podcast: Nikola Tesla and Innovation Today | WBUR and NPR - On Point with Tom Ashbrook
the great visionary of innovation, Nikola Tesla — with alternating current, hydroelectric power, the guts of the radio, and much more.
This hour, On Point: “Tesla-mania” — as the U.S. looks for innovation.



more links @delicious

Wireless Power Electrifies CES - Forbes.com

LAS VEGAS--Walking around Fulton Innovations' showcase at the Consumer Electronics Show, it's easy to think that 2009 will be the year of wireless electricity. A blender whirs wireless, and a laptop powers up without a battery. Like a modern day version of the 1904 World's Fair, it's the miracle of electricity without a plug in sight. The devices are all powered by electromagnetic coils built into the charging surface.

More links: @delicious

CES 2010: Haier demos 'completely' wireless HD video
a 32-inch LCD powered wirelessly from up to six or seven feet,
and which received content via a wireless link from a Haier prototype Blu-ray player.

The IPad's Five Best Surprises - PCWorld Business Center
long awaited Apple Tablet computer...
= iPhone/iPod Touch with 9.7" display and 64-bit CPU.

DVDVideoSoft.com: Download free DVD, iPod, YouTube video converter and editor software and freeware

interface elements for jQuery demos
HTML/javascript, not Flash or Silverlight

Visual jQuery 1.2.6
a very nice, interactive and visual,
jQuery API documentation;
example of what can be done by jQuery

Manning: Hello World!
A top-seller programming book,
written by a 10-year old and hid dad.
Apparently a serious and useful book,
even for non-beginners, using Python programming language.


Manning.com: THIS WEEK'S BESTSELLING
US RETAIL TITLES as of Jan 17, 2010:
1. Hello World!
2. jQuery in Action
3. Spring in Action, Second Edition
4. The Art of Unit Testing
5. Unlocking Android
6. SQL Server MVP Deep Dives
7. Algorithms of the Intelligent Web
8. Java Persistence with Hibernate
9. Website Owner's Manual
10. C# in Depth

InfoQ: Google Go: A Primer
Google recently announced their new programming language, Go. It is designed to bring some of the advances of modern programming languages back down to the systems arena where C still dominates today. However, the language is still experimental and evolving.

Simplified and modernized C language,
with managed memory (garbage collection)
with pointers but without pointers arithmetic,
some memory management included, familiar syntax, excellent performance...

It is not a typical object-oriented language,
but is have very useful constructs.
Optimized for concurrent (parallel) programming.

The concept is similar to Apple's ancient Objective-C...

Google's Nexus One vs. the Droid: Two Phones Dissected
"A new teardown analysis finds Motorola's flagship Android device has $179.11 worth of components inside. Google's Nexus One, on the other hand, has $174.15 worth of goodies"

You can see iSuppli's full component breakdown for the Droid here,
and for the Nexus One here.

The 14 Days of jQuery
fourteen consecutive days of new releases to celebrate the release of jQuery 1.4. You'll notice that we're excited about the number fourteen since jQuery 1.4 is being released on the birthday of jQuery (January 14th)

Titanum: Developing JavaScript Desktop Applications

"Titanium" is an open source platform
for developing desktop applications
by using web technologies,
build around WebKit browser, JavaScript language.
It supports multiple OSs, including Windows, Linux, OS X,
as well as multiple hardware platforms (x86, PowerPC etc)
multiple scripting languages: JavaScript, Python, Ruby,
and various plug-ins such as Flash, Silverlight, JavaFX

video @InfoQ

source @github

Self Publishing - Lulu.com
Print & sell your own books, photo books, calendars, ebooks...

Xbox.com | Project Natal
"You Are the Controller...
a revolutionary new way to play:
no controller required."
A 3D camera detecting movements, face and voice recognition...
...Use-case 6: shopping for clothes, virtual try-on from home, with a friend
How it works (video)
Videos @YouTube
Expected for holiday season 2010.

A Deluge of Devices for Reading and Surfing - NYTimes.com

Tablets, of course, have been around for years. In 2001, Bill Gates erroneously predicted at an industry trade show that they would be the most popular form of PC sold in America within five years.



More links about tablets @delicious
More links about CES 2010 @delicious

MSI Shows Dual-screen 7-inch and 10-inch Netbooks - PC World




What Defines an E-Reader?

Software Carpentry

Most of people, including scientists,
who start programming as a side activity
learn it "hard way".
Even worse, they end up programming "professionally"
by leveraging tools, and never learning basics.

Similar as a carpenter can build
a simple but useful shelf or a deck
but may not be able to engineer a house or a bridge,
writing simple but useful programs still requires learning the "craft".

Software Carpentry is now a course on basic software development skills for programmers with backgrounds in science and engineering, rather than computer science @wikipedia

Podcast interview with Greg Wilson
More links @delicious

The Best of CES 2010 - PC World

eReaders, Tablets, Smartphones, Smartbooks, Netbooks,
3D TVs, Photo/Video Cameras with WiFi and GPS,
New CPUs from Intel, Nvidia...
As if the Christmas for geeks started on Jan-7 (Orthodox Christian calendar)

Garr Reynolds/Introduction
"One of the things I always told people is that they have got to get their own website. I don't care if you have your own consulting business, run a 5-person design shop, or are a 57-year old director in a 22,000 person IT firm, you've got to have a place on the web to let people know who you are. A personal website is expected. It does not have to be fancy (better if it is not, actually). But it does have to tell your own unique story. Everyone is special. Everyone is different. The key — perhaps the main key — is finding what is different about yourself and letting the world know about your difference and what you can contribute. A website is one way you can communicate your difference, grow your network, and make connections across this planet."

The Dawn of the Tablet PC: CES 2010 Roundup - PC World
"The Dawn of the Tablet PC: CES 2010 Roundup
Tablet PCs are the big thing at CES 2010.
Here's a look at what HP, Lenovo, and Sony have lined up -
as well as at some of the challengers aiming to knock them down."

Jon Skeet: Coding Blog
C# expert, author of book "C# in Depth",
best reputation / most answers on Stack Overflow,
works at Google...

Google "Nexus One" Phone - Web meets phone.
A nice tool to start a year...
Try "feel" to see how it would fit in your hand...

Slowing Growth of Wikipedia and Models of its Dynamic (Presented at Wikimedia Foundataion and WikiSym 2009)
An interesting and controversial analysis of Wikipedia.org growth.
Apparently it has changed from exponential to linear
maybe because of push against "middle class" editors...
Also available as a mp3 podcast at CHI conversations.

Clojure
a dynamic functional programming language,
compiles to Java VM and .NET CLR,
good for highly-parallel apllications, thread-safe,
Lisp-based... looks promising...
* my clojure links @ delicious

Dr. Vojislav B. Mišić: Info Page

"Kaizen", "Kanban"

To start the new year in the spirit of "Kaizen" (continuous improvement)
for software projects here is a good and interesting free book about
Scrum (agile, sprints) & Kanban ("visual board")

InfoQ: Kanban and Scrum - making the most of both