mini-linkspam

[queenlua]

• The Night Watch (pdf). I'm not sure how well the humor translates if you're not a programmer/compsci-sort, but this article's been making the rounds in my tech circles lately and it's the funniest thing I've read in ages. "The systems programmer has read the kernel source, to better understand the deep ways of the universe, and the systems programmer has seen the comment in the scheduler that says 'DOES THIS WORK LOL,' and the systems programmer has wept instead of LOLed, and the systems programmer has submitted a kernel patch to restore balance to The Force and fix the priority inversion that was causing MySQL to hang."


• Winning Candy Crush. It's not quite a layperson's guide, though it's close—I like clear, accessible explanations for straightforward hacks like this one.


• Together and Alone, Closing the Prime Gap. I remember reading about the hubub over the University of New Hampshire lecturer who came kinda out of nowhere and published a major result relating to the twin prime conjecture; however, I hadn't known about all the awesome progress that's been made since. This article is accessible to non-math folk and is pretty interesting stuff.

Comments

[amielleon]

Can I say I'm mildly annoyed at the Prime Gap article for having a picture of the (white) guy who made the better result later, but not the (Asian) guy who started all the fuss until near the bottom of the the article, and (unrelatedly) the mixed metaphor (combs and... fish?).

Still, interesting bit of math news I missed while hiding in my pokemon cave. And lol @ haxing candy crush.

[queenlua]

Alas on both points :/ though, re: mixed metaphor: I always feel kind of bad for science journalists, since I imagine they're having to grok new material and write intelligibly/accessibly under deadline pressure, so unless it's super egregious* I try to be forgiving :P

* i was going to link a reference to a hilariously botched explanation in this one episode of numb3rs, but (a) damn it is near impossible to even get short clips on youtube nowadays, and (b) did you know numb3rs fandom is evidently super-duper into making fanvids because now i do

[butthefuturerefused]

Oh, god, don't worry, "The Night Watch" didn't lose anything in translation (from "person who knows what systems programming is" to "person who does not"). That was fabulous.

[queenlua]

RIVERS OF BLOOD ALL DAY EVERY DAY