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Google Removing H.264 Support in Chrome
The web’s open and community-driven development model is a key factor in its rapid evolution and ubiquitous adoption. The WebM Project was ...
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History & Retro Computing
The most popular blog posts about history & retro computing on Hacker News. 122 posts.
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Time-zone database used by Unix shut down due to IP litigation
Today (2011-10-06), the time-zone database was closed down . It is perhaps easy to read that line, think it doesn't affect you, and then ...
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Bjarne Stroustrup on Dennis Ritchie: They said it couldn't be done, & he did it
What a sad week. Rob Pike reports that Dennis Ritchie also has passed away. Ritchie was one of the pioneers of computer science, and a well-deserved Turing winner for his many contributions, notabl…
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Stephen Wolfram on Steve Jobs: A Few Memories
Stephen Wolfram shares personal memories of Steve Jobs, how their paths crossed, and the support and encouragement Jobs provided over the years.
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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.
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The Roots of Lisp
(I wrote this article to help myself understand exactly what McCarthy discovered. You don't need to know this stuff to program in Lisp, but it should be helpful to anyone who wants to understand the essence of Lisp � both in the sense of its origins and its semantic core. The fact that it has such a core is one of…
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How Super Mario Bros. 3 was made
I picked up a children's picture book at the local library recently. Some of you might be thinking, "Why would you take out a Japanese picture book ? Are your Japanese language skills that atrophied?" Well, this happened to be a very special book, because it showed kids how Nintendo games are made, from start to…
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Programming Language Development: The Past 5 Years
I recently compiled a list of Perlis Languages that were meant to illustrate varying paradigms not typically found in mainstream programming languages. Those languages were meant to stretch your mind and are not necessarily representative of the state of the art in language design and implementation. In this post I…
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The lost Van Jacobson paper that could save the Internet
One of my heroes has always been Van Jacobson. His 1988 paper on solving TCP congestion is an enjoyable read, with cross-discipline appeal. The history of all this is fascinating, such as congestio…
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The Document Which Was Formerly Called The MIT Guide to Lockpicking
Which is too bad in a way. I thought it was a cool piece of urban folklore no matter where it came from, and it contributed to giving college students everywhere a reputation for healthy rebeliousness.
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How automatic transmission almost made sperm whales extinct
It was the familiar story of human cruelty and greed: the sperm whales were hunted to the oblivion. Then, in the 1970s, the better part of humanity led by good people - ecological activists - saw the error of their ways and stopped the murder. Good triumphed over evil. Amen. The problem with such…
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IEEE Refuses to Accept Public-Domain Papers?
It turns out that, in response to #3, IEEE is overriding its scientific referees and flat-out refusing to accept public-domain papers.
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Siri meets Eliza
Jordan Mechner is an author, graphic novelist, screenwriter and video game designer, best known as the creator of Prince of Persia. Follow his latest projects here.
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Apple's 1987 Knowledge Navigator, Only One Month Late
In 1987, Apple released this concept video for Knowledge Navigator, a voice-based assistant combined with a touchscreen tablet computer. Based on the dates mentioned in the Knowledge Navigator video, it takes place on September 16, 2011. The date on the professor’s calendar is September 16, and he’s looking for a 2006…