Tootfinder

The “luggable” form factor but with flat display (this one has a plasma display) is my favorite 80s computer design

“Tahoe is the worst user interface update in the history of the Mac. Every change is either wrongheaded, poorly executed, or both. The Mac remains usable only because of Tahoe’s lack of ambition: it mostly alters the appearance and metrics of interface elements rather than making fundamental changes to the structure of the Mac UI. ....The bad ideas embodied in Tahoe reveal an Apple design team that has abandoned the most basic principles of human-computer interaction.”
—John Siracusa

#Blakes7 Series C, Episode 08 - Rumours of Death
ORAC: To cross it undetected would be impossible.
AVON: I'll take your best option within the perimeter.
https://blake.torpidity.net/m/308/378…

#Blakes7 Series C, Episode 03 - Volcano
VILA: It's not serious. The pad'll take care of it, if you don't fiddle with it. You did very well there, I must say.
AVON: Must you?
https://blake.torpidity.net/m/303/492

Isomorphic Labs, a Google DeepMind spinoff, unveils IsoDDE, a drug design system it says surpasses AlphaFold 3 in predicting biomolecular structures (Isomorphic Labs)
https://www.isomorphiclabs.com/articles/the-isomorphic-labs-drug-design…

The Isomorphic Labs Drug Design Engine unlocks a new frontier beyond AlphaFold - Isomorphic Labs
Today, we are excited to share an update on our progress towards a new frontier of drug design. We have unlocked a new paradigm of predictive accuracy in understanding our biomolecular world, allowing us to rationally design new medicines on a computer with unprecedented understanding and precision.

from my link log —
Fast sorting networks, branchless by design.
https://00f.net/2026/02/17/sorting-without-leaking-secrets/
saved 2026-02-17

Very interesting, sounds like a good team,
"IBM researchers are working with the developers of the secure messaging platforms Signal and Threema to design cryptographic systems that can resist future quantum computer attacks."
https://cyberinsider.com/ibm-part…

IBM partners with Signal to develop quantum-safe messaging encryption
IBM researchers are working with Signal and Threema to design cryptographic systems that can resist future quantum computer attacks.

Anthropic launches Claude Sonnet 4.6 with improvements in coding, consistency, and more, for Free and Pro users; it features a 1M token context window in beta (Anthropic)
https://www.anthropic.com/news/claude-sonnet-4-6

Introducing Sonnet 4.6
Claude Sonnet 4.6 is a full upgrade of the model’s skills across coding, computer use, long-reasoning, agent planning, knowledge work, and design.

Watch this if you haven’t already.
The history, design and precision of the machines that are needed to produce our tiny computer chips at scale is wizardry. I can’t believe this technology is real. Truly mind blowing!
https://youtu.be/MiUHjLxm3V0

"LLMs work (somewhat) for coding computer programs. As everyone knows this is the highest form of human endeavor—unsurpassed by any other lesser activity such as project management, design, art or writing. Therefore LLMs will excel in every other field."
I really believe this is the crux understanding why so many programmers (including good programmers) fall for it in a way that can only be described as a cult, were any criticism is not only not allowed but reflexively is seen as either laughable or belligerent.
Anyway, LLMs are good* at writing code because writing code is easy and highly repetitive and doesn't actually take a lot of skill; unless it's novel ways to write code which LLMs cannot do.
Taking this as a sign LLMs can do other "lesser" activities is saying a lot about the hubris of programmers and not a lot of the capabilities of LLMs.
*for some definitions of "good"

A for Andromeda
is a British television science fiction drama serial
written by cosmologist Fred Hoyle,
in conjunction with author and television producer John Elliot.
It concerns a group of scientists who detect a radio signal from another galaxy that contains instructions for the design of an advanced computer.
When the computer is built, it gives the scientists instructions for the creation of a living organism named Andromeda
But one of the scientists…

The #UCL World Cancer Day: Public Lecture streamed on Youtube is very (over)optimistic about the role of AI in drug design and in silico clinical trials (ouch). Computer people always overestimate the reliability of data. One day, perhaps (and perhaps not).
https://www…

Series C, Episode 12 - Death-Watch
TARRANT: Thank you, Zen.
DARVID: [On screen] And so everything is ready. The formalities are complete. The Champions are prepared. The Arbiters have activated the combat computer which will control the conditions of battle. Only the computer knows when it will begin and where. [the screen fades to black. A computer display prints up:

HALO: A Fine-Grained Resource Sharing Quantum Operating System
John Zhuoyang Ye, Jiyuan Wang, Yifan Qiao, Jens Palsberg
https://arxiv.org/abs/2602.07191 https://arxiv.org/pdf/2602.07191 https://arxiv.org/html/2602.07191
arXiv:2602.07191v1 Announce Type: new
Abstract: As quantum computing enters the cloud era, thousands of users must share access to a small number of quantum processors. Users need to wait minutes to days to start their jobs, which only takes a few seconds for execution. Current quantum cloud platforms employ a fair-share scheduler, as there is no way to multiplex a quantum computer among multiple programs at the same time, leaving many qubits idle and significantly under-utilizing the hardware. This imbalance between high user demand and scarce quantum resources has become a key barrier to scalable and cost-effective quantum computing.
We present HALO, the first quantum operating system design that supports fine-grained resource-sharing. HALO introduces two complementary mechanisms. First, a hardware-aware qubit-sharing algorithm that places shared helper qubits on regions of the quantum computer that minimize routing overhead and avoid cross-talk noise between different users' processes. Second, a shot-adaptive scheduler that allocates execution windows according to each job's sampling requirements, improving throughput and reducing latency. Together, these mechanisms transform the way quantum hardware is scheduled and achieve more fine-grained parallelism.
We evaluate HALO on the IBM Torino quantum computer on helper qubit intense benchmarks. Compared to state-of-the-art systems such as HyperQ, HALO improves overall hardware utilization by up to 2.44x, increasing throughput by 4.44x, and maintains fidelity loss within 33%, demonstrating the practicality of resource-sharing in quantum computing.
toXiv_bot_toot

Lots of great lines in this post by @bf.wtf
“A world generates a story. And world-building is what the computer is for. Not in the fantasy sense, but in the practical one. Running your business is world-building. Raising a family is world-building.”
https://shimmeringvoid.leaflet.pub/3m7

Cadence rolls out ChipStack, an AI agent to help chipmakers like Nvidia speed up the complex chip design process by up to 10x by building a "mental model" (Stephen Nellis/Reuters)
https://www.reuters.com/business/cadence-int…

#Blakes7 Series D, Episode 09 - Sand
SERVALAN: No.
TARRANT: [He holsters his gun.] It's fairly standard equipment. If there's power for the life supports, there will be for these. [Servalan activates the base computer.] Ah!
https://

If, in computer science (e.g. in a database) you need to create a many-to-many-relationship where the hierarchical order is important, there is ONLY one game in town: Parent-Child.
#programming #database #dba

Series C, Episode 11 - Moloch
TARRANT: Yes, Vila. I take the point. You're obviously far cleverer than I.
VILA: Right.
TARRANT: [Examining a map] So - this is where we're going.
VILA: What? - Where are we going?
TARRANT: To destroy a computer.
https://blake.torpidity.net/m/311/468

Series D, Episode 11 - Orbit
PINDER: Checkmate, Egrorian!
EGRORIAN: How dare you!
PINDER: Checkmate... checkmate...
EGRORIAN: [To game board] Recall the last six moves. [Computer replays a sequence of moves]
PINDER: [Sighing] Oh...
https://blake.torpidity.net/m/411/160

Series D, Episode 03 - Traitor
AVON: So Tarrant, this is your big moment.
TARRANT: If the teleport works.
VILA: It's working perfectly now, I checked it myself.
DAYNA: [Laughs] Yes, but would you use it yourself Vila? That's the real test.
https://blake.torpidity.net/m/403/176…