Towards Matter, Particularly – Sensory encounter with a microscopic world

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In 'Towards Matter, Particularly' scientific instruments are repurposed to bring to our sensual awareness the ever-present particles whirling with us. The particles determine how and when they reveal themselves, eliciting moments of light and sound and inviting new relationships with the matter that is us and our world.

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Reverse-engineering a carry-lookahead adder in the Pentium

Addition is harder than you'd expect, at least for a computer. Computers use multiple types of adder circuits with different tradeoffs of size versus speed. In this article, I reverse-engineer an 8-bit adder in the Pentium's floating point unit. This adder turns out to be a carry-lookahead adder, in particular, a type known as "Kogge-Stone."1 In this article, I'll explain how a carry-lookahead adder works and I'll show how the Pentium implemented it. Warning: lots of Boolean logic ahead.

The die photo above shows the main functional units of the Pentium. The adder,...

Project Mini Rack - compact and portable homelabs

Project Mini Rack - compact and portable homelabs

Today I'm announcing Project MINI RACK, an open source project to help those building homelabs, RF/wireless rigs, and other electronics projects into mini 10" racks.

Запускаем Doom на пульте от тепловоза

Приветствую всех!
Пару раз я уже показывал компьютеры, использовавшиеся в составе систем автоведения поездов. Но, как нетрудно догадаться, ими число ЭВМ, устанавливаемых на наших локомотивах и электричках, не ограничивается. Пришло время замахнуться на куда более «жирный» девайс — часть микропроцессорной системы управления и диагностики.
Итак, в сегодняшней статье поговорим о вот таком блоке, куда более навороченном, чем ранее виденные. Заодно посмотрим, что там внутри, вернём его в работоспособный вид, узнаем, на что он способен, а главное — немного прикоснёмся к технике с немецких железных дорог.
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Top 10 ways to monitor Linux in the console

Top 10 ways to monitor Linux in the console

top (pictured below... above is btop) is the first utility everyone recommends to monitor Linux (or any form of UNIX, including macOS) resource usage. It's efficient, available almost everywhere... but it's also a bit basic. It shows essential metrics, but looks like it's from the 80s. There are ways to brighten it up, like highlighting active processes or changing color schemes, but it's not the only game in town!

Nowadays, there are a lot of modern monitoring tools—and some not so...

Текущее дооснащение деревенской лаборатории-мастерской

Мастерская любого самоделкина — личное место силы, где всё устроено как должно. Цитадель, дворец, замок, берлога! Это пространство для релаксации, здесь нехотя распрямляются сжатые пружины души и ослабляются натянутые нервы. Сюда приходят для радости и успокоения, для медитаций над железками и деревяшками, вкушать сладость творчества под аромат канифоли. Ниже речь пойдёт о собственной деревенской лаборатории-мастерской, в том числе и для электровакуумных экспериментов, что подразумевает огневые и горячие работы, стеклодувное дело, применение множества химикатов, опыты с электричеством и прочее в таком духе. Как та армейская собака, при всякой возможности стараюсь здесь что-то улучшить или доработать. Читать дальше →

Fluid Simulation Pendant

[Hardware] Wearable real-time FLIP device

The origin of the cargo cult metaphor

https://invidious.privacyredirect.com/watch?v=iILq0ADHrw8

The cargo cult metaphor is commonly used by programmers. This metaphor was popularized by Richard Feynman's "cargo cult science" talk with a vivid description of South Seas cargo cults. However, this metaphor has three major problems. First, the pop-culture depiction of cargo cults is inaccurate and fictionalized, as I'll show. Second, the metaphor is overused and has contradictory meanings making it a lazy insult. Finally, cargo cults are portrayed as an amusing story of native misunderstanding but the background is much darker: cargo cults are a reaction to decades of oppression of Melanesian islanders and the destruction of their culture. For these reasons, the cargo cult metaphor is best...

January Update: Thinking Out Of The Vox

Happy New Year! This month we discuss the current state of the PineVox, seeing what the community have been up to with their PineNotes, announcing InfiniTime 1.15 and announcing the end of production of the Pinebook Pro.

Vulcan – Beyond the three-metre threshold

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Vulcan is an immersive journey to the heart of telluric powers. It is a tribute to volcanologists and volcanoes, exploring themes such as human smallness and the fascination of the immensity of natural forces.

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