Tags: web-review, neuroscience, ai, craftsmanship, memory, posix, tools, philosophy, graphics, webgpu, framework, type-systems, unix, 3d, rust, mobile, criticism, web, matrix, history, postgresql, agile, profiling, science, decision-making, product-management, legacy, politics, sqlite, python, java, spring, culture, architecture, mathematics, databases, security, complexity, ssh, internationalization, react, language, time, foss, project-management, tests, learning, ci, protocols, c++, github, git, shader, machine-learning, tech, quality, career, data-visualization, dns, 2d
Let’s go for my web review for the week 2024-44.
Tags: tech, philosophy, history, politics
A very precious philosopher from the 20th century. Her texts are still very precious and resonate today. In this piece it’s focusing about tech relevant excerpts, she had plenty to say about today’s politics as well.
https://www.honest-broker.com/p/what-you-can-learn-from-just-seven
Tags: tech, foss, ai, machine-learning
Nice initiative from the OSI. It is timely, such a definition was surely needed. The data information part seems fairly weak though… for sure you could make a system which doesn’t respect the four freedoms that way.
https://opensource.org/ai/open-source-ai-definition
Tags: tech, foss, ai, machine-learning
Like me, you find the Open Source AI Definition weak on the training data information side? You’d be right and there’s a reason for it… it’s probably hiding quite some open washing for the larger models. This is a good explanation of the motives and consequences.
https://tante.cc/2024/10/16/does-open-source-ai-really-exist/
Tags: tech, web, mobile, react, framework, criticism
This is definitely true. As long as web frontends are dominated by large frameworks, the web will always have subpar experience on mobile. And the solution isn’t going to come from the mobile providers too happy to gatekeep their app store.
https://infrequently.org/2024/10/platforms-are-competitions/#fn-failure-on-repeat-2
Tags: tech, matrix, protocols
This is definitely getting there in terms of performance and usability. The mobile clients seem mature enough, just need the desktop clients to catch up before this becomes really something I’d feel confident enough to recommend and push for.
https://matrix.org/blog/2024/10/29/matrix-2.0-is-here/
Tags: tech, unix, posix
It’s nice to see the standard still moves. Some of the additions are definitely welcome.
https://blog.toast.cafe/posix2024-xcu
Tags: tech, time, culture, internationalization
Time management and timezones are definitely complicated. In a way it’s culture colliding with computers and localisation… it can’t be simple.
https://ssoready.com/blog/engineering/truths-programmers-timezones/
Tags: tech, tools, ssh, dns, security
Nice technique for automating the verification of SSH host keys. It’d be nice to see wider adoption.
https://blog.apnic.net/2022/12/02/improving-sshs-security-with-sshfp-dns-records/
Tags: tech, github, ci, security, tools
Definitely an interesting tool. GitHub Actions workflow aren’t easy to setup while ensuring they’re secure, having a tool analyzing them for issues can only help.
https://blog.yossarian.net/2024/10/27/Now-you-can-have-beautiful-clean-workflows
Tags: tech, rust, type-systems, memory
Interesting progress on safe type casting in Rust. This should bring nice zero copy parsing of binary data in some cases.
https://lwn.net/SubscriberLink/994334/5e1f97f08916b494/
Tags: tech, c++, rust, legacy
This is a good view of what you’re getting into with the “rewrite it in Rust” knee-jerk reaction.
https://gaultier.github.io/blog/lessons_learned_from_a_successful_rust_rewrite.html
Tags: tech, postgresql, databases, ai, machine-learning, language
I definitely like the approach of having vectorisation in the RDBMS directly. This is one less moving part, less complexity at the application level to synchronize everything together. In this case it’s a Postgres extension.
https://www.timescale.com/blog/vector-databases-are-the-wrong-abstraction/
Tags: tech, sqlite, databases, tools
Interesting, there’s now an official tool to replicate sqlite databases. It’s still early days, we’ll see which features it’ll get.
Tags: tech, java, spring, profiling
A quick tour of the available tools to profile Spring Boot applications.
https://foojay.io/today/how-to-profile-a-performance-issue-using-spring-boot-profiling-tools/
Tags: tech, git, tools
Yet another Git option I missed. This is definitely useful, I’ll try it out.
https://andrewlock.net/working-with-stacked-branches-in-git-is-easier-with-update-refs/
Tags: tech, python, 3d, webgpu, data-visualization
Looks like a very interesting Python library to build interactive 3d visualizations.
https://docs.pygfx.org/stable/index.html
Tags: tech, 2d, 3d, graphics, mathematics
Ever wondered how to simulate 3D from 2D based primitives? Here is a nice experiment explaining how to approach it.
https://www.charlespetzold.com/blog/2024/09/Rudimentary-3D-on-the-2D-HTML-Canvas.html
Tags: tests, 3d, graphics
A nice list of the techniques used to render shadows in games.
https://30fps.net/pages/videogame-shadows/
Tags: tech, 3d, graphics, shader
Very nice deep dive into a post-processing shader to create a painted scene effect.
https://blog.maximeheckel.com/posts/on-crafting-painterly-shaders/?ck_subscriber_id=2669647738
Tags: tech, craftsmanship, learning, career
Indeed, those are fundamental traits to make sure you learn and make progress on your journey.
https://registerspill.thorstenball.com/p/the-basics
Tags: tech, learning, career, craftsmanship
Another excellent piece from Kent Beck, he’s right that the real differentiator in our profession is about digging deep on topics, seeing them through even if that’s on the side. Curiosity is a key trait.
https://tidyfirst.substack.com/p/background-work
Tags: tech, agile, architecture, history
Good explanation on how the agile movement scaled down about design over time in its literature. It’s probably its biggest failure. The good thing is that the pendulum is starting to swing in the other direction a bit (that’s probably why Beck is now working on a book series on software design).
https://explaining.software/archive/the-death-of-the-architect/
Tags: tech, quality, product-management, project-management
This is accurate in my opinion. Engineering and product teams need to properly negotiate, otherwise quality will suffer.
Tags: tech, project-management, product-management, decision-making
Interesting guidelines idea to help teams manage the priorities themselves. It’s written in the context of a product manager but I think it is lightweight and generic enough to apply in other contexts.
https://productmanagers.substack.com/p/how-to-not-be-a-prioritization-machine
Tags: science, complexity
It’s sometimes extremely difficult to get to the original source of a scientific claim. Our corpus of science is so large and complex now that finding where a claim comes from can be a daunting task.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bgo7rm5Maqg
Tags: science, neuroscience
This is an amazing example of the brain plasticity. It’s also great to have a patch for increased quality of life with a training of only a few weeks.
https://academic.oup.com/cercor/article/34/6/bhae239/7696241?login=false
Bye for now!