NSA Concedes Hadoop Beats Its Pricey Alternatives
The National Security Agency has acknowledged that Hadoop, the open source big-data analysis tool, is more powerful and higher performing than its commercial counterparts.
The Poke Test, Using a Fork to Flip, and Other Steak-Cooking Myths
Lifehacker tackles how to properly cook a steak, just in time for grilling season.
Why Would Ecuador Want Edward Snowden?
An explanation of possible reasons Ecuador is considering granting asylum to the former NSA contractor.
It’s Memorial Day weekend, which means my family and I are headed to our summer place in Maine to open it for the season. It’s become an annual tradition, and for me it marks the start of summer.
As I’ve done during all my past trips to the Island, I’ll post pictures while I’m there. Check out the Boston Island blog as well, as we’ll be posting stuff from our trip there too.
“I won’t be offended if you turn away to watch the planes flying. I do it myself all the time,” NAS Oceana commanding officer CAPT Bob “Goose” Geis tells our group as he starts his brief on the facility’s history and operations. It’s an appropriate introduction to a meeting being held in the control tower conference room, a space seven stories above the tarmac with floor-to-ceiling glass on three sides, giving a 270 degree view of everything happening on the airfield.
I’m in Virginia Beach this week for EAST: Joint Warfighting Conference 2013, which is being hosted by my office. My hotel is on the 7th floor of a beachfront hotel, so this was my view this morning when I woke up. I can live with this.
Meetings are a huge time-waster. Unless your organization has broken through to a state of enlightened gathering where meetings stay on topic, are brief, and are used sparingly in order to maximize effectiveness and minimize productivity destruction, you’ve probably suffered sat through countless meetings that could just have easily been handled with a couple of quick emails.
Part of the problem, I think, is that people sit down for meetings. When somebody sits down they subconsciously have the expectation of being there for a while.
Google is celebrating graphic designer Saul Bass’ 93rd birthday today with a really neat Doodle - this time a video, as a tribute to his work in films. One of the things I love about Google Doodles is that, because they like to pick less well-known subjects, I often get introduced to new people and subjects with which I wasn’t familiar. Saul Bass is no exception. I recognize his work for sure, but I didn’t know him by name.
Meet the newest addition to my automotive family: Gisela, a 2003 BMW 330i ZHP. She’s Imola Red (Imolarot 2 to be specific) with black leather interior. I’ve had her for about a month, and I’m in love.
Gisela is my third BMW. My first was Erika, a 1992 325is in Brilliantrot, and my second was Natalia, a black 2001 330ci. This is the first 4 door BMW I’ve owned, and I’m really enjoying the convenience of having the rear doors.
Responsive design techniques are the future for the web, and for good reason. The ever-increasing number and variety of devices and their screen sizes makes the practice of dedicated desktop and mobile sites not only outdated, but unscalable. I’m a huge proponent of responsive & adaptive design and implement these technologies in every site I build. Despite all the amazing benefits they provide, there’s still something that bugs me as a developer: lack of server-side responsiveness.
The camera in Android 4.0 introduced a very cool feature: time-lapse video. Despite how awesome I think it is, I’ve never actually used it - until today. I shot this video out of the 4th story window of a hotel near BWI airport. I think I’m going to love using time-lapse, so brace yourselves for a whole slew of these types of videos from me.
