Monday, March 31, 2014

84 miles / gallon of gas

This Three-Wheeled Car Costs Just $6,800 And Goes 672 Miles On A Tank Of Gas | Co.Exist | ideas + impact:



The Elio costs $6,800 and gets 84 miles to the gallon. 

It’s possible to drive 672 miles on a single tank of gas.



But how safe it is, so small and light?






Sunday, March 30, 2014

Alibaba & China’s Big Internet Players

Alibaba And China’s Big Internet Players | On Point with Tom Ashbrook:

"Alibaba is coming to the U.S.A. The Chinese Internet giant – China’s Amazon and more – is coming to Wall Street for an IPO. A giant stock offering. Maybe the biggest tech offering ever. 

 It’s opening a huge window into China’s alternate Internet universe:
  •  Alibaba as its Amazon. 
  •  Baidu as its Google. 
  •  Tencent as its Facebook."


At start functional "clones" of American internet companies,

in China this is an efficient collaboration with government...

Online trade bigger and more important than brick & mortar retail...






Saturday, March 29, 2014

OneNote Web API

OneNote and Microsoft's quiet API revolution - Scott Hanselman:

Office team launched OneNote for Mac, they also launchedhttp://dev.onenote.com along with integration partners like Feedly, JotNot, IFTTT, Weave News Reader and more all integrating with their REST API.

The moral of the story here is - if you have no API then you have no story.


the samples are all on GitHub too: https://github.com/OneNoteDev.



Scott Hanselman's Complete List of Productivity Tips

Scott Hanselman's Complete List of Productivity Tips - Scott Hanselman:
"DON'T WORRY, JUST DROP THE BALL."
  • Scale Yourself
  • Look for Danger Signs
  • Understand Effectiveness Versus Efficiency
  • Define "Work"
  • Do It, Drop It, Delegate It and Defer It
  • Drop the Ball

  • Resolve Inbox Issues
  • DON'T CHECK EMAIL IN THE MORNING (OR AT NIGHT)
  • FIND YOUR ROBERT SCOBLE
  • REMAIN IN YOUR FLOW
  • CONSERVE YOUR KEYSTROKES
  • Triage the Inbox of Your Life
  • Get Rid of Psychic Weight
  • Reserve Fridays for Reflection
  • Try the Pomodoro Technique

  • Realize that Being Busy is a form of Laziness
  • Face the Fact: Multitasking is a Myth
  • But Here's What You Can Multitask
  • Clean Out Mental Clutter
  • Homework

Global Windows Azure Bootcamp 2014

Global Windows Azure Bootcamp | a Windows Azure Bootcamp on several locations globally at the same time:
Global Windows Azure Bootcamp

Global Windows Azure Bootcamp | Locations
There are 138 locations registered in 57 countries and 137 cities.

Recent new features in Azure:
Azure: ExpressRoute Dedicated Networking, Web Site Backup Restore, Mobile Services .NET support, Hadoop 2.2, and more - ScottGu's Blog

Change Print Font, Save Money

Teen to government: Change your typeface, save millions - CNN.com

"A 14-year-old student claims to have found a way of saving the US government $400 million dollars\simply by changing the font they use for official documents.

... if the government chose Garamond font instead of Times New Roman, 
...it would use 25 per cent less ink because each character is lighter and thinner.

Ink is two times more expensive than French perfume by volume..."

Chanel No. 5 perfume costs $38 per ounce, while the equivalent amount of Hewlett-Packard printer ink can cost up to $75.

Government's annual printing expenditure: $1.8 billion

#FontFriday: Garamond, the Eco-Friendly Font | Casey Connect

Times New Roman-sample.svg     AdobeGaramondSp.svg

Garamond - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Times New Roman - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

ng-book: Book on AngularJS

ng-book: The Complete Book on AngularJS:
"opinionated book about opinionated library"

A new way to sell a (e)book: online, with source code, videos and samples
The author is also teaching Angular in person, in San Francisco.

Yet Another Podcast #121–AngularJS Roundtable | Jesse Liberty
"Angular is new jQuery"

that is a "big deal", since jQuery is used by most (80%) of web sites.
With a large team in Google actively developing it,
there is a huge interest for Angular.

It just needs a good integration with PhoneGap / Cordova,
to make it practical for mobile development also...

Sample Mobile Application with AngularJS | Christophe Coenraets (PhoneGap)

Building PhoneGap Apps with AngularJS

AngularJS: API: ngTouch
The ngTouch module provides touch events and other helpers for touch-enabled devices. The implementation is based on jQuery Mobile touch event handling (jquerymobile.com).




Friday, March 28, 2014

Graphical perception: fundamentals

Graphical perception – learn the fundamentals first:



perception





The greatest value of a picture is when it forces us to notice what we never expected to see.
—John W. Tukey. Exploratory Data Analysis. 1977.



Leslie Lamport - Turing Award Winner

Leslie Lamport - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Leslie Lamport - A.M. Turing Award Winner:

"For fundamental contributions to the theory and practice of distributed and concurrent systems, notably the invention of concepts such as causality and logical clocks, safety and liveness, replicated state machines, and sequential consistency."

Leslie Lamport, a Principal Researcher at Microsoft Research, has been named as the recipient of the 2013 ACM A.M. Turing Award for imposing clear, well-defined coherence on the seemingly chaotic behavior of distributed computing systems

Leslie Lamport Selected as 2013 ACM A.M. Turing Award Winner | Microsoft Research Luminaries | Channel 9



E2E: Erik Meijer and Leslie Lamport - Mathematical Reasoning and Distributed Systems | Going Deep | Channel 9

research.microsoft.com/en-us/um/people/lamport/pubs/paxos-simple.pdf

Paxos (computer science) - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

LaTeX - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The LaTeX logo, typeset with LaTeX

Turing Award - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia


IoT Thermal Printer with Raspberry Pi

IoT Thermal Printer, all with a little Py and Pi | Coding4Fun Blog | Channel 9:



1289_MED.jpg998_MED.jpg



Mini Thermal Receipt Printer ID: 597 - $49.95 : Adafruit Industries, Unique & fun DIY electronics and kits



Raspberry Pi Model B 512MB RAM ID: 998 - $39.95 : Adafruit Industries, Unique & fun DIY electronics and kits

Explain Git with D3.js

Explain Git with D3:

"This website is designed to help you understand some basic git concepts visually"



onlywei/explain-git-with-d3

Thursday, March 27, 2014

A Day Made of Glass...by Corning

A Day Made of Glass... Made possible by Corning. (2011) - YouTube:


"




"freemium" Office on iPad, before Surface

Microsoft scraps 'Windows-first' practice, puts Office on iPad before Surface - Computerworld:
Three all-touch core apps -- Word, Excel and PowerPoint -- 
have been seeded to Apple's App Store and are available now.

...The Office apps can be used by anyone free of charge to view documents and present slideshows. But to create new content or documents, or edit existing ones, customers must have an active subscription to Office 365."


Office in iTunes

Nadella unveils mobile managment suite for iPad and Android - Computerworld

Gmail e-money system

Google’s brilliant plan to get millions to adopt its e-money system: Gmail 

In May 2013, Google soft-launched a straightforward scheme for sending money to other people. It lets you connect Gmail with a Google Wallet account and send money to a friend for free (from a linked bank account) or for a small fee (from a credit card).

Google - Amazon: Cloud price war

Google's Bigger, Cheaper Cloud - NYTimes.com:

"Some of the price cuts are as much as 85 percent.
Amazon is expected to soon respond with moves of its own.
Over the long term, according to the executive in charge of Google’s public cloud, Google wants software developers, both independent and within companies, to count on prices steadily dropping at a rate that roughly tracks Moore’s Law. That means a doubling of power per dollar every 18 to 24 months. 

Google also wants its cloud business to move from a series of different services to a single, comprehensive product that handles familiar business applications, new apps, and big back-end data analysis and storage jobs."

Price war! Amazon cuts cloud costs to counter Google - Computerworld

The price of AWS' Simple Storage Service (S3) is being reduced, on average, 51 percent. The company's Elastic Cloud Compute (EC2) has been reduced by 30 percent to 40 percent for the latest generation of compute nodes. AWS' Relational Database Service (RDS) has been cut by 28 percent, on average. ElastiCache service has been reduced by 34 percent on average and Elastic mapReduce has been lowered by 27 percent to 61 percent.

On Tuesday, Google announced Google Compute Engine (GCE) would now cost, on average, 32 percent less. Google Storage was been cut, on average, by 68 percent. Google BigQuery on-demand analysis services were reduced, price-wise, by up to 85 percent.

D3.js: a hexagonal cartograms

Conceptualisation of a D3 linked view with a hexagonal cartogram - Spatialists:



China Still Dominates, but Some Manufacturers Look Elsewhere - Interactive Feature - NYTimes.com


Advanced Visualization of Elections

way beyond blue-and-green maps

512 Paths to the White House - Interactive Feature - NYTimes.com:
By MIKE BOSTOCK and SHAN CARTER , with D3.js

explained:
shancarter.com/talk/2012/visualized/


Over the Decades, How States Have Shifted - Interactive Feature - NYTimes.com





IBM Node-RED for IoT

Meet Node-RED, an IBM project that fulfills the internet of things’ missing link — Tech News and Analysis:



node-red-screenshot

Vega: A Visualization Grammar

Vega: A Visualization Grammar:
"Vega is a visualization grammar, a declarative format for creating, saving and sharing visualization designs. 

With Vega you can describe data visualizations in a JSON format, and generate interactive views using either HTML5 Canvas or SVG."


As mentioned in this podcast, it is using D3, and D3 creator Mike Bostock (PhD student on Stanford, NY Times, Square) is advisor on Vega project.

podcast:
Data Stories #22: NYT Graphics and D3 with Mike Bostock and Shan Carter | Data Stories

Vega and D3 · trifacta/vega Wiki


Wednesday, March 26, 2014

architecture: Mushroom House

The Mushroom House | Zillow Blog

Internet of Everything: $14.4 trillion?

Cisco pegs potential profit value for Internet of Everything at $14.4 trillion | ZDNet: "Cisco is projecting that the Internet of Everything has the potential to grow 

global corporate profits by 21 percent in aggregate by 2022."


Facebook -$2B, -7% = OculusRift

Facebook shares fall 7% on Oculus deal - latimes.com:
"The reality of Facebook’s $2-billion-plus acquisition of Oculus VR set in on Wall Street on Wednesday, dragging down Facebook shares and the Nasdaq.
Facebook fell nearly 7% to $60.38 "

Oculus technology apparently has a great potential,
and would be a good fit for Microsoft or Sony,
but asking price was probably too much for them...


Tuesday, March 25, 2014

cubism.js: Mike Bostock: Time Series Visualization

Creator of D3.js JavaScript visualization library
introduced a new tool (D3 plugin): cubism.js

Mike Bostock @ Square talks about Time Series Visualization on Vimeo: "


Mike Bostock @ Square talks about Time Series Visualization from Librato on Vimeo.


Youtube,Vimeo: Video Playback Speed

Youtube and Vimeo: Adjust Video Playback Speed | Motertech:



YouTube: switch to HTML5 player, select speed



Vimeo: download video file, select playback speed on local player



Youtube3





Docker @ Linux

From the Editors: Docker is the future - SD Times
We don't often see technologies arise that are clearly the future of software development. Git was one such piece of software. Hadoop another. But this year, we're betting on Docker. (plus, there was a $15M investment... )

docker.io
The whole story



Docker (software) - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia:
"Docker is an open source project that automates the deployment of applications inside software containers.

The Linux kernel comprises cgroups for resource isolation (CPU, memory, block I/O, network, etc.) that does not require starting any virtual machines, and also provides namespaces to completely isolate application's view of the operating environment, including process trees, network, user ids and mounted file systems. LXC combines cgroups and namespace support to provide an isolated environment for applications; Docker is built on top of LXC, enabling image management and deployment services."

Written in Go Programming Language


It is likely that something similar is running on Google infrastructure for a while... With millions of servers, optimization and management are crucial, 
and there are many excellent engineers in Google... 

How about Microsoft Azure? There may be similar options available on Windows also, and enough reason and engineers in Microsoft to try similar.
Obviously, since Linux runs on Azure, Docker can too...

Another consideration: in multi-server environment, most of "apps" are the same,
with minimum configuration differences (i.e. IP & DNS address), and they only need private memory and process space, can share everything else.
So maybe a "container" is still not optimal for maximum utilization of resources.


Monday, March 24, 2014

Windows Azure => Microsoft Azure

Microsoft to rebrand 'Windows Azure' as 'Microsoft Azure' | ZDNet:

"Microsoft will announce its rebranding of its "Windows Azure" cloud operating system to "Microsoft Azure,

...

The rebranding makes sense, given Windows Azure isn't all about Windows. Azure customers can run Linux in virtual machines on the operating system. Azure users also can run Oracle databases and middleware, and use non-Windows-specific development tools, including Java, Ruby, PHP and Python."

Google is driving such naming (everything Google xy), 
so Microsoft needs to reinforce its brand... 

Highcharts - JavaScript charting library

Charting library with similar usage to jqPlot, but with more features.

Highcharts - Highcharts product

Free for Non-commercial

chart-types
Do you want to use Highcharts for a personal website, a school site or a non-profit organisation? Then you don't need the author's permission, just go on and use Highcharts. For commercial websites and projects, see License and Pricing.

(from $90 /site, from $390/developer)

It works in all modern mobile and desktop browsers including the iPhone/iPad and Internet Explorer from version 6. On iOS and Android, multitouch support provides a seamless user experience. Standard browsers use SVG for the graphics rendering. In legacy Internet Explorer graphics are drawn using VML.
(and Canvas for Android 2.x)

ajax


Sunday, March 23, 2014

CSS: Absolute Relative Static

HTML Canvas can be combined with CSS positioned text
to get better quality and control of text on charts,
as demonstrated in this excellent book.


Sigma js: drawing graphs (not charts)

Sigma js:

"Sigma is a JavaScript library dedicated to graph drawing. It makes easy to publish networks on Web pages, and allows developers to integrate network exploration in rich Web applications."
(MIT license)

Using Sigma for Drawing Graphs @ InfoQ

Using Sigma.js with Neo4j | Max De Marzi



SQL Server 2014: NoSQL Speeds

SQL Server 2014: NoSQL Speeds with Relational Capabilities:

"For the last four or five years Microsoft has been working on the first rewrite of SQL Server’s query execution since version 7 in 1998. The goal is to offer NoSQL-like speeds without sacrificing the capabilities of a relational database. 

At the heart of this endeavor is project Hekaton, their memory optimized tables. While still accessible via traditional T-SQL operations, internally they are a fundamentally different technology."





AngularJS 2.0 for Mobile Apps

AngularJS 2.0 Will Target Mobile Apps, Drop Support For Older Browsers:

"AngularJS 2.0 is a framework for mobile apps" says the AngularJS team. The framework will continue to be supported for desktops, but the primary focus will be on getting the mobile bit right. The goals also include support for EcmaScript 6 along with a transpiler (since browsers don't support ES6 yet). 

The changes planned are outlined in an article "AngularJS 2.0" along with links to design documents to elicit feedback from developers.

...
Support only modern browsers that auto-update - Chrome, FireFox, Opera, Safari and IE11. On mobile, Chrome on Android, iOS 6+, Windows Phone 8+ and Firefox Mobile. There "may" be support for older versions of Android."

Saturday, March 22, 2014

TED | Talks

TED | Talks (list)

TED Talks as of 2.24.2014 @ docs.google (spreadsheet)

TED - YouTube (1500 videos)

TED2014 | TED Blog

Larry Page: Where's Google going next?

Larry Page: Where's Google going next? - YouTube: ""



Google Acquires Artificial Intelligence Startup DeepMind For More Than $500M | TechCrunch

Plex Media Server

Plex - Plex Media Server: Your Media on all of Your Devices - Plex.tv:

Plex organizes all of your personal media, wherever
you keep it, so you can enjoy it on any device.








podcast: Creating the Plex Software Ecosystem with Elan Feingold on the Hanselminutes 






TED “Negropodamus”: IoT, Knowledge Pills

“Negropodamus” disses Internet of Things, predicts knowledge pills | Ars Technica:

"TED’s 30th anniversary kicked off with MIT MediaLab founder Nicholas Negroponte, who took the stage to recount his 40-plus years of experience as a technology experimenter and visionary....

Yet technology is in some sense moving backward right now, dumbing things down and skewing innovation. Negroponte took an opportunity to bash the “Internet of Things” as it's presently marketed, rightly noting that it’s often little more than putting “an oven control on your phone...”



... In 30 years, Negroponte said, we’re going to be able to literally ingest information. Once information is in your bloodstream, some kind of mechanism could deposit the information in the brain. You could take a pill and learn English or the works of Shakespeare...

Nicholas Negroponte at TED2014 | TED Blog

Nicholas Negroponte | Speaker | TED

Nicholas Negroponte - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia


Nicholas Negroponte: in 1984, makes 5 predictions

Friday, March 21, 2014

SQL Server 2014 released

SQL Server 2014 released to manufacturers, will be generally available April 1 - The Official Microsoft Blog - Site Home - TechNet Blogs:

"Built-in in-memory technology for faster application performance

In-memory transaction processing (In-Memory OLTP), speeds up an already very fast experience by delivering speed improvement of up to 30x."

Will this be enough to compete with "NoSQL" solutions?


Electric Mountain Bikes

Clever, and could be useful for "hilly" places like San Francisco



Amazon.com: Yukon Trails Electric Mountain Bike (26-Inch): Sports & Outdoors:

  • 36V 10AH Battery
  • 250 W in Hub Motor
  • 7 Speed
  • Shimano Shifter
  • F / R V Brakes
  • $881




Java 8 released: (Java, Lambdas) -> Java 8

Oracle Releases Java 8 at EclipseCon: @ InfoQ

  • Lambdas
  • Method References
  • Streams
  • Extension methods 
  • new date and time processing
  • Nashorn, native JavaScript support to the JVM
  • OpenJFX brings JavaFX to the OpenJDK
Lambda expressions are noting new, but they are new to Java.
In this case even JVM is changed to better support it... 
Given that even COBOL could have similar features, it was time :)

Everything About Java 8 @ InfoQ

Thursday, March 20, 2014

Equinox on Web

Equinox - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia:

An equinox occurs twice a year (around 20 March and 22 September), when the plane of Earth's equator passes the center of the Sun. At this time the tilt of the Earth's axis is inclined neither away from nor towards the Sun. The term equinox can also be used in a broader sense, meaning the date when such a passage happens. The name "equinox" is derived from the Latin aequus (equal) and nox (night), because around the equinox, night and day are about equal length.

Clay - A 3D engine on canvas



peterned

Wednesday, March 19, 2014

Read twice as fast, one word at a time

Read twice as fast, one word at a time | Jesse Liberty:



"Based  on significant research, Flash Reading appears to be able to instantly increase your reading speed by 50% to 100% or more, while maintaining or increasing comprehension.  



 The general idea is to flash each word on the screen sequentially, pausing a bit for punctuation.  Some more sophisticated incarnations slow down slightly for larger words."



5 Text Reader Apps That Really Help You Speed Read



Free online speed reading software | Spreeder.com




Datum - Data

Making Sense of Data - - Unit 1 - Introducing the Data Process:



"A datum is a single fact or piece of information. 



The plural, data, is a collection of information. "



Data (/ˈdtə/ day-tə or /ˈdætə/ da-tə, also /ˈdɑːtə/ dah-tə)
is a set of 
values of qualitative or quantitative variables;
restated, data are individual pieces of 
information


Google: Making Sense of Data: Fusion Tables

Making Sense of Data - - Welcome to Making Sense of Data:



Google using data to change learning patterns
(and advertise new Fusion Tables tool)

Activities Before Lessons

science beakerAlthough most courses present lessons before they present activities, our research has shown that activities are more beneficial for learning than watching videos and reading text.
no lectureIn this class, activities are presented before lessons. This way, you get a chance to experience concepts before reading about them in the lessons.

Event Sourcing

Event Sourcing:  @ Martin Fowler

"Event Sourcing ensures that all changes to application state are stored as a sequence of events. Not just can we query these events, we can also use the event log to reconstruct past states, and as a foundation to automatically adjust the state to cope with retroactive changes"

Reference 3: Introducing Event Sourcing @ MSDN Patterns & Practices

  • Events happen in the past. For example, "the speaker was booked," "the seat was reserved," "the cash was dispensed." Notice how we describe these events using the past tense.
  • Events are immutable. Because events happen in the past, they cannot be changed or undone. However, subsequent events may alter or negate the effects of earlier events. For example, "the reservation was cancelled" is an event that changes the result of an earlier reservation event.
  • Events are one-way messages. Events have a single source (publisher) that publishes the event. One or more recipients (subscribers) may receive events.
  • Typically, events include parameters that provide additional information about the event. For example, "Seat E23 was booked by Alice."
  • In the context of event sourcing, events should describe business intent. For example, "Seat E23 was booked by Alice" describes in business terms what has happened and is more descriptive than, "In the bookings table, the row with key E23 had the name field updated with the value Alice."
Event Store for Web Applications @ InfoQ



Event Sourcing Basics · EventStore/EventStore Wiki @ GitHub

All events should be represented as verbs in the past tense such as CustomerRelocated, CargoShipped, or InventoryLossageRecorded.
Transactional view of an order with delete
A common question that arises is how to delete information.
It is not possible as previously jump into the time machine and say that an event never happened (eg: delete a previous event). As such it is necessary to model a delete explicitly as a new transaction...
(that is un-doing effects of one that needs to be removed)

Hottest 'event-sourcing' Answers - Stack Overflow


CQRS Info Command Query Responsibility Segregation




Tuesday, March 18, 2014

Frozen: Piano Tutorial with Sheet Music

Let It Go Piano Tutorial with Sheet Music - Disney's Frozen Soundtrack - YouTube:



How To Play "Let It Go" (Idina Menzel) Part 1 - Frozen Soundtrack - YouTube

Frozen - Let It Go Tutorial (Easier Version) - 50% speed - YouTube

"Let It Go- Frozen | MuseScore.com


Open-source governance

Open-source governance - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia:

"Open-source governance is a political philosophy which advocates the application of the philosophies of the open source and open content movements to democratic principles in order to enable any interested citizen to add to the creation of policy, as with a wiki document. Legislation is democratically opened to the general citizenry, employing their collective wisdom to benefit the decision-making process and improve democracy"


Semantic MediaWiki

Semantic MediaWiki - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia:

"Semantic MediaWiki (SMW) is an extension to MediaWiki that allows for annotating semantic data within wiki pages, thus turning a wiki that incorporates the extension into a semantic wiki. Data that has been encoded can be used in semantic searches, used for aggregation of pages, displayed in formats like maps, calendars and graphs, and exported to the outside world via formats like RDF and CSV."

SemanticMediaWiki Logo.png


LEGO Robot solves Rubik's Cube in 3 Seconds

LEGO Robot Defeats Rubik's Cube in 3 Seconds | The Escapist:





The Facebook Mobile Release Process

The Facebook Mobile Release Process: @ InfoQ



Interesting... Facebook as "mobile" company,

now integrated mobile development to same teams that create web features.



Timed releases for mobile apps @ Facebook



qconsf.com/system/files/presentation-slides/The-Facebook-Mobile-Release-Process.pdf



Similar to Google Chrome and Mozilla Firefox,

not Facebook has regular release schedule (every 2 months?),

where new features are included when they are ready.



Predictable schedule re-assures developers that they will have a chance next time,

and makes it easier to synchronize teams and efforts.



Using Git, automated builds and tests, CI, OS tools







 

Apple testing smartwatch

Apple reportedly testing inductive, solar and motion charging for its unannounced smartwatch:



"OK, Google", Android Wear

Google reveals Android Wear, an operating system for smartwatches | The Verge:

Google unveils Android Wear, its modified OS for wearables | Internet & Media - CNET News

Google announces Android Wear, a Nexus-like platform for wearables



LG:  G Watch,
Motorola: Moto 360







G-watch-theverge-1_560

Sunday, March 16, 2014

Run Android on PC

Surf Report: How to run Android apps on your computer:

"App Player" Windows Application that emulates Android 4.0

Another reason for Microsoft to "embrace" Android

(and make its own Android App Store, like for Nokia phones :)



Windows 8.x could "embedded" Windows RT, Windows Phone 8.x and Android each running in its own window, not fullscreen..  :)



It would be best to standardize PhoneGap,

and make it a part of all mobile OSs...














F# embedded in Excel

Excel Coding Errors Are Destroying World Economies and F# (with Tsunami) Is Here to Stop Them!:

Interesting marketing concept / idea:
it is easier to sell "pain killers" than "vitamins"
since people primarily want to solve immediate problems...

Microsoft Office is moving to JavaScript based plugins...
F# may be a bit too much power to average Excel user...

And Excel is used and misused for much more critical things
that it is designed for...

Excel Fail
London Whale Part Result Of Excel Error - Business Insider

It's all in JP Morgan's 129 page report onthe $6 billion trading loss. In an appendix on page 127, the report talks about how one London-based quant was working on a new VaR (Value at Risk) model for the Chief Investment Office.


On top of not being tested correctly, the report states that the model suffered from some pretty standard Excel flaws.


Microsoft Corporation Launches Cheaper Office Software
Microsoft Office tools remains the world standard for productivity software, with over one billion users spending over $25 billion dollars on them in that last fiscal year.




Saturday, March 15, 2014

Disney's Frozen - "Let It Go" in 25 languages

Disney's Frozen - "Let It Go" Multi-Language Full Sequence - YouTube:

25x Lyrics: UniLang • View topic - Frozen's "Let it Go" in 25 Languages

Hear Frozen's "Let it Go" in 25 Lang
uages | Disney Insider
“‘Let it Go’ in 25 Languages” showcases multiple voice actors singing the song in different languages.


Original English version
English Lyrics: Idina Menzel - (Disney's Frozen) Let It Go Lyrics | MetroLyrics

book: Designing Evolvable Web APIs with ASP.NET

Designing Evolvable Web APIs with ASP.NET - O'Reilly Media:

By 


"Design and build Web APIs for a broad range of clients—including browsers and mobile devices—that can adapt to change over time. This practical, hands-on guide takes you through the theory and tools you need to build evolvable HTTP services with Microsoft’s ASP.NET Web API framework. ...."


Harnessing the power of the web


Linus Torvalds & git - YouTube

Linus Torvalds & git - YouTube: ""



'via Blog this'

Fluent 2014 - The Web Platform (O'Reilly Conference)

Keynote Video: Fluent 2014 - O'Reilly Conferences, March 11 - 13, 2014, San Francisco, CA:

Fluent Conference 2014 - YouTube (videos)




F# Snippets

Home Page | F# Snippets:



About | F# SnippetsThis web site allows you to easily share F# source code snippets. It is similar to other Pastebin services, but focuses only on F#.



Reasonable Code with F# @ InfoQ



http://www.tryfsharp.org/



http://tryfs.net




WebSockets vs HTTP speed (Neo4j)

It’s over 9000! Neo4j on WebSockets | Max De Marzi:



With NoSQL, the speed is essential feature.

And typical JSON / HTTP combination could become limitation.

So BSON / WebSockets is an interesting, much faster, alternative...



In case of Neo4j this is very useful

when accessing from non-Java (non-embedded) applications.




book: HTML5 in Action

Manning: HTML5 in Action:


HTML5 in Action - Manning Publications (online samples)

html5-ia/html5-ia code @ GitHub

Friday, March 14, 2014

A Question of Craftsmanship

A Question of Craftsmanship @ InfoQ:

"Kevlin Henney addresses the motivation, implications, pros and cons of a craftsmanship view of software development, as well as touching on other metaphors and their implied practices."



qconlondon.com/dl/qcon-london-2010/slides/KevlinHenney_IntroductionSoftwareCraftsmanship.pdf



People in high tech take pride in their work. 
They are individuals who see the details of the things they produce 
in the light of the trials and triumphs they experience while creating products. 
In the courage of creation, they find a place to hang their individuality. 
Programmers and techno types appreciate elegant, 
spare code and the occasional well-turned architectural hack.
- Rick Levine, The Cluetrain Manifesto

https://speakerd.s3.amazonaws.com/presentations/46933d002d9d01312a2e02bd55941050/A_Question_of_Craftsmanship.pdf



Software engineering is the science and art 

of designing and making, with economy and 

elegance, applications, bridges, frameworks, 

and other similar structures so that they can 

safely resist the forces to which they may be 

subjected. 


A Question of Craftsmanship - Kevlin Henney - Agile SG 2013 // Speaker Deck




Amazon Prime $99

As it Warned, Amazon Boosts the Price of Prime - Businessweek:



It may be time for them to start using natural gas instead of diesel :)




Thursday, March 13, 2014

Simple NoSQL wrapper for SQL

Thinking Biggy with Rob Conery @ .NET Rocks!

"Biggy is a project in GitHub that puts a wrapper over top of Postgres (and SQL Server for that matter) to allow you to handle documents (aka JSON) efficiently and fast. Rob takes on thinking around noSQL in general, including graph and document databases. This leads to a whole discussion on what we should store and why."

robconery/biggy

louischatriot/nedb

PostgreSQL: The world's most advanced open source database

Rob Conery | Web Development with NodeJS, Ruby on Rails, .NET and ASP.NET MVC


Waiting for the Summer to Come - Carl Franklin

Waiting for the Summer to Come - Carl Franklin - YouTube:


.NET Rocks!

Google Drive Reduced Prices

Google Drive Chops Prices - InformationWeek:



"Google Drive now offers 15 GB of storage for free, up from 5 GB. Its paid storage tiers are now 100 GB for $24 a year, down from $60; 1 TB for $120 a year, down from $600; and 10 TB for $1,200 a year, with larger allotments available."


Microsoft OneDrive (previously known as SkyDrive) offers 7 GB for free, 50 GB for $25 a year, 100 GB for $50 a year, and 200 GB for $100 a year.

Apple iCloud offers 5 GB of storage at no cost, a 10-GB upgrade for $20 a year, a 20-GB upgrade for $40 a year, and a 50-GB upgrade for $100 a year.

Dropbox offers 2 GB for free, with 100 GB for $99 a year, 200 GB for $199 a year, and 500 GB for $499 a year.

Free Windows Phone OS ?

Will Microsoft Waive Windows Phone Fees? - InformationWeek:

"Microsoft has waived Windows Phone licensing fees for two Indian smartphone makers Lava and Karbonn. Will the company extend the offer to other manufacturers to help boost sales?


Google allows handset makers to use Android for free



...Reports suggest that Nokia pays between $20 and $30 per device to license Windows Phone..."


Wednesday, March 12, 2014

Open Web - Tim Berners-Lee

An online Magna Carta: Berners-Lee calls for bill of rights for web | Technology | The Guardian:

"The inventor of the world wide web believes an online "Magna Carta" is needed to protect and enshrine the independence of the medium he created and the rights of its users worldwide."



Web We Want | Celebrating the free, open, universal WebFreedom of speech and belief and freedom from want and fear.

Web for Kids (Small Pieces Loosely Joined)

Small Pieces Loosely Joined for Kids:



"A Unified Theory of the Web."

2002 David Weinberger

Disney $1 Billion Technology (vs. Comcast)

While the technology is nice, it is more interesting who is Disney's main competitor: Comcast (Universal Studios).
Is Comcast becoming a new AT&T?


Disney Bets $1 Billion on Technology to Track Theme-Park Visitors - Businessweek:

"MyMagic+, Walt Disney’s (DIS) $1 billion experiment in crowd control, data collection, and wearable technology that could change the way people play—and spend—at the Most Magical Place on Earth. "



MyMagic+ promises far more radical change. It’s a sweeping reservation and ride planning system that allows for bookings months in advance on a website or smartphone app. Bracelets called MagicBands, which link electronically to an encrypted database of visitor information, serve as admission tickets, hotel keys, and credit or debit cards; a tap against a sensor pays for food or trinkets. The bands have radio frequency identification (RFID) chips—which critics derisively call spychips because of their ability to monitor people and things.



World Science U

World Science U:

"IMMERSE YOURSELF IN THE WORLD OF SCIENCE"
  • SCIENCE UNPLUGGED
    EXPLORE QUICK ANSWERS TO HUNDREDS OF QUESTIONS. UNSCRIPTED. UNCENSORED.
  • SHORT COURSES
    TAKE 2-3 WEEK EXPLORATIONS. NO HOMEWORK. NO PREREQUISITES.
  • UNIVERSITY COURSES
    JOIN 8-10 WEEK COURSES, WHEN YOU WANT TO GET SERIOUS.

25th anniversary of the WWW


Web at 25: Celebrating the 25th Anniversary of the Invention of the Web
Web at 25: Celebrating the 25th Anniversary of the Invention of the Web

Official Google Blog: On the 25th anniversary of the web, let’s keep it free and open:





First website ever goes back online on the open Web’s 20th birthday | Ars Technica