05 Feb 2010, Posted by Matthew Reinbold in Tools,Wunderkammer (the links), 0 Comments
Wunderkammer: Feb 5th, 2010
This Sunday the Colts will play the Saints in the annual excuse for over-the-top sport glorification known as the Superbowl. It’s then that I’ll say a sad farewell to a wonderful distraction for another seven months. Football or not, however, the links never leave. Here’s what stuck the week of Feb 5th, 2010.
- Vector Magic – An online service that allows a person to upload a bitmap image and have it converted to vector. I keep Inkscape and its reasonably good “Trace Bitmap” functionality around for this purpose but Vector Magic works in a pinch.
- Marble Magnets! – a really simple craft one can do with any printed designs that has a very impressive result.
- Twitter Spinner – I’m fairly cool on this web service built on top of twitter with the exception of its ability to auto-rotate profile and background pics. It probably wouldn’t be that hard to do one’s self and might be a great way of displaying information that is not timely enough to tweet but does occasionally change (maybe promo an upcoming talk?).
- The Great Reboot – John Robb lays out the properties necessary for core processes that can withstand systemic shocks (ala the global credit crisis):
- Resilient to rapidly propagating global shocks (an inevitable outcome of a global system that is too large, fast, and complex to control).
- Highly productive in their ability to produce everything from food to products to energy (they produce wealth). Networked innovation.
- Extremely efficient and low cost. This stems from: shorter distances, less energy, less space, less time, less mass, and less information (as in, less management overhead required).
I think I just read a book about that kind of thing.
- Evoke Game Trailer – While on the topic of sustainability its worth mentioning a new online game called Evoke – A Crash Course in Saving the World that launches on March 3rd. It challenges players to tackle such world problems as poverty, hunger, sustainable energy, water security, conflict, disaster relief, health care, education, and human rights.
This has all the makings of some very preachy gameplay. However, given its laudible ambitions I’m willing to give it the benefit of the doubt.
- Quirky – Crowd Sourced Product Creation and Fabrication – Crowdsourcing seems to be extremely hit or miss. Either the wisdom of the masses produces a fantastic result or it degenerates into chaos. Quirky seems to have creating some interesting products thus far. The challenge will be whether they can keep it up.
- Don’t Just Hash those Passwords! – Algorithms like MD5 and SHA256 are great for encrypting large tracts of text. However, their most beneficial aspect – their speed – also makes them susceptible to brute force dictionary attacks. The solution? Use an algorithm that’s slow as hell. The speed difference is unnoticeable when doing once (like logging a user in). But when attempting tens of thousands of combinations those subtle differences add up to a big security gain.
- 37 Signals Rework Trailer – 37 Signals first book, Getting Real was cute but extremely narrow in focus (“When all you have is a hammer…”). Their next book, Rework, again picks easy-to-loath workspace practices and binds them together into a tepid anthem. I’m sure it will be a hit:
- Peace between Silverlight and Flash Developers? – something this level headed is destined to be ignored:
“It’s fair to say that anything outside of your comfort zone is going to be frustrating to learn. Over time, you’ll come to realize that each language was developed a specific way to have specific strengths and weaknesses, and you’ll find knowing them all will help you be a better developer. Which makes you a better expert. Which only helps your users. So… how does it hurt to be closed minded to anything?”
That reminds me – I had started one of those “Learn X in a Week” online courses but the language didn’t have the ease, speed, power, or sheer sexuality that programming in ColdFusion had. Suppose I need to adjust my expectations and try again. :p
- FontSpring – Web-ready fonts at affordable prices. Because spending $345 per client for a type face eats into the margins.
That’s it for what I found interesting this week. What ended up sticking in your browser tabs?