The Cost Of JavaScript - 2023 - YouTube
A great talk from Addy on just how damaging client-side JavaScript can be to the user experience …and what you can do about it.
Link tags: hardware
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PAST Visions of the Future - Future of Interfaces
Video visions of aspirational futures made from the 1950s to the 2010s, mostly by white dudes with bullshit jobs.
Inside the Globus INK: a mechanical navigation computer for Soviet spaceflight
The positively steampunk piece of hardware used for tracking Alexei Leonov’s Apollo-Soyuz mission.
Shift Happens
Marcin’s book is coming along nicely—you just know it’ll be a labour of love.
You’ve never seen a book on technology like this. Shift Happens is full of stories – some never before told – interleaved with 1,000+ beautiful full-color photos across two volumes.
The Kickstarter project launches in February. In the meantime, there are some keyboard-based games here for you to enjoy.
Russell Davies: The internet of good things
An internet-enabled kettle sounds stupid, but this is a genuinely thoughtful piece of hardware.
Have I reached the Douglas Adams Inflection point (or is modern tech just a bit rubbish)? – Terence Eden’s Blog
This chimes with something I’ve been pondering: we anticipate big breakthoughs in software—AI!, blockchain!, metaverse! chatbots!—but in reality the field is relatively stagnant. Meanwhile in areas like biology, there’s been unexpected advances. Or maybe, as Terence indicates, it’s all about the hype.
Notes from a gopher:// site - daverupert.com
The result of adding more constraints means that the products have a broader appeal due to their simple interface. It reminds me of a Jeremy Keith talk I heard last month about programming languages like CSS which have a simple interface pattern:
selector { property: value }. Simple enough anyone can learn. But simple doesn’t mean it’s simplistic, which gives me a lot to think about.
The computer built to last 50 years | ploum.net
A fascinating look at what it might take to create a truly sunstainable long-term computer.
The Optional Chaining Operator, “Modern” Browsers, and My Mom - Jim Nielsen’s Blog
This is something I bump against over and over again: so-called evergreen browsers that can’t actually be updated because of operating system limits.
From what I could gather, the version of Chrome was tied to ChromeOS which couldn’t be updated because of the hardware. No new ChromeOS meant no new Chrome which meant stuck at version 76.
But what about the iPad? I discovered that my Mom’s iPad was a 1st generation iPad Air. Apple stopped supporting that device in iOS 12, which means it was stuck with whatever version of Safari last shipped with iOS 12.
So I had two older browsers that couldn’t be updated. It was device obsolescence because you couldn’t install the latest browser.
Websites stop working and the only solution is to buy a whole new device.
Meet the Self-Hosters, Taking Back the Internet One Server at a Time
Taking the indie web to the next level—self-hosting on your own hardware.
Tired of Big Tech monopolies, a community of hobbyists is taking their digital lives off the cloud and onto DIY hardware that they control.
The Infrastructural Power Beneath the Internet as We Know It - The Reboot
I’ve lately been trying an exercise where, when reading anything by or about tech companies, I replace uses of the word “infrastructure” with “means of production.”
Brilliant!
Interplanetary Lobbing
League tables for the game of probe-throwing currently underway in our solar system.
The league covers expensive hardware lob matches held between planets in the Solar System. Two dwarf planets have recently been admitted to the league and lost their first matches against league champions Team Earth.
The unreasonable effectiveness of simple HTML – Terence Eden’s Blog
I love the story that Terence relates here. It reminds me of all the fantastic work that Anna did documenting game console browsers.
Are you developing public services? Or a system that people might access when they’re in desperate need of help? Plain HTML works. A small bit of simple CSS will make look decent. JavaScript is probably unnecessary – but can be used to progressively enhance stuff.
Hack the Moon
The history of Apollo’s hardware and software—the technology, the missions, and the people; people like Elaine Denniston and Margaret Hamilton.
(The site is made by Draper, the company founded by Doc Draper, father of inertial navigation.)
Playdate. A New Handheld Gaming System
Well, this is interesting. Panic, the little software company that could, are making a handheld gaming device. This is like the hardware equivalent of the indie web.
djinn and juice : The Best Debugging Story I’ve Ever Heard
Cassie and I were swapping debugging stories. I shared the case of the 500 mile email with her. She shared this with me.
Very Slow Movie Player on Vimeo
I love this use of e-ink to play a film at 24 frames per day instead of 24 frames per minute.
Malicious AI Report
Well, this an interesting format experiment—the latest Black Mirror just dropped, and it’s a PDF.
The Official NoPhone Store
Like a nicotine patch for your phone hand.
Pi-hole®: A black hole for Internet advertisements
This looks like a terrific use of a Raspberry Pi—blocking adtech surveillance at the network level.
Wouldn’t it be great if the clichéd going-home-for-Christmas/Thanksgiving to fix the printer/wifi included setting up one of these?
There’s an article about Pi-hole in Business Week where the creators offer some advice for those who equate any kind of online advertising with ubiquitous surveillance:
For publishers struggling to survive even with maximum ad surveillance, the Pi-hole team recommends a renewed focus on subscriptions, affiliate links, and curated endorsements for products and services that might truly interest users, similar to the way podcast hosts may talk about how much they personally enjoy a sponsor’s products. There’s nothing wrong with pitching people stuff they might enjoy, the team says. It’s just the constant, ever-intensifying surveillance that needs to stop.