La storia di quei ragazzi che fecero Unix. E la particolare giocosità di uno di essi.

Money quote: "Thompson had passed some of his time after the demise of Multics writing a computer game called Space Travel, which simulated all the major bodies in the solar system along with a spaceship that could fly around them. Written for the GE-645, Space Travel was clunky to play—and expensive: roughly US $75 a game for the CPU time. Hunting around, Thompson came across a dusty PDP-7, a minicomputer built by Digital Equipment Corp. that some of his Bell Labs colleagues had purchased earlier for a circuit-analysis project. Thompson rewrote Space Travel to run on it.

And with that little programming exercise, a second door cracked ajar. It was to swing wide open during the summer of 1969 when Thompson’s wife, Bonnie, spent a month visiting his parents to show off their newborn son. Thompson took advantage of his temporary bachelor existence to write a good chunk of what would become the Unix operating system for the discarded PDP‑7. The name Unix stems from a joke one of Thompson’s colleagues made: Because the new operating system supported only one user (Thompson), he saw it as an emasculated version of Multics and dubbed it “Un-multiplexed Information and Computing Service,” or Unics. The name later morphed into Unix."

https://spectrum.ieee.org/tech-history/cyberspace/the-strange-birth-and-long-life-of-unix

Più efficienza e ricavi: chi utilizza l’intelligenza artificiale “stacca” i concorrenti - il mio articolo per CorCom

https://www.corrierecomunicazioni.it/digital-economy/piu-efficienza-e-ricavi-chi-utilizza-lintelligenza-artificiale-stacca-i-concorrenti/

La nuova sfida delle banche: ecco rischi e opportunità dei token - il mio articolo per CorCom

https://www.corrierecomunicazioni.it/finance/la-nuova-sfida-delle-banche-ecco-rischi-e-opportunita-dei-token/

L’estate è il momento migliore per fare esperimenti ed esplorazioni. Per questo sono tornato ad esplorare Linux e *BSD come possibili strumenti di lavoro più leggeri, ad esempio per quando sono in viaggio (ammesso che si tornerà a viaggare, un giorno). Sono ambienti in cui sono molto meno produttivo che con macOS (lo so per esperienza) ma quando ho riflettutto su quanto invece io sia realmente produttivo con l'iPad Pro ha ridotto la distanza con Unix. E così, leggiucchiando in giro, sto trovando un po' di storie di gente che passa a Linux o *BSD. Ma è possibile che siano ancora/di nuovo delle alternative sensata per il dekstop o è solo una mia idea? Beh, comunque, questo ragazzetto qui sotto è passato a FreeBSD (bella scelta) e tiene Windows 10 al calduccio in una macchina virtuale. Contento lui.

Money quote: "My line of work requires me to maintain some form of Windows installation, so I decided to keep it in a VM rather than dual booting as I was developing code and not running any high-end visual stuff like games. My first thought was to install Arch or Gentoo Linux, but the last time I attempted a Gentoo installation it left me bootless. Not that there is anything wrong with Gentoo, it was probably my fault, but I like the idea of some sort of installer so I looked at rock-solid Debian. My dad had installed Debian on his sweet new cutting-edge Lenovo laptop he received recently from work. He often raves about his cool scripts and much more effective customized experience, but often complains about his hybrid GPU support as he has an Intel/Nvidia hybrid display adapter (he has finally resolved it and now boasts his 6 connected displays).

I didn’t want to install Windows again, but something didn’t feel right about installing some flavour of Linux. Back at home I have a small collection of FreeBSD servers running in all sorts of jails and other physical hardware, with the exception of one Debian server which I had the hardest time dealing with (it would be FreeBSD too if 802.11ac support was there as it is acting as my WiFi/gateway/IDS/IPS). I loved my FreeBSD servers, and yes I will write posts about each one soon enough. I wanted that cleanliness and familiarity on my desktop as well (I really love the ports collection!). It’s settled – I will run FreeBSD on my laptop. This also created a new rivalry with my father, which is not a bad thing either."

https://www.manios.ca/blog/2018/01/finally-moving-away-from-windows/

A quanto pare ci sono problemi con il link precedente. Passando dall’Internet archive dovrebbe funzionare

Advertising, l’Antitrust Uk pensa a una task force sui mercati digitali - il mio articolo per CorCom

https://www.corrierecomunicazioni.it/digital-economy/advertising-lantitrust-uk-pensa-a-una-task-force-sui-mercati-digitali/

Pagamenti, le banche eruopee lanciano la sfida a Visa e Mastercard - il mio articolo per CorCom

https://www.corrierecomunicazioni.it/digital-economy/pagamenti-le-banche-eruopee-lanciano-la-sfida-a-visa-e-mastercard/

Ci sono delle cose che gli architetti debbono sapere. Alcune belle, altre strane, molte surreali, spesso sorprendenti. Una lista intrigante.

Money quote:
49. What went wrong in Fatehpur Sikri.
50. What went wrong in Pruitt-Igoe.
51. What went wrong with the Tacoma Narrows Bridge.
52. Where the CCTV cameras are.
53. Why Mies really left Germany.
54. How people lived in Çatal Hüyük.
55. The structural properties of tufa.

https://www.readingdesign.org/250-things

L’importanza delle AirPods Pro: piccole ma fenomenali - il mio articolo per Il Post

https://www.ilpost.it/antoniodini/2020/07/04/limportanza-delle-airpods-pro-piccole-ma-fenomenali/

E pensare che era rallentato il tasso di connessione a Internet: prima del lockdown la gente si connette meno. C'è un incastro (o più di uno) da risolvere. Le cause e le conseguenze sono vitali.

Money quote: "Had growth rates held steady near the 11% average for 2005 to 2017, more than half a billion extra people would now be online. Of the 3.8 billion who remain unconnected, an alarming proportion are women. In poor urban areas, men can outnumber women on the internet as much as two to one."

https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2018/oct/18/exclusive-dramatic-slowdown-in-global-growth-of-the-internet

Note sulle proprietà degli inchiostri delle penne stilografiche.

Money quote: "Fountain pen ink is basically water with colorant and other chemicals required for proper functioning. Each manufacturer has their own formula."

https://crlf.site/log/notes/200430-inks/

Pop-App 2020, il programma per salvare i libri pop-up per l’infanzia - il mio articolo per Anobii

https://blog.anobii.com/it/2020/07/06/libri-pop-up-per-linfanzia/

Il nuovo servizio di posta Hey è diventato famigerato per le ragioni sbagliate: la polemica con Apple sulla tassa dell'App Store, il desiderio di reinventare il modo con il quale gestiamo la posta. Ne scrivo domani sul Foglio Innovazione. Ma in realtà c'è anche tutto il discorso relativo all'uso delle tecnologie. Perché fare un servizio di posta elettronica adesso è molto diverso da quando bastava installare "sendmail" su un server Unix. Anzi, totalmente.

Money quote: "We didn’t jump into the cloud 10 years ago just because it was cool, it felt like we were comparatively late to adopt Kubernetes, we don’t use a service mesh. We’ve let these technologies mature, and now we’re getting real value."

https://info.acloud.guru/resources/kubernetes-aws-cloud-scaling-hey

Se volete fare una immersione nella mente di uno dei più importanti sviluppatori (ha creato Mosaic) e venture capitalist, questa intervista a Marc Andreessen fa al caso vostro.

Money quote: "Q: You're waking up on Monday morning, or on a Sunday night, you're looking at this [[your calendar]], what are you thinking?

A: I’m thinking “God, I’m organized! I have a plan!”. If I didn’t have this, I’d be in a panic the very first moment I wake up."

https://www.theobservereffect.org/marc.html

Uber spinge sul food delivery, acquisita Postmates per 2,6miliardi di dollari - il mio articolo per CorCom

https://www.corrierecomunicazioni.it/digital-economy/uber-spinge-sul-food-delivery-acquisita-postmates-per-25-miliardi-di-dollari/

Adware preinstallato nei dispositivi Android, Kaspersky lancia l'allarme - il mio articolo per CorCom

https://www.corrierecomunicazioni.it/cyber-security/adware-preinstallato-nei-dispositivi-android-kaspersky-lancia-lallarme/

News online, Instagram alle calcagna di Twitter – il mio articolo per CorCom

https://www.corrierecomunicazioni.it/digital-economy/news-online-instragram-alle-calcagna-di-twitter/

Gli Usa pronti a bannare TikTok: “Info in mano al governo cinese” – il mio articolo per CorCom

https://www.corrierecomunicazioni.it/digital-economy/gli-usa-pronti-a-bannare-tiktok-info-in-mano-al-governo-cinese/

I vincitori scrivono la storia e dei perdenti si capisce qualcosa solo leggendo e mettendo assieme i frammenti. Come quelli dei filosofi greci e romani, i pagani cioè, che criticavano come assurdo il cristianesimo tutto e la Genesi nell'Antico Testamento soprattutto.

Money quote: "According to Julian, Moses’ cosmogony is incomplete. Darkness, the deep and the waters are not said to have been created (God did not say: ‘Let there be darkness’ etc), so they must have been pre-existent. The fact that angels are not mentioned implies that Moses’ God did not create spiritual beings. For Julian, Moses’ God was nothing but an ‘arranger’ of preexisting, non-created matter. Hence he cannot have been the Supreme God, who is the ultimate creator of all things. On other points as well, Julian argues that Plato’s Timaeus makes much more sense as a cosmogony than Genesis 1."

https://aeon.co/essays/why-would-apollo-make-positive-statements-about-judaism