It being sundae and a day of imposed rest since the religious discrimination is heavy upon the land, at least here in Greater Metropolitan Arab and probably throughout the Old Confederacy, time is arrived to clear tabs. I rather hate to admit that this has been a very tabbing week. Happily most of them do not merit much discussion, if any.
The starting is is an article [Link] about an Ubuntu tablet. A year ago I would have thought this a wonderful idea and snapped one up even if I had to ante up a half kilobuck. Why? Because then I would have a tablet I knew I could do stuff with. Now, given the way that wannabe master Mark and his pseudo-church instrumentality have vertically copulated Ubuntu, I could not find a pole long enough, and light enough for me to touch the thing.
I have had discussion with my colleagues, most with similar bents and creaks to myself, who own tablets what they do with. I find that they largely use them as an alternative to a smart phone. (Many are like I and in denial over the cost of rate plans from pirate cell providers – or is that redundant?) This actually makes them more attractive but not compelling. I prefer my phone to do little more than let me talk – an occasional text in tornado season when the service is flattened is about all.
But an Ubuntu tablet. Shuttleworth needs to quit recycling his body fluids.
Next, more engagingly, news [Link] of a simulation of the early universe by boffins in Nippon. The cherry here is that the simulation indicates that normal stochastic fluctuation can collapse the nine spatial dimensions into three nerds and six bogs; that is, three robust dimensions and six empty, vapid dimensions. This raises question of why there are so many bogs today?
Next, an article [Link] in the Economist on fragmenting bullets. Underwhelming. What is amusing and entertaining is the demonstration of how little journalists, at least this one, understand Clausewitz. Usually the Economist does a better job. Hopefully this is just an off day for the fellow.
They do rather make up for it in a nice article [Link] on differential equations. Gotta get a copy of the real paper but if it’s half as interesting as the journalist wrangles, it redeems the rag.
