Computers

https://www.google.fi/amp/s/www.wired.com/story/these-explosions-show-why-the-faa-doesnt-want-laptops-in-luggage/amp The US government wants a “laptop ban” on planes. But this time, it’s to prevent fliers from putting large electronics, like laptops, into their checked luggage. Is it safe to stow electronics—especially those with lithium-ion batteries—in cargo holds? It seems that lithiun-ion batteries combined with some other flammable items in cargo can make a very dangerous flammable →

https://opensource.com/article/17/10/4-website-maintenance-mistakes-avoid?sc_cid=7016000000127ECAAY  Maintenance is a good idea for every website, but it’s a requirement for websites using open source code. The upside of open source is that everyone can participate. The downside is that means keeping up with everyone’s changes.  Maintenance is a simple process, but there are basic mistakes that many people make at least →

https://www.redhat.com/en/blog/do-we-really-need-swap-modern-systems  Swap is used to give processes room, even when the physical RAM of the system is already used up. In the past, some application vendors recommended swap of a size equal to the RAM, or even twice the RAM. Once the physical memory is used up, swap gets used. As the swap disk is much slower →

https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2017/10/crypto-failure-cripples-millions-of-high-security-keys-750k-estonian-ids/  A crippling flaw in a widely used code library has fatally undermined the security of millions of encryption keys used in some of the highest-stakes settings, including national identity cards, software- and application-signing, and trusted platform modules protecting government and corporate computers. The weakness allows attackers to calculate the private portion of any vulnerable key →

https://techcrunch.com/2017/09/29/its-time-to-give-firefox-another-chance/ Many people have switched to Chrome. It’s now time to give Firefox another chance. Mozilla seems to have found its groove and focus again — and it’s starting to show. Version 57 is the most important Firefox release in years. Mozilla has dubbed this release “Firefox Quantum.” Many of the updates in Quantum come from Mozilla’s experimental Servo browser and →

Your Hard Disk As An Accidental Microphone article tells that modern hard disks can sense sounds around them unintentionally.  [Alfredo Ortega] has uncovered in his talk at the EKO Party conference in Buenos Aires where he he demonstrates how a traditional spinning-rust computer hard disk interacts with vibration in its surroundings, and can either become →

https://techcrunch.com/gallery/heres-everything-google-announced-today/ Google held a press conference yesterday in San Francisco, where the company announced everything from new phones to crazy machine learning-powered wearable cameras. It was a flurry of news. Techcrunch condensed it all the highlights down well into one quick slideshow. →

https://techcrunch.com/2017/09/30/ai-hype-has-peaked-so-whats-next/?ncid=rss&utm_source=tcfbpage&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+Techcrunch+%28TechCrunch%29&utm_content=FaceBook&sr_share=facebook Year 2017 has been the year of AI, reaching a fever pitch of VC and corporate investment. But, as with any hot technology, AI is outgrowing this phase of experimentation and hype. According to research firm Gartner, we’re past the “peak of inflated expectations.”  Next up is a necessary recalibration of the space—one that →

I have written several postings on SOLU computer that aimed to reinvent personal computer. Solu Machines, founded in 2014, was developing a Solu computer it claimed to be revolutionary. I did report about it that because it looked interesting and I happen to know the person behind this vision. At least what they did was →

https://blog.acolyer.org/2017/09/19/to-type-or-not-to-type-quantifying-detectable-bugs-in-javascript/ Very interesting scientific analysis of using Flow/TypeScript annotations to autodetect 15% of bugs in JavaScript  To type or not to type: quantifying detectable bugs in JavaScript Gao et al., ICSE 2017 Is it worth the extra effort to add static type annotations to a JavaScript project? Should I use Facebook’s Flow or Microsoft’s TypeScript if so? →