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The latest mural in Łódź: "TIGER" in a "technological" environment, the EC1 building or a code referring to a programming language... Author: Adam Wirski, known as 'Kruk'.
The concept is to refer to the activity of the SESTO company, on whose building it is located - i.e. the production of electronic components for railway substations, as well as other electronic systems used in industry. Łódź, Poland
Ab abstractum, ad infinitum...
Two iPads eying each other.
I rarely publish self-portraits like this mainly because, as I have four arms, they usually elicit some sort of comment from folk, and that makes me feel self-conscious.
This is for the Flickr Friday theme this week of Recursion which I found intriguing. Recursion is a concept that reminds me of the happy days when I used to learn new programming languages by writing programs to play board games like Reversi (Othello).
Recursion in that context is one program routine calling a nested copy of itself repeatedly, and it was useful to analyse board scores several moves in advance to work out which initial move was most powerful. As you can imagine I sold the rights to that idea to DeepMind and retired on the proceeds some while ago…
The approach I have used here of using two devices with front-facing cameras to provide the visual recursion is hardly a novel idea, I am sure, but I’d not done it before and wanted to try it out as a proof of concept. Previously I’d just used a single device and a mirror.
To be honest, it was a real fiddle to get even half right - point it in the right direction with the right position and right height and tilt, and plonk the screen to focus and then trigger the shutter... Great fun was had!
And with this still shot you rather miss out on the real fun which was watching a change in the initial image percolating down the stack of frames, at about four or five frames a second.
It’s also interesting to see how the saturation increases in successive iterations - so much for the iPad’s colour veracity then!
Thank you for taking the time to look. I hope you enjoy the image! Happy Flickr Friday :)
[Edit: If you have not played with this kind of thing before you may find this visually confusing, so I thought I would add some explanation.
There are two identical iPads involved here, one with a green cover (you can see that at the top), and one with a black cover, though it’s folded back so you only see the hinge at the bottom.
Both iPads have their cameras switched on to use the front-facing camera on the device - the selfie one. Both display a live view on their screens of what their camera is seeing.
The green iPad is lying on my dining table (brown cover) facing up to the ceiling.
I am holding the black iPad upside down (facing the green iPad) about 12 or 15 inches above the green. I’m taking the picture we see here with the black, suspended, iPad.The picture shows the green iPad and its screen.
But the green iPad screen is showing what it is seeing, which is the black iPad with my finger on the shutter button. It is also showing what the black iPad is showing on its display - which is this image. And so we have the first degree of recursion - I am taking an image of the image I am taking… And this image of the image I am taking shows the image of the image I am taking as well (via the green and black iPads again) and so the recursion continues and disappears into itself in the distance.
Technical note: You can do this with a single device and a mirror but you run into a problem. The camera on these devices is not in the centre of the screen but set in the edge of the device outside the display area. To get the image of table (green) iPad in the frame I needed to tilt the suspended iPad to one side.
This creates a perspective distortion in the image - I fixed this with a perspective correction while processing the main image, but you can see it still in the images within images. If you use a mirror then the perspective distortion gets worse with each iteration.
But what I did here was to use two devices both with similar offset cameras. Placing one camera at one side and the other camera at the other (the green camera is on the right and the black camera was on the left) means that the two perspective distortions work against each other (negative feedback) so the image is much more centralised.
I didn’t realise this when I started - it was a happy accident! My main problem was convincing the suspended black iPad to orient the display so that the shutter button wasn’t on the same side as the camera so I didn’t obscure the camera with my finger... sigh.
I hope these notes help you if you try it yourself - do have a go: it’s fun.]
Laws of Physics
Laws of Nature
Laws of Common Sense
Laws of Man
Laws of Musk
Lords of COBOL
Laws of God
Laws of Beans and Beer
"Now is the time for all good men to come to the aid of their country." – Charles E. Weller
Media:
* Wikipedia: Filler text
* Stu Phillips and Glen A. Larson: Battlestar Galactica Theme (1978)
* Prometheus of Videos: Empire Strikes Back: Intro to Imperial Fleet & Executor / Arrival At Hoth (1980)
Tualatin Fred Meyer, 11:26 PM.
See also: January 20, 2025, 4:16 PM (2024)
The Macro Mondays theme for this week is "Stitch". Photo of a LabVIEW Logo hat patch. LabVIEW is a graphical programming language created by National Instruments
[Eng. /Esp.]
Transputers T800C mounted on IMS 404 boards, linked on an IMS B012
Transputer processors were designed and manufactured by Inmos Ltd., UK from the late '80s to the early 90's, to directly support the Occam programming language, based on C.A.R. Hoare's CSP formalism, providing massive parallelism. Scalar performance increase had staggered, an massive parallelism was the Promises Land (rings a bell guys?), with a wide range of many different parallel programming paradigms. Imnos was not able to catch up with the technology roadmap, delivering the last transputer model (T9000, codenamed H1) at a lousy 100 MHz wereas TI DSPs were alredy running at 300 MHz, which lead to the end of the last great British and European computing project, under my point of view. The transputers shown in the picture are part of the set I installed and configured to implement as a proof of concept the theory I introduced in my PhD. However, working with them meant to program my own tools for loading and debugging programs, and whenever I managed to shone my tools, new commercial tools were available, until eventually the entire European Transputer project crumbled. Fortunately, my theoretical work was sound enough and I could happily wrap up, defend and get my PhD. That was 23 years ago... passed in a wink!
Los transputers fueron procesadores diseñados y fabricados por Inmos Ltd. UK entre finales de los '80 y principios de los '90, para soportar directamente el lenguaje de programación Occam, basado en el formalismo CSP de C.A.R. Hoare, permitiendo paralelismo masivo. El incremento del rendimiento escalar parecía detenido y la programación paralela era la Tierra Prometida (¿No os suena esto?), con una enorme variedad de paradigmas de programación paralela. Imos fue incapaz de seguir la oportunidad tecnológica, entregando el último modelo de transputer (T9000, código de desarrollo H1) a unos tristes 100 MHz, mientras que los DSPs de Texas Instruments salían a 300 MHz, lo que condujo al fracaso del último gran proyecto Británico y Europeo de computación, bajo mi punto de vista. Los transputers de la fotografía forman parte del conjunto que monté y configuré para implementar una prueba de concepto del desarrollo teórico de mi tesis doctoral. Sin embargo, trabajar con ellos significaba hacerme mis propias herramientas, y para cuando conseguía tenerlas afinadas, siempre aparecían nuevas herramientas comerciales, hasta que todo el proyecto europeo en torno a los transputers se hundió. Afortunadamente la parte teórica de mi trabajo era lo suficientemente sólida, y pude finalmente acabar, defender y obtener mi doctorado. Eso fue hace ya 23 años... que han pasado en un abrir y cerrar de ojos!
Todays Macro Monday theme is "In Between" and I thought about the gaps at the back of a fountain pen nib.
I'm pretty computer literate, I can hack my way through all sorts of programming languages and tend to learn software applications fairly painlessly, but I still have a bit of an obsession in writing in fountain pen.
I find it steadies my thought process down and gives me thinking time. I even take great care in finding specific inks to write in.
Ranging from British Racing Green when I want to be patriotic through to my everyday ink that I have imported from Japan just because it writes smoothly and I love the colour.
I also think my pens will make a nice gift for my children when I'm too old to use them. They're my everyday pens so they've seen their share of action but I think if you have something beautifully made then it's to be used not stored and hidden away.
I'm just showing Robbie some neat things on his eMac. I think in this picture I was showing him a bit how to program in this awesome programming language Python (www.python.org). Later that I found perhaps the best text editor in the world. I love it. It's called TextMate and it can do everything (www.macromates.com).
probably the double entendre of the title isn't obvious for non-informatics, so i will try to give some hints: ;)
"life cycle" is a meta-concept in the computer sciences
"java" doesn't mean only coffee or an isle, but it's also the name of a program language
there is this phrase: "A programmer is a device for turning coffee into software" by Unknown(?)
(it's an assimilation of the original citation "A mathematician is a device for turning coffee into theorems" by Paul Erdos)
'the life cycle of java' On Black: small and large
(best Explore @102)
This incredible glass structure sits in front of what was The Sundowner Motel in Albuquerque. The Sundowner was built in 1960 during the heart of Route 66 tourism.
This glass structure casts amazing coloured shadows on the ground. I'd love it in my yard.
This motel was where Bill Gates and Paul Allen lived when they wrote a version of the programming language BASIC for the Altair 8800 computer in 1975. Their company Albuquerque based MITS later moved off to Seattle as they were unable to get funding from banks here in Albuquerque. The rest, as they say, is history.
The Sundowner Motel is now an apartment complex.
Cuthbert was a big fan of the Korn shell. These days he uses bash.
We're Here: Shells
The Kornshell: Command and Programming Language
by Morris I. Bolsky and David G. Korn
Haskell (named after one of my husband's favourite programming languages) is my only boy Pullip (aka, Taeyang), which as you can imagine makes him quite popular with my five girls :D
The poor dear has an extremely small wardrobe though, as it seems the stores here in Canada almost never sell Ken (doll) clothes any more (what happened to the good old days of the 80s and early 90s when nearly every toy and department store was overflowing with Barbie accessories and outfits?). Thus most of the time he remains in some of the pieces of his stock outfit, which he doesn't actually mind too much, as he's something of a proper gentleman with dapper taste in clothes.
A view down the side of one of the open atriums within Bell Works in Holmdel, NJ. Bell Works is the two million-square-foot building formerly known as "Bell Labs," where Bell employees did foundational research that led to discoveries and advancements in transistors, lasers, the Unix operating system, the C programming language, and CCD technologies. Several noble prizes were awarded to the teams who worked here back in the day.
Today, Bell Works is a re-imagined workspace, nicknamed the "Metroburb", featuring floors of private offices that overlook a giant atrium area full of specialty shops, restaurants, a basketball court, both Dental and Medical offices, an indoor virtual driving range, art gallery space, escape rooms, the Axelrod Performing Arts Academy, and the Holmdel branch of the Monmouth County Public Library. They are open to the public from 6:00 AM to Midnight each day, and it's a great place to walk some laps in bad weather in a safe, secure environment.
Panasonic Lumix ZS100 compact digital camera, 9mm (25mm equiv on 35mm), F7, ISO 320, 1/80th second.
In the distant future of year 2020 corporations rule supreme. Largest and most sinister of them all is the Empire Corp. A band of underground hackers and freedom fighters is fighting to bring down the world order and restore liberty to the people. Among them:
Lola - a girl from a wealthy family who managed to steal source code of the BLACK_STAR_ICE - the most deadly piece of software ever created
CY3ER - a hacker fluent in over six hundreds of programming languages
Bernard - a legendary hacker of old, a co-author of FORCE operating system
Luc - a street racer with big dreams
Hanzo & Chuck - pair of street samurais/mercs, veterans of Corporate Wars working for cartels
The 17th century French polymath, Blaise Pascal (1623-1662), is famous for several reasons. Taught by his father, he was a child prodigy who excelled in mathematics and the science of his day.
Amazingly enough, whilst still in his teens, he developed ideas about calculating machines and over three years produced 50 prototypes. He is rightly considered one of the fathers of mechanical calculators and his findings contributed eventually to the rise of modern computers. In fact one of the early computer programming languages was named after him: Pascal.
His major scientific discoveries, however, related to chemistry, particularly the study of fluids and the clarification of theories about gases under pressure and the vacuum. I can recall first learning about him in high school Chemistry - a Pascal is now a unit of pressure.
His major contributions to mathematics began when he was just 16, both in geometry and probability theory. In fact this latter theory led him to his primary reason for choosing to believe in God (though let me add, this is NOT why he believed in God - more of that in the next picture).
Pascal's Wager is another term that has entered our lexicon. In it Pascal argues that one must stake one's own life on the outcome of a coin toss.
Suppose the following (and I'll use terms current with the theology of his age):
You believe in God AND
{God exists} = Eternal Happiness or Heaven
{God does not exist} = Nothing
You do not believe in God AND
{God exists} = Eternal Damnation or Hell
{God does not exist} = Nothing
Now leaving aside the debate about Hell (in which most people in Pascal's age believed), you can see the conclusion. By staking your life on the fact that God exists you cannot lose the bet. And more than this, you have lived a virtuous life (supposing that you are true to the principles of your faith).
But this rational argument is not why Blaise Pascal believed in God. He also said, "The heart has its reasons which reason cannot tell." So to the next picture...
This model represents the logo of KotlinConf, a conference dedicated to Kotlin programming language.
While the logo as pictured on their homepage certainly has an origami-like appearance, I don’t know if it is based on an actual origami model or only made to look like one. Nonetheless, I was able to devise a way of folding exactly the same shape from a single square of paper (duo colored: blue on one side and orange on the other) without any cutting or glue. It was a fun challenge.
I wrote a little program in R (a programming language for statistics) to produce a homemade leaf (for nature enthusiasts in quarantine):
postscript("Homemade_Leaf.ps", width = 10, height = 10)
phi=seq(-pi,pi,pi/200)
### ???
r15=0.25*(1+cos(phi))*(1+cos(5*phi))+0.1*(1+cos(phi))*(1+cos(15*phi))+(1-0.2*cos(phi))*(1+cos(phi))
phi15=phi+0.025*((1+cos(phi))*(-sin(5*phi)-2*sin(15*phi)/5)+(1-cos(phi))*(-sin(phi)))
r15=r15/max(r15)
plot(r15*sin(phi15),r15*cos(phi15),type='l',xlim=c(-1,1),ylim=c(-0.3,1))
MAX=8
for(i in 1:MAX){
ri=r15*i/MAX
lines(ri*sin(phi15),ri*cos(phi15),col='gray')
}
for(j in 1:length(r15)){
vx=rep(0,MAX+1)
vy=rep(0,MAX+1)
for(i in 1:MAX){
rji=r15[j]*i/MAX
vx[i]=rji*sin(phi15[j])
vy[i]=rji*cos(phi15[j])
}
lines(vx,vy,col='darkgreen')
}
dev.off()
"Treinta y tres, tres tes"
"BINGO!!!!"
A quadtych to all of you :D
Today, studying Programming Languages (Lisp( :D ), Prolog( :@ ) and relative things( :AbsoluteShit: )...)
I hope I'll survive to tomorrow :D
PS: I know there are some cuts of color and things, but this was the intention, not to create a master master piece... ^^
I like playin round with colour schemes.
My favourites so far: The lime and white ones.
I'm going to build some of them for sure.
Things you shouldn't do while you are supposed to learn C programming language:
*) Try different colour schemes using a digital model of your MOC
*) Create a collage and publish it on flickr
Read the article on opensource.com
Education Reform: Insert your favorite “Wrath of Khan” joke blog title here
Design without debt: Five tools for designers on a budget
Scratch, a programming language for kids
Created by Jessica Duensing for opensource.com
Cobol was one of the first high-level programming languages. Condemned to disappear many years ago, it is still more current than ever. In the USA there is an urgent search by programmers in this language to keep alive the millionaire applications developed in this language, which is not resigned to death.
I love it, it was one of the most powerful and beautiful languages that I knew in my computer profession.
Kotlin is a programming language for the Java Virtual Machine (JVM) which is gaining in popularity. Having used it for some time, I'm quite happy about the results and I held a Kotlin birds-of-a-feather session at the recent Devoxx.PL conference in Kraków, Poland.
Since the logo is quite simple and based on geometric shapes representing just the letter K, I couldn't resist trying to design it in origami. Lacking duo paper with the right colors, I used a three--layer sandwich paper (Tant-tissue-Unryu).
In computer science, polymorphism is a programming language feature that allows values of different data types to be handled using a uniform interface. The concept of parametric polymorphism applies to both data types and functions. A function that can evaluate to or be applied to values of different types is known as a polymorphic function. A data type that can appear to be of a generalized type (e.g., a list with elements of arbitrary type) is designated polymorphic data type like the generalized type from which such specializations are made.
Source :Wikipedia
Shui gui (Chinese: 水鬼; pinyin: shuǐ guǐ; literally: "water ghost") are the spirits of people who drowned. They lurk in the place where they died, and drag unsuspecting victims underwater and drown them in order to take possession of their bodies. This process is known as ti shen (Chinese: 替身; pinyin: tì shēn; literally: "replace the body"), as the spirit will return to the world of the living in the victim's body while the victim's soul will take the former shui gui's place and constantly seek to seize possession of another living person's body. Ghosts that died of watery causes, they will haunt the pong, pool, lake, river or sea that they died or drown in. These ghosts are said to be waiting for their victims, and they can only be reincarnated if they can claim a victim, so, the victim would in turn claim the next and so on. These ghosts are said to be very afraid of Rain and Snow as it would come down on them like millions of needles poking and piercing through them. Unlike other ghosts, they are most active during Noon time, when the sun is directly above the sky.THE ANCIENT TAOIST PRINCIPLE OF RECIPROCITY ; IF YOU DO ME A FAVOR, I WILL RETURN A GREATER FAVOR TO YOU BUT IF YOU HURT ME, I WILL NOT OFFER THE OTHER CHEEK. IF YOU INSULT ME, I WILL PUNCH YOU; IF YOU PUNCH ME, I WILL BREAK YOUR ARM; IF YOU BREAK MY ARM, I WILL BREAK YOUR LEG; AND IF YOU BREAK MY LEG, I WILL PUT YOU IN A COFFIN Five Ghosts in Taoist Sorcery
Many Western Folks who studied Feng Shui or read up Feng Shui Materials would have come across "Five Ghosts". Many Chinese Folks may have heard about Five Ghosts but don't know who they are and what they are used for. The "Five Ghosts" found in Feng Shui Studies are totally different from the "Five Ghosts" used in Taoist Sorcery. Let's get started to go into details of Five Ghosts in Taoist Magic / Sorcery ...Mao Shan sect's Five Ghosts (茅山五鬼术): In the old records, Mao Shan Five Ghosts (also known as Five Spirits or Five Ghostly Generals) is known to have 2 groups of 五鬼. The 1st group of 五鬼 (primordial group) is recorded to consist of these 5 spirits:
Dou Ren (窦仁) Li Kai (李凯) Zhang Wu (张五) Shi Tai (十泰) Chu Mian (褚免)
Under the 茅山鳳陽派 (Feng Yang Sect), the concept of the Five Spirits are that they are spirit guardians governing the 5 cardinal directions and as named as:Central: Yao Bi Song (中央姚碧松) North: Lin Jing Zhong (北方林敬忠) West: Cai Zi Liang (西方蔡子良)
South: Zhang Zi Gui (南方张子贵) East: Chen Gui Xian (東方陈贵先) Many of the Taoist Black Magic to hex/ disturb/destroy the enemies will summon these 5 ghosts [Yao Bi Song (中央姚碧松),Lin Jing Zhong (北方林敬忠), Cai Zi Liang (西方蔡子良), Zhang Zi Gui (南方张子贵), Chen Gui Xian(東方陈贵先)]. Very often these names will be found written on Black Magic Talismans. In the folklore (民俗学)， the Five Spirits are another group consisting of the 5 colors corresponding to the Five Colors Charm (五色符): Black Ghost Xiao Zan (黑面獠牙鬼萧贊) White Ghost Guan Qian (玉/花面獠牙鬼管钱) Yellow Ghost Chang Yong (黄面獠牙鬼常拥) Red Ghost Jin Cai (紅面獠牙鬼晋財) Green Ghost Wei De (青面獠牙鬼魏得)
Although termed similarly as the Five Spirits, these 2 groups are essentially different in purpose. The 1st group mentioned (primordial group/five cardinal directions) is summoned to perform information seeking/checking and doing tasks without seeking "official permission" from the deities of the 3 realms and the Mao Shan practitioner's 祖师爷。 This is one of the Closed Door Magic Skills (内门术) that is closely guarded and strongly advised not to practise/use. As it is a Closed Door Secret Art (内门术), only disciples who has been inducted into the lineage officially (公入法门) can chant the incantations and invoke the Five Spirits. For the second group of Five Ghosts, they are summoned most frequently by spiritual mediums to assist devotees (民间通灵术) to gain wealth and fulfill requests. As these group of Five Ghosts are not enlightened beings, once a request is being fulfilled, the person who made the request will need to repay back at a certain "price" that usually he/she won't know till "the day is due". Till today, a lot of the unorthodox sects (even those who claimed that they are orthodox) still summon the 2 groups of Five Spirits to assist the devotees in their requests and to make things work in order to gain the trust of the devotees or followers. In Mao Shan Magic Skills (茅山术), there are a few sets of Secret Rituals(法门) to send off or disperse these 2 groups of Five Ghosts away. But once these Secret Rituals(法门) are invoked, the owner of the Five Spirits will receive repercussions in a way that he/she cannot withstand. MORE GROUPS OF FIVE GHOSTS IN TAOISM: Five Ghosts used in "FIVE GHOSTS TRANSFER WEALTH" MAGIC(五鬼运财法): They are wondering ghosts summoned from 5 directions. They are called:
Wealth Bringing Ghost Of East Direction (东方生财鬼 Wealth Bringing Ghost Of West Direction (西方生财鬼) Wealth Bringing Ghost of South Direction (南方生财鬼) Wealth Bringing Ghost of North Direction (北方生财鬼) Wealth Bringing Ghost of the Middle (中央生财鬼) More Information on "FIVE GHOSTS TRANSFER WEALTH" MAGIC(五鬼运财法):FIVE GHOSTS TRANSFER WEALTH Five Ghosts used in "FIVE GHOSTS CONFUSE THE HEAVEN" MAGIC(五鬼混天法): They are Ghost Officials of the Five Directional Spiritual Camps (五营官将）.Their names are Cao Shi(曹十) Zhang Si(张四) Li Jiu (李九)
Wang Ren (汪仁) Zhu Guang (朱光) Note: There are specific steps and proper procedures in drawing Taoist Talismans and also individual secret spells to chant while drawing them. Merely copying or photocopy the Talisman will not produce any Magical Power from it. Important: Do not seek help to cast Black Magic Spells onto anyone just for fun. Do not harm the innocent people. Make sure You can provide good enough valid reasons, even if You can afford to pay the high fee. Email/Enquiry/Fee/Pricing: super.kumantong@gmail.com The "Five Ghosts" found in Feng Shui Studies are totally different from the "Five Ghosts" used in Taoist Sorcery. Let's get started to go into details of Five Ghosts in Taoist Magic / Sorcery ... Mao Shan sect's Five Ghosts (茅山五鬼术):
In the old records, Mao Shan Five Ghosts (also known as Five Spirits or Five Ghostly Generals) is known to have 2 groups of 五鬼. The 1st group of 五鬼 (primordial group) is recorded to consist of these 5 spirits Dou Ren (窦仁) Li Kai (李凯) Zhang Wu (张五)
Shi Tai (十泰) Chu Mian (褚免) Under the 茅山鳳陽派 (Feng Yang Sect), the concept of the Five Spirits are that they are spirit guardians governing the 5 cardinal directions and as named as: Central: Yao Bi Song (中央姚碧松) North: Lin Jing Zhong (北方林敬忠)
West: Cai Zi Liang (西方蔡子良) South: Zhang Zi Gui (南方张子贵) East: Chen Gui Xian (東方陈贵先) Many of the Taoist Black Magic to hex/ disturb/destroy the enemies will summon these 5 ghosts [Yao Bi Song (中央姚碧松),Lin Jing Zhong (北方林敬忠), Cai Zi Liang (西方蔡子良), Zhang Zi Gui (南方张子贵), Chen Gui Xian(東方陈贵先)]. Very often these names will be found written on Black Magic Talismans. In the folklore (民俗学)， the Five Spirits are another group consisting of the 5 colors corresponding to the Five Colors Charm (五色符): Black Ghost Xiao Zan (黑面獠牙鬼萧贊) White Ghost Guan Qian (玉/花面獠牙鬼管钱) Yellow Ghost Chang Yong (黄面獠牙鬼常拥) Red Ghost Jin Cai (紅面獠牙鬼晋財) Green Ghost Wei De (青面獠牙鬼魏得) Although termed similarly as the Five Spirits, these 2 groups are essentially different in purpose. The 1st group mentioned (primordial group/five cardinal directions) is summoned to perform information seeking/checking and doing tasks without seeking "official permission" from the deities of the 3 realms and the Mao Shan practitioner's 祖师爷。 This is one of the Closed Door Magic Skills (内门术) that is closely guarded and strongly advised not to practise/use. As it is a Closed Door Secret Art (内门术), only disciples who has been inducted into the lineage officially (公入法门) can chant the incantations and invoke the Five Spirits. For the second group of Five Ghosts, they are summoned most frequently by spiritual mediums to assist devotees (民间通灵术) to gain wealth and fulfill requests As these group of Five Ghosts are not enlightened beings, once a request is being fulfilled, the person who made the request will need to repay back at a certain "price" that usually he/she won't know till "the day is due".
Till today, a lot of the unorthodox sects (even those who claimed that they are orthodox) still summon the 2 groups of Five Spirits to assist the devotees in their requests and to make things work in order to gain the trust of the devotees or followers. In Mao Shan Magic Skills (茅山术), there are a few sets of Secret Rituals(法门) to send off or disperse these 2 groups of Five Ghosts away. But once these Secret Rituals(法门) are invoked, the owner of the Five Spirits will receive repercussions in a way that he/she cannot withstand.
MORE GROUPS OF FIVE GHOSTS IN TAOISM: Five Ghosts used in "FIVE GHOSTS TRANSFER WEALTH" MAGIC(五鬼运财法): They are wondering ghosts summoned from 5 directions. They are called: Wealth Bringing Ghost Of East Direction (东方生财鬼) Wealth Bringing Ghost Of West Direction (西方生财鬼) Wealth Bringing Ghost of South Direction (南方生财鬼) Wealth Bringing Ghost of North Direction (北方生财鬼)
Wealth Bringing Ghost of the Middle (中央生财鬼) More Information on "FIVE GHOSTS TRANSFER WEALTH" MAGIC(五鬼运财法):FIVE GHOSTS TRANSFER WEALTH
Five Ghosts used in "FIVE GHOSTS CONFUSE THE HEAVEN" MAGIC(五鬼混天法):
They are Ghost Officials of the Five Directional Spiritual Camps (五营官将）.Their names are: Cao Shi(曹十) Zhang Si(张四) Li Jiu (李九) Wang Ren (汪仁) Zhu Guang (朱光) Note: There are specific steps and proper procedures in drawing Taoist Talismans and also individual secret spells to chant while drawing them. Merely copying or photocopy the Talisman will not produce any Magical Power from it. Important: Do not seek help to cast Black Magic Spells onto anyone just for fun. Do not harm the innocent people. Make sure You can provide good enough valid reasons, even if You can afford to pay the high fee.
Email/Enquiry/Fee/Pricing: super.kumantong@gmail.com Qixi Festival (七夕节) - The Chinese Valentine's Day YIN SHAN SECT FAST & FURIOUS (7 In 1) WEALTH BRINGING TALISMAN BEWARE: GONG TAU (降头) Is Real & Deadly
Duanwu Festival (端午节) - Best Day Of The Year To Create Super Powerful Taoist Talismans Chinese Feng Shui Compass - The Luo Pan (罗盘)
The Origin, History & Different Schools Of Feng Shui (风水),Supreme Oneness Divination - Tai Yi Shen Shu (太乙神数) Six Yang Waters Technique - Da Liu Ren (大六壬)The Ancient Chinese Art of Six Yang Waters Technique The literal English translation of the above term written in Chinese Da Liu Ren 大六壬, has no coherent insights to it, let alone does it convey its full meaning to the readers at large except to a few good men from the ancient past imperial astronomical bureau in traditional China. In some colloquial Chinese dialects, such as Cantonese, it renders a cursory view of a particular scheme of things to happen in some future scenarios or provides some perspectives of some kind of clandestine plots being work in progress and is not fathomable to the audience at large except by the “chosen few” who have deeply studied and internalize its cryptic coding technique or in the words of the digital alphabets era, loosely translated as the “programming language standards” use to make “forecasting scenarios” in ancient China. If any serious attempt of expressing its full sense and contextual meaning here would probably take up more descriptive content to qualify it as an all-inclusive title which would go against the intended norm, as a matter of brevity and succinctness. Da Liu Ren 大六壬, in Short, Liu Ren as an arcane art, only a selected few could have the privilege to acquire it. Amongst those well-versed with its deep and penetrating knowledge & insights of Liu Ren ( translated in vernacular English language as Six Yang Waters Technique ) were typically members of the ancient China Astronomical Bureau. Most ancient scholars/literati in traditional China found it extremely difficult in comprehending the passages in question, the associated cryptic comments and its technical explanations are rarely helpful to the uninitiated general readers. According to ancient Chinese records as extracted from Mengxi bitan 夢溪筆談 ( Dream Brook Essays ) in about year 1086, one of its sections on symbolic numerology ( xiang shu 象数 ) contains some of the knowledge developed by staff member of the Astronomical Bureau includes three passages concerning the Liu Ren 六壬 celestial chart system/technique that comes immediately after the first passage on the Dayan 大衍 calendar method of the Kaiyuan 開元reign-period in Tang dynasty China. The first of these three passages reads :The Ancient Chinese Art of Six Yang Waters Technique The literal English translation of the above term written in Chinese Da Liu Ren 大六壬, has no coherent insights to it, let alone does it convey its full meaning to the readers at large except to a few good men from the ancient past imperial astronomical bureau in traditional China. In some colloquial Chinese dialects, such as Cantonese, it renders a cursory view of a particular scheme of things to happen in some future scenarios or provides some perspectives of some kind of clandestine plots being work in progress and is not fathomable to the audience at large except by the “chosen few” who have deeply studied and internalize its cryptic coding technique or in the words of the digital alphabets era, loosely translated as the “programming language standards” use to make “forecasting scenarios” in ancient China. If any serious attempt of expressing its full sense and contextual meaning here would probably take up more descriptive content to qualify it as an all-inclusive title which would go against the intended norm, as a matter of brevity and succinctness. Da Liu Ren 大六壬, in Short, Liu Ren as an arcane art, only a selected few could have the privilege to acquire it. Amongst those well-versed with its deep and penetrating knowledge & insights of Liu Ren ( translated in vernacular English language as Six Yang Waters Technique ) were typically members of the ancient China Astronomical Bureau. Most ancient scholars/literati in traditional China found it extremely difficult in comprehending the passages in question, the associated cryptic comments and its technical explanations are rarely helpful to the uninitiated general readers. According to ancient Chinese records as extracted from Mengxi bitan 夢溪筆談 ( Dream Brook Essays ) in about year 1086, one of its sections on symbolic numerology ( xiang shu 象数 ) contains some of the knowledge developed by staff member of the Astronomical Bureau includes three passages concerning the Liu Ren 六壬 celestial chart system/technique that comes immediately after the first passage on the Dayan 大衍 calendar method of the Kaiyuan 開元reign-period in Tang dynasty China.
Donald Knuth, 1974 @ CHM
In this portrait of the artist as a young man, bit by bit he realizes that he is a prisoner, yet keeps a hand in both camps.
From comment stream below: I think art is the emergent beauty of computational complexity. We use a process of simple steps to create a pattern or resonant homology to the computational complexity of nature.
Natural beauty, whether fractal or evolved, it the product of iteration. We immediately recognize such constructs as complex and rich (a intricate shell, a landscape). A blank canvas in a gallery or a silent symphony is not art. The art there is at a higher level of abstraction, art in the process itself. The only reason people pay any attention at all to such things is that they represent a symbolic hack to the institution of art, a banner that we've been punked.
I took this photo to document the setup that I was using while I was working on my senior project in college. It was a little table-top particle physics project, using a detector (just off camera to the right) not built by me. I set up the data acquisition chain in the lab and wrote some software to run it. (Side note: that was implemented in LabView, which I haven’t used since. LabView is an interesting concept that lets you write software graphically, instead of in a traditional programming language. I remember waking up that semester in the middle of trippy dreams involving that programming language.)
Most of the electronics boards here were, I think, basically spare parts that my advisor (the late Prof Ulrich Becker) had brought back from CERN. I think some of it was stuff that had gone bad and thus been tossed. He would take the boards to his lab bench and figure out which solder joint had failed or whatever and fix it. (It may have also just been surplus.)
(For the curious, the bottom rack is a CAMAC crate and the rack above it is a NIM crate.)
The most interesting artifact here is the module on the very top, which isn’t connected to anything in this photo but worked just fine and was used for manual testing. It was a simple pulse counter, old enough that the display used Nixie tubes ( www.youtube.com/watch?v=wXBK__h6MY0 ). Unfortunately I do not have a picture of it powered on. Those Nixie tubes were so cool. The hand lettering in orange paint says “KF GRP”. This was a reference to the Kendall-Friedman Group. Henry Kendall and Jerry Friedman were the MIT part of the MIT-SLAC deep inelastic scattering experiments that discovered the quark structure of the proton in the late 60s and early 70s. Kendall, Friedman, and Richard Taylor won the Nobel Prize for this in 1990. So I always assumed that this was surplus left over from that era, although that is an assumption.
Henry Kendall assisted as an instructor for a small lab component of a class I had as a freshman in the fall of 1998. (Physics majors don’t take a “real” lab class until junior year, but this was some very light introduction to the lab environment that was folded into another class.) I distinctly remember him gently scolding me for showing too many significant digits in my numerical results. It’s a lesson I never forgot! Only a month or two later, he tragically died in a diving accident in Florida. I saw Friedman give a lecture at MIT at some point. I don’t recall if I ever encountered Taylor when I was at SLAC.
This lab was in Building 44 — the MIT Cyclotron building, which has since been demolished. I must have an old film picture of the cyclotron somewhere. I should see if I can find one. (The cyclotron dated to about 1940 but I believe the building was newer [ physicstoday.scitation.org/doi/10.1063/1.3058412 ].)
The Atari 400 and Atari 800 were released in 1979. The 800 was the higher-end model and the one I grew up with.
I spent many afternoons and weekends with this machine, typing in BASIC programs from magazines and playing games. BASIC was the first programming language I learned, and I learned it on this machine.
10 PRINT "HELLO WORLD"
20 GOTO 10
Writing a book here: open.spotify.com/show/3mMrq70ofFvPputOjQIiGU?si=kwclM6f8Q...
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Siri-Stroustrup Software Engineer-cat sez:
"Eurekat! I has just invented a new programming language called CAT++
It has classes and objects and also has Inheritance Polymorphism that allows it to create default objects such as Meeces, Fishes and Birdies - Yum Yum!
Wait a minute though - does that mean that I could actually belong to a parent class called Mousie that forces me to inherit the same member functions as a mousie has? HIIIIILPPPPPPP............!
An Instantiation is a concept in Object Oriented Programming (OOP) - You can create an object with a set of properties that are defined by a Class in a program. When you create a member of a class, it is the instantiation (i.e. realization or creation) of a specific object of that class.
Object (computer science)
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
In computer science, an object is a location in memory having a value and possibly referenced by an identifier. An object can be a variable, a data structure, or a function. In the class-based object-oriented programming paradigm, "object" refers to a particular instance of a class where the object can be a combination of variables, functions, and data structures. In relational database management, an object can be a table or column, or an association between data and a database entity (such as relating a person's age to a specific person).[1]
Contents [hide]
1 Object-based languages
2 Object-oriented programming
3 Specialized objects
4 Distributed objects
5 Objects and the Semantic Web
6 See also
7 References
8 External links
Object-based languages[edit]
Main article: Object-based language
An important distinction in programming languages is the difference between an object-oriented language and an object-based language. A language is usually considered object-based if it includes the basic capabilities for an object: identity, properties, and attributes. A language is considered object-oriented if it is object-based and also has the capability of polymorphism and inheritance. Polymorphism refers to the ability to overload the name of a function with multiple behaviors based on which object(s) are passed to it. Conventional message passing discriminates only on the first object and considers that to be "sending a message" to that object. However, some OOP languages such as Flavors and the Common Lisp Object System (CLOS) enable discriminating on more than the first parameter of the function.[2] Inheritance is the ability to subclass an object class, to create a new class that is a subclass of an existing one and inherits all the data constraints and behaviors of its parents but also changes one or more of them.[3][4]
Object-oriented programming[edit]
Main article: Object-oriented programming
Object-Oriented programming is an approach to designing modular reusable software systems. The object-oriented approach is fundamentally a modelling approach.[5] The object-oriented approach is an evolution of good design practices that go back to the very beginning of computer programming. Object-orientation is simply the logical extension of older techniques such as structured programming and abstract data types. An object is an abstract data type with the addition of polymorphism and inheritance.
Rather than structure programs as code and data an object-oriented system integrates the two using the concept of an "object". An object has state (data) and behavior (code). Objects can correspond to things found in the real world. So for example, a graphics program will have objects such as circle, square, menu. An online shopping system will have objects such as shopping cart, customer, product,. The shopping system will support behaviors such as place order, make payment, and offer discount. The objects are designed as class hierarchies. So for example with the shopping system there might be high level classes such as electronics product, kitchen product, and book. There may be further refinements for example under electronic products: CD Player, DVD player, etc. These classes and subclasses correspond to sets and subsets in mathematical logic.[6][7]
Specialized objects[edit]
An important concept for objects is the design pattern. A design pattern provides a reusable template to address a common problem. The following object descriptions are examples of some of the most common design patterns for objects.[8]
Function object: an object with a single method (in C++, this method would be the function operator, "operator()") that acts much like a function (like a C/C++ pointer to a function).
Immutable object: an object set up with a fixed state at creation time and which does not change afterward.
First-class object: an object that can be used without restriction.
Container: an object that can contain other objects.
Factory object: an object whose purpose is to create other objects.
Metaobject: an object from which other objects can be created (Compare with class, which is not necessarily an object)
Prototype: a specialized metaobject from which other objects can be created by copying
God object: an object that knows too much or does too much. The God object is an example of an anti-pattern.
Singleton object: An object that is the only instance of its class during the lifetime of the program.
Filter object
Distributed objects[edit]
Main article: Distributed object
The object-oriented approach is not just a programming model. It can be used equally well as an interface definition language for distributed systems. The objects in a distributed computing model tend to be larger grained, longer lasting, and more service-oriented than programming objects.
A standard method to package distributed objects is via an Interface Definition Language (IDL). An IDL shields the client of all of the details of the distributed server object. Details such as which computer the object resides on, what programming language it uses, what operating system, and other platform specific issues. The IDL is also usually part of a distributed environment that provides services such as transactions and persistence to all objects in a uniform manner. Two of the most popular standards for distributed objects are the Object Management Group's CORBA standard and Microsoft's DCOM.[9]
In addition to distributed objects, a number of other extensions to the basic concept of an object have been proposed to enable distributed computing:
Protocol objects are components of a protocol stack that enclose network communication within an object-oriented interface.
Replicated objects are groups of distributed objects (called replicas) that run a distributed multi-party protocol to achieve high consistency between their internal states, and that respond to requests in a coordinated way. Examples include fault-tolerant CORBA objects.
Live distributed objects (or simply live objects)[10] generalize the replicated object concept to groups of replicas that might internally use any distributed protocol, perhaps resulting in only a weak consistency between their local states.
Some of these extensions, such as distributed objects and protocol objects, are domain-specific terms for special types of "ordinary" objects used in a certain context (such as remote invocation or protocol composition). Others, such as replicated objects and live distributed objects, are more non-standard, in that they abandon the usual case that an object resides in a single location at a time, and apply the concept to groups of entities (replicas) that might span across multiple locations, might have only weakly consistent state, and whose membership might dynamically change.
Objects and the Semantic Web[edit]
The Semantic Web is essentially a distributed objects framework. Two key technologies in the Semantic Web are the Web Ontology Language (OWL) and the Resource Description Framework (RDF). RDF provides the capability to define basic objects—names, properties, attributes, relations—that are accessible via the Internet. OWL adds a richer object model, based on set theory, that provides additional modeling capabilities such as multiple inheritance.
OWL objects are not like standard large grained distributed objects accessed via an Interface Definition Language. Such an approach would not be appropriate for the Internet because the Internet is constantly evolving and standardization on one set of interfaces is difficult to achieve. OWL objects tend to be similar to the kind of objects used to define application domain models in programming languages such as Java and C++.
However, there are important distinctions between OWL objects and traditional object-oriented programming objects. Where as traditional objects get compiled into static hierarchies usually with single inheritance, OWL objects are dynamic. An OWL object can change its structure at run time and can become an instance of new or different classes.
Another critical difference is the way the model treats information that is currently not in the system. Programming objects and most database systems use the "closed-world assumption". If a fact is not known to the system that fact is assumed to be false. Semantic Web objects use the open world assumption, a statement is only considered false if there is actual relevant information that it is false, otherwise it is assumed to be unknown, neither true nor false.
OWL objects are actually most like objects in artificial intelligence frame languages such as KL-ONE and Loom.
The following table contrasts traditional objects from Object-Oriented programming languages such as Java or C++ with Semantic Web Objects:[11][12]
OOP ObjectsSemantic Web Objects
Classes are regarded as types for instances.Classes are regarded as sets of individuals.
Instances can not change their type at runtime.Class membership may change at runtime.
The list of classes is fully known at compile-time and cannot change after that.Classes can be created and changed at runtime.
Compilers are used at build-time. Compile-time errors indicate problems.Reasoners can be used for classification and consistency checking at runtime or build-time.
Classes encode much of their meaning and behavior through imperative functions and methods.Classes make their meaning explicit in terms of OWL statements. No imperative code can be attached.
Instances are anonymous insofar that they cannot easily be addressed from outside of an executing program.All named RDF and OWL resources have a unique URI under which they can be referenced.
Closed world: If there is not enough information to prove a statement true, then it is assumed to be false.Open world: If there is not enough information to prove a statement true, then it may be true or false.[13]
Children and teens have an opportunity to explore programming using the Finch robots and the Scratch programming language. The maze was too tough to master in a single 90-minute session, so the 1st-place trophy will be reserved for next time. (But everyone got some leftover easter candy as a consolation prize.)
This project is made possible by a grant from the U.S. Institute of Museum and Library Services and Texas State Library and Archives Commission (2016).
A blockchain, originally block chain, is a continuously growing list of records, called blocks, which are linked and secured using cryptography. Each block typically contains a cryptographic hash of the previous block, a timestamp and transaction data. By design, a blockchain is inherently resistant to modification of the data. It is "an open, distributed ledger that can record transactions between two parties efficiently and in a verifiable and permanent way". For use as a distributed ledger, a blockchain is typically managed by a peer-to-peer network collectively adhering to a protocol for validating new blocks. Once recorded, the data in any given block cannot be altered retroactively without the alteration of all subsequent blocks, which requires collusion of the network majority. Blockchains are secure by design and are an example of a distributed computing system with high Byzantine fault tolerance. Decentralized consensus has therefore been achieved with a blockchain. This makes blockchains potentially suitable for the recording of events, medical records, and other records management activities, such as identity management,transaction processing, documenting provenance, food traceability or voting. Blockchain was invented by Satoshi Nakamoto in 2008 for use in the cryptocurrency bitcoin, as its public transaction ledger.The first work on a cryptographically secured chain of blocks was described in 1991 by Stuart Haber and W. Scott Stornetta.In 1992, Bayer, Haber and Stornetta incorporated Merkle trees to the design, which improved its efficiency by allowing several documents to be collected into one block.In 2002, David Mazières and Dennis Shasha proposed a network file system with decentralized trust: writers to the file system trust one another but not the network in between; they achieve file system integrity by writing signed commits to a shared, append-only signature chain that captures the root of the file system (which in turn is a Merkle Tree). This system can be viewed as a proto-blockchain in which all authorized clients can always write, whereas, in modern blockchains, a client who solves a cryptographic puzzle can write one block.[citation needed] In 2005, Nick Szabo proposed a blockchain-like system for decentralized property titles and his bit gold payment system that utilised chained proof-of-work and timestamping. However, Szabo's method of double-spending protection was vulnerable to Sybil attacks. The first blockchain was conceptualised by a person (or group of people) known as Satoshi Nakamoto in 2008. It was implemented the following year by Nakamoto as a core component of the cryptocurrency bitcoin, where it serves as the public ledger for all transactions on the network.Through the use of a blockchain, bitcoin became the first digital currency to solve the double spending problem without requiring a trusted authority and has been the inspiration for many additional applications. In August 2014, the bitcoin blockchain file size, containing records of all transactions that have occurred on the network, reached 20GB (gigabytes). In January 2015, the size had grown to almost 30GB, and from January 2016 to January 2017, the bitcoin blockchain grew from 50GB to 100GB in size.The words block and chain were used separately in Satoshi Nakamoto's original paper, but were eventually popularized as a single word, blockchain, by 2016. The term blockchain 2.0 refers to new applications of the distributed blockchain database, first emerging in 2014. The Economist described one implementation of this second-generation programmable blockchain as coming with "a programming language that allows users to write more sophisticated smart contracts, thus creating invoices that pay themselves when a shipment arrives or share certificates which automatically send their owners dividends if profits reach a certain level". Blockchain 2.0 technologies go beyond transactions and enable "exchange of value without powerful intermediaries acting as arbiters of money and information". They are expected to enable excluded people to enter the global economy, protect the privacy of participants, allow people to "monetize their own information", and provide the capability to ensure creators are compensated for their intellectual property. Second-generation blockchain technology makes it possible to store an individual's "persistent digital ID and persona" and are providing an avenue to help solve the problem of social inequality by "potentially changing the way wealth is distributed".:14–15 As of 2016, blockchain 2.0 implementations continue to require an off-chain oracle to access any "external data or events based on time or market conditions [that need] to interact with the blockchain". In 2016, the central securities depository of the Russian Federation (NSD) announced a pilot project, based on the Nxt blockchain 2.0 platform, that would explore the use of blockchain-based automated voting systems. IBM opened a blockchain innovation research center in Singapore in July 2016. A working group for the World Economic Forum met in November 2016 to discuss the development of governance models related to blockchain.[28] According to Accenture, an application of the diffusion of innovations theory suggests that blockchains attained a 13.5% adoption rate within financial services in 2016, therefore reaching the early adopters phase. Industry trade groups joined to create the Global Blockchain Forum in 2016, an initiative of the Chamber of Digital Commerce. A blockchain is a decentralized, distributed and public digital ledger that is used to record transactions across many computers so that the record cannot be altered retroactively without the alteration of all subsequent blocks and the collusion of the network. This allows the participants to verify and audit transactions inexpensively. A blockchain database is managed autonomously using a peer-to-peer network and a distributed timestamping server. They are authenticated by mass collaboration powered by collective self-interests.The result is a robust workflow where participants' uncertainty regarding data security is marginal. The use of a blockchain removes the characteristic of infinite reproducibility from a digital asset. It confirms that each unit of value was transferred only once, solving the long-standing problem of double spending. Blockchains have been described as a value-exchange protocol. This blockchain-based exchange of value can be completed more quickly, more safely and more cheaply than with traditional systems. A blockchain can assign title rights because it provides a record that compels offer and acceptance.
Blocks
Blocks hold batches of valid transactions that are hashed and encoded into a Merkle tree. Each block includes the cryptographic hash of the prior block in the blockchain, linking the two. The linked blocks form a chain.This iterative process confirms the integrity of the previous block, all the way back to the original genesis block.
Sometimes separate blocks can be produced concurrently, creating a temporary fork. In addition to a secure hash-based history, any blockchain has a specified algorithm for scoring different versions of the history so that one with a higher value can be selected over others. Blocks not selected for inclusion in the chain are called orphan blocks. Peers supporting the database have different versions of the history from time to time. They only keep the highest-scoring version of the database known to them. Whenever a peer receives a higher-scoring version (usually the old version with a single new block added) they extend or overwrite their own database and retransmit the improvement to their peers. There is never an absolute guarantee that any particular entry will remain in the best version of the history forever. Because blockchains are typically built to add the score of new blocks onto old blocks and because there are incentives to work only on extending with new blocks rather than overwriting old blocks, the probability of an entry becoming superseded goes down exponentially as more blocks are built on top of it, eventually becoming very low. For example, in a blockchain using the proof-of-work system, the chain with the most cumulative proof-of-work is always considered the valid one by the network. There are a number of methods that can be used to demonstrate a sufficient level of computation. Within a blockchain the computation is carried out redundantly rather than in the traditional segregated and parallel manner.
The block time is the average time it takes for the network to generate one extra block in the blockchain. Some blockchains create a new block as frequently as every five seconds. By the time of block completion, the included data becomes verifiable. In cryptocurrency, this is practically when the money transaction takes place, so a shorter block time means faster transactions. The block time for Ethereum is set to between 14 and 15 seconds, while for bitcoin it is 10 minutes.Express. Why is Ripple XRP falling today? Why is it crashing in value?Ripple price: Why is Ripple XRP falling today? Why is it… 'Ripple is first in line' - CEO reveals next cryptocurrency to catch up with bitcoin
'Ripple is first in line' - CEO reveals next cryptocurrency to…
Ripple price news: Why is XRP falling so fast? What's happening to Ripple?Ripple price news: Why is XRP falling so fast? What's happening… Bitcoin price BOOST: Big investors are FINALLY realising Bitcoin is GAME-CHANGING Bitcoin price WARNING: CEO says cryptocurrency has 'NOTHING to do with the real economy' BITCOIN has come under fire from the CEO of Euronext as the financial expert claimed the cryptocurrency "has nothing to do with the real economy".
Bitcoin price suffered a massive plunge as the cryptocurrency reached the value of $9,114.56, according to Coindesk at 10:37 pm on February. As the crypto-craze started to die down, Euronext CEO Stéphane Boujnah claims bitcoin cannot even be classified as a cryptocurrency. Speaking on Bloomberg, Mr Boujnah said Euronext will never open a bitcoin market. He said: "We will not create a bitcoin market because the mandate of Euronext is to power Pan-European capital markets to finance the real economy and bitcoin has nothing to do with the real economy. "Bitcoin has a lot to do with bitcoin. And we believe bitcoin is not a cryptocurrency.
"Bitcoin is at best a crypto asset. All currencies are assets but not all assets are currencies. "Clearly, bitcoin today is just like a piece of art, or just like a diamond, just like a Pokemon card.
"It can be anything to capture value but today people buy it because it goes up and because it’s not as serious and transparent as a lot of assets. "So great, good luck. Like any emerging assets, it’s very fancy, which is great, but this is not our mandate. "Our mandate is to be the place regulated, transparent, open, reliable. It’s not our mandate to be part of this new game in town." Despite the rollercoaster few months suffered by the crypto mania, bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies such as Ripple and ethereum still benefit from a "growing" appreciation among institutional investors, according to Dr Garrick Hileman, from the Cambridge University Centre for Alternative Finance.In an exclusive interview with Express.co.uk, Dr Hileman said: "Any breakthrough technology, and bitcoin and blockchain, are certainly breakthrough technologies, hype often outpaces the reality. “In terms of both of how mature the technology is, the rates of adoption. “We’ve seen this before with bitcoin and we’ve seen the price shoot up first in late 2013 when it first entered the mainstream public consciousness. “The price subsequently crashed 85 percent as security at a major exchange broke down and bitcoin’s were stolen. “So we’ve seen this kind of story repeat where bitcoin rises, gets hyped and then there’s a crash.” This section is transcluded from Fork (blockchain). A hard fork occurs when a blockchain splits into two incompatible separate chains. This is a consequence of the use of two incompatible sets of rules trying to govern the system. For example, Ethereum has hard-forked to "make whole" the investors in The DAO, which had been hacked by exploiting a vulnerability in its code. In 2014 the Nxt community was asked to consider a hard fork that would have led to a rollback of the blockchain records to mitigate the effects of a theft of 50 million NXT from a major cryptocurrency exchange. The hard fork proposal was rejected, and some of the funds were recovered after negotiations and ransom payment.
Decentralization
By storing data across its network, the blockchain eliminates the risks that come with data being held centrally. The decentralized blockchain may use ad-hoc message passing and distributed networking. Its network lacks centralized points of vulnerability that computer crackers can exploit; likewise, it has no central point of failure. Blockchain security methods include the use of public-key cryptography. A public key (a long, random-looking string of numbers) is an address on the blockchain. Value tokens sent across the network are recorded as belonging to that address. A private key is like a password that gives its owner access to their digital assets or the means to otherwise interact with the various capabilities that blockchains now support. Data stored on the blockchain is generally considered incorruptible. This is where blockchain has its advantage. While centralized data is more controllable, information and data manipulation are common. By decentralizing it, blockchain makes data transparent to everyone involved. Every node in a decentralized system has a copy of the blockchain. Data quality is maintained by massive database replication[9] and computational trust. No centralized "official" copy exists and no user is "trusted" more than any other. Transactions are broadcast to the network using software. Messages are delivered on a best-effort basis. Mining nodes validate transactions, add them to the block they are building, and then broadcast the completed block to other nodes. Blockchains use various time-stamping schemes, such as proof-of-work, to serialize changes. Alternate consensus methods include proof-of-stake. Growth of a decentralized blockchain is accompanied by the risk of node centralization because the computer resources required to process larger amounts of data become more expensive.
Openness
Open blockchains are more user-friendly than some traditional ownership records, which, while open to the public, still require physical access to view. Because all early blockchains were permissionless, controversy has arisen over the blockchain definition. An issue in this ongoing debate is whether a private system with verifiers tasked and authorized (permissioned) by a central authority should be considered a blockchain. Proponents of permissioned or private chains argue that the term "blockchain" may be applied to any data structure that batches data into time-stamped blocks. These blockchains serve as a distributed version of multiversion concurrency control (MVCC) in databases. Just as MVCC prevents two transactions from concurrently modifying a single object in a database, blockchains prevent two transactions from spending the same single output in a blockchain.[24]:30–31 Opponents say that permissioned systems resemble traditional corporate databases, not supporting decentralized data verification, and that such systems are not hardened against operator tampering and revision. Nikolai Hampton of Computerworld said that "many in-house blockchain solutions will be nothing more than cumbersome databases."Business analysts Don Tapscott and Alex Tapscott define blockchain as a distributed ledger or database open to anyone.
Permissionless
The great advantage to an open, permissionless, or public, blockchain network is that guarding against bad actors is not required and no access control is needed.This means that applications can be added to the network without the approval or trust of others, using the blockchain as a transport layer.
Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies currently secure their blockchain by requiring new entries including a proof of work. To prolong the blockchain, bitcoin uses Hashcash puzzles developed by Adam Back in the 1990s.
Financial companies have not prioritised decentralized blockchains. In 2016, venture capital investment for blockchain related projects was weakening in the USA but increasing in China. Bitcoin and many other cryptocurrencies use open (public) blockchains. As of January 2018, bitcoin has the highest market capitalization.
Permissioned (private) blockchain
Permissioned blockchains use an access control layer to govern who has access to the network. In contrast to public blockchain networks, validators on private blockchain networks are vetted by the network owner. They do not rely on anonymous nodes to validate transactions nor do they benefit from the network effect. Permissioned blockchains can also go by the name of 'consortium' or 'hybrid' blockchains.
The New York Times noted in both 2016 and 2017 that many corporations are using blockchain networks "with private blockchains, independent of the public system."
Disadvantages
Nikolai Hampton pointed out in Computerworld that "There is also no need for a "51 percent" attack on a private blockchain, as the private blockchain (most likely) already controls 100 percent of all block creation resources. If you could attack or damage the blockchain creation tools on a private corporate server, you could effectively control 100 percent of their network and alter transactions however you wished." This has a set of particularly profound adverse implications during a financial crisis or debt crisis like the financial crisis of 2007–08, where politically powerful actors may make decisions that favor some groups at the expense of others.[citation needed] and "the bitcoin blockchain is protected by the massive group mining effort. It's unlikely that any private blockchain will try to protect records using gigawatts of computing power — it's time consuming and expensive."He also said, "Within a private blockchain there is also no 'race'; there's no incentive to use more power or discover blocks faster than competitors. This means that many in-house blockchain solutions will be nothing more than cumbersome databases."
Uses
Blockchain technology can be integrated into multiple areas. The primary use of blockchains today is as a distributed ledger for cryptocurrencies, most notably bitcoin.While a few central banks, in countries such as China, United States, Sweden, Singapore, South Africa and England are studying issuance of a Central Bank Issued Cryptocurrency (CICC), none have done so thus far.
General potentials
Blockchain technology has a large potential to transform business operating models in the long term. Blockchain distributed ledger technology is more a foundational technology—with the potential to create new foundations for global economic and social systems—than a disruptive technology, which typically "attack a traditional business model with a lower-cost solution and overtake incumbent firms quickly".Even so, there are a few operational products maturing from proof of concept by late 2016.The use of blockchains promises to bring significant efficiencies to global supply chains, financial transactions, asset ledgers and decentralized social networking.
As of 2016, some observers remain skeptical. Steve Wilson, of Constellation Research, believes the technology has been hyped with unrealistic claims.To mitigate risk businesses are reluctant to place blockchain at the core of the business structure.
This means specific blockchain applications may be a disruptive innovation, because substantially lower-cost solutions can be instantiated, which can disrupt existing business models. Blockchain protocols facilitate businesses to use new methods of processing digital transactions.[68] Examples include a payment system and digital currency, facilitating crowdsales, or implementing prediction markets and generic governance tools.
Blockchains alleviate the need for a trust service provider and are predicted to result in less capital being tied up in disputes. Blockchains have the potential to reduce systemic risk and financial fraud. They automate processes that were previously time-consuming and done manually, such as the incorporation of businesses.In theory, it would be possible to collect taxes, conduct conveyancing and provide risk management with blockchains.
As a distributed ledger, blockchain reduces the costs involved in verifying transactions, and by removing the need for trusted "third-parties" such as banks to complete transactions, the technology also lowers the cost of networking, therefore allowing several applications.
Starting with a strong focus on financial applications, blockchain technology is extending to activities including decentralized applications and collaborative organizations that eliminate a middleman.
Land registration
"Land is a financial source, if people can prove they own it, they can borrow against it."
Emmanuel Noah, CEO of Ghanian startup BenBen, New York Observer
Frameworks and trials such as the one at the Sweden Land Registry aim to demonstrate the effectiveness of the blockchain at speeding land sale deals.The Republic of Georgia is piloting a blockchain-based property registry.The Ethical and Fair Creators Association uses blockchain to help startups protect their authentic ideas.
The Government of India is fighting land fraud with the help of a blockchain.
In October 2017, one of the first international property transactions was completed successfully using a blockchain-based smart contract.
In the first half of 2018, an experiment will be conducted on the use of blocking technology to monitor the reliability of the Unified State Real Estate Register (USRER) data in the territory of Moscow.
The Big Four
Each of the Big Four accounting firms is testing blockchain technologies in various formats. Ernst & Young has provided cryptocurrency wallets to all (Swiss) employees,has installed a bitcoin ATM in their office in Switzerland, and accepts bitcoin as payment for all its consulting services. Marcel Stalder, CEO of Ernst & Young Switzerland, stated, "We don't only want to talk about digitalization, but also actively drive this process together with our employees and our clients. It is important to us that everybody gets on board and prepares themselves for the revolution set to take place in the business world through blockchains, [to] smart contracts and digital currencies."PwC, Deloitte, and KPMG have taken a different path from Ernst & Young and are all testing private blockchains.
Smart contracts
Blockchain-based smart contracts are contracts that can be partially or fully executed or enforced without human interaction.One of the main objectives of a smart contract is automated escrow. The IMF believes blockchains could reduce moral hazards and optimize the use of contracts in general.Due to the lack of widespread use their legal status is unclear.
Some blockchain implementations could enable the coding of contracts that will execute when specified conditions are met. A blockchain smart contract would be enabled by extensible programming instructions that define and execute an agreement.For example, Ethereum Solidity is an open-source blockchain project that was built specifically to realize this possibility by implementing a Turing-complete programming language capability to implement such contracts.
Nonprofit organizations
Level One Project from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation aims to use blockchain technology to help the two billion people worldwide who lack bank accounts.
Building Blocks project from the U.N.'s World Food Programme (WFP) aims to make WFP's growing cash-based transfer operations faster, cheaper, and more secure. Building Blocks commenced field pilots in Pakistan in January 2017 that will continue throughout spring.
Decentralized networks
The Backfeed project develops a distributed governance system for blockchain-based applications allowing for the collaborative creation and distribution of value in spontaneously emerging networks of peers.[88][89]
The Alexandria project is a blockchain-based Decentralized Library.
Tezos is a blockchain project that governs itself by voting of its token holders. Bitcoin blockchain performs as a cryptocurrency and payment system. Ethereum blockchain added smart contract system on top of a blockchain. Tezos blockchain will add an autonomy system – a decentralized code Development function on top of both bitcoin and Ethereum blockchains.
Governments and national currencies
The director of the Office of IT Schedule Contract Operations at the US General Services Administration, Mr. Jose Arrieta, disclosed at the 20 Sep ACT-IAC (American Council for Technology and Industry Advisory Council) Forum that its organization is using blockchain distributed ledger technology to speed up the FASt Lane process for IT Schedule 70 contracts through automation. Two companies, United Solutions (prime contractor) and Sapient Consulting (subcontractor) are developing for FASt Lane a prototype to automate and shorten the time required to perform the contract review process.
The Commercial Customs Operations Advisory Committee, a subcommittee of the U.S. Customs and Border Protection, is working on finding practical ways Blockchain could be implemented in its duties.[1]
Companies have supposedly been suggesting blockchain-based currency solutions in the following two countries:
e-Dinar, Tunisia's national currency, was the first state currency using blockchain technology.
eCFA is Senegal's blockchain-based national digital currency.
Some countries, especially Australia, are providing keynote participation in identify the various technical issues associated with developing, governing and using blockchains:
In April 2016 Standards Australia submitted a New Field of Technical Activity (NFTA) proposal on behalf of Australia for the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) to consider developing standards to support blockchain technology. The proposal for an NFTA to the ISO was intended to establish a new ISO technical committee for blockchain. The new committee would be responsible for supporting innovation and competition by covering blockchain standards topics including interoperability, terminology, privacy, security and auditing.[99] There have been several media releases[100] supporting blockchain integration to Australian businesses.
Banks
Don Tapscott conducted a two-year research project exploring how blockchain technology can securely move and store host "money, titles, deeds, music, art, scientific discoveries, intellectual property, and even votes".. Furthermore, major portions of the financial industry are implementing distributed ledgers for use in banking, and according to a September 2016 IBM study, this is occurring faster than expected.
Banks are interested in this technology because it has potential to speed up back office settlement systems.
Banks such as UBS are opening new research labs dedicated to blockchain technology in order to explore how blockchain can be used in financial services to increase efficiency and reduce costs.
Russia has officially completed its first government-level blockchain implementation. The state-run bank Sberbank announced 20 December 2017 that it is partnering with Russia's Federal Antimonopoly Service (FAS) to implement document transfer and storage via blockchain.
Deloitte and ConsenSys announced plans in 2016 to create a digital bank called Project ConsenSys.
R3 connects 42 banks to distributed ledgers built by Ethereum, Chain.com, Intel, IBM and Monax.
A Swiss industry consortium, including Swisscom, the Zurich Cantonal Bank and the Swiss stock exchange, is prototyping over-the-counter asset trading on a blockchain-based Ethereum technology.
Other financial companies.
The credit and debits payments company MasterCard has added three blockchain-based APIs for programmers to use in developing both person-to-person (P2P) and business-to-business (B2B) payment systems.
CLS Group is using blockchain technology to expand the number of currency trade deals it can settle.
VISA payment systems, Mastercard,Unionpay and SWIFT have announced the development and plans for using blockchain technology.
Prime Shipping Foundation is using blockchain technology to address issues related to the payments in the shipping industry.
Other uses
Blockchain technology can be used to create a permanent, public, transparent ledger system for compiling data on sales, storing rights data by authenticating copyright registration,[116] and tracking digital use and payments to content creators, such as musicians. In 2017, IBM partnered with ASCAP and PRS for Music to adopt blockchain technology in music distribution.Imogen Heap's Mycelia service, which allows managers to use a blockchain for tracking high-value parts moving through a supply chain, was launched as a concept in July 2016. Everledger is one of the inaugural clients of IBM's blockchain-based tracking service.
Kodak announced plans in 2018 to launch a digital token system for photograph copyright recording.
Another example where smart contracts are used is in the music industry. Every time a dj mix is played, the smart contracts attached to the dj mix pays the artists almost instantly.
An application has been suggested for securing the spectrum sharing for wireless networks.
New distribution methods are available for the insurance industry such as peer-to-peer insurance, parametric insurance and microinsurance following the adoption of blockchain.The sharing economy and IoT are also set to benefit from blockchains because they involve many collaborating peers.Online voting is another application of the blockchain. Blockchains are being used to develop information systems for medical records, which increases interoperability. In theory, legacy disparate systems can be completely replaced by blockchains.Blockchains are being developed for data storage, publishing texts and identifying the origin of digital art. Blockchains facilitate users could take ownership of game assets (digital assets),an example of this is Cryptokitties.
Notable non-cryptocurrency designs include:
Steemit – a blogging/social networking website and a cryptocurrency
Hyperledger – a cross-industry collaborative effort from the Linux Foundation to support blockchain-based distributed ledgers, with projects under this initiative including Hyperledger Burrow (by Monax) and Hyperledger Fabric (spearheaded by IBM)
Counterparty – an open source financial platform for creating peer-to-peer financial applications on the bitcoin blockchain
Quorum – a permissionable private blockchain by JPMorgan Chase with private storage, used for contract applications
Bitnation – a decentralized borderless "voluntary nation" establishing a jurisdiction of contracts and rules, based on Ethereum
Factom, a distributed registry
Tezos, decentralized voting.
Microsoft Visual Studio is making the Ethereum Solidity language available to application developers.
IBM offers a cloud blockchain service based on the open source Hyperledger Fabric project
Oracle Cloud offers Blockchain Cloud Service based on Hyperledger Fabric. Oracle has joined the Hyperledger consortium.
In August 2016, a research team at the Technical University of Munich published a research document about how blockchains may disrupt industries. They analyzed the venture funding that went into blockchain ventures. Their research shows that $1.55 billion went into startups with an industry focus on finance and insurance, information and communication, and professional services. High startup density was found in the USA, UK and Canada.
ABN Amro announced a project in real estate to facilitate the sharing and recording of real estate transactions, and a second project in partnership with the Port of Rotterdam to develop logistics tools.
Academic research
Blockchain panel discussion at the first IEEE Computer Society TechIgnite conference
In October 2014, the MIT Bitcoin Club, with funding from MIT alumni, provided undergraduate students at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology access to $100 of bitcoin. The adoption rates, as studied by Catalini and Tucker (2016), revealed that when people who typically adopt technologies early are given delayed access, they tend to reject the technology.
Journals
In September 2015, the first peer-reviewed academic journal dedicated to cryptocurrency and blockchain technology research, Ledger, was announced. The inaugural issue was published in December 2016. The journal covers aspects of mathematics, computer science, engineering, law, economics and philosophy that relate to cryptocurrencies such as bitcoin. There are also research platforms like Strategic coin that offer research for the blockchain and crypto space.
The journal encourages authors to digitally sign a file hash of submitted papers, which will then be timestamped into the bitcoin blockchain. Authors are also asked to include a personal bitcoin address in the first page of their papers.
Predictions
A World Economic Forum report from September 2015 predicted that by 2025 ten percent of global GDP would be stored on blockchains technology.
In early 2017, Harvard Business School professors Marco Iansiti and Karim R. Lakhani said the blockchain is not a disruptive technology that undercuts the cost of an existing business model, but is a foundational technology that "has the potential to create new foundations for our economic and social systems". They further predicted that, while foundational innovations can have enormous impact, "It will take decades for blockchain to seep into our economic and social infrastructure."
No, no the programming language but the roller coaster in Efteling... soaring just above us while we were having a waffle...
Title: In October 1979, eleven students, mainly newly arrived Vietnamese refugees enrolled in a special language course at Fanshawe College, toured various schools and public functions in St. Thomas. Here, Alderman Peter Laing greeted the group on Talbot Street across from city hall. Currently, the Hamad family, refugees from Syria, have been settling into their new life in St. Thomas since February 17th. The family is being privately sponsored by First United Church.
Creator(s): St. Thomas Times-Journal
Bygone Days Publication Date: March 1, 2016
Original Publication Date: October 19, 1979
Reference No.: C9 Sh4 B6 F9 4
Credit: Elgin County Archives, St. Thomas Times-Journal fonds
Also known as "pulling," the Czochralski process is also used to grow single silicon crystals that are cut and used as silicon wafers (which seemed appropriate, given this is meant as a gift to a creator of a programming language). This is a more time-consuming, expensive process than the verneuil (flame fusion) process commonly used to create lab-created gem rough, is of higher quality, and allows for larger finished stones.
The gem was cut from red corundum (which is what a ruby is -- any other color of corundum is a sapphire).
I need to stop ordering books from Amazon starting from this Monday (I ordered one over the weekend). I've managed to sort most of them out today and limited them to three shelves. Top shelf - mostly used and want to read, middle shelf - read most of them and might want to read again, bottom shelf - reference only. Oh the sad life of a geek!
Happy Day of the Programmer (the 256th day of the year).
This is the book I associate most with my becoming a programmer.
Image source:
www.flickr.com/photos/striatic/928762
www.flickr.com/photos/editor/2590568234
Read the article on opensource.com
Can programming language names be trademarks?
Created by Meredith Atwater for opensource.com
There is no predefined agenda; instead attendees collaboratively create one during the first evening of the event.
Right now, I am listening to a discussion of entropy and the mathematics of time by Lee Smolin, Jaron Lanier and Neal Stephenson…
So many cool but concurrent sessions… I’m open to your votes on which ones to attend…
Saturday, August 4th
09:30
1.The Next Big Programming Language
2.Open Science 2.0
3.Digital Data Libraries
4.Citizen Science - Where Next?
5.Future of Healthcare
6.Visual Garage - We'll Fix Your Graphs and Visuals
7.Quantum Computing - What, Why, How
8.Synthesizing Life
10:30
1.Efficient Inverse Control: Through the Users Not the Resources
2.Clinical Problems in Neuroscience / Towards Practical Cognitive Augmentation / Towards Practical Cognitive Augmentataion
3.How to Build Intelligent Machines
4.Why aren't there more Scientists on the Covers of Magazines
5.Future of Human Space Flight and Ocean Exploration
6.Science and Art
7.3D Video Applications: How to Publish Science in Video
8.The Nature of Time and Mathematics
9.Alternate terms of Science Education
10.Future History of Biology
11.Human Cell and Regeneration Map or is it worth building a cellular resolution database for the whole human body?
11:30
1.3D Printing / Robot Printing / Food Printing / Printer Printing
2.Just When You Thought It Was Safe to Teach Evolution
3.Sequencing the Genome: Implications, Ethics, Goals
4.Are Patents Preventing Innovation?
5.Tricoder is Finally Here
6.Ethical Implications of the Information Society
7.Reversible Computation and Its Connections to Quantum Interpretations
8.Mapping Science and Other Big Networks
9.A Magician Looks at the Irrational and Pseudo-Science
10.Listening to the World: Voices from the Blue Deep
14:00
1.Collecting More Data Faster Can Make an Organization Dumber
2.Skepticism and Critical Thinking in an Age of Marvels
3.Computable Data/Mathematics
4.$100 Laptop Demo
5.Where Are the Aliens?
6.The Selfish Scientist
7.Evolutionary Robotics
8.Buildings, Energy Use and Behavior Change - Can the Built Environment be an Interface?
9.Why a Mouse?: Multi-touch, Physical and Social Interfaces for Manipulating Data
10.Scientific Communication in 2030
11.Universe or Multiverse?
12.Reuse of Sewage to Grow Food and Provide Sanitation
13.Is Collaborative Policy Making Possible? (think wikipedia, government simulation games)
14.Viral Chatter
15:00
1.Freebase Demo
2.Biodiversity on the Web: Science Publishing
3.Prioritizing the World's Problems
4.Display of Greater than 2D Data or Lots of 2D Data All at Once
5.E-Science Beyond Infrastructure
6.Implantable Devices and Microchips for Healthcare / Diver Assistance Devices
7.Using Evolution for Design and Discovery
8.Stem Cells (a.k.a. How to Get Scientists to Care about Web 2.0
9.Machine Reading & Understanding Science
10.Science & Fundamentalism
11.Biological Data & Research / Open Source Biomedical Research for Neglected Diseases
12.My Daughter's DNA: Hacking Your Genome / Towards a Data Wiki
13.Network-Centric Biomedicine
14.Squishy Magnets, Talking Paper and Disapearing Ink: How can inventables.com open its doors to kids for free.
16:00
1.Give us your Data! Google's effort to archive and distribute the world's scientifcic datasets.
2.Personal Impact Factor: Measuring Scientific Contributions Outside the Literature
3.Kids, Science, Math & Rational Thought
4.Micro-UAVs
5.Machine Learning in the Natural Sciences
6.Hunch Engines
17:00
1.Data Mining the Sky
2.All-Fluidic Computing
3.Science vs. Capitalism: Utopian Effots in the Overshoot Century
4.Dinosaurs and Ancient Sarahans
5.The Paperless Home
6.Provenance Analytics: Illuminating Science Trails and the Future of Scientific Publications
20:00
1.Piracy, Murder and a Media Revolution
2.Engineering Living Instruments
3.Nanohype: The volumnious vacuous vapid world where only size matters.
Sunday, August 5th
09:30
1.Golem: Data Mining for Materials (and Non-Programmers): sketching information systems Andrew Walkingshaw / Searching the Edges of the Web
2.Novel Biofuels
3.Genome Voyeurism – Let's poke through Jim Watson's genome
4.Would You Upload?
5.Reforming Patent Systems
6.How to Celebrate Darwin in 2009
7.Innovation is Not Pointless...But It's So 20th Century
10:30
1.Large Scale Molecular Simulation
2.Tree of Life: Fractal Data Problem
3.Planetary Defense Against Asteroids
4.The Automation of Science and the Technological Singularity
11:30
1.Science on the Stage
2.Human Microbiome
3.Out Future Lies in Space
4.Climate Crisis vs. Environmental Justice
Freshly compiled OTHELLO.C
Once upon a time in prehistoric days of personal computing, Robert Halstead of MIT wrote a game of Othello in C programming language. In late 1978, Leor Zolman really wanted to play that game on his micro but couldn't, he had to write a C compiler first. The compiler he wrote became known as BDS C -- one of the most widely known and influential C compilers of the 8-bit era.
In the fall of 2007 I really wanted to run a few old games and demos for an awesome but mostly forgotten computer called Vector-06C and, disappointed by the state of existing software emulators, created my own hardware implementation. Reverse engineered without a complete circuit diagram, with scarce documentation, tested by software written for the original computer it has fancy graphics and it plays music. But I find its role as a historical link the most fascinating.
Recreated in 2008 for want of a demo, using a compiler written in 1979 for want of an Othello game, running the game from mid-70's on a 21st century FPGA, here it is. Looking not very impressive but with a kind heart, this is an entirely free and open source project. It utilizes approximately 30% of EP2C20 FPGA on Altera DE1 development board, fully recreating a 8080-based computer that was popular in the former Soviet Union in late 80's to mid-90's. It's worth noting that unlike many other Soviet-era designs this computer was truly original, borrowing very little from any other computer of the time.
Other projects created for, or ported to the DE1 kit include at least a couple of ZX Spectrum clones, FPGApple: an Apple ][ recreation, Minimig: the Amiga clone, One-Chip MSX, and new projects keep emerging.
vector06cc project URL: code.google.com/p/vector06cc/
Writing a book here: open.spotify.com/show/3mMrq70ofFvPputOjQIiGU?si=kwclM6f8Q...
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As many of you are already aware, we created the Pudú mascot for the One Laptop Per Child campaign in Chile (Un computador por niño). While the Chilean initiative does not call specifically for the OLPC hardware developed by Nicholas Negroponte and his team at MIT, it was inspired by the work done there. So, for a lomg time we have been following news about the OLPC machine which is named the XO. Having now lived with an XO for about three weeks, this is our preliminary review of the software and hardware including the story of why we bought our children a computer and how we decided on the XO over other options. For a shorter version, just skip to the parts about the XO as an e-book reader and Scratch. I must apologize in advance for the poor writing, but I'd rather get this up now than later. More photos in the OLPC set.
----------- Background -----------
A few months ago I posted about our experience with programming. At the time we were staying at my parents house and had access to a total of three computers: ours (a Mac laptop), my father's laptop (running Vista) and my mother's desktop (running Windows Me). We actually had our old swing-arm-display iMac with us, but didn't bother setting it up for lack of space in addition to the fact that the other computerss were available for the kids to use.
Meanwhile we were gearing up for a six month trip overseas. Knowing that we would have limitations with regard to luggage weight and would unlikely have regular access to lending libraries, we decided that it would be a smart decision to find some sort of e-book reader for our travels. This was especially important after a summer and fall reading binge that amounted to having checked out at least five hundred books. Sophia alone was consuming a thousand pages per week. (We know this because in October she was curious about such. So we sat down with the receipts from the library, searched for the lengths of the book on Amazon, and plugged them all into a spreadsheet (including the URLs for each book) which spit out a total of 23,507 pages for the previous twenty-two weeks.)
OLPC had recently announced the Give One Get One program in the United States and Canada during the holiday season and the ASUS Eee PC was becoming available as well. We also looked at some handheld devices that would serve for e-book reading like the iPod Touch, the Nokia N800 or N810.
Considering that the price of the handhelds were either the same or not much lower and that they didn't offer the same chance to continue dabbling in programming, it seemed like a better option to get one of the two laptops that would allow them to further explore. We talked it over with Sophia and Enzo and they decided that one laptop for two children would be a great gift. The bonus was being able to have one sent to a child somewhere else in the world who wouldn't likely have a computer otherwise.
At the time we placed our order, the estimated delivery date was for mid January and that was to their grandparents home in Washington State. Of course, the G1G1 program was only shipping the computers to addresses in the participating countries meaning that my parents would have to send it to us in South America when it arrived, so the kids also had to agree to wait until as late as February to receive their XO.
We eventually left Washington, spent two and a half weeks in Argentina and on December 21 having just arrived in Chile, we received an email from OLPC (dated December 21) letting us know that the XO had shipped on the 19th. The message included a FedEx tracking number and when we plugged into the FedEx website it showed that the package had been left at my parents' front door. The good news was that it arrived much earlier than the anticipated delivery date. The bad news was that my parents had gone to visit my brother and were not planning to return home until the 27th.
Since they were also unlikely to be checking email, I sent off an email to all of my siblings asking for them to either contact my parents or if they knew anyone in the area to ask them to bring in the XO from the cold and possibly the rain as well. We quickly heard back from my sister and confirmed after a few days that someone had been able to give it shelter.
Eventually, my parents returned home, made arrangements to pick it up, tested it out, and got it in the mail around mid-January. It arrived here in Chile eleven days later and the kids have been loving it ever since.
----------- Review -----------
There have been plenty of reviews lauding the hardware. The XO is solidly built and includes a few technologies that are not found in other laptops. Everyone who has seen the kids' machine has marveled at what has been packed into it for such a low cost. (Yeah, we know it was supposed to be a $100 laptop, but if you consider inflation since that target was set, the current price of $188 is getting pretty close.) For example, not having a hard drive makes each minor and major jolt the machine takes much more bearable to someone who is used to handing computers with care. Speaking of handling, the handle is great for kids and the two smaller holes allow for them to add some sort of strap which we haven't gotten around to doing just yet. Finally, most people are not used to having a built-in webcam (although that is fast becoming standard issue on most laptops).
Screen
I have not a single complaint to report about the screen. The low power setting works like a charm for reading outside with strong sunlight as we have been experiencing just that with the clear skies and long summer days here in Viña.The fact that it swivels around and folds flat is another plus that can only be found in tablet computers at this time, the Eee PC did not offer this and that too helped make our decision.
Keyboard
This is perhaps the major hardware drawback, but I am really the only one complaining and not much at that. The sealed keyboard is designed for a purpose and meets the goal. The kids are hunt-and-peck typists (as am I) with petite fingers (here's my problem), so they haven't had much problem as they go about inputing text and keyboard commands.
Wifi
The wifi reception has been walking all over our Mac and has given us a pretty impressive picture of the wifi penetration here in Viña del Mar. We would love to try the mesh networking features built into the XO software, but will have to wait until we find some other XO users to do that.
Expansion
We added a 16MB SD card (that came with our camera) to it which is primarily used for transferring files from our Mac and for save the most important files that the kids create, a sort of backup system.
Software
There are too many activities to touch on each one as this review is much longer than it was intended to be, so here I'm mostly mentioning some of the kids' favorites and giving some more information on those that they've used the most.
Sugar Interface (XO's GUI)
First off, the user needs to be willing to adjust to a new way of considering the operating system. Sugar has been criticized and laughed at by many, but the kids have picked it up without delay and even I have come to appreciate many of its charms. Do note that they had played with the interface previously when I let them run it off a CD on an old Dell laptop from work that was headed for the trash. There is room for Sugar to improve, but when you consider the true target audience is going to work with these computers without much (if any) prior experience on any computer, the readjustment pain is instantly removed from the equation.
Draw and Write (pre-installed)
There are no frills in either of these activities. They serve exactly the purpose that their names imply. When the kids want to write a story or other document, Write (which I believe is a version if AbiWord) steps in swiftly and does the job. If they need an illustration for said story or some other purpose, Draw works more or less just like Paint in Windows.
Browser (pre-installed)
The kids have few complaints, especially after upgrading from system 650 to 653 which appeared to deliver considerable speed improvements in the browser, although that may have been the result of something else - no definitive proof there. I created a little web launch pad we call Soen - Nose for the kids (a text-only page so that it loads quickly) that contains links to many of the sites that they frequent on the web. A somewhat clunky version of the Adobe Flash plugin can be installed and we did at first, but as we upgraded the system software we didn't install flash again.
XO as an e-book reader (pre-installed)
One of the reasons we chose an XO over other options like the Asus Eee PC, was it's ability to work as an e-book reader.
Before leaving on our trip, Sophia had read H.G. Wells's The Time Machine which I had recommended to feed her science fiction addiction. So, after the XO arrived we immediately downloaded several science fiction classics from H.G. Wells and Jules Verne as e-books in different formats (.pdf, .txt, .html). So far our favorite sources are manybooks.net and Project Gutenberg. The kids' launch pad has links to several other sites as well.
Many Books is especially nice as it offers many different formats for each book including HTML, large print PDFs, PDFs formatted for the iPhone (which Sophia likes on the XO) and even better (in my opinion) an option to create custom PDF and HTML files. The XO can handle both. While the Reader icon does not appear at the the bottom of the screen like the other activities, it is pre-installed and launches when a PDF file is opened. HTML files open in the Browser. TXT files
Here are some of the books we've got loaded on the XO at the moment:
20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, Around the World in 80 Days, The Mysterious Island, A Journey to the Centre of the Earth, The War of the Worlds, The Time Machine, and The Invisible Man.
eToys (pre-installed)
I'm not sure how to describe eToys. For the kids it wasn't exactly new having already played with Squeakland (on which eToys is based) using both Mac and Windows machines. The activity allows them to play with and combine a variety of media.
TamTam (pre-installed)
Both of the kids enjoy the four TamTam activities which allow them to create music in different ways.
Turtle Art, Pippy and Turtle Art with Sensors (first two pre-installed, last one add-on)
Turtle Art is an XO version of Seymour Papert's Logo which allows students to write programs (series of instructions) directing a turtle around the screen and leaving a trail (the drawing). Pippy is a version of the Python programming language for the XO. Turtle Art with Sensors allows for the turtle to be controlled with sound level and pitch and (through a connected device) resistance an voltage.
Scratch (add-on, must download separately)
When a version of Scratch for the XO appeared for downloading about a week and a half ago, the kids were elated. Scratch is by far their favorite programming environment and while they enjoyed playing with Turtle Art and Pippy, nothing could compare to Scratch. They have not been disappointed as they have spent countless hours working on a variety of projects either alone or as a team. I might go as far to say that if the XO was no more than a portable Scratch machine it would be worth the price, but of course it is much more, so that stretch doesn't need to be made.
Sim City (add-on)
SimCity is a classic. The version available for the XO is the original release and aside from the small text which can be a bit difficult to read, it works wonderfully. Since loading it on the XO, the kids have spent many hours learning the ins and outs of the game.
Guido van Robot, Ruler, Stopwatch (add-ons)
These are some of the other activities that we've downloaded and installed. The ruler and stopwatch are practical for exactly what you would expect them to be. Guido van Robot is another programming type activity which we've tinker with a bit.
Acoustic Tape Measure and Chat (pre-installed)
These are two activities that we'd love to try out but, like the mesh networking, we'll need to wait until we have some more XO owners around to do so.
Warnings
Not all has been perfect with the XO, but we knew going in that the software was still in something of a beta state. Although our first attempt to get online was an easy success, we subsequently had a few snafus connecting to wifi which have since been resolved. We also have met with some frustration regarding some of the additional software (none of the items mentioned above) that can be added. Finally, we had some issues with the volume being set to zero and not being able to readjust it. All that said, we have successfully upgraded the system from the version 650 with which it shipped to 653 the day after receiving it and eventually version 656 which is currently the latest stable version released. At this point everything is working well.
----------- Conclusion -----------
The XO is not for everyone. If you can afford a full-blown laptop, if you are looking to do extensive touch typing, if you have no interest in experimenting with a new interface, or if you are unwilling to deal with beta-ish software, it's most likely not the machine for you and you should look elsewhere. The target audience for this machine is a child who is eager to experiment and learn. The XO fits that bill splendidly. It also serves as a great, albeit a little heavy, e-book reader.
UPDATE
One important point I forgot to make was that the kids are asking for a USB mouse because the built-in trackpad seems to be too sensitive to make drawing on the XO a pleasurable experience.