September 29, 2025

Tech

Tim Berners‑Lee recalls creating the web by merging internet and hypertext, urging CERN to open its IP, criticizes data‑harvesting platforms, promotes MIT’s Solid for personal data, and calls for AI governance mirroring CERN’s collaborative, accountable model.

Ollama introduces a web search API, granting real‑time data access via its platform. A free tier supports casual use, while developers may switch to higher rate limits in Ollama’s cloud plan for expanded capacity.

The article critiques Kent Beck's 2003 TDD book, noting its narrow claims, unproven benefits, flawed examples, and confusing presentation, while acknowledging his disciplined practice; ultimately, weak examples and unrealistic assumptions curb its teaching value.

Good taste in software engineering, unlike raw skill, hinges on selecting values such as speed, correctness, or resilience tailored to each project; it develops through varied problems, nuanced trade‑offs, learning from outcomes, and resisting rigid habits that could derail success.

Moving from coding to leadership means shifting from doing to enabling. This piece explores using emotional intelligence and the Process Communication Model to empower diverse personalities, maintain visibility without micromanaging, and stay impactful by amplifying your team’s success.

The piece argues that most real‑world queries fit on one fast node, with typical scans around 100 MB, making massive‑parallel systems wasteful. Modern SSDs and CPUs are far cheaper, so lightweight local engines like DuckDB should suffice.

The 2025 guide lists NumPy, Pandas, Matplotlib, scikit‑learn, TensorFlow, PyTorch, and Pygame as must‑know libraries, covering numerical arrays, data frames, visual charts, machine‑learning basics, deep‑learning frameworks, and beginner game creation.

AI coding agents generate code fast but lack depth, forcing developers to debug and refactor, limiting productivity to ~10 %. The article frames this as a “tech lead’s dilemma,” proposing LLMs as lightning‑fast junior engineers paired with engineering practices for delivery.

The article likens today’s AI surge to the 1990s dot‑com bubble, highlighting inflated valuations, massive data‑center spending, and frenzied capital flows. AI is slowly generating revenue, but large investments must prove tangible returns to avoid a repeat collapse.

Apple is developing an internal chatbot named Veritas to accelerate Siri’s feature testing, mirroring ChatGPT and Gemini for staff dialogues, but the tool won’t be consumer‑facing, and Apple may eventually adopt Google’s Gemini for AI search.

Firefox now offers an opt‑in right‑click “Search Image with Google Lens” that lets users find similar products, translate text, and draw inspiration directly from photos, while collecting feedback to refine placement and future mobile integration.

Meta’s Connect 2025 saw Mark Zuckerberg unveil AI‑enabled Ray‑Ban smart glasses, but a technical fiasco—failed voice calls, wrong cooking answers, and wristband interface errors—undermined the pitch, exposing the gap between Silicon Valley hype and practical value in everyday life.

Privacy Badger is a free EFF extension that learns to block trackers after they hit a domain on three sites, while allowing resources via a yellow list. It sends GPC and DNT signals and works on Chrome, Firefox, and Edge.

Koi‑Research uncovered the postmark‑mcp supply‑chain worm, a malicious MCP package that silently BCCs every email from AI assistants to giftshop.club, harvesting credentials, invoices, and resets. The paper urges immediate removal, credential rotation, log reviews, and reevaluating MCP ecosystem verification.

Police ignored a noise complaint to address serious crimes, illustrating how urgency can erode community lawfulness. Similarly, software teams chasing high priorities trap engineers in bugs and debt, stunting delivery. Portfolio work—dedicated time for low‑priority tasks—balances urgency and quality.

Linus Torvalds criticized a Google engineer's RISC‑V kernel patch as garbage, highlighting the need for safe 32‑bit construction from two 16‑bit values. He proposed a constexpr, noexcept helper using proper casting, bitwise OR, and clear naming to avoid hidden bugs.