3331
Parse, Don’t Validate – Some C Safety Tips
“A good programmer is someone who looks both ways before crossing a one-way street.” – Doug Linder
3332
Airbrush art of the 80s (2015)
The 80’s was a decade of many things — excess, greed, and big hair, to name a few — but it was also the heyday for airbrush art. As a teenager in the late 80’s, I desperately wanted an airbrush so I could paint my favorite band logos on the back of my jean jacket, and maybe make some money on the side painting…
3333
The inspection paradox is everywhere (2015)
I have updated this article with new data, better code, and friendlier data visualization. You can read the new version here . Th...
3334
The Sega Master System
We traditionally divide consoles into “generations”—the earliest devices like the Magnavox Odyssey are the first generation, the Atari 2600 is second, the NES third, the SNES and Genesi…
3335
The Color of the Future: A history of blue
A history of blue 🦋
3336
Better Know a Ruby Thing: Singleton Classes
Write an awesome description for your new site here. It will appear in your document head meta (for Google search results) and in your feed.xml site description.
3337
Attention Wasn't All We Needed
Personal blog of Stephen Diehl - Software engineer writing about technology, programming, and the future
3338
Typewriter Plotters (2022)
Did you know there were typewriters that used ball point pens to draw not just text but also graphics? I’ve collected several of these over the years. Read on to discover a world that you didn’t know existed.
3339
The "AI 2027" Scenario: How realistic is it?
Everyone’s been talking about it. JD Vance read it. What does it actually tell us?
3340
Aldous Huxley predicts Adderall and champions alternative therapies
If delivered today, the last of Huxley’s 7-part lecture series at MIT would probably be categorised under motivational talks or self-help strategies. It surv...
3341
Zig and the design choices within
(From someone who has spent far too much time thinking about the designs of programming languages)
3342
Delete tests
We’ve had decades of thought leadership around testing, especially coming from holistic development philosophies like Agile, TDD, and BDD. After all that time and several supposedly superseding movements, the developers I talk to seem to have developed a folk wisdom around tests. That consensus seems to boil down to…
3343
Escaping surprise bills and over-engineered messes: Why I left AWS
Frustrated with AWS's complexity and cost risks, I switched to NearlyFreeSpeech for its prepaid model, ensuring financial control while keeping hosting simple and flexible.
3344
The architecture of “not bad”: Decoding the Chinese source code of the void
WTF moment: Why my native OS refuses to return a "True" value.
3345
Epistemic Collapse at the WSJ
For a long time now fundamental theoretical physics has been suffering not just from a slowdown in progress, but from a sort of intellectual collapse (I wrote about this here a while back in the co…
3346
Writing into Uninitialized Buffers in Rust
A blog by sunfishcode
3347
Is outbound going to die?
HN Discussion
3348
Dr John C. Clark, a scientist who disarmed atomic bombs twice
One scientist did it twice
3349
Reality Check
Like this newsletter? Why not listen to the podcast version on Better Offline? Part 1 is out now (here're other links), and Part 2 comes out Friday May 2nd! I'm sick and god-damn tired of this! I have written tens of thousands of words about this and
3350
3351
A bit more on Twitter/X's new encrypted messaging
Update 6/10: Based on a short conversation with an engineering lead at X, some of the devices used at X are claimed to be using HSMs. See more further below. Matthew Garrett has a nice post about T…
3352
Google's new AI mode is good, actually
When I wrote about how good ChatGPT with GPT-5 is at search yesterday I nearly added a note about how comparatively disappointing Google's efforts around this are. I'm glad I …
3353
Fun with Telnet (2024)
Some time ago I came across a cinematic experience ......... @@@@@ @@@@@ ........... ......... @ @ @ @ ........... ......... @@@ @ @ .......... ........ @@ @ @ ......... ........ @@@@@@@ @@@@@ th ....... ...... ----------------------- ...... ..... C E N T U R Y .... .... ----------------------- ... ... @@@@@ @@@@@ @ @…
3354
Installing and using HP-UX 9
A few weeks back I got a note on Bluesky, linking me to a website offering a free computer. The owner was in Cambridge, not far from me, and the computer was an HP 9000/300 Series - a Model 340, specifically.
3355
Parsing JSON in Forty Lines of Awk
A single-function JSON parser for the POSIX shell.
3356
Testing “Exotic” P2P VPN
My standard "everyday" solution when it comes to connecting computers into a single network is Wireguard. Wireguard is good, supports p2p, and generally has no downsides.
3357
TLA+ Modeling Tips
Model minimalistically Start from a tiny core, and always keep a working model as you extend. Your default should be omission. Add a compone...
3358
Tips for installing Windows 98 in QEMU/UTM
Windows 98 runs surprisingly well in QEMU via UTM SE, but it requires some care in setting it up. It’s a great way to run old 90s Windows and DOS software on your iPad (and Mac too, though you have… Continue reading →
3359
Bill Gates's Personal Easter Eggs in 8 Bit BASIC (2008)
If you type “WAIT6502,1″ into a Commodore PET with BASIC V2 (1979), it will show the string “MICROSOFT!” at the top left corner of the screen. Legend has it Bill Gates himself inserted this easter egg “after he had had an argument with Commodore founder Jack Tramiel”, “just in case Commodore ever…
3360
GOP Cries Censorship Over Spam Filters That Work
The chairman of the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) last week sent a letter to Google’s CEO demanding to know why Gmail was blocking messages from Republican senders while allegedly failing to block similar missives supporting Democrats. The letter followed media reports accusing Gmail of disproportionately flagging…