Noteworthy on the Web- etherfarm: etherblog: Henry at HandworksThis Saturday morning, I will be speaking along with Don Williams and Christopher Schwarz in Amana, Iowa at Handworks, a formidable gathering of people interested in woodworking tools and traditions. I’m a late addition to the speaker lineup, which is perhaps appropriate because actually–I won’t be speaking that much.... […]Narayan
- Armin Ronacher: Porting to Python 3 ReduxAfter a very painful porting experience with Jinja2 to Python 3 I basically left the project idling around for a while because I was too afraid of breaking Python 3 support. The approach I used was one codebase that was written in Python 2 and translated with 2to3 to Python... […]Armin Ronacher
- Ars Technica: Think your Skype messages get end-to-end encryption? Think againIf you think the private messages you send over Skype are protected by end-to-end encryption, think again. The Microsoft-owned service regularly scans message contents for signs of fraud, and company managers may log the results indefinitely, Ars has confirmed. And this can only happen if Microsoft can convert the messages... […]Dan Goodin
- Thom Hogan SansMirror: Will the Floodgates Open?Samsung this week released the source code that powers their recent NX-300 camera. That makes it probably the most high-level camera completely open to hackers (in the good, original sense of the word "hacker"). … […]Thom Hogan SansMirror
- Eater SF: Expansion Wire: Speaking of West Portal, it's one...Speaking of West Portal, it's one of the few places where there isn't a La Boulange outlet yet. But that's about to change: undaunted by that whole enormous Starbucks rollout, Pascal Rigojust signed a lease to open La Boulange #14 (#15 if you count the still-pending Inner Sunset... […]Allie Pape
- Geek.com: School experiment discovers garden cress won’t germinate near a routerGarden cress is a fast growing and edible herb that will sprout in just a small amount of slightly alkaline water. But there is one exception to that rule, and is has scientists… […]Matthew Humphries
- Ars Technica: “SpecialisRevelio!” Macs use Harry Potter spell to unlock secret “backdoor”Aurich Lawson / Warner Bros. Entertainment The Mac on your desk or on the cafe table next to you has a chip with secret functions that can be unlocked only by inputting a spell from the Harry Potter series. The SMC, or system management controller, is a chip used to... […]Dan Goodin
- Geek.com: New transparent adhesive stays red for 3 minutes for easy applicationIf you go to the store and buy a tube of adhesive, chances are it’s going to be a clear solution. That’s great for when you want to glue something transparent together, but… […]Matthew Humphries
- Every Day Commentary: Muyshondt Aeon and Nautilus Mk. II ReviewThis whole thing started for me when I found Doug P's (Quickbeam) old site flashlightreviews.com. There is so much information there, even in the archived site, that I still go back there and do research. The 5 star review system was brilliant--clear and simple. Doug's knowledge was impressive. But the... […]Tony Sculimbrene (noreply@blogger.com)
- The Register: The quest continues for a fondleslab that fondles you backBritish vibro pioneers say: Anything can be a speaker HiWave, the haptics company which emerged from Brit hi-fi consortium NXT with a mission to make our fondleslabs fondle us back, has fragmented into a part which makes money and the more-interesting Redux.… […]The Register
- AudioStream: Genelec G SeriesThis picture tells most of story (except the most important part) from the Genelecroom. They hosted a wonderful demo where each of the four active speakers from their G-Series, the company's first "consumer range" destined for the home as opposed to the recording studio, plus their biggest brother 8260A... […]Michael Lavorgna
- CNET News.com: Apple looks to move San Francisco store a few blocks awayThe company's current store at Stockton and Ellis streets in San Francisco will be moved to Union Square, if all goes well. [Read more] […]Don Reisinger
- Bare Feats Test Lab: Mac Pro Muscle: TransIntl Double Decker Fast Internal Storage SolutionWant to stuff eight screaming fast 6Gbps SSDs in your Mac Pro's drive bays? We did it with the help of Double Decker kits. […]Bare Feats Test Lab
- Lifehacker: How To Get Rid of AntsYou can put an end to most ant problems with inexpensive products from the home center or hardware store (and save the expense of hiring an exterminator). Whether you've found the pests inside your home or outdoors, the folks from Family Handymantell you everything you need to know to... […]Tessa Miller
- Planet PostgreSQL: Raghavendra Rao: Disk page checksums to detect filesystem failures in PostgreSQL 9.3Beta 1New feature introduced in PostgreSQL 9.3Beta 1 i.e. "Disk page checksums". Thanks to authors Simon Riggs, Jeff Davis & Greg Smith.In earlier releases, if there's any data corruption block on disk it was silently ignored until any pointer arrives on it or some wrong results shown by the... […]Planet PostgreSQL
- Python News: Python 2.7.5 releasedPython 2.7.5 has been released. […]Python News
- David Lebovitz: How to Prepare and Cook ArtichokesIt’s fresh artichoke season and I’m finding them piled up at my local market, practically tumbling off the stands. Last week, I stood there, putting one after the other in my market basket, where I took them home to admire the beauties on my kitchen counter. But they’re not just... […]David
- Ars Technica: Google wants your WordPress blog—and everything else—in its cloudSAN FRANCISCO, CA—Google wants your applications and data on its servers. At the Google I/O conference today, Google's Cloud Platform team introduced new public services and tweaks to existing services based on the compute and data storage infrastructure that supports Google's search engine and other applications. Urs Hölzle, Google's... […]Sean Gallagher
- The Tao of Mac: Getting Started with Android StudioI think this is the most interesting Google novelty for today (right after I figure out if Hangouts will kill plain XMPP, but that’s another matter). Eclipse needs to die a quick, excruciatingly messy death, and this is better simply by dint of being different. I do wonder... […]Rui Carmo
- Ars Technica: Carnivorous plant has deleted most of its junk DNAThe business end of a bladderwort, ready to suck in prey. Enrique Ibarra-Laclette, Claudia Anahí Pérez-Torres and Paulina Lozano-Sotomayor. Over the weekend, Naturereleased a paper that describes the genome of a fascinating creature with a rather unglamorous name: the bladderwort. These plants live in swampy or liquid environments and... […]John Timmer
- etherfarm: etherblog: Henry at Handworks
Category Archives: Stuff
Withings smart baby monitor review
One of the joys challenges of being a first-time parent is being exposed to a bewildering array of gadgets and equipment required to care for the baby, from baby car seats, strollers and diaper pails to 2-axis rocking robots (thanks Rohit!). … Continue reading
Organizing with Delicious Library
Delicious Library is one of the slickest apps on the Mac, and won countless design accolades. Essentially, it is a database for your books, CDs and DVDs (version 2 added gadgets), and it looks glorious on a large monitor like … Continue reading
Posted in Mac, Stuff
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Ginormous iPod to go
The hard drive in my October 2006 vintage 80GB iPod 5.5G died a few weeks ago. I wasn’t keen on upgrading to the iPod Classic as: With a maximum capacity of 160GB, it is still too small to house my … Continue reading
Why I will never buy a Kindle
One of my bosses got a Kindle 2 a few months ago, and was wondering how an avowed gadget lover such as myself did not have one already. I am perfectly comfortable reading books in electronic form on the small … Continue reading
Posted in Book reviews, Economics, Soapbox, Stuff
3 Comments
On the Toyota accelerator fiasco
From 2000 to 2007, I lived and worked in downtown San Francisco, and did not need a car to commute, so I never bothered to get one. When Acxiom purchased Kefta, they moved us to Foster City, 23 miles away … Continue reading
Posted in Soapbox, Stuff
3 Comments
Matias Tactilepro 3.0 review
The decline in computer prices in the last 10 years is not an unqualified blessing. Something had to give, and component quality is one of the areas where manufacturers skimp. There is no room in a $500 computer for a … Continue reading
Withings scale
I received today a Withings networked body scale. This gizmo measures your weight and estimates body fat ratio using an impedance bridge, and uploads it over WiFi to their web server, where you can watch trends and monitor your progress. … Continue reading
Cocoon Grid-It review
I spied a medium-sized Cocoon Grid-It organizer in the Flight 001 store on Hayes Street last Sunday, and bought one. This is a board, roughly letter size, with a criss-crossing web of elastic bands. there is a zippered pocket in … Continue reading
Yet another bag company in San Francisco
Women’s handbags have become the mainstay of the luxury industry, generating well over $10B a year in revenues. San Francisco has no dearth of companies designing, and sometimes manufacturing, bags locally, but most have an urban, not luxury sensibility. We … Continue reading
Posted in San Francisco, Stuff
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Pablo Designs Brazo LED lamp
I bought one of these beauties from Room & Board (also available from Design Within Reach) in the bronze finish. It’s a task lamp with 18 white LEDs. Light intensity can be controlled via a rotary knob, although the lowest … Continue reading