Sensors

Beancount Ledger Reconciliation with Vim Macros: A Hacker's Tale

2025-08-19

A seasoned Vim user tackles the challenge of managing personal finances with Beancount, a text-based ledger system. Facing a mess of CSV and PDF bank statements and numerous uncategorized internal transfers, the author ingeniously leverages Vim macros to automate the reconciliation process. The article details the macro creation process, highlighting problem-solving and showcasing impressive Vim skills. Through creative use of Vim, the author transforms chaotic financial data into a clear and efficient Beancount ledger, dramatically improving productivity.

(tangled.sh)

Development

The Fatal Flaw of "The Art of Multiprocessor Programming": Ignoring the futex

2025-08-19

This article critiques "The Art of Multiprocessor Programming," a well-regarded textbook, for its omission of the futex, a crucial modern concurrency technique. The author argues that the book's lack of coverage renders its content outdated and impractical. Futexes, enabling efficient mutex implementations, significantly improve concurrency performance and are widely used in operating systems like Linux, Windows, and macOS. The article details futex functionality and provides code examples demonstrating high-performance mutex construction using futexes, including spinlocks, non-recursive mutexes, and recursive mutexes. The author concludes that the book's failure to cover essential technologies like futexes makes it insufficient for modern concurrency programming needs.

(h4x0r.org)

Development concurrency programming multiprocessor programming

Axel Springer's Copyright Battle Against Ad Blockers: Is Website Code Software?

2025-08-19

German publisher Axel Springer has been battling ad blocker Adblock Plus for years. Initially using competition law, they lost. They then pivoted to copyright law, arguing Adblock Plus' modification of their website code constitutes infringement. The German Federal Court of Justice overturned a previous ruling, siding with Axel Springer, stating website code is copyrightable software, and its modification may be infringement. This case has drawn significant attention; its outcome could profoundly impact the software industry, internet ecosystem, and even the future of online news' pay models and access to information.

(torrentfreak.com)

Tech ad blockers

Critical Cache Poisoning Vulnerability in Dnsmasq: Single Character Attack

2025-08-19

Researchers from Tsinghua University and Nankai University discovered a critical cache poisoning vulnerability (SHAR attack) in the Dnsmasq DNS software. Attackers can inject malicious DNS records by using a single special character, bypassing Dnsmasq's defenses. This vulnerability exploits the silent handling of queries containing special characters by some upstream recursive resolvers, creating a large attack window for brute-forcing TxID and source port. The success rate is 100%, affecting all Dnsmasq versions. Mitigation includes detecting silent upstream resolvers and implementing rate limiting and spoof detection.

(lists.thekelleys.org.uk)

Tech cache poisoning

Hand-Counting Ballots: A Threat to Election Accuracy?

2025-08-19

Hand-Counting Ballots: A Threat to Election Accuracy?

A growing number of states are considering banning electronic tabulators and mandating hand-counting of ballots. However, studies show that hand-counting leads to significantly higher error rates (up to 25%), increased costs, and substantial delays. For example, Nye County, Nevada's 2022 hand count resulted in a 25% error rate, and a similar bill in Arizona was only vetoed by the governor. This not only threatens election accuracy and security but also fuels voter concerns about corruption. The article advocates for the continued use of electronic tabulators, supplemented by post-election audits to ensure timely and accurate results.

(votingrightslab.org)

Misc election hand counting electronic tabulators

Retro PC Emulation on Raspberry Pi Pico: Pico-286

2025-08-19

Retro PC Emulation on Raspberry Pi Pico: Pico-286

The Pico-286 project is a remarkable feat of emulation, bringing the classic PC experience of the late 80s and early 90s to the Raspberry Pi Pico. This lightweight project offers a fun way to explore retro computing and learn about low-level system emulation. It supports various Intel CPUs (up to 286), a range of classic peripherals (sound cards, graphics cards), and various graphics and text modes. Pico-286 even emulates the artifact colors produced by early displays! This open-source project is cross-platform and runs on Raspberry Pi Pico, Windows, and Linux.

(github.com)

Development

EloqKV: Outperforming Redis with Distributed ACID Transactions and Tiered Storage

2025-08-19

EloqKV: Outperforming Redis with Distributed ACID Transactions and Tiered Storage

EloqKV is a high-performance distributed database with a Redis/ValKey compatible API. It offers ACID transactions, full elasticity and scalability, tiered storage, and session-style transaction syntax, all while maintaining Redis' simplicity. EloqKV achieves up to 1.6 million QPS on a c6g.8xlarge instance, exceeding Redis and ValKey's performance. Its distributed ACID transactions eliminate cross-slot errors, and tiered storage automatically offloads cold data to disk, saving up to 70% on memory costs. EloqKV is designed for developers needing a robust database solution for demanding AI applications.

(github.com)

Tech Redis compatible

PyPI Bolsters Account Security with Expired Domain Checks

2025-08-19

PyPI Bolsters Account Security with Expired Domain Checks

To prevent domain resurrection attacks – a type of supply chain attack where an attacker buys an expired domain to hijack PyPI accounts – PyPI now checks for expired domains. This enhances account security by un-verifying email addresses associated with expired domains; over 1,800 email addresses have been unverified since early June 2025. While not a perfect solution, it significantly mitigates a major attack vector. Users are advised to add a second verified email address for enhanced security.

(blog.pypi.org)

Development domain resurrection

iPadOS: Beyond Jobs' Vision?

2025-08-19

iPadOS: Beyond Jobs' Vision?

Many argue that iPadOS has strayed from Steve Jobs' original vision, transforming the iPad from a simple content consumption device into a computer-like one. The author counters that this isn't a betrayal, but a fuller realization of Jobs' vision. Jobs aimed to create a device bridging the gap between phones and laptops, fulfilling everyday needs. iPadOS's evolution, such as the addition of the Apple Pencil, enhances creative potential without sacrificing ease of use. This mirrors the evolution of the iPhone and Mac, adding features while maintaining core usability to meet evolving user needs. iPadOS's layered design allows newcomers to experience simple joy, while power users can explore advanced features. Ultimately, the iPad is more powerful and user-friendly, achieving Jobs' vision of making computing accessible to all.

(victorwynne.com)

Tech

UK Drops Demand for Apple iCloud Backdoor

2025-08-19

UK Drops Demand for Apple iCloud Backdoor

The UK will no longer compel Apple to provide backdoor access to its iCloud encryption, according to US Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard. This follows a January order demanding access to encrypted data globally. Apple challenged the order, citing the CLOUD Act, a bilateral agreement preventing such data demands between the US and UK. US pressure reportedly led the UK to withdraw its request. It remains unclear if Apple will reinstate its enhanced encryption service in the UK.

(www.theverge.com)

Tech

Google's War on the Open Web: The Slow Kill of XML

2025-08-19

This article exposes Google's long-running campaign against XML and its implications for the open web. From shutting down Google Reader to attempting to remove XSLT, Google leverages its browser market dominance and influence within the WHATWG to gradually undermine the foundations of the open web. The author argues this isn't a technical issue but a strategic move by Google to consolidate its centralized approach, ultimately aiming to stifle independent, decentralized ecosystems. The article calls on developers to use XML and XSLT, provide feedback, and build alternatives to combat Google's monopolistic practices.

(wok.oblomov.eu)

Tech open web

Hitachi Unveils World's Smallest and Thinnest Contactless IC Chip

2025-08-19

Hitachi has announced the development of the world's smallest and thinnest contactless IC chip, measuring just 0.15 x 0.15 millimeters and 7.5 micrometers thick. Leveraging SOI technology to reduce the distance between circuit elements, the chip maintains the same functionality as its larger predecessor while boasting a quarter of the surface area and one-eighth the thickness. This results in over a tenfold increase in productivity. The breakthrough is expected to revolutionize applications for contactless IC chips across security, transportation, entertainment, traceability, and logistics.

(www.hitachi.com)

Hardware IC chip SOI technology miniaturization

DIY Equatorial Mount: Building a Star Tracker from Scratch with PCBs

2025-08-19

DIY Equatorial Mount: Building a Star Tracker from Scratch with PCBs

Starting with amateur astrophotography, the author progressed from a simple tracker to researching expensive equatorial mounts, ultimately deciding to build their own high-precision equatorial mount using PCB design and CNC machining. The article details the entire process, from learning PCB design and selecting harmonic gears and motors to writing OnStepX firmware and overcoming WiFi stability issues. The resulting mount, costing approximately €1700, achieves 1-2 arcsecond tracking accuracy, enabling stunning nebula and galaxy photographs. The author shares challenges and lessons learned, such as PCB design errors and debugging. This is a challenging yet rewarding DIY project showcasing maker spirit and technical prowess.

(www.svendewaerhert.com)

Hardware equatorial mount

Safely Using snprintf: Avoid Buffer Overflows

2025-08-19

This article highlights a lesser-known feature of the `snprintf` function: its ability to determine the required buffer size before formatting, thus preventing buffer overflows. By calling `snprintf` twice – once with `NULL` and 0 to get the size, and again with a properly allocated buffer – the need for manual buffer size calculations is eliminated. The author also recommends a lightweight header-only library for easier usage.

(bernsteinbear.com)

Development buffer overflow

The Crystal Palace: A Century of Photography, from Glory to Ashes

2025-08-19

The Crystal Palace: A Century of Photography, from Glory to Ashes

This article recounts the epic story of the Crystal Palace, from its debut at the 1851 Great Exhibition to its dramatic destruction by fire in 1936. Through a rich collection of historical photographs, it chronicles the building's construction, relocation, fires, and eventual demolition. The images capture the Palace's grandeur and magnificence, as well as its decline and the enduring legacy it left behind.

(heritagecalling.com)

Misc photography history Crystal Palace

Ted Chiang: Beyond Hard Sci-Fi, a Philosophical Deep Dive

2025-08-19

Ted Chiang: Beyond Hard Sci-Fi, a Philosophical Deep Dive

This review delves into the unique writing style of acclaimed science fiction author Ted Chiang. He transcends the typical 'hard' vs. 'soft' sci-fi dichotomy, crafting universes with internally consistent scientific laws that serve as vehicles for exploring profound philosophical questions and human relationships. Chiang uses science not as mere backdrop, but as a central driver of the narrative. For instance, in 'Story of Your Life,' the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis (language shaping thought) becomes key to understanding alien intelligence. The review praises Chiang's masterful portrayal of compatibilism (reconciling free will and determinism) while pointing out his relative weakness in depicting society's interaction with technology and a lack of diversity in his philosophical explorations.

(linch.substack.com)

Tech Ted Chiang

Netflix Ditches Kafka and Cassandra for In-Memory Database on Tudum

2025-08-19

Netflix Ditches Kafka and Cassandra for In-Memory Database on Tudum

Netflix's fan website, Tudum, initially used a CQRS architecture with Kafka and Cassandra, but suffered from delays in previewing content updates. To address this, the Netflix team replaced Kafka and Cassandra with RAW Hollow, an internally developed in-memory object store. RAW Hollow's in-memory dataset dramatically improved content preview and page rendering speeds, offering a better experience for both editors and visitors.

(www.infoq.com)

Tech

Building a TPU from Scratch: A Fool's Errand?

2025-08-19

A team of hardware novices, driven by a desire to prove their capabilities, embarked on the ambitious project of building a TPU from the ground up. Rejecting the easy route of research, they adopted a 'hacky' approach, starting with a fundamental understanding of neural network mathematics. They constructed a systolic array for matrix multiplication, cleverly incorporating double buffering, pipelining, and a vector processing unit to achieve both inference and training on the XOR problem. Their success in building a fully functional TPU showcases remarkable ingenuity and perseverance.

(www.tinytpu.com)

Hardware

Croatian Freediver Shatters Underwater Breath-Hold Record

2025-08-19

Croatian Freediver Shatters Underwater Breath-Hold Record

Croatian freediver Vitomir Maričić has set a new Guinness World Record for the longest breath held voluntarily underwater using oxygen, an astonishing 29 minutes and 3 seconds, surpassing the previous record by over four minutes. He achieved this remarkable feat in a 3-meter-deep pool in Opatija, Croatia, in front of five judges and approximately 100 spectators. Maričić's achievement highlights not only exceptional lung capacity and endurance but also his remarkable mental fortitude and the crucial support of his team.

(divernet.com)

Misc freediving breath-hold

Microsoft Bets Big on AI Agents: The Demise of Traditional Business Apps?

2025-08-19

Microsoft Bets Big on AI Agents: The Demise of Traditional Business Apps?

Microsoft executives boldly predict that traditional business applications will be a relic of the past by 2030, replaced by AI-powered "business agents." These AI agents will leverage generative AI and vector databases to dynamically adapt to user needs and optimize workflows in a goal-oriented manner. This prediction has sparked industry debate, with some questioning its optimism and the feasibility of rapid enterprise transformation, while others see it as a major shift requiring businesses to embrace AI to avoid obsolescence. Microsoft plans to gradually transition customers to this new model by offering AI agents as add-on services for existing applications.

(thenewstack.io)

Tech

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