originally a reference to using Litmus Paper to determine whether a liquid is an acid or a base. (more)

Ryan Tomayko demonstrates Pre-Forking code leveraging the UNIX-native opportunities. Eric Wong's mostly pure-RubY HTTP backend (Web Server), Unicorn, is an inspiration. I've studied this file for a couple of days now and it's undoubtedly one of the best, most densely packed examples of UNIX programming in Ruby I've come across. Unicorn is basically Mongrel (including the fast Ragel/C HTTP parser), minus the threads, and with teh Unix turned up to 11. That means processes (MultiProcess). And all the tricks and idioms required to use them reliably... MRI Ruby people need to accept, like Python (you have seen multiprocessing, yes?), that Unix processes are one of two techniques for achieving reliable ConCurrency and parallelism in server applications. Threads (Multi Threaded) are out. You can use processes, or ASynch/events, or both processes and async/events, but definitely not threads. Threads are out. (more)

David Byrne/St Vincent collaboration: album/tour (more)

Brian McCallister seeks an architecture providing a robust general web server designed for writing WebApp-s. (more)

MultiProcess ConCurrency model (more)

high-performance ASynch Web Server (more)

part of LocalWorld (more)

Term I made up while reading 2011-08-17-StrossUsenixFuture. (more)

The Internet lowers the barrier for electronic connection between people at a distance. This is a key force in the growth of the Network Economy and SmallWorld. (more)

Variety of Hosted Server flavors I've experienced (newest at top) (more)

Maciej Ceglowski announced the Pinboard Investment Co Prosperity Cloud which will involve him picking 6 Start Up-s to get free publicity on PinBoard (plus $37). I've been claiming for a while that the current culture of VC and angel investing has made the definition of 'startup' unnecessarily narrow. My goal is to give a leg up to innovative projects which, because they do not aim for explosive growth, hold little interest for traditional investors. (Life Style Company) (more)

To date, this vast market potential has failed to overcome the technical and non-technical barriers impeding adoption of DG (Distributed Generation of Electric Energy) (MicroGrid) technologies in mainstream markets. In the latter instance, those barriers include anti-competitive industry practices, regulatory incompetence, stakeholder myopia and institutional inertia. The biggest technical challenge to expanding deployment of distributed-energy resources (DER) is the lack of plug-and-play systems available on the market... Now, a clutch of Clean Energy companies claim claim to have cracked the code on specific pieces of the plug-and-play puzzle... Sky Built Power... The MTM is a self-contained unit that produces power from multiple generation sources, including fossil-fuel generators, solar arrays, wind, fuel cells and batteries. The packaged system ships with rapidly deployable solar blankets, wind turbines backup batteries and a generator. The slogan says it all: Mobile Hybrid Power System Built on Military-Grade Trailers—Power in Under an Hour! See 2011-05-12-RobbOmnivorousEnergyProduction.

use of power plant to generate both heat and electricity - aka CHP (more)

System that provides flexible local power (Energy), ideally integrated into World Energy Grid (more)

creator of PinBoard

non-free Open Twitter? (more)

Cal Newport notes how setting a daily-requirement (Habit?) Game Rule for a side-project (like Writing, if you're not a full-time Writer) is a self-defeating process. Here’s what happens when you resolve to write every day: you soon slip up. If you’re not a full-time writer, this is essentially unavoidable... This slip-up, however, has big consequences. It provides evidence to your brain that your plan to write every day will not succeed. As I’ve argued before, the human brain is driven, in large part, by its need to assess plans: providing Motivation to act on good plans, and reducing motivation (which we experience as Procrastination) to act on flawed plans. The problem for the would-be writer is that the brain does not necessarily distinguish between your vague and abstract goal, to write a novel, and the accompanying specific plan, to write every day, which you’re using to accomplish this goal... To leverage the psychology of your brain, you need to instead choose clear goals that you clearly know how to accomplish, and then approach scheduling with flexibility. Be aggressive, but remain grounded in the reality of your schedule.

PBS Front Line aired a 1hr piece on the Wall St "Untouchables" who the Barack Obama administration has refused to prosecute. Glenn Greenwald summarizes the history.

You get a "cage" in a CoLocation facility. You get power, environmental control, and network redundancy. You're on your own for everything else. (more)

what keeps everything alive (more)