Oct 24 2013
[NASA’s Lunar Atmosphere and Dust Environment Explorer has]…a series of lasers on the outer hull designed to shoot back data to three base stations here on Earth much faster than traditional radio data links – and the agency reports the first tests have been a roaring success
So this is probably faster than my broadband from Comcast.
Jun 22 2013
Many of us believe that filesystem integrity is the single most important component of computer systems. Disk drives fail, computer systems are upgraded, networks improve and and morph from wired to wireless – but the data files that represent the accumulated work and knowledge of users remain. It’s bad enough that, as applications become outdated, proprietary file formats become unreadable: who now can read an old WordStar doc? (Even NASA has learned, to its chagrin, that failure to have a policy regarding collected data can result in historic losses. For example, the original video transmission tapes from the Apollo 11 moon landing are gone, nowhere to be found; and telemetry from the first lunar orbiter satellites were stored in an uncertain file format on tapes that could only be played on machines no longer made.) We will probably never entirely overcome these kinds of issues. But it would be absolutely stupid to compound them, by using filesystems inherently vulnerable to data loss.
Anyone who has used Macs or PCs for more than a minute has erased a file they wished they’d kept. Or had a disk crash and become unreadable. Or discovered that a long-unread but valued image file now contains junk.
Over the years, OS designers have come up with various methods to prevent this from becoming a disastrous
Jun 18 2013
Found this buried in a storage cabinet. Blast from the past. When WWDC was in San José, and Mac programmers were Real Men, not wimpy iOS code monkeys. Does anyone remember HyperCard? MacApp? MPW?
1990 WWDC briefcase
1990 WWDC briefcase label
Jun 13 2013
Well, just in case you’ve forgotten how cool it was then, here‘s the intro commercial for the G5.
Feb 16 2013
This is beyond funny. The phone phreak subculture of the 1970s ended up changing the entire world, much like the model railroad club at MIT did.
Apr 06 2012
“The team at USC was able to prove that they had indeed built a solid-state quantum computer by supplying it with a simple data set, and applying Grover’s algorithm, which is a mathematical proof demonstrating the potential power of quantum computers….
…This diamond-encrusted computer was able to find the correct choice on the first try 95% of the time, thus proving that the researchers successfully built a functional quantum computer.”
Mar 18 2012
“Hello world” is the basic test program to teach the elemental syntax of a programming language. It’s like learning to say “hello, my name is …” in a foreign language.
Mar 07 2012
With today’s introduction of Apple’s iPad 3 or iPad HD or whatever the hell they end up calling it, I think we’ll be entering a pretty Siri-ous phase when it comes to mobile Artificial Intelligence (AI) technology. Apple has a winner in Siri, its iOS digital assistant app, and knows it, so we’ll soon be seeing all-Siri, all the time in Apple products to come this year including, no doubt, Cupertino’s own big-screen TV.
But this is not to say that Google’s Android will be far behind. There are stories popping-up about Google doing its own Siri-like app. But I expect Google to go significantly beyond Siri capability and I base that belief on the fact that Google has been working in this area since at least 2008, when they hired one of the scientists who did the basic research behind this category-shaping product.
Jan 01 2012
WolframTones works by taking simple programs from Wolfram’s computational universe, and using music theory and Mathematica algorithms to render them as music. Each program in effect defines a virtual world, with its own special story–and WolframTones captures it as a musical composition.It’s all original music–fresh from “mining” Wolfram’s computational universe. Sometimes it’s reminiscent of familiar musical styles; sometimes it’s like nothing ever heard before. It’s a taste of what it’s like to explore the computational universe–and a hint of what’s to come…
Jan 01 2012
Research in touch and gesture-based computing, released just before the iPhone and iPad rocked the world.
Jan 01 2012
Jun 04 2010
Flash? We don’t need no stinkin’ Flash.
– Steve Jobs (more or less)
Apr 29 2009
Using Google search activity in Mexico to help track human swine flu levels.
Apr 19 2009
Making sense of the reams of data from satellites, drones and ground sensors cries out for a handheld device that is both versatile and easy to use. With their intuitive interfaces, Apple devices—the iPod Touch and, to a lesser extent, the iPhone—are becoming the handhelds of choice.
Sep 13 2008
By offering mobile developers an alternative way for making their mobile applications run on handsets, even when no wireless connection exists, Google is paving the way for developers to build browser-based applications that can run on any mobile platform, as opposed to having to build separate versions of their applications in order to support those same mobile platforms.
Sep 08 2008
Apple’s got more up its sleeve than touch alone. How about “gaze vector fusion”?
Aug 04 2005
Came across this old receipt, which nearly gave me a stroke to look at. Thought you might like to have a stroke, too…. ;-)
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