February 2012
January 2012
myNoSQL: Notes About Amazon DynamoDB →
nosql:
It’s been only a couple of hours since the news about Amazon DynamoDB got out and since then I went through as much documentation as I could. Here are my notes so far. If you found interesting bits please leave a comment and I’ll add them to the list (with attribution):
it is not the first…
iDoneThis blog: Silicon Valley's Productivity... →
idonethis:
The wonder of Silicon Valley has been its rich history of producing incredibly capital efficient companies operating at massive scale. No doubt part of that achievement lies in the capital efficiency of software engineering itself where technology gives incredible leverage to create and disrupt…
In Dreams
parislemon:
I first encountered 955 Dreams about a year ago when I came across a magical iPad app called The History of Jazz. When I sat down with co-founder Kiran Bellubbi to talk about the app for a TechCrunch story, it was immediately apparent that his vision extended far beyond just one beautiful app.
I kicked off my story with something he said to me: “The shallow experience for a user...
The Cost of Doing Business: Foxconn, Apple and the... →
“Out of the crooked timber of humanity, no straight thing was ever made.” - Immanuel Kant Ours is an imperfect society. The nature of our reality, our desires and our need to possess, while maintaining a façade of moral righteousness, puts us at odds with the reality that exists within the systems we have created. In recent days, the character of our era of consumerism has been put in...
Destroy all Software, WAT →
Awesome lightning talk video on language insanity
A Petabyte is A LOT of Data
Coding Relic: Multiple Inheritance →
Coding Relic: Offense →
500px: Second Wave →
Soul Calibur for iOS Is Out →
parislemon:
An automatic download for me. I was addicted to the original for the Dreamcast back in they day. Yes, at one point I owned a Dreamcast.
At $11.99 it may seem a bit pricey (and that’s actually after a 20% release week discount), but it’s a Universal app that works on both the iPhone and iPad.
I’m downloading it right now, so I haven’t played it yet. But the reviewers so far seem to...
A Long Bleak Winter - NYTimes.com →
underpaidgenius:
What is written as a recommendation by the NY Times Editorial Board to the leaders of the European Union is actually better considered as a prediction.
Greece is careening toward a disorderly default because the northern European economies won’t accept the idea of forgiving the ‘southerner’s debts’ — even though in reality the debts were caused by the real estate/bank crash of...
Life after college roadmap
From mint.com
A blog from the mind of falicon: How would you... →
falicon:
Today I’m making the first public mention of a new little service I’ve built called whoclicked.it. A simple service designed to tell you who actually clicks on the links you share around the web.
It’s an idea that’s been on my mind for a couple of years now, but was primarily driven by two…
“To have peace with this peculiar life; to accept what we do not understand; to...”
– M. C. Escher mcescher.com
Cut the working week to a maximum of 20 hours,... →
stoweboyd:
If we were rational about the new world of work, we would accept the idea that people should work less, since productivity has climbed so much in the past few decades. But will that be accepted doctrine of Western countries? Can we shift to a 20 hour work week?
Heather Stewart via The Observer
A thinktank, the New Economics Foundation (NEF), which has organised the [recent London]...
Disqus: The Official Blog: Tip of the Week: Shares... →
disqus:
Hi, this is Amanda, the newest member of the Community Team. Here, at Disqus, we are all about facilitating communication and fostering the growth of ideas. How can we help you maximize the movement of your bright ideas? We let you share your insights, with all of your favorite people, on the…
Octav Druta: If you met yourself, what would you... →
octavdruta:
Biologists have managed to look at ever smaller and smaller things. And astronomers have looked further and further… into the dark night sky, back in time and out in space.
But maybe the most mysterious of all… Is neither the small nor the large. It’s us, up close.
Could we even recognize…
CNNMoney Tech Tumblr: Startup You →
cnnmoneytech:
Fake Grimlock, a caffeine-fueled giant robot dinosaur, has been stomping through the blogs of tech luminaries such as Fred Wilson, Eric Ries and Brad Feld dispensing advice and commentary on the startup scene. Here at CNNMoney, we’re fans of his rather stark perspective and tendency…
Engagio's Blog: Posting to Tumblr, People Search,... →
engagio:
We quietly released 7 new features on December 22nd, just before Christmas. They all directly contribute to Engagio’s two key premises (and promises): a) helping you manage multi-site conversations, b) bringing you visibility about the potential relationships from whom you’ve interacted…
What SoundCloud's Massive New Funding Means →
What becomes possible when technology cuts out the middlemen in music publishing and distribution? A lot of very strange and sometimes wonderful things. Berlin based music and audio sharing network SoundCloud has raised a reported $50m more venture capital from the super prestigious Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, Mike Butcher at TechCrunch Europe reported today. The company had raised about...
Does Your Language Shape How You Think? - Guy... →
underpaidgenius:
When I first got involved in studying linguistics, I read the work of Benjamin Whorf, whose theory — The Whorfian Hypothesis — was that language shapes thought, and as a result, people can only think thoughts that are expressible in the languages they know. This theory fell out of favor in later decades, but new evidence has emerged that suggests that our perception of the world...
December 2011
Strong Opinions @marksbirch: Seriously Bold Tech... →
marksbirch:
About this time of year, folks put together lots of lists about the past year as well as the outlook on the future. While these are nice, thoughtful, and insightful posts, I think people are being way too timid. This is the time to aim high and hit it out of the ballpark.
So without further…
Eric Bidelman: Introducing filer.js →
ericbidelman:
Some 1300+ lines of code, 106 tests, and a year after I first started it, I’m happy to officially unleash filer.js (https://github.com/ebidel/filer.js); a wrapper library for the HTML5 Filesystem API. Unlike other libraries [1, 2], filer.js takes a different approach and incorporates…
blog.izs.me: Browser : Operating System →
izs:
Fairly early in my career as a programmer, I switched from the C and C++ path over to front-end web development. It was fun, in-demand, and provided a way to scratch my artistic and programming itches at the same time. I spent a lot of that time wrestling with web browsers. These days, I write…
How this works...
programmer 1: Hey, it turns out you don't need semicolons in JavaScript, and my previous reasons for putting them there are not actually true. Neat.
programmer 2: Yeah, but it'll break.
p1: But... that's just it, it *doesn't* break. It's actually ok for me to do this.
p2: No it isn't.
p1: Why not?
p2: Browser bugs.
p1: Which browsers?
p2: All of them.
p1: Well, it works fine on all the engines I've tested---
p2: IE.
p1: Works fine there, too. Even in IE 5.
p2: Compression. Compressors can't handle it. Need the semicolons. All of them.
p1: All the compressors in use today handle it fine. In fact, the code compresses a little *better* in most of them.
p2: Well, whatever, that's not how it's done.
p1: Ok, well, there are other reasons to do things besides a convention. I mean, you're wearing an unconventional hat, and that's cool.
p2: So, now you have a problem with my coding style AND my hat?? FUCK YOU.
p1: You can code however you want, and I love your hat, I was ju---
p2: No. NO. Fuck you. Seriously. You crossed a line, dude. Too far.
p1: [puzzled] I don't get why this an issue, I mean, if you see the spec, it says---
p2: You just can't let this go, can you? Why don't you lighten up?
p1: Let what go, exactly? And I don't really think that I'm the one who needs to lighten anything.
p2: Oh, so now you come in with the personal attacks. I get it. We're all not smart enough to understand your precious spec, so you have to attack people? HAVE YOU NO DECENCY, SIR? AT LONG LAST, HAVE YOU NO DECENCY?
p1: I think maybe hacker news isn't for me...
MongoDB Durability: A Tradeoff to Be Aware Of →
nosql:
The MongoDB team post about MongoDB’s durability made some waves last week. While I’d still recommend reading the original post, I’m including below a summary of the most important points from the post:
First, there are many scenarios in which that server loses all its data no matter what.
[…]
In the real world, traditional durability often isn’t even done correctly.
...
Janky: Jenkins + Hubot = GitHub flavored CI →
thechangelog:
GitHub continues to share their homegrown development toolbox with the world. The latest is Janky, a specialized continuous integration server powered by Jenkins and Hubot. No longer is Hubot good just for entertainment or demystifying esoteric 80s TV show references in the team chatroom. With Janky, Hubot is a remote control for your build box:
hubot ci build...
Strong Opinions @marksbirch: Public Markets Vs.... →
fred-wilson:
““I’m spending the rest of the day on our product. I believe that that’s what serves investors the best, and I believe that that’s the way it will be rewarded by the market in the long term the best.”
Mark Pincus
After Zynga IPO, Pincus Aims to Keep ‘Startup Feeling’ -…
“Computers don’t care about API design. Convenient serialization formats, sane...”
– APIs are for human beings (too) - Twilio Engineering BlogTwilio Engineering Blog (via devexp)
API Half-lives
Some other things I've found myself thinking about in particular cases wrt to this question about API half-lives:
How active is their API discussion forum?
How responsive are they to API bugs/issues?
How core is the API to their business?
How long have they been around already?
What is their runway?
Do they seem like they're passionate about what they're doing?
Are they likely acqui-hire targets?
“to steal from someone and not feel bad, you either have to be a sociopath or...”
– power to the people, especially the artists
Hi I’m Louis C.K. and this is a thing : IAmA
Louis CK is doing an AMA on Reddit. This is part of his response to a question about his Beacon Theater special, available for download DRM free at louisck.net
(via jericsinger)
GPU-Accelerated Databases →
nosql:
Wolfgang Gruener reporting on a new patent filed by IBM:
Instead of traditional disk-based queries and an approach that slows performance via memory latencies and processors waiting for data to be fetched from the memory, IBM envisions in-GPU-memory tables as technology that could, in addition to disk tables, significantly accelerate database processing. According to a patent filed by...
