The website "One Million Checkboxes" (OMCB) launched on June 26, 2024, and unexpectedly attracted 500,000 players who checked over 650,000,000 boxes in two weeks.
Users creatively used the checkboxes to write binary messages, leading to a Discord server where they discussed botting the site and created complex drawings and animations.
Despite some complaints about bots, the creator found the community's creativity inspiring and documented the experience in a YouTube video to share the emotional impact.
The post discusses the emotional journey and creative process behind the website "One Million Checkboxes" (OMCB), highlighting the balance between constraints and creativity on the internet.
The author shares their decision to shut down the site, citing reasons such as the natural end of interest, rising costs, and the desire to avoid maintenance burdens.
The story has resonated with many readers, evoking nostalgia and a renewed sense of joy in software engineering, contrasting with the often overwhelming and commercialized tech landscape.
AnandTech, a renowned tech review site, is shutting down, marking the end of an era for in-depth, technical reviews and articles.
The site was known for its detailed and integrity-driven content, which significantly influenced many tech enthusiasts and professionals.
The closure has sparked nostalgia and discussions about the changing landscape of tech journalism, with many lamenting the loss of such a unique and reliable resource.
Elasticsearch and Kibana are now open source again, with AGPL being added as a license option alongside ELv2 and SSPL.
This change reaffirms Elastic's commitment to open source, addressing previous issues with AWS and market confusion that led to a fork of Elasticsearch.
The move aims to simplify user experience by offering multiple licensing options and aligns with Elastic's goal to support more open-source licensing.
Anthropic has launched an interactive tutorial for prompt engineering in Claude, aimed at teaching users to create optimal prompts.
The course covers beginner to advanced topics, including prompt structure, addressing common issues, and building complex prompts, with practical exercises and an "Example Playground" for experimentation.
The tutorial uses Claude 3 Haiku and includes a Google Sheets version for ease of use, making it accessible for new users to understand and apply prompt engineering techniques effectively.
Anthropic has released a Prompt Engineering Interactive Tutorial, which has garnered significant attention from the tech community.
The tutorial aims to teach users how to effectively communicate with Large Language Models (LLMs) to achieve desired outcomes, a skill known as prompt engineering.
This release is notable because it provides structured guidance on optimizing prompts, which is crucial for improving the performance and reliability of AI-driven applications.
The GPU API MkII #9312 has been merged into the main branch of libsdl-org, introducing significant updates like the Refresh graphics component, which supports modern APIs such as Vulkan and the PS5 graphics API.
The update includes an offline shader compilation system, aiming to streamline the GPU API, enhance performance, and improve resource safety.
The main contributor is @thatcosmonaut, with support from the FNA core team and feedback from various collaborators, indicating a collaborative effort to refine and optimize the API.
SDL3's new GPU API has been merged into the main branch, despite SDL3 still being in preview, aiming to simplify cross-platform graphics development, including on consoles.
This new API is designed to be more powerful than the old SDL 2D API, supporting modern GPU features and targeting both 2D and some 3D needs.
While similar efforts like WebGPU/WGSL exist, they lack console backends, and the new SDL3 GPU API does not yet support WebGPU as a backend.
The author recounts a series of events starting from July 24, 2021, when his wife, Kim, was arrested after being found with a suspicious bottle, leading to the discovery of her tampering with his water bottle.
The author had been suffering from hypercalcemia and vitamin D toxicity since 2019, with fluctuating health despite numerous medical tests and treatments, including MRI and PET-CT scans.
The source of the excessive vitamin D and calcium remained unknown until the author discovered Kim adding a brown liquid to his water, which she claimed was potassium.
A blog post on rattvisan.blog discusses a suspected poisoning case in Sweden, where the author alleges his wife poisoned him with vitamin D.
Despite medical records and video footage, the Swedish prosecutor chose not to press charges due to insufficient evidence, sparking debate about the justice system.
Commenters express disbelief at the decision, discuss the possibility of private prosecution, and speculate on the wife's motivations and mental state.
The post discusses techniques to bypass enterprise firewalls, enabling arbitrary inbound and outbound requests over any protocol, which is useful for deploying software in restricted network environments.
It introduces a repository named "holepunch" containing NixOS modules that automate these firewall bypassing tricks, including tunneling inbound SSH connections inside outbound HTTPS requests.
The techniques assume control over hosts on both ends of the network request and utilize tools like forward proxies, TLS-terminating reverse proxies, reverse tunnels, and Corkscrew to disguise and tunnel traffic.
The post discusses the limitations and potential vulnerabilities of firewall rules, highlighting that they may not be as secure as commonly believed.
It shares real-world anecdotes and technical insights on how vendors and individuals can bypass firewall restrictions using tools like SSH and netcat, raising concerns about security practices.
The conversation underscores the tension between security policies and practical needs, emphasizing the importance of transparent communication and proper security measures to prevent unauthorized access.
The rise of large cloud providers is leading to a fragmented or "balkanized" internet, where interoperability with the general internet is limited.
Historical context: The internet transitioned from a government and educational tool to a commercialized space dominated by advertising and user data monetization.
Concerns include data theft and excessive traffic from cloud services, prompting some to block access from major providers like AWS to protect local resources.
The author is blocking AWS connections to their on-premises services due to concerns about abuse and attacks.
Blocking Amazon's extensive IP range is challenging, but the author is willing to sacrifice some legitimate traffic to reduce unwanted traffic.
There is a debate about whether blocking cloud providers' IPs could lead to the fragmentation (balkanization) of the internet, but the author prioritizes security over this concern.
Google Closure Library has been archived, marking the end of its maintenance despite its historical significance in building robust email clients like Gmail's editor.
The Closure Compiler will continue to receive support, even as the JavaScript ecosystem has evolved to reduce the need for such comprehensive libraries.
Closure Library's legacy of engineering excellence remains influential in the development community.
CIEL is an extended version of Lisp, with discussions highlighting its well-documented tools and the potential for a mascot or logo.
Key features discussed include shell pass-through in the REPL, ease of compiling binaries, and the interactive nature of CIEL's REPL compared to Python's.
Users noted the significance of the name "Ciel" (French for "sky"), ease of installation, and comparisons to other languages like Clojure and Nim, emphasizing the potential for CIEL to standardize the Common Lisp ecosystem.
DuckDuckGo has made its Mac browser open source, available on GitHub, and it is based on WebKit, the same engine as Safari.
Users have reported a decline in DuckDuckGo's search quality, citing AI spam and irrelevant local business links, prompting some to switch to alternatives like Brave Search and Kagi.
Brave engineers are actively working on resolving captcha issues, highlighting ongoing improvements in alternative search engines.
The post discusses the common misconception that Rust's syntax is the main issue, while the real challenge lies in its semantics.
It provides various syntax styles (Rs++, Rhodes, RhodesScript, Rattlesnake, CrabML) to illustrate how Rust's semantics can be simplified.
The post suggests several changes to Rust's standard library function to make it more user-friendly, including removing nested functions, constraints, and simplifying error handling.
The article discusses the complexity and readability issues in Rust's syntax, particularly when dealing with generic types and lifetime markers.
Examples provided include the use of async functions in traits, which can result in convoluted code due to the combination of lifetimes and type bounds.
The discussion highlights differing opinions on Rust's syntax choices, such as the use of the single quote (') for lifetimes, and whether more verbose keywords would improve code readability.
Algora TV introduces a new feature called Livestream Billboards, allowing developers to earn money through in-video ads while livestreaming.
The setup requires Elixir, Erlang/OTP, PostgreSQL, FFmpeg, and OBS Studio, with detailed steps provided for project initialization and database configuration.
The architecture involves streamers using Fly (an Elixir app) and RTMP servers, with media storage and delivery handled by Tigris, and the service is distributed under the AGPLv3 License.
Algora is an open-source livestreaming platform for developers, supporting multistreaming to platforms like Twitch, YouTube, and X, and aggregating live comments.
Built using Elixir for productivity and fault tolerance, Algora leverages Phoenix LiveView and OTP for handling complex streaming pipelines and BEAM clustering for low latency.
The project is maintained by a solo developer who is seeking contributions and feedback, with bounties available for prioritized issues.
Google is facing allegations of misleading users about the privacy of its Incognito mode, potentially entitling users to up to $5,000 in compensation for privacy violations.
The lawsuit claims Google tracked activity, sold personal data, and misled users about the privacy of Incognito mode between 2016-2023.
Eligibility criteria include using Incognito mode during the specified period, expecting privacy, not always consenting to tracking, being 18+, and a US resident.
Users of Google Chrome's incognito mode might be eligible for up to $5,000, but no settlement has been reached yet.
The lawsuit claims that incognito mode's name and icon are misleading, suggesting full anonymity, despite warnings that it doesn't hide activity from websites, employers, or ISPs (Internet Service Providers).
The case has ignited discussions about tech literacy and user expectations, with potential risks for those joining the lawsuit, including possible costs if the case is lost.