Nelson's Linkblog 2011-03

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Home theater PC

Notes from a hacker

2011-03-31 tv • video • pc • htpc

Minecraft rock star

Charming post from Notch, the Minecraft author, about getting a surprise private jet trip to a party

2011-03-30 minecraft • rockstar • fame • fun

Title fraud in NY

"Is it common to tip your title agent $150 when buying a house in New York?"

2011-03-29 fraud • housing • realestate • title

Map rendering software

2011-03-29 maps • osm

Open terrain map tiles

My StackExchange question about maps

2011-03-29 maps • terrain • osm • tiles

Cocoon - Grid-It

A little carrying thingy for lots of little gadgets

2011-03-28 storage • bag • gadgets • case • aviation

Rogers broke Warcraft

Canadian ISP's lousy P2P throttling filters also hampered low bandwidth Warcraft traffic

2011-03-28 games • badtech • isps • rogers • worldofwarcraft • warcraft • trafficshaping

Amazing little climbing game, like a modern Crazy Climber

2011-03-28 games • rockclimbing • climbing • flash

1ms latency systems

Systems talk on building a very low latency transactional system

2011-03-28 performance • computation • systems • design • architecture • trading

MapBlast LineDrive

A forgotten, beautiful visualization of driving directions

2011-03-28 driving • directions • maps • mapblast • linedrive • yahoo

Peanuts despair

Peanuts comic without the final panel is remarkably bleak

2011-03-28 via:metafilter • peanuts • cartoon • funny • 3eanuts

Virginia Woolfe soundtrack

Who knew they made an LP of the dialog?

2011-03-28 movies • elizabethtaylor • richardburton

Mustard hypnosis

Captivating video of a machine capable of picking up sauces

2011-03-28 machines • robots • video • via:metafilter • engineering

Python JIT postmortem

Unladen Swallow project ended up fizzling out, but some good observations

2011-03-28 python • jit • jitc • performance • llvm

Minecraft texture pack that's very pink and girly

2011-03-28 minecraft • games • art • girly • gender

A manifesto from someone claiming to be behind the Comodo SSL certificate hack

2011-03-28 ssl • security • badtech • iran • hacking

Little tangible computer interface, looks kinda silly but kinda cool

2011-03-27 games • tangible • computers • hci • userinterface

The National Map

USGS now provides a slippy map

2011-03-27 maps • usgs • government • data

Mid-air gear repair

Wingwalker changes the tire on a plane

2011-03-26 flying • aviation • wingwalker • stuntpilot • mechanic

Fixing Google eng

Interesting list of problems in Google's engineering culture. I'd agree with about half of these.

2011-03-26 google • engineering • systems • management • culture

Git Community Book

2011-03-26 git • scm • software • manual • documentation

Wrapper script for git makes common github operations easier

2011-03-26 git • github • programming • scm • tools

More on the Bluetooth GPS for iOS

2011-03-25 ios • gps • bluetooth • aviation

new iOS Bluetooth GPS

Third choice of device: looks pretty good

2011-03-25 gps • bluetooth • iphone • ios • ipad • aviation

SSL CA survey 2010

Amazing bit of research into what's in the wild for SSL certificate authorities

2011-03-25 security • ssl • cas • certificates • x.509

A Javascript compiler / obfuscator; better than Google Closure and YUI?

2011-03-25 javascript • compiler • closure • yui • programming

EFF SSL Observatory

Data on the roots of the SSL web of trust

2011-03-25 ssl • security • trust • civilrights

Smutley the cat

AIDS education video

2011-03-25 aids • aides • funny • animation • sex • via:metafilter

Ark Music Factory

the machine behind the instant phenom video

2011-03-25 music • videos • friday • industry • media

Eve hardware upgrade

Performance notes from a recent systems upgrade: more RAM, CPU, etc = measured improvements

2011-03-24 hardware • optimization • eve • games • eveonline • mmos • systems

color.xxx pitch deck

Freakin' hysterical

2011-03-24 hype • software • iphone • socialmedia • parody • funny

Yet more Raffi+Gaga

2011-03-23 raffi • twitter • ladygaga

My buddy Raffi explained the Twitter code to Lady Gaga

2011-03-23 raffi • twitter • ladygaga • nerds

@DadNeedsADrink

Funny Twitter account

2011-03-23 twitter • funny • parenting • fatherhood

Garbage collection (1960)

First published description of garbage collection; look for the keyword "reclamation"

2011-03-23 languages • programming • lisp • computerscience • gc • garbagecollection

Eve dynamic BGP

Online game has some fancy technology to adjust BGP routes in real time for better user experience

2011-03-23 networks • optimization • bgp • ccp • eve • eveonline • mmos

Developer Support Handbook

From Pamela Fox, who did great dev support work at Google

2011-03-23 google • developers • support • advocacy

A font whose purpose is to draw bar charts and pie charts and stuff

2011-03-23 fonts • visualization • hack • via:iamcal • clever

Certificate authority compromised

Evidence that one of the important links in the chain of security for web browsers was compromised last month

2011-03-23 security • badtech • certificates • ssl • https

Elizabeth Taylor to Reagan on AIDS

What an amazing woman

2011-03-23 aids • 80s • reagan • elizabethtaylor • activism

Metafilter vs. sex traffickers

Amazing story of an Internet community helping some young Russian women in a dangerous situation

2011-03-23 russia • immigration • prostitution • metafilter • community

snappy compression

A Google compression library: 2x bigger than gzip, but 10x faster

2011-03-22 speed • compression • google • code • opensource • library

Proof git was written for real programs who work in sometimes messy way

2011-03-22 git • versioncontrol • vc • branching

Google doodle patent twaddle

Google patents the idea of their doodles. In related news: global patent system is broken.

2011-03-22 google • patents • absurd • badtech

Game release dates

RPS calls for a single global release date, instead of the current three day European delay

2011-03-22 games • release • marketing • europe

Courses have instructors

Excited by the success of my friend's new startup providing online teaching with real live instruction

2011-03-22 education • distancelearning • courses • teaching

A headless WebKit for running Javascript

2011-03-22 testing • software • browser • headless • visualization

Child performance horror screwed down 35%

2011-03-22 music • children • via:metafilter • funny • awful

Wikipedia history map

Visualization of all the geotagged wikipedia articles with specific years in them

2011-03-22 map • history • wikipedia • visualization

Techncial weather forecasts done with nicer visualization than the usual government products

2011-03-21 weather • forecast

Etsy deployment

They push 20 code changes to their servers a day, here's part of how

2011-03-21 etsy • servers • deployment

Twitter datacenters

They just pulled off a big datacenter migration, a phenomenally complex task

2011-03-21 hosting • twitter • scalability • architecture • datacenter

Kyle Franklin interview

Airshow pilots and wingwalker had a crash and fire, interview with the victim

2011-03-21 franklinsflyingcircus • aviaton • accident • flying

Amazon Payments

Flexible Payments Service, a PayPal competitor

2011-03-20 payments • paypal • amazon • ecommerce • creditcards

Freedom to roam

The right to travel and forage private property is codified in much of Northern Europe

2011-03-20 freedom • rights • civilrights • hiking • roaming • foraging

Stop motion animation of many images of monuments

2011-03-20 paris • photography • video • via:metafilter

Fun and pretty puzzle game

2011-03-19 spacechem • games • puzzles • zachtronics

Takes screenshots of your Windows screens at regular intervals

2011-03-19 timetracking • software • productivity • screenshot

third party integration for VFRmap

2011-03-19 maps • flying • aviation • api

Color scheme designer

Helps you pick out a pleasing palette

2011-03-19 color • colortheory • design

notepad app for iPad, tries to be beautiful

2011-03-19 ipad • ios • notes • notepad

Microsoft on Rustock takedown

Sounds like an amazing bit of work they did

2011-03-18 Microsoft • rustock • badtech • security • botnet

Details of a failure of Amazon's hosting infrastructure

2011-03-18 amazon • reddit • outage • reliability

PostgreSQL interface for Python, written purely in Python

2011-03-18 python • database • postgres • postgis • postgresql

PyPy compatibility

Things that don't work like cPython. The lack of refcounting seems like it will cause lots of confusing errors

2011-03-18 python • pypy • code • programming

PyPy in practice

Matt tries out PyPy; it works!

2011-03-18 python • pypy • optimization • jit

London Boys vs Autechre

2011-03-18 music • video • funny • 80s • autechre

Tokyo park during an earthquake: cracks, water coming up through landfill

2011-03-18 video • earthquake • japan • tokyo

VCs never say No

Exchange about AirBnB: Fred Wilson's last comment is "We are still in the gathering data phase"

2011-03-18 no • venturecapital • vc • entrepreneurs • startups • airbnb

Gantz Graf dance

too short, but awesome little dance performance

2011-03-17 autechre • music • dance • glitch

RSA SecurID hacked by China?

RSA's two factor system is the target of a "Advanced Persistent Threat", which sounds like code for China to me

2011-03-17 hackers • hacks • rsa • badtech • twofactor • securid • china

Rustock Botnet offline

Coordinated takedown, but the zombies may yet re-find their master

2011-03-17 botnets • badtech • rustock • spam • virus

First person tsunami

Horrifying video of rising floodwaters; it just keeps coming and coming.

2011-03-16 japan • video • tsunami • earthquake • via:waxy

Details of the release of the CIA agent who killed two people in Pakistan

2011-03-16 pakistan • cia • spycraft • spies • diplomacy

VFR over the Rockies

List of various routes across the mountains

2011-03-16 flying • mountains • aviation • rockies

Metacritic: iOS

iPhone games become serious

2011-03-16 games • iphone • ios • ipad • reviews

Updates on benchmarks of the new Python VM. It's getting to production readiness!

2011-03-15 python • code • optimization • jit • speed

Flight sim history

Screenshots of old flight sims

2011-03-15 flight • simulators • aviation • games

Wives per GOP candidate

The party of family values is up and to the right!

2011-03-15 politics • republicans • hypocrisy • marriage

Who's That? Brooown!

New Das Racist video has some 16 bit videogaming goodness

2011-03-15 games • retro • dasracist • music

Twitter / OpenSource

They've put a lot of code online. Kestrel in particular is interesting.

2011-03-15 twitter • opensource • code • messagequeue

Urban water explorer

D3 driven visualization of quality of life and water consumption data. A bit hard to explore, but neat D3 demo.

2011-03-15 d3 • visualization • javascript • water • world

Render mathematical equations in HTML, via Javascript

2011-03-14 math • typesetting • tex • latex • javascript • via:metafilter

Single blade prop

Crazy propulsion for a motorglider

2011-03-13 planes • aviation • propeller

Bird aerobatics

Crazy video of birds doing mid-air somersaults

Tsunami in Santa Cruz

Close-up, detailed video of the waves hitting the harbour

2011-03-13 tsunami • earthquake • santacruz

Franklins' Flying Circus accident

Popular airshow performers have an engine failure during a flight, serious accident

2011-03-13 plane • crash • aviation • wingwalker • aerobatics • airshow • franklinsflyingcircus

Charlie Sheen / Ferris Bueller

Nice little performance

2011-03-13 movies • ferrisbueller • charliesheen • sheen

Python library for genetic algorithms. Nice slide presentation at PyCon

2011-03-12 python • programming • geneticalgorithms • gas • optimization

Fun performance of Tubular Bells by a bunch of women playing cool old synthesizers

2011-03-12 music • synthesizers • brooklyn • organ • moog • tubularbells

Collection of 4chan-style MSPaint comics, often about marijuana. Some NSFWish

2011-03-12 nsfw • comics • funny • marijuana • mspaint

iPad 2 Wi-Fi Teardown

What's inside and how it's built

2011-03-12 ipad • app • teardown • parts • components • design

Tsunami in SF Bay

great photo of a tidal wave

2011-03-11 tsunami • tidalwave • weather • earthquake • sanfrancisco

Here's what a tsunami looks like

2011-03-11 tsunami • earthquake • tides • ocean

GemCraft Labyrinth

Great Tower Defense game, been playing it a couple of weeks now

2011-03-11 games • gemcraft • via:metafilter • towerdefense

Mr. Rogers was awesome

We're missing this kind of sincerity in modern media

2011-03-10 fredrogers • mrrogers • television • tv • emmys • winning

Homebirth tragedy

Very sad story of a child dying because of a preventable infection. Turns out medical science has some value, who would have guessed?

2011-03-10 birth • homebirth • tragedy • death • pregnancy • quacks • homeopathy

YSlow for Chrome

Great tool just got tossed overboard from the burning ship that is Yahoo

2011-03-10 chrome • optimization • web

Company selling $300,000 / year in currency for the game Eve Online. Customer list was hacked.

2011-03-10 games • rmt • hacks • eveonline • eve • ccp

The passion gap

Nice reflection on why startups can be uniquely successful even with competition

2011-03-10 startups • entrepreneurs • success

$100 dedicated servers that use Xen on private hardware

2011-03-10 servers • hosting • internet • xen

Large e-commerce stores are vulnerable to scams

2011-03-10 apple • itunes • security • fraud

Google on Android malware

Official response to the mess in the Android store last week

2011-03-09 google • android • malware • badtech

Examples from the parallel Internet

2011-03-09 china • innovation • startups • facebook • twitter • group

Pinboard Crushing

Post-mortem of what happened to PinBoard the day they doubled their user count

2011-03-08 yahoo • delicious • scalability • pinboard • database

Timeline of web browsers

Great graphic of the family tree

2011-03-08 browsers • web • internet • firefox • chrome • webkit • mozilla • via:metafilter

Gay on the range

Collection of pulp gay novel covers

2011-03-08 gay • via:metafilter • novels • pulp • 1960s

Happy Toy Machine

startup from a high school classmate; design and make custom toys

2011-03-08 toys • custom • manufacture • play

A different set of online weather reporting

2011-03-07 awos • asos • weather • aviation

List of online weather stations, they have a funky web UI

2011-03-07 awos • weather • aviation

Business that helps airplane owners manage their plane's maintenance

2011-03-07 planes • aircraft • maintenance • business • aviation

Enable Chrome speedups

GPU rendering and pre-rendering, not on by default

2011-03-07 google • chrome • browser • gpu • acceleration

Hysterically arch review of a terrible, but popular Parisian restaurant

2011-03-07 paris • food • france • restaurants • via:waxy

1900 infographics

amazing sociology data from students of WEB DuBois

2011-03-07 via:waxy • infovis • graphics • charts • blackhistory • dubois

State security office was seized during the protest, much evidence of brutality and spying

2011-03-07 security • civilrights • egypt

Like the Ballard novel; squatters in a 45 story skyscraper in Caracas

2011-03-06 venezuela • squatter • jgballard • ballard • highrise • poverty

AI Rock Paper Scissors

Simple learning Markov system, but it beats me!

2011-03-06 via:waxy • games • ai • rockpaperscissors

2011-03-06 graphics • webgl • fractals • via:mbostock

Why US broadband sucks

Head of my awesome ISP explains how the lack of fibre access maeks broadband suck

2011-03-06 broadband • internet • isp • policy • fcc • competition

Highlighting the 1000+ special rights that married people get under federal law

2011-03-05 gay • civilrights • marriage • government

Manning being held naked

Soldier accused of leaking the diplomatic cables is being denied clothing

2011-03-05 humanrights • prison • manning • wikileaks

yet another Javascript asynchronous loader. This is getting confusing

2011-03-04 javascript • optimization • asynchronous

Minecraft record factory

Incredible amount of complexity

2011-03-04 minecraft • games • emergent

Fact checking Jobs

Why would Apple feel the need to exaggerate their market dominance?

2011-03-04 apple • ipad • ios • stevejobs

Detailed profile of the Twitter and Square founder

2011-03-03 jack • jackdorsey • twitter • square • startups

Apparently the empty page is a complex special case

2011-03-03 via:diveintomark • browser • firefox • mozilla • aboutblank • badtech

Automattic Status

great public dashboard for WordPress and related services

2011-03-03 wordpress • status • ddos

16 years of Windows

Surprisingly engaging video of someone installing every version of Windows via upgrades. What's remarkable is how the old apps continue to work

2011-03-03 legacy • windows • microsoft

Android malware

The hazards of an open platform

2011-03-03 android • malware • badtech • virus • rootkit

Westboro Baptist photos

Photojournalist got access inside the church, interesting photos. Click Portfolio, then Westboro

2011-03-03 westboro • gayrights • gays • photos • photography • batshitinsane

Sony's war on hackers

Roundup of 10+ years of failed attempts to keep their products closed

2011-03-03 sony • hackers • badtech • drm • dmca

Urban downhill bike race

2011-03-03 via:metafilter • racing • bicycle • chile • danger

Beautiful Flash presentation of Baroque engraving techniques

2011-03-03 drawing • engraving • art • baroque • via:metafilter

X-Plane scenery map

places where enthusiasts have made scenery for the flight simulator

2011-03-03 aviation • flying • xplane • scenery

Shackleton in colour

Amazing photographs from the 1915 Antarctica expedition

2011-03-02 via:kottke • photos • photography • antarctica • shackleton • exploration • 1915

Javascript library to fake up a web browser environment while running headless in Rhino or the like

2011-03-02 javascript • debugging • browser • code

Engine out takeoff

Stupid pilot tricks

2011-03-02 flying • gliding • batshitinsane

Spacewar! HTML5

Classic game ported to run in Javascript, via a PDP-1 emulator

2011-03-02 spacewar • games • html5 • javascript

A reimagined children's book. Goodnight Shai-Hulud bursting out of the dune

2011-03-01 dune • parody • via:metafilter • goodnightmoon

Amazing photographs from an enormous pool of lava in the middle of a volcano

2011-03-01 photos • photography • volcano • lava • magma • geology

Javascript library to simplify web socket access

2011-03-01 websockets • html5 • javascript • code • library

Airplane sales 2010

Table of how many new airplanes were delivered in 2010

2011-03-01 airplanes • aviation • market • cirrus • cessna • piper

Sheen Family Circus

Instant remix of the crazy

2011-03-01 via:mathowie • sheen • charliesheen • familycircus • crazy • batshitinsane

Rumsfeld v. Rice

Crazy emails from a bad man

2011-03-01 government • politics • bush • rumsfeld • rice

Chainsaw birdcall

Insane video of an Australian Lyrebird imitating natural and artificial sounds

2011-03-01 birds • song • via:metafilter • nature

Social web browser: Looks like Google Chrome with Facebook woven through it

2011-03-01 chrome • facebook • startup • browser

It's bad to laugh at someone so clearly mentally ill, but boy this insanity is pretty epic

2011-03-01 charliesheen • sheen • crazy • batshitinsane • actor • drugs