Dwayne Phillips ' Day Book

Items I happen to view each day. Science, Techonology, Management, Culture, and of course Writing

This is my day book for this week. I have modeled this after science fiction and computer writer Jerry Pournelle's view, or as he calls it, his Day Book. I encourage you to see Jerry Pournelle's site and subscribe to his services.

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This week: December October 27-November 2, 2014

Summary of this week:

Monday - Tuesday - Wednesday - Thursday - Friday - Saturday - Sunday

Monday October 27, 2014

Using Google+ Hangouts so that adults can read to kids. This is an excellent use of technology.

One Google employee confirms that yes, working at Google is as much fun as everyone says.

One theory about declining numbers of women in computing is that the industry has too many wild ups and downs.

Our Army wants more cyber warriors, so it may cut the physical requirements for them, i.e., no pushups at 5AM.

How the iPhone 6 is boosting the entire US economy. Now let's hear some politician gripe about Apple (legally) "dodging" taxes.

Guess what? Not all Kickstarter projects, once they are funded, deliver a product. Such is technology development.

A look at how much and how little the humble keyboard has changed.

Nothing in this beautiful video is real—it is all computer generated.

The role of the Maker Movement in hands-on education.

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Tuesday October 28, 2014

A collection of user experience UX tools.

Code.org is trying to raise money to bring coding to high schools.

Future speculation: in ten years airliner windows will be replaced by giant video screens.

"Popular problems and figureheads represent shortcuts. Shortcuts in how you think about your project and shortcuts about finding acceptance. But all the work worth doing is about taking the long way."—Seth Godin

Twitter hits financial expectations, but stock drops 10%. Investors want more.

Interesting, a survival library of knowledge needed to bring back civilization if necessary. Of course, you would need to print everything to paper and keep it in a safe place.

Microsoft announces unlimited online storage for all Office 365 accounts. It is about time. If you are making Word and Excel files, you really don't use much disk space. Now we wait to see if Google Docs and others remove their silly storage caps.

Apple Pay activates a million users in 72 hours. That is a large number, but we are growing accustomed to such large numbers.

Verizon has been inserting codes into web traffic so that advertisers can target users. This falls under the "hey, we didn't sign up for this" and privacy issues.

Alienware pumps up a couple of its gaming machines. A newer desktop monster and a portable computer.

Apple dropped the classic iPod because it couldn't get the parts (actually too expensive). Actually, Apple has enough money to build factories to supply the parts. The truth is that the parts became too expensive.

The mobile world: half of YouTube viewers are now from phones and tablets.

If you do some odd things with your PS1 you find yourself in Windows 93.

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Wednesday October 29, 2014

The slacker diet picks up as Taco Bell's iPhone app let's you order before you arrive. Get that 24-taco box ready.

Our FTC is suing AT&T for slowing data rates of consumers, i.e., not delivering what was promised.

Alienware shows their own Graphics Amplifier. Let the gaming begin.

After 15 years, the HTML5 spec is finally final.

Amazon is sitting on an $83million pile of unsold Fire phones.

LG is having no trouble selling phones.

Our government has found someone not named Edward Snowden who is leaking things to the press.

A look inside the amazingly thin iPad Air 2.

Ars interviews Google about Android and the Nexuses.

Code School now has its instructional videos on iOS. Here is Code School's site.

Reddit moves into crowdfunding with its own Redditmade site.

A groceries-carrying rocket exploded on takeoff yesterday. Things might get dicey on the ISS.

Apple is donating $100million worth of iPads to 114 US schools. I hope the iPads actually get to the students.

Internet "TV" may soon be on the same playing field as cable "TV."

The battle between Apple Pay and other products is beginning. Apple may lose this one.

Sometimes I wonder what people in law enforcement think they are doing. The FBI created a phoney newspaper site to trap suspects.

Electronic Arts has a big financial quarter.

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Thursday October 30, 2014

CurrentC, the Apple Pay competitor, has already been hacked. I'm glad nothing like this has happened to Health Care dot Gov (not).

Samsung's mobile profits take a big fall as they aren't selling their Galaxy phones.

HP may have changed everything here: HP has a Sprout PC that comes with a 3D scanner and large touchpad as input devices.

Microsoft enters the wearable health gadget world with the Microsoft Band.

YouTube is now showing videos at 60 frames per second vice 30.

Microsoft lays off another 3,000 persons.

This is just a Kickstarter campaign, so ... Ampy: a battery that recharges itself with your physical movement. Why hasn't everyone already done this?

Google's Project Ara shows an actual working modular phone.

Excellent graph shows the decline of women in computer science. I took a bunch of computer science classes 1979—1983 and I don't remember seeing many women.

A recent study shows that solar energy will be as cheap as fossil fuels in 2016. That is a very agressive prediction that includes all sorts of government subsidies, i.e., we will pay you to use this.

This story is all over the Internet, so it must be important. A woman walked the sidewalks of NYC with a hidden camera in front of her. It shows how brutish and stupid the men of NYC are when it comes to treating a woman.

This article discusses how much people disliked Windows 8 compared to Apple's offerings.

The use of GitHub as an education tool.

The most important (not) story in the world today is that Tim Cook pulicly, officially, really anounces that he is homosexual.

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Friday October 31, 2014

Timex announces a $400 smartwatch. Timex? $400?

Tips on writing computer code that is easier for humans to read.

Amazon admits it "got the price wrong" on its Fire phone. They lost about $200million on that one.

The MPAA has banned Google Glass from all theatres in America. Do they have the authority to do that? This will hold, of course, until someone sues on the basis of the Americans with Disabilities Act.

Time Warner lost almost 200,000 cable TV subscribers in three months.

Actual proof, with data, that cable TV companies slow Netflix content. As if we needed data to prove what we already knew.

LG has a new smartphone that almost eliminates the bezel around the screen.

Mass protests force Hungarian government to drop proposed Internet tax. Would the same happen in the US or would we just sleep through it all?

A must-have poster that shows every Apple product ever.

Flipboard updates their magazine-style app.

Considerations for moving to Office 365.

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Saturday November 1, 2014

The most popular computing platform on the planet remains Android with 84% world market share.

More detail on the crash of the Virgin Galactic SpaceShipTwo.

The Starbucks smartphone app lets you order before you get there and skip the line.

HP announces a new smartwatch designed by a watch designer.

A few new items in the Java programming language.

A look at HP's entry into the 3D printing market.

Coming next year, The Grid brings websites that design themselves around your content. We shall see.

Skills needed to get hired at Google(?)—these are all in a BS degree in CSC or computer engineering.

Larry Page agrees with me: these computers are taking our jobs.

College loans soon to be tied to "gainful employment" regulation. Good luck with that one.

China completes a to-the-moon-and-back mission. The next person to walk on the moon will be from China.

Meteor: an open-source platform for building apps.

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Sunday November 2, 2014

These guys converted their van into a laundromat so homeless people can wash their clothes. Excellent.

Evernote adds a Work Chat feature that allows you to stay in Evernote.

The US lags behind other countries in Internet service—mostly due to government mis-regulation.

Business lessons pulled from the biography of Steve Jobs.

OpenBSD 5.6 was released.

Space exploration took a big step sideways this week with two catastrophic failures.

Energy copanies are now building the largest floating machines in the history of man. Several dozen are under construction.

Sam's Club, others to follow, is already discounting the iPhone 6 for Christmas.

The Internet Archive gives us the Internet Arcarde—900 older games to play in the browser.

Writers must be able to be rejected. Writers are always rejected—daily and brutally.

There is more to freelance work than hating a day job.

Qoutes by writers about writers.

Plot and structure.

Alternatives to NaNoWriMo: one is to write 52 short stories in 52 weeks. I also did that one.

Tips for moving into writing for eLearning companies.

Tips on writing your About page.

If you want to write, read a lot and learn how to read deeper.

Why one writer jumps from MS Word to Scrivener.

One more time: write everyday.

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