• The Ryzen 9 3950X lands in two weeks unless it doesn't.  (WCCFTech)
  
  AMD haven't said anything more specific than September but there's only so much September to go around.
  
  
• Meanwhile the Ryzen 3900X has the third highest PassMark score.
  
  At 31,877 the $499 3900X is just behind the Intel's $3000 Xeon W-3175X at 33,358.
  
  The large L3 cache on Zen 2 seems to give a significant boost to AMD on this benchmark - the 3700X outperforms the Threadripper 2990WX.  So this may or may not apply to your particular workload.
  
  
• Z is a functional language that installs with NPM and compiles to JavaScript.
  
  Having just spent a couple of days working with TypeScript, I can confidently say that this entire concept needs to die in a fire.
  
  
• Build your own 6502 computer.  (Eater.net)
  
  All the nerdy kids are doing it.
  
  
  
  
• Unionise, get fired is the new get woke, go broke.  (BBC)
  
  I seem to recall hearing of these particular idiots before.  But it's possible I'm thinking of different idiots.
  
  
• Buried in this typically moronic article about France banning Facebook's Libra is an absolute gem.  (Vice)

  "The monetary sovereignty of countries is at stake [from] possible privatization of money by a sole actor with more than 2 billion users on the planet,” [said French finance minister Bruno Le Maire].

  The monetary sovereignty.  Of France.
  
  
• Discord's Nitro game store is dead, surprising absolutely no-one.  (Neowin)
  
  Except possibly Google, who are very easily surprised, being complete morons.
  
  
• Ash finally won a Pokemon tournament.
  
  

Posted by: Rick C at Monday, September 16 2019 03:03 AM (Iwkd4)

Posted by: Pixy Misa at Monday, September 16 2019 12:23 PM (PiXy!)

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• TCL showed off Frank's 2000" TV.  (AnandTech)
  
  Well technically it's 132" but 132 is close to 2000, right?  Right.
  
  It used 24 million micro-LEDs rather than a conventional LCD or OLED panel.  I have no idea what that means in terms of cost, colour accuracy and so on, but does that really matter when it's 2000"?
  
  
• France and Germany just banned private blockchains and probably a million other things too.  (Reuters)
  
  Their target was Facebook, but they are idiots and took out everything within a fifty-mile radius.
  
  
• When a large company urges the government to regulate its industry it is invariably in order to kill off smaller competitors.  (NPR)
  
  
• It's time to break up everything.
  
  
• The emulator for the Commander X16 I posted about yesterday.  (GitHub)
  
  40K of shiny 8-bit goodness awaits!  Runs on Windows, Mac, and Linux.
  
  
• JPMorgan's Athena platform has 35 million lines of Python code.  (TechRepublic)
  
  Python 2.7, to be precise.  Which means that no matter what the Python Software Foundation decides, Python 2 will be alive and supported for a long time yet.
  
  

Posted by: Rick C at Sunday, September 15 2019 01:26 AM (Iwkd4)

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• Endless Space is free at Humble Bundle for the next 24 hours.
  
  You just need to sign up for their newsletter.  Your email address has probably been leaked a thousand times by now anyway.
  
  
• Xiaomi's Mi 9 has (reads specs) no headphone jack.  (AnandTech)
  
  Please stop doing that.
  
  
• Sega's Genesis Mini comes with 42 games for $80.  (Ars Technica)
  
  That price is a bit high for the hardware - it's just another emulator running on a cheap Arm microcontroller - but it includes two controllers and the bundled game lineup looks solid.  I never owned a Sega console but I recognise most of the game titles even so.
  
  
• AMD's twelve-core Threadripper 1920X was discounted to $199 at Amazon.  (Tom's Hardware)
  
  Two problems: First, it requires an expensive motherboard that looks likely to be obsoleterated very soon, and second, I say was.  It's already out of stock.
  
  
• Asus' dual screen Zenbook Pro gets a full review.  (Tom's Hardware)
  
  No PgUp/PgDn/Home/End keys on this one.  They have an excuse - there's not much room because they had to move the trackpad to the right of the keyboard to squeeze in the second screen above. 
  
  I harp on this because my own fairly nice Dell laptop with its 4k screen doesn't have those keys either.  I used to have a keyboard and monitor in the office so the days I was working there I would plug those in and everything would be great.  But now we don't have a permanent office because most of the Sydney-based staff worked from home anyway, and it turns out that not having those keys drives me nuts when I'm trying to code.
  
  And my new HP laptops don't have those keys either.  Sigh.
  
  
• Early Pleistocene enamel proteome from Dmanisi resolves Stephanorhinus phylogeny.  (Nature)
  
  Well good, because that's been bugging me.
  
  
• ChocoPy is a subset of Python 3 designed for teaching compiler construction.
  
  Only problems are the compiler is written in Java and it compiles to Risc-V, which makes it basically useless.
  
  
• King Canute eat your heart out: France wants to block Facebook's Libra cryptocurrency at the border.  (ZDNet)
  

Posted by: Jay at Saturday, September 14 2019 01:20 PM (vuQH5)

Posted by: Pixy Misa at Saturday, September 14 2019 01:25 PM (PiXy!)

3 That sounds like someone not familiar with college professors would say.

Posted by: Rick C at Sunday, September 15 2019 01:26 AM (Iwkd4)

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Posted by: Pete Zaitcev at Friday, September 13 2019 01:59 PM (LZ7Bg)

Posted by: Pixy Misa at Saturday, September 14 2019 12:24 AM (PiXy!)

Posted by: Pixy Misa at Saturday, September 14 2019 12:31 AM (PiXy!)

Posted by: Mauser at Wednesday, September 18 2019 10:16 AM (Ix1l6)

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• Intel says no our Celeron and Pentium processors aren't disintegrating while you watch and there's nothing to worry about probably.  (Tom's Hardware)
  
  If you have a Pentium N4200 or a Celeron J3355, J3455, or N3350 there is absolutely nothing to worry - wait, what does this notebook have? - nothing to worry about.
  
  
• How Apple went from being a purveyor of interesting but overpriced gadgets to a purveyor of boring but overpriced gadgets.  (ZDNet)
  
  
• IBM launched its new Z15 mainframe capable of running 2400000 Docker instances on a singe node.  (ZDNet)
  
  At 2400001 it collapses into a black hole of infinite suckage.
  
  
• The Ramans do everything in threes.  (CNET)
  
  Yep, it's another one, due for perihelion in December.
  
  
• The famous Libet experiment that demonstrated that your brain knew what you were going to do before you did might have been wrong.  (The Atlantic)
  
  Or at least, misinterpreted.  Certainly this article misinterprets it, but people who actually understood it - including Libet - may have misinterpreted the data.

Posted by: David at Friday, September 13 2019 02:17 PM (wXI5i)

Posted by: Pixy Misa at Saturday, September 14 2019 12:29 AM (PiXy!)

Posted by: cxt217 at Saturday, September 14 2019 08:19 AM (LMsTt)

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• Apple announced the iPhone Okay We're Not Going To Use Roman Numerals Anymore, the iPhone Okay We're Not Going To Use Roman Numerals Anymore Pro, and the iPhone Okay We're Not Going To Use Roman Numerals Anymore Pro Max and no, it's not the iPhone ][ either.  (AnandTech)]
  
  Now with basically what you had last year only slightly more so.
  
  Apple boasts of having 6x faster matrix multiply in the AI processor, which is actually significant.  It means your phone can do more clever stuff without having to pass it off to the cloud to get immediately stolen.
• Apple also announced a new iPad bumping the screen size up to 10.2" and well that's basically it. (AnandTech)
  
  
• That screen-scraping decision was a ruling against a LinkedIn request for a preliminary injunction so the case is still ongoing.  (TechDirt)
  
  That makes more sense.  Saying that LinkedIn can't take measures to block web scraping while the case is under review is very different from saying they can't ever do so.
  
  Even more analysis.  (Volokh Conspiracy)
  
  
• Chrome 77 doesn't distinguish EV certificates.  (Bleeping Computer)
  
  This has been coming for a while.  It used to show the verified company name in the URL bar; now it doesn't bother.
  
  Also fixed are 36 security vulnerabilities so if you wanted to keep the EV notifications, tough.
  
  
• Australia's government is looking to ban Twitter.  (ZDNet)
  
  That's not what they thought they were doing, it's just what they actually are doing.

Posted by: Rick C at Thursday, September 12 2019 12:09 AM (Iwkd4)

Posted by: Pixy Misa at Thursday, September 12 2019 10:10 AM (PiXy!)

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• MSI's 5120x2160 34" ultrawide monitor is now shipping.  (Tom's Hardware)
  
  Announced back in May, it can now be yours for just $1199.
  
  
• AMD's leaked BIOS update has leaked.  (Tom's Hardware)
  
  That is, its existence leaked first, and now the BIOS itself, or at least a beta version.  On the 3700X it immediately fixed the boost clock issue; on a 3900X results were mixed.  But it does look like the problem with Ryzen 3000 not hitting its clock targets will get resolved.
  
  
• Michael Bloomberg is spending $160 million to get kids back to smoking cigarettes just like the good old days.  (Axios)
  
  
• The 9th Circuit says not only are you allowed to scrape public websites, but they are not allowed to try to prevent you.  (Hacker News)
  
  The first part seems logical, the second part smacks of judicial overreach.  I'll be looking for analysis of this because it's a pretty significant decision.
  
  
• If you need a 64-core server with 24 NVMe drive bays in a 2U form factor then today is your lucky day unless you also wanted to run 100GbE using a PCIe 3.0-only NIC.  (Serve the Home)
  
  Because it only has a PCIe 4.0 x8 slot free after everything else is accounted for.

Posted by: Rick C at Saturday, September 14 2019 01:05 PM (Iwkd4)

Posted by: Pixy Misa at Saturday, September 14 2019 01:22 PM (PiXy!)

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• The Cult of Kubernetes.  (christine.website)
  
  
  
  
  
• It’s not wrong that "🤦🏼‍♂️".length == 7
  
  Well, it's 7 in Java and JavaScript, 5 in Python 3, and 17 in Rust.  Oh, and 1 in Swift.  Because fuck programmers trying to write applications that actually work anyway.
  
  
• Urban Dictionary - yes, that Urban Dictionary - has scrubbed the term "GamerGate" from its site except for the entomological definition of the crown princess of an anthill.  (One Angry Gamer)
  
  It really does mean that as well as the other thing.  (Wikipedia)
  
  Walking talking Superfund site Zoe Quinn was also deemed too outré for the famously staid lexicographers at UD.
  
  
• Is there a regular expression to detect a valid regular expression?  (StackOverflow)
  
  Not only is the answer no, but you are going to hell for having asked and I am going with you for having answered.
  
  Well, technically.  But since regular expressions haven't been regular since the incident of which we shall remain silent, you can just use 
  /^((?:(?:[^?+*{}()[\]\\|]+|\\.|\[(?:\^?\\.|\^[^\\]|[^\\^])(?:[^\]\\]+|\\.)*\]|\((?:\?[:=!]|\?<[=!]|\?>)?(?1)??\)|\(\?(?:R|[+-]?\d+)\))(?:(?:[?+*]|\{\d+(?:,\d*)?\})[?+]?)?|\|)*)$/
  
  
• Regarding people disappearing into paintings...
  
  
  
  
  
• So what the heck is going on with Thirdripper?  (Gamers Nexus)
  
  The latest leaks claim that it will appear in 4 and 8 channel versions - that latter is possible with the TR4 socket, though not with current motherboards - and 64 or 128 lanes of PCIe 4.0, with one quarter switchable to SATA mode so you can have 32 SSDs connected directly to the CPU.  Which is very not possible with current motherboards.
  
  In the video Steve mentions "surface-mount LGA sockets" and for a minute I thought he was referring to BGA, i.e. surface-mount CPUs.  But no, it's LGA, and current Threadrippers are LGA already.
  
  So most likely the four-channel sTRX4 models will drop straight in to existing motherboards, though they'll need new motherboards for the PCIe 4.0 and SATA extensions, while the high-end sWRX8 models will really need a new motherboard.
  
  

Posted by: Rick C at Tuesday, September 10 2019 12:18 AM (Iwkd4)

Posted by: Jay at Tuesday, September 10 2019 12:24 AM (mrlXS)

Posted by: Pixy Misa at Tuesday, September 10 2019 03:32 AM (PiXy!)

Posted by: Rick C at Tuesday, September 10 2019 07:25 AM (Iwkd4)

Posted by: Rick C at Wednesday, September 11 2019 02:30 AM (Iwkd4)

Posted by: J Greely at Wednesday, September 11 2019 03:28 AM (ZlYZd)

Posted by: Rick C at Wednesday, September 11 2019 03:34 AM (Iwkd4)

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• Type checking 4 million lines of Python.  (Dropbox)
  
  Ick.  I maintain about 250,000 lines of Python at my day job, and that's bad enough.
  
  I'd like to port it all to Crystal but that's not commercially viable at the moment.
  
  
• Excellivization.
  
  
  
  
• Apple is under attack for attacking Google over publicising websites attacking iOS.  (Ars Technica)
  
  One more and we'll square the circle.
  
  
• Western Digital announced 18TB CMR and 20TB SMR 3.5" hard drives - to ship next year, so you'll have to wait a bit.  (Serve the Home)
  
  These are 9 platter helium-filled models again.  Density really isn't going anywhere.
  
  
• Google knows your grandparents' names, addresses, phone numbers, and middle initials.  (Forbes)

  Beyond that, Google knew their exact addresses and their middle initials.  I couldn't even have told you those things about my grandparents...

  Could someone explain the concept of phone books to these idiots?  I have some kids I need to get off my lawn.
  
  
• Two college students thought it was a great idea to use another student's account to try to hack a student financial aid database, get the entry for Tiffany Trump, and then load in her dad's tax returns.  (The Inquirer)  
  
  They couldn't guess her password reset questions even though every detail of her family's life is public, and their attempts set off alarms at the IRS.
  
  Brillant, as the saying goes.  Laurel and Hardy now face two years in prison.
  
  
• Sony announced a new family of Walkmans.  Walkmen?  Walkpeople?  (Forbes)
  
  Each is basically a little Android device - 2" x 4" - with a microSD slot, USB C, an old-school Walkman-styled case, and (checks and double-checks fine print) a headphone jack.
  
  Prices are not particularly cheap, starting at AU$499 (which might mean US$299), but it looks like they've used top-quality DACs and amplifiers so it might be worthwhile.
  
  
• Twitter is fickle.
  
  

Posted by: The Brickmuppet at Monday, September 09 2019 05:54 AM (YUAc9)

Posted by: Mauser at Monday, September 09 2019 05:55 AM (Ix1l6)

Posted by: Frank at Tuesday, September 10 2019 12:57 PM (rglbH)

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