Lots to say about this. The guy in charge is one of the top techies from ARM and he was working with U. Manchester, which has a long history of innovative computer architecture work. I’m also a big believer in using lots of cheap, low power processors (such as ARM based cell phone CPUs) instead of the big expensive Intel / AMD server chips used in todays data centers. Anyway been following this since the 20-teens with the first SpiNNaker. Also like the work being done at the Barcelona Supercomputing Center. Ah, I see the new SpiNNaker is just up the road at Sandia Labs. From The Next Platform.

Sandia Deploys SpiNNaker2 Neuromorphic System

One thing I have always wondered, and have never seen discussed, is how Franco survived after WW II. One of Hitlers earliest supporters, and perhaps even the model for his policies, Franco was the original Fascist Dictator. He murdered as many as 100,000 of his own countrymen and had them buried in mass graves. Why didnt the Allies get rid of this guy at the end of WW II (and Salazar in Portugal along with him)? From the Boston Review.

Kill It with Fire

An article about the old homebrew / hobbiest phase of personal computers. I used to subscribe to Byte magazine in my teens. I wish I had kept a few of those old issues. I do have a collection from Creative Computing on my bookshelf.

Creatures of Thought

Had a little project I was working on before the move. Had to put it aside for a few months. When I tried to run it yesterday, it failed. Seems Ubuntu upgraded Python and some older libraries won’t allow 3.13 or whatever I’m using now. Tried to install an older version, but Ubuntu uses Python as part of the OS now so it (more or less) blocks older versions from being installed. They are ways but they aren’t pretty. So I’m sorta stuck. It’s only a Raspberry Pi so I’ll just get new hardware and install on older OS. I’ll also use Virtual Environments, even though this a single user (and perhaps single application) machine.

The upshot is expect everything to be broken in the future. If you have working (Python) today, make copies of all libraries and tools in a virtual environment. Because nothing may work tomorrow. I’ll contrast this to the Good Old Days where you could update things and they would mostly work. And if they didn’t you could safely downgrade.

On a similar note I’m told everyone uses ChatGPT to look up bugs these days, the same way everyone used to search Q&A web sites, mostly Stack Overflow. So if nobody is using the Q&A sites, where will future answers (content) for big fixes and other information come from? Will AI tools leave us stuck in 2025? I can see this being a problem with other forms of content.

Now you kids get off of my lawn!

From CACM. This was a big story in the UK, but to me the real failure seems to be in the UK justice system. How did they prosecute hundreds (?) of post office employees with what seems to be little or no factual evidence. Didn’t anyone think there was something else wrong?

How Software Bugs led to ‘One of the Greatest Miscarriages of Justice’ in British History

from the Associated Press.

Fictional fiction: A newspaper’s summer book list recommends nonexistent books. Blame AI

From The Guardian UK.

Soul icon Irma Thomas on the Stones, segregation and survival: ‘Restaurants refused to serve us – we lived on sardines and crackers’

Moving into the new house involved lots of set-up. Nearly every tech encounter was bad. When things work, they mostly work well, but something out of the ordinary (like assigning a completely new owner) leads to problems. My garage door opener was first. Seems simple. There is an app to open and close the doors remotely. Why not? Could be useful. Took me days. Problem was (fundamentally) that the old owner was still logged in and only a factory reset would get him to give up control. Except it took hours to get to this understanding.

This week my nest thermostat (which nowhere says “nest” or even “Google” — as if I’m supposed to know this) started rapidly going on and off the WiFi. Good old Reddit says it could be lots of things but likely a router with a single SSID for 2.4 GHZ and 5 GHz channels. Ok. I’ll log in and re-name one. It’s a new Netgear Nighthawk mesh system with three nodes that I set up via a phone app. Checked the app and no way to do this sort of setup, or any of the other things I usually do with a router. So I went to my PC and tried to log in. It started asking me security questions (where was I born?). Ok. Easy. Except it didn’t like my answers. Seems there is a bug that will probably require me to do a factory reset and start all over. I don’t see any guarantes that it will not hose me again with these sorts of questions.

Today I tried to program the keyless lock for the garage. We have two, one for the front door and one for the garage. Decided to do a factory reset of the garage lock and put in some codes. A few hours later, nada. Lots of other people with similar problems. YouTube videos no help. Sent in a support request. Reading Reddit it looks like lots of people buy these locks, can’t get them to program, and just ignore the keypad and use an old fashioned key. One guy claims to have 30 in an apartment and none can be programmed. So it isn’t just me. Oh, seem the front door looks very similar but is a different manufacturer. I’m going to hold off on that for a while until I get caught up.

From CFA Institute.

Vices, Virtues, and a Little Humor: 30 Quotes from Financial History