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Knuth: Recent News
Leading banks and investment funds have been foundering, because of bad debts and lack of trust; and other, less well-known kinds of fiscal chaos are also on the horizon. For example, due to an unfixable security flaw in the way funds are now transferred electronically, worldwide, it is no longer safe to write…
The (logarithmic) calendar I want
I was looking at my Google Calendar tonight and I realized that this software was encouraging a way of thinking about time which has signifi...
The Demon Machine
Over the weekend I was reunited with the first two computers I spent extensive time programming. The Sharp MZ-80K (released in 1979) and t...
Why Palantir Makes My Head Hurt
While I've blogged before about Palantir Technologies (e.g., Beware the Spectacular B-Round Valuation), this will probably be my last post about them because, since leaving MarkLogic, I am no longer terribly involved in the Intelligence Community space nor engaged against them as an indirect competitor. I initially
Do Not Start A Startup: Or, What I Learned At Startup School 2011
Home page for Andy Brett
Things That Turbo Pascal is Smaller Than
It's not about technology for its own sake. It's about being able to implement your ideas.
Klout Is Odious
The positioning of Klout is gross, turning ordinary social interactions into some sort of game with a competitive score. Of course there are meaningless achievements . But what’s most loathsome is the primary purpose of Klout is to offer “Perks” (aka “ads”) to you based on your Klout score. Yes, I can get a free…
Experts often end up where they started as beginners
Experts often end up where they started as beginners. If you've never seen the word valet, you might pronounce it like VAL-it. If you realize the word has a French origin, you would pronounce it val-A. But the preferred pronunciation is actually VAL-it. Beginning musicians play by ear, to the extent that they can play
The LMAX Architecture - 100K TPS at Less than 1ms Latency
LMAX is a retail financial trading system that can handle that can 6 million orders per second on a single JVM thread. The business logic runs in-memory surrounded by disruptors using event sourcing.
Arduino Controlled Dishwasher
Explore the rise of retrofication in the automotive industry, blending classic design with modern technology for sustainable solutions and reducing environmental impact.
Elements of Modern C++ Style
“C++11 feels like a new language.” – Bjarne Stroustrup The C++11 standard offers many useful new features. This page focuses specifically and only on those features that make C++11 really feel like…
This One Hurts: Dr. Walter Bortz on Dr. John McCarthy
John McCarthy died four days ago. He was 84. His obit in the “New York Times” made specific reference to his generally attributed parenthood of artificial intelligence. John was my good…
Apple's iTV: Apps Are the New Channels
Why not something like Newsstand for TV network apps?
The implications of UEFI "Secure Boot" for Linux users
Last month Steven Sinofsky from Microsoft announced new requirements for manufacturers wanting to ship Windows 8 systems, including a feature called “Secure Boot”. Canonical, together with Red Hat, today publishes a white paper highlighting the implications of these requirements for users and manufacturers. The paper…