Syzygies

20 ms·

241.
by Syzygies 3y ago
As a mathematician I'm hypersensitive to people overreaching with theory. It's often the King's clothes. There are indisputable reasons why a musical fifth sounds good, but vision is more organic. Evolution has left us with m
242.
by Syzygies 3y ago
"I'm sorry Dave, I'm afraid I can't do that" is the actual quote from 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968). I also love the scene where Dave takes Hal apart. We've always called the first computation the Macaulay compu
243.
by Syzygies 3y ago
Or get both? As a research mathematician, my iPad Pro is for drawing mathematics and reading papers, to get me away from a 32" screen when I'm not coding. The MacBook Air is for when I can't be at my 32" screen. Coding i
244.
by Syzygies 3y ago
Years ago I kept a journal of every bug, coding in pre-ANSI C. I figured that with care, I'd never make the same mistake twice. I found the list years later. Last entry: "Forgot to eat. Got sick."
245.
by Syzygies 3y ago
I want to take computer-generated math animation, and transform it to look as if I hand drew every frame. This must be within the reach of consumer AI by now? I'll be happy to hand draw a large training set. Otherwise I don't know
246.
by Syzygies 3y ago
I stopped reading after the Haskell example, which looked idiomatic and reasonable to me. Yes it's short; that's a reason to learn Haskell. I'd much rather code in the shower than handcuffed to a keyboard.
247.
by Syzygies 3y ago
Wow. I didn't expect visiting HN to read about my Dad (Bryce Bayer) again!
248.
by Syzygies 3y ago
I needed a sample LaTeX vita file in the early 1980's. I had logins on various math department servers, so I searched from root on each machine, and decided to base my vita on David Mumford's vita source file. That says something
249.
by Syzygies 3y ago
Anyone who follows an acronym for advice isn't cut out to be an effective manager.
250.
by Syzygies 3y ago
This could be done more cleanly in keyboard firmware. I recovered from a deep dive into mechanical keyboards by trying Topre switches, the obsession killer. I now have four Leopold FC660C keyboards with Hasu FC660C controllers, with custom
251.
by Syzygies 3y ago
"Travel" shouldn't be considered a special risk. I had my laptop stolen on a San Francisco BART train. It is possible to set up Apple devices so they're bricks in anyone else's hands. If you're not satisfied wi
252.
by Syzygies 3y ago
Analog circuit code golfing: Long ago, a current mirror to charge a 12v battery bank from a "12v" iPod charger, evading the usual regulator voltage drop. More recently, a circuit to trip a solenoid when a bit of hot dog goes missi
253.
by Syzygies 3y ago
I was at a conference in Germany where Faugère presented his work. The room was stunned, but didn't understand. Hendrik Lenstra asked me to spend several days with Faugère, then give an expository talk. My marching orders: Assume nothi
254.
by Syzygies 4y ago
I've tested a lot of file synchronization software. I rely via scripts on Unison, originally authored by the computer scientist Benjamin Pierce, and now decades of tweaking by a strong open source community. https://github.c
255.
by Syzygies 4y ago
I fell in love with the ninja build system recently. It's machine language for build systems, and I can write my own scripts to generate the ninja build file, rather than introducing any new language from someone else just for build de
256.
by Syzygies 4y ago
As a professor in office hours last night, my students were expressing anxiety about age thirty, as if that was old. Was I really saying people kept getting smarter past thirty? "Perhaps, wiser. And at least you can go more than forty
257.
by Syzygies 4y ago
Most Rogue Amoeba software requires an "ACE" extension incompatible with Activation Lock.
258.
by Syzygies 4y ago
"Alas, the final product horrified Cooper—who loathed BASIC" This so reminded me of that wolf-to-dog "What could go wrong" meme. https://imgur.com/uVJPlZF
259.
by Syzygies 4y ago
Yes! A magnet is an extra step, off the critical path. One needs to add soap eventually; why not use it as signal? This is the same principle I keep trying to explain to my college: Data should be entered ONCE then sourced everywhere needed
260.
by Syzygies 4y ago
Thinking obesity is one number is as dumb as thinking intelligence is one number. Card counting used to be one number, till they realized how much better two numbers did. Yet in this day of smart phones, one still sees geriatricians calcula
261.
by Syzygies 4y ago
I've been on various NSF grant panels. One was math / applied math / statistics. Everyone shares their concerns reading proposals, that's how one builds cred. Synthetic data got mentioned. Late in the decision process, I
262.
by Syzygies 4y ago
> you basically need so see every compute problem as an array problem and immediately see patterns for how to solve them. I was briefly a commercial APL programmer, after APL blew my mind in college. (An IBM 1130 running Fortran punched
263.
by Syzygies 4y ago
Once I recognized that art supplies can substitute for construction materials, this opened up a world for me. For example, though miscommunication I had many holes to fill in some period kitchen cabinet doors in my house. The normal sequenc
264.
by Syzygies 4y ago
Two decades ago I painted my apartment with artist grade titanium white acrylic. It still looks new. A temperament that I share with everyone on HN is a suspicion of convention. So many common practices are dumb that it's hard to see e
265.
by Syzygies 4y ago
I've been planning to put up a web site with plans, as most DIY plans out there are rather sketchy. For most DIY engineering projects I have a pretty good idea of the practical physics, but this challenged me and involved some false st
266.
by Syzygies 4y ago
Tom Colicchio, Thomas Keller, Paul Bertoli and many other chefs have their version of "precious tomatoes", a tomato confit. None of these recipes scale. After many years of struggling with home dehydrators, I bought one of those f
267.
by Syzygies 4y ago
I nevertheless had my M2 MacBook stolen on BART in San Francisco last month. This wouldn't have happened if it were universally understood that stolen MacBooks are worthless. My interaction went smoothly, but this could have gone badly
268.
by Syzygies 4y ago
I had a rather expensive monitor that would sometimes refuse to wake up. I ended up scripting an Alfred keystroke to use AppleScript and System Preferences to toggle the resolution, which would wake up the screen. This would be easier, as I
269.
by Syzygies 4y ago
Of course, the most important story related to AWK is that of Peter Weinberger's face. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_J._Weinberger https://spinroot.com/pico/pjw.html
270.
by Syzygies 4y ago
I believe that these "groupoid" ideas lead into higher category theory, and the supporting mathematics for theorem provers such as Lean.

More ›