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APPLE EXECUTIVES BREAK DOWN AIRPODS’ NEW FEATURES

The AirPods' new features include Adaptive Audio, Personalized Volume, Conversational Awareness, and Vision Pro connectivity for the AirPods Pro 2.

TESLA’S OPTIMUS ROBOT CAN NOW SORT OBJECTS AUTONOMOUSLY

Tesla's Optimus robot can now sort objects on its own using its end-to-end trained neural network. The company shared a video showing the robot self-calibrating and physically sorting colored blocks into trays. The robot is able to adapt and adjust to its environment dynamically. Tesla is encouraging people to come and work with the company to help develop Optimus. The video is available in the article.

VIDEO

A promo video released by Google shows off the Pixel 8 and Pixel 8 Pro from all angles. The devices are set to launch on October 4. The Pixel 8 line seems to focus on new camera features. The Pixel 8 Pro will have new camera features, including Pro controls, Real Tone, Night Sight, Astrophotography, Super Res Zoom, and the ability to swap faces in an image. A list of the complete camera specifications for both the Pixel 8 and Pixel 8 Pro is available in the article.

HERE’S WHY IT MATTERS

A capsule containing material from an asteroid was released from a passing spacecraft and retrieved by NASA this morning. The OSIRIS-REx spacecraft collected several hundred grams of asteroid material. The capsule will be processed to prevent any contamination before it can be opened. NASA hopes to investigate the asteroid material to discover whether the basic building blocks of life were formed on ancient asteroid bodies and delivered to Earth from outer space.

IDENTIFIED

A creature discovered off the coast of Okinawa, Japan in 2018 left biologists baffled as it wasn't like anything else they've seen before. The creature has now been determined to be a type of parasitic flatworm. It is made up of two forms of the parasite that cooperate together. This article tells the story of how scientists identified the creature. Pictures of the flatworm are available.

SOLVING THE ENGINEERING STRATEGY CRISIS

This article discusses a unified theory of Engineering strategy. It focuses on how individuals can drive strategy even if they are not the company's CTO. The article discusses what engineering strategies are, why some strategies are more effective than others, why written strategy is powerful, and how to drive engineering strategy as an individual. Solving the engineering strategy crisis only requires two straightforward steps: write down the existing strategy and then improve the quality of the strategy.

CLOUDNATIVEPG

CloudNativePG is an operator designed to manage PostgreSQL workloads on any supported Kubernetes cluster running in private, public, hybrid, or multi-cloud environments. It leverages Kubernetes by extending its controller and defining all the actions that a good database administrator would normally do when managing a highly available PostgreSQL database cluster. CloudNativePG covers the full life cycle of a PostgreSQL database cluster with a primary/standby architecture using native streaming replication.

UNITY APOLOGIZES TO DEVS, REVEALS UPDATED RUNTIME FEE POLICY

Unity's runtime fee will no longer apply to games built on Unity Personal. It will only apply to developers on the Pro and Enterprise plans using the next LTS version of Unity arriving in 2024. The fee will not apply to games made with previous versions of Unity unless they are upgraded to the next version of Unity. Games with less than $1 million in trailing 12-month revenue will be exempt from the fee.

A STRANGE SIGN OF THE TIMES

The FBI seized stolen credentials for 80 million accounts from a darknet marketplace in April. It decided to work with the owner of data breach notification service 'Have I Been Pwned' to notify people whether their data was part of the seized data. Have I Been Pwned is run by a couple in Australia. This article tells the story of how the service started and why the FBI decided to work with it.

GOING

Many organizations and even a few government institutions have reached out to Shopify to request a Meeting Cost Calculator of their own after the company's success with the tool.

EXPERT CSS: THE CPU HACK

This article discusses how to continually crunch data and reevaluate state using CSS without ever touching JavaScript.

BRITAIN SET TO APPROVE AMENDED MICROSOFT-ACTIVISION DEAL

The amended Microsoft-Activision deal involves the sale of Activision's cloud gaming rights to Ubisoft.

CHOOSE POSTGRES QUEUE TECHNOLOGY

Postgres queue technology is a relatively obscure tech that announces and listens for new jobs and enables row locks.

TO TAME TECH

The Federal Trade Commission has been preparing a complaint against Amazon since at least the start of this year and it will file an antitrust case against the online retailer as soon as Tuesday.

MY SOLOPRENEUR STORY: ZERO TO $45K/MO IN 2 YEARS

The story of how one solopreneur created four successful products and built an audience of 97,000 followers on Twitter to bring in a total revenue of around $45,000 a month in just two years.

INSIDE APPLE’S PLAN TO CHANGE THE WAY WE WATCH SPORTS

Apple signed a 10-year deal last fall to serve as MLS' primary broadcast partner. The deal is set to give Lionel Messi a percentage of the revenue generated from new subscriptions to MLS Season Pass. This was Apple's biggest move yet into the sports business. Apple is methodically working its way into deals with other leagues and broadcasters.

MICROSOFT’S SURFACE AND AI EVENT: ALL THE NEWS AND ANNOUNCEMENTS

Microsoft held a special event in New York City on September 21. It announced new Surface hardware and detailed its vision for AI-powered features in its products at the event. Microsoft plans to release the next big Windows update on September 26. This page contains a collection of articles that detail the announcements made at the event.

AMAZON’S RUMORED HOME PROJECTOR CAN TURN ANYTHING INTO A SCREEN

Amazon is rumored to be working on a projector that can turn any surface into a screen. The device has many potential applications for Amazon's smart home ecosystem. Amazon is also working on technology to map homes. Its attempt to acquire iRobot for its home mapping technology has stalled due to regulatory scrutiny.

PRICING IN THE END OF OBESITY

Many major companies are working hard to assess the impact that a new class of weight loss drugs will have on their businesses. Obesity is an enormous global healthcare issue, affecting around one in eight people. It's extremely expensive in terms of human health and economic costs. Many companies either directly or indirectly profit from obesity, so making the disease less prevalent will likely hurt them.

BUZZ

buzz is a small, statically typed scripting language. It is unambiguous and requires no nonsense coercion. A VS Code extension with syntax highlighting is available.

DIVING INTO ENGINEERING METRICS

This essay dives into the world of engineering metrics. It looks at what engineering metrics are and their purpose, how they relate to productivity, and how to make the most from them. Engineering metrics are quantitative measures that provide insight into various aspects of the software development process. They can help understand performance, support decision-making, communicate progress, and ensure quality.

THE CASINO ON MARS

The speculative frenzy in crypto is attracting users and catalyzing the infrastructure necessary to create a thriving crypto civilization. This article draws similarities between the crypto industry and settling a new planet. While some people see crypto as a desolate planet without purpose, others see it as a blank slate on which an upgraded financial system and internet platform can be built. The casino-like speculation is part of the bootstrapping process.

THE MOST ADVANCED YET ACCEPTABLE PRODUCTS WIN

The Most Advanced Yet Acceptable (MAYA) design rule dictates that the ideal design sits between solutions that are completely novel and entirely familiar. Designs that are too novel will be tuned out and familiar designs will be overlooked. A balanced design can make or break the success of innovations. This article uses hits and misses from three high-profile tech categories to illustrate the concept of MAYA.

SPLUNK FOR $28 BILLION IN CASH

Splunk's technology helps businesses monitor and analyze data to minimize the risks of hacks and resolve technical issues faster.

HOW DO DATABASES EXECUTE EXPRESSIONS?

Most databases use a tree-walking interpreter, a few use stack or register-based virtual machines, a couple use just-in-time compilers, and some do vectorized interpretation.

APPLE’S FAILURE TO DEVELOP ITS OWN MODEM DETAILED IN NEW REPORT

Apple recently extended its deal with Qualcomm for modems due to issues resulting from underestimating the complexity and technical challenges of developing its own.

IS ENCRYPTION AT REST A SCAM?

Encryption at rest is a scam when it comes to database security.

SHERIF

Sherif is an opinionated, zero-config linter for JavaScript monorepos that enforces rules to provide a better standardized developer experience

WHY OPEN SOURCE AI WILL WIN

Open source AI will give companies more control over their products, but it will take some years before it catches up to proprietary technology.

PROMPT FIDELITY

DALL-E 3, OpenAI’s latest text-to-image generator, will be available to ChatGPT Plus and Enterprise customers in early October. OpenAI has yet to release any technical details about the model. DALL-E 3 refines small details like hands more effectively and can create engaging images without hacks or prompt engineering. Examples of images generated with DALL-E 3 along with their prompts are available in the article.

AMAZON IS SET TO SUPERCHARGE ALEXA WITH GENERATIVE AI

Amazon unveiled an all-new Alexa voice assistant powered by a large language model during its fall hardware event on Wednesday. The new Alexa can understand conversational phrases and respond appropriately, interpret context more effectively, and complete multiple requests from one command. It could take home automation to the next level. Amazon will roll out the new assistant slowly to customers in the US through a preview program in the coming months.

Researchers have successfully extracted and decoded RNA from a thylacine. The sample was taken from a roughly 130-year-old museum specimen. The research could help scientists in bringing the species back from extinction. It also helped transform the way scientists view museum and archive specimens.

Varda Space Industries’ satellite has been in orbit for two months longer than originally planned as it waits for government approval to return to Earth with its cache of pharmaceutical specimens. The satellite launched on June 12 without a reentry license. Its purpose was to demonstrate Varda’s technology for producing commercial materials inside a recoverable capsule designed to return the products to Earth. The FAA denied Varda’s reentry license as the company did not demonstrate compliance with regulatory requirements. A request for reconsideration is pending.

ELECTRICSQL

ElectricSQL is a local-first sync layer for web and mobile apps. It enables developers to build reactive, real-time, and local-first apps directly on Postgres. ElectricSQL makes apps feel instant as app code talks directly to a local database. It supports multi-user collaboration and conflict-free offline.

INTRODUCING RUNES

Svelte 5's runes unlock universal, fine-grained reactivity in JavaScript. They use function syntax to achieve the same things and more as let, =, the export keyword, and the $: label. Svelte 5 is not yet in production, but developers can test its new features through an interactive playground on its preview site.

UNTIL MARKETS TURNED LAST YEAR

Apple and Goldman Sachs were working on an investing feature that would let customers buy and sell stocks in 2020. The project was canceled as the markets went south last year. It was meant to roll out in 2022 and allow iPhone users to put money into Apple shares. The infrastructure for the feature is mostly built and ready to go, should Apple eventually decide to move forward with it.

LANGUAGE MODEL UXES IN 2027

This article explores what large language model-powered software might look like in the medium-term future. LLMs are going to significantly shift how we interact with computers. The current state of the technology seems rudimentary and it's increasingly clear that generative AI can't quite replace the other UX innovations that have been introduced over the last several decades. LLM UXes will likely evolve to have a memory of past interactions in order to provide more relevant responses.

TESLA MIGHT HAVE 2 MILLION CYBERTRUCK RESERVATIONS, TALLY SAYS

Tesla received over 250,000 reservations for the Cybertruck within a week of its unveiling and continued getting hundreds more reservations every week since.

EVERY PROGRAMMER SHOULD KNOW #1: IDEMPOTENCY

Idempotency refers to the property of an operation or function that produces the same result when applied multiple times as it does when applied only once.

POST-QUANTUM MAKEOVER

The Signal Protocol added a layer of encryption using a post-quantum cryptography algorithm that the National Institute of Standards and Technology selected as a potential replacement for quantum-vulnerable forms of encryption last year.

FACEBOOK CHANGED ITS LOGO — SEE IF YOU CAN TELL THE DIFFERENCE

Facebook’s new logo features a darker blue and a few other subtle tweaks.

DESIGNER

This article covers how to overcome the two most common challenges when working with designers and product managers and how to build a working relationship that makes you one of their favorite engineers to work with.

XML IS BETTER THAN YAML. HEAR ME OUT...

XML is better than YAML as there are situations where XML is appropriate but there aren’t any situations where YAML is appropriate.

XBOX LEAK: NEW XBOX SERIES X DESIGN, NEXT-GEN IN 2028, AND MORE

Unredacted documents from the FTC v.Microsoft case have revealed plans for a new disc-less Xbox Series, a gyro controller, and a next-gen hybrid Xbox in 2028. This is the biggest leak in Xbox history. Xbox chief Phil Spencer has hinted that Microsoft's plans may have changed. This page contains a collection of articles with more details about the leak.

“DOUBLE-CHECK” ANSWERS

Google Bard is now integrated with Google apps and can double-check answers against web content. It can now also work in over 40 languages. Bard Extensions are opt-in features that let Bard pull data from Google's other services for integration into a Bard conversation. They allow Bard to pull real-time flight and hotel information, suggest YouTube videos about a topic, and more. Data from Google apps used in AI conversations will not be viewed by human reviewers or be used to train future versions of the model.

BRAIN-COMPUTER INTERFACE

Neuralink is looking for its first human test subjects for an initial six-year trial. The trial will test Neuralink tech designed to help those with paralysis control devices. The company is looking for people with quadriplegia due to vertical spinal cord injury or ALS who are over the age of 22 and have a consistent and reliable caregiver. The study is not related to the all-encompassing brain computer that Elon Musk has been talking about for years.