039;s Modular Robotics chain systems - PolyBot

Mersenne Prime Search How HTML5 will kill the native app Over the past two decades, the mobile industry has become increasingly stunted by fragmented protocols, standards, and regional differences. But a hot new technology called HTML5 promises to remedy this by delivering an unprecedented open, democratic and wonderfully fertile mobile web. Evangelists say the HTML5 movement has so much momentum that it could defeat the native app — an application that is designed to run on a single platform — in as little as two years. Sundar Pichai, who leads Google’s HTML5-happy Chrome OS initiative, agrees that the “incredible advantages of the Web will prevail” over the dominant native app model. Another mobile developer expert Mike Rowehl adds: “We’ll forget that we even passed through another era of native apps on the way to the mobile web.” The transition comes at a time when the mobile revolution is driving economic growth in the US and abroad. So there’s tremendous logic behind HTML5’s onslaught. Things are moving very quickly.

Anonymous Code Blocks in Python Ruby has anonymous code blocks, Python doesn't. Anonymous code blocks are (apparently) an important feature in implementing DSLs, much touted by Ruby protaganists. As far as I can tell, the major difference between code block in Ruby and functions in Python is that code blocks are executed in the current scope. You can rebind local variables in the scope in which the code block is executed. Python functions have a lexical scope, with the execption that you can't rebind variables in the enclosing scope. Note It turns out that this is wrong. If you define a function inside a function or method which uses the variable 'x', this will be loaded from the scope in which the function was defined; not the scope in which it is executed. I thought it would be fun to try and implement this feature of anonymous code blocks for Python, using code objects. This article looks at the byte-code operations used in code objects and experiments with creating new ones. Python doesn't have code blocks.

Column Glassy-eyed Optimists or Material Geniuses - 05-02 KNOWLEDGE CENTER Improving Productivity and Efficiency for Automotive Part Manufacturing According to consulting firm IRN Inc., the automotive industry is expected to launch an average of 120 new vehicles annually through 2020... Engineering The K900: Kia Goes Big & Up Gary S. Vasilash Once, Kia was all about comparatively innocuous, thrifty cars. Engineering GM Brings on the Heavy-Duty Silverado and Sierra Gary S. Those who are looking for dependability, durability and capability in their trucks now have new vehicles from Chevrolet and GMC to consider, heavy-duty trucks that also include style and comfort. Machining a "Rock Racer" Building a race car to traverse dusty Mojave Desert trails at more than 100 mph and then crawl up steep stone-covered hills is no small feat.

I Didn't Know Acrobat Could Do That! - Lori's Top 10 Community Translation Episode available in 2 languages Available Translations: Join the Community Translation Project Thanks for your interest in translating this episode! Please Confirm Your Interest Thanks for your interest in adding translations to this episode! An error occurred while processing your request. Another translator has already started to translate this episode. Thanks for Participating! This episode has been assigned to you and you can expect an e-mail shortly containing all the information you need to get started. About This Episode Lori counts down her Top 10 features in Acrobat X in this short compilation.

pegtl Welcome to the Parsing Expression Grammar Template Library "Don't Parse" -- Dan J. Bernstein The Parsing Expression Grammar Template Library (PEGTL) is a C++0x library for creating parsers according to a Parsing Expression Grammar (PEG). Status Development is cooling down a little, main addition in 0.29 are some examples on how to build parse trees with appropriate actions ... but please read the changelog at the end of this documentation for changes that might affect you. Note: The slow rate of updates since August 2008 is not because the project has been abandoned; the library has simply reached a state where it it can be -- and is -- used without many changes. Note: As of March 2010 there is a BUG that seems to affect GCC 4.4.x and newer on Mac OS X 10.6 regarding exceptions not being correctly caught; this bug is triggered by current PEGTL code, exceptions thrown from the parser "Abort" the program, rather than being caught. Features Comprehensive set of parsing rules. Requirements Input

Wired 11.04 The Bacteria Whisperer The Bacteria Whisperer Bonnie Bassler discovered a secret about microbes that the science world has missed for centuries. The bugs are talking to each other. By Steve Silberman Trim and hyperkinetic at 40, Bonnie Bassler is often mistaken for a graduate student at conferences. The point of the call, of course, was that Bassler - an associate professor of molecular biology at Princeton - is now officially a genius herself. The notion that microbes have anything to say to each other is surprisingly new. New research suggests, however, that microbial life is much richer: highly social, intricately networked, and teeming with interactions. Last year, Bassler and her colleagues unlocked the structure of a molecular language shared by many of nature's most fearsome particles of mass destruction, including those responsible for cholera, tuberculosis, pneumonia, septicemia, ulcers, Lyme disease, stomach cancer, and bubonic plague. Page 2 >> Previous Story: Wrist-Top Revolution

Current News Feeds A SURGE in the number of applications for undergraduate science and maths courses has been attributed in part to a federal government scheme. The scheme is aimed to reduce student fee contributions in priority areas. Applications grew by 12.6 per cent to 19,390 for courses starting this year, following a 17 per cent rise to 17,222 last year. Demand was flat until last year, a spokesperson for Tertiary Education Minister Chris Evans said. The federal government allocated $562 million over four years in the 2008 budget to enable universities to lower fees for science and maths courses, amid concerns over the low demand for the courses, especially among high-performing students. Rob Norris, Monash University science dean and president of the Australian Council of Deans of Science, said applicants nominating science as their first preference at Monash next year had jumped by 28 per cent. "If it were clearly cheaper to do an arts degree, they may very well do that.

Meta-level thinking I have been trying to figure out what characterizes some of the best programmers I know, or know about. It's a frustrating endeavor of course, since most of these people are very different from each other, and have different experiences and ways to think and learn about stuff. Not to mention the fact that programmers tend to be highly individualistic. But I think that I'm finally zeroing in on something that is general enough but also specific enough to categorize most of these people, and the general mind needed to be a really good programmer. When people try to become better programmers there are generally a few different kinds of advices you can get. Learn - and understand - LispMore generally, learn a new language that is sufficiently different from your current knowledgeWork with domain specific languagesUnderstand metaprogrammingRead up on the available data structures (Knuth anyone)? This is why Lisp has a tendency to change the way people write Java code.

Lightcraft Technology Incorporated What is a Lightcraft? A Lightcraft is a 1kg launch vehicle, made from high temperature ceramic materials, that flies into space on a megawatt laser beam. The Lightcraft, shown here in flight, is both a single-stage-to-orbit launch vehicle and a satellite. How does it work? A ground based laser is the power source that propels the Lightcraft into orbit. The back side of the craft is a large, highly polished parabolic mirror that is designed to capture the laser beam projected at it from the ground. History of Lightcraft 1987 Prof.