The Daily Index — Wednesday, June 28, 2023 · TLDR Index

Across today’s newsletters

Today’s Index

TLDR

MICROSOFT?

OpenAI's plans to market a personalized assistant for work would put it in competition with Microsoft. Microsoft owns an estimated 49% of OpenAI. It is likely that the issue of OpenAI releasing a work assistant was discussed prior to Microsoft's $10 billion investment into OpenAI in January. There is no doubt that OpenAI was planning to enter the enterprise market as it is quite lucrative.

fastcompany.com · 2 min

TLDR Web Dev

WHAT IS A WEBHOOK?

This system design refresher goes over what a webhook is, in what cases webhooks are needed, and the advantages webhooks have over short polling. It also covers other miscellaneous topics, such as a case study on Stack Overflow’s architecture, key OOP concepts, tools to ensure code quality, and developer roadmaps.

open.substack.com · 8 min

TLDR

MICROSOFT WANTS TO MOVE WINDOWS FULLY TO THE CLOUD

An internal Microsoft presentation, revealed as part of the ongoing FTC v. Microsoft hearing, discusses a full Windows operating system streamed from the cloud to any device. Windows 365, a service that streams Windows to devices, has so far been limited to commercial customers. Microsoft has been working on bringing the service to Windows 11. Moving Windows to the cloud would enable improved AI-powered services and allow people to roam freely with their devices.

theverge.com · 2 min

TLDR

SPACEX MAKING MORE THAN 1,000 CHANGES TO NEXT STARSHIP ROCKET

SpaceX's plans for upgrading its Starship megarocket include changing how the rocket's two stages separate, propulsion system improvements, and a beefed-up launch pad. Elon Musk estimates that there is a 60 percent chance that the next Starship test flight will make it to orbit. It may be some time before SpaceX obtains clearance for its next test flight. This article details the changes that SpaceX will make to Starship.

arstechnica.com · 9 min

TLDR

THE ONE-SHOT DRUG THAT KEEPS ON DOSING

Scientists from Rice University have engineered drug-delivering microparticles that release their contents in timed delays that can span days or even weeks. The injections contain hundreds of tiny microplastic particles that each encapsulate a small dose of a drug. The microplastic particles are made of a polymer that breaks down safely in human bodies. Timing and dosage can be controlled by adjusting the molecular weight of the polymer used for each capsule. A long-active delivery strategy like this will help many people with chronic issues who are unable to follow their prescribed treatments.

arstechnica.com · 12 min

TLDR

LLM POWERED AUTONOMOUS AGENTS

Large language models are powerful general problem solvers. There are now several proof-of-concept demos of LLM-powered agents that can solve problems by themselves. This article looks at how LLM-powered autonomous agent systems work. It covers their general structures, how they complete tasks, different types of memory, and more. Several case studies of real autonomous agents are presented and discussed in the article.

lilianweng.github.io · 28 min

TLDR

ADVANCED MACOS COMMAND-LINE TOOLS

macOS has a huge arsenal of standard Unix tools. It also has several macOS-specific command-line utilities. This article presents a list of advanced macOS command-line tools and shows readers how to use them.

saurabhs.org · 2 min

TLDR

AFTER REDDIT BLACKOUTS

Many people append 'Reddit' to their search queries when trying to find helpful resources on specific topics. The tactic lost its effectiveness during the Reddit protest earlier this month as many pages were suddenly inaccessible or unhelpful. Google unveiled a new feature called Perspectives on Monday that will at least partially resolve the issue. Perspectives surfaces discussion forums and videos from social media platforms. The Perspectives tab is available now on mobile web and the Google app in the US.

cnbc.com · 3 min

TLDR

THE BILLION-DOLLAR SEARCH FOR IMMORTALITY

Altos Labs, one of the best-financed startups in history, is on a mission to increase healthspan. It aims to find medicines to treat many diseases at once by targeting aging. This article takes readers on a tour of Altos' UK hub. While some argue that the quest for longevity benefits all humanity, there is no evidence that the benefits will trickle down to the non-billionaires.

unherd.com · 8 min