Friday Links

IMG_0294Back in the day I used to always have a Friday link blog post and I’ve noticed I’ve been doing a lot more reading so it just feels right to visit this back.

  1. Apple owes everyone an apology and it should start with me, specifically - You can’t but own one of the latest Apple MacBook Pros and not hate the keyboard. I’ve been lucky” enough to experience all three versions of it. The latest is on my new laptop from Spatial Networks which I have to admit feels the best of any of them but I’m just waiting for the f” key to stop working like it has on all my other ones. I used to enjoy typing on MacBooks but not anymore. The thing is they keep trying to fix broken and not just go back to something that worked.
  2. Electric scooters have zipped by docked bikes in popularity - Here in Tempe, AZ we get to see all of them. Bird, Uber/JUMP, Lime, Razor and various ones I can’t even tell the brand. Their are like lice on every corner just fallen over and broken. I noted in St. Pete that they didn’t have any scooters and it was surreal walking around on sidewalk without jumping out of the way of some idiot on a scooter. I don’t understand the business model but I hate to say they are here to stay.
  3. A look at IBM S/360 core memory: In the 1960s, 128 kilobytes weighed 610 pounds - I mean the title says it all. These things were HUGE! X and Y wires. It’s madness but apparently it worked!
  4. Notre Dame Cathedral will never be the same, but it can be rebuilt - Thanks to all the pictures and Lidar imagery, the Catheral will be rebuilt and be very close to original. But…

While architects have enough detailed information about the cathedral to pull off a technically very precise reconstruction, the craftsmanship is unlikely to be the same. Today, the stone that makes up the cathedral would be cut using machinery, not by hand by small armies of stonemasons as in the 12th century. Nineteenth-century and 20th-century Gothic buildings always look a little dead, because the stone doesn’t bear the same marks of the mason’s hand,” Murray told Ars Technica.

Still I look forward to watching this happen.



Date
April 19, 2019