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  An Object is not a Hash

Following my article A String is not an Error, I want to bring attention to an issue that similarly applies to JavaScript in general, but has special relevance in the Node.JS environment. The problem boils down to the usage of {} as a data-structure where the keys are supplied by untrusted user input, and the mechanisms that are normally used to assert whether a key exists. Consider the example of a simple blog created with Express. We decide to store blog posts in memory in a {}, indexed ...

   Object,Hash,Node.js,JavaScript     2012-01-19 10:16:10

  How the Internet is Changing Economics

I'm not an economist by training, but I've spent a long time observing markets, and I've often wondered what the great economic thinkers of centuries past (Marx, Smith, Keynes, others) would say if they were alive today and could witness the transformations that have been caused by mass media (radio, TV, print) and the Internet. The Internet, in particular, has had a transformative effect that will doubtless be studied for hundreds of years to come. One of the things that can be said abou...

   Internet,Economic,Change,Reason     2012-01-14 12:03:05

  Fujitsu CTO: Flash is just a stopgap

Flash is a necessary waystation as we travel to a single in-memory storage architecture. That's the view from a Fujitsu chief technology officer's office. Dr Joseph Reger, CTO at Fujitsu Technology Solutions, is that office-holder, and – according to him – flash is beset with problems that will become unsolvable. He says we are seeing increases in flash density at the expense of our ability to read and write data. Each shrink in process geometry, from 3X to 2X and onto 1X, ...

   Flash,Memory,Bottleneck,Limitation,Futur     2011-08-12 07:31:34

  How does computer boot up?

The whole boot process of computer can be summarized in 4 phases. 1. BIOS In the 70's  read-only memory(ROM) was invented. The boot program is written into ROM, the first thing the computer does is to read and execute this program when it's powered on. The program in this chip is called "Basic Input/Output System" (BIOS). 1.1 Power-On Self-Test The BIOS will first check whether the computer hardware can fulfill the basic conditions for booting up, this process is called Power-On Self-Test...

   Computer, boot, partition     2013-02-23 23:19:47

  Parallel Javascript

Lately the ideas for a parallel, shared memory JavaScript have begun to take shape. I’ve been discussing with various JavaScript luminaries and it seems like a design is starting to emerge. This post serves as a documentation of the basic ideas; I’m sure the details will change as we go along. User Model The model is that a JavaScript worker (the “parent”) may spawn a number of child tasks (the “children”). The parent is suspended while the children exe...

   Parallel JavaScript,API,Spawn,Parent,Task     2012-01-11 12:02:00

  SSH Security and You - /bin/false is *not* security

Backstory While at RIT around 2004 or 2005, I discovered that a few important machines at the datacenter allowed all students, faculty, and staff to authenticate against them via ssh. Everyone's shells appear to be set to /bin/false (or some derivative) on said machines, so the only thing you'll see after you authenticate is the login banner and your connection will close. I thought to myself, "Fine, no shell for me. I wonder if port forwarding works?" ...

   Linux,Security,/bin/false,SSH     2012-02-06 07:46:29

  Linux Command Line tips that every Linux user should know t

Below is the collection of Linux command line tips which I’ve found useful for Linux users. To get more information about the command mentioned below just open your terminal and type man <command>.Things a Linux user must learnLearn bash: No need to refer a lengthy bash guide or something else. Just read the complete man page of bash (man bash).Learn vim: You might be using Emacs or Eclipse for your work all the time but nothing can compete vim.Learn ssh: Learn the basics of passw...

   Linux,Unix,Command line,Tips     2012-03-21 09:27:03

  Programming Languages for Machine Learning Implementations

Machine learning algorithms have a much better chance of being widely adopted if they are implemented in some easy-to-use code. There are several important concerns associated with machine learning which stress programming languages on the ease-of-use vs. speed frontier.Speed The rate at which data sources are growing seems to be outstripping the rate at which computational power is growing, so it is important that we be able to eak out every bit of computational power. Garbage collected la...

   Programming language,Machine learning,Development     2011-11-16 08:22:17

  Can Your Programming Language Do This?

One day, you're browsing through your code, and you notice two big blocks that look almost exactly the same. In fact, they're exactly the same, except that one block refers to "Spaghetti" and one block refers to "Chocolate Moose." // A trivial example: alert("I'd like some Spaghetti!"); alert("I'd like some Chocolate Moose!"); These examples happen to be in JavaScript, but even if you don't know JavaScript, you should be able to follow along. The repeated code looks wrong, ...

   Programming,Maintainability,Reusable     2011-05-31 07:42:41

  Why I switched from Ruby back to C++

After two months of Sol Trader development in Ruby, I took a difficult decision last Wednesday morning: I’ve decided to rewrite the game code from scratch in C++. Let me explain my reasons. If you'd like to receive announcements about Sol Trader or be part of the beta program, sign up at soltrader.net. Why I did it Slow frames: When working with Ruby, I use the excellent Gosu library to do all my game specific coding. This initially worked great, but occasionally I’d just...

   C++,Ruby,Advantage,Feature     2012-01-09 08:56:21