always true
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Kind: Reposts
Earth-Moon Fire Pole
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Earth-Moon Fire Pole My son (5y) asked me today: If there were a kind of a fireman’s pole from the Moon down to the Earth, how long would it take to slide all the way from the Moon to the Earth? Ramon Schönborn, Germany First, let’s get a few things out of the way: In…
How To Set Up an OSRM Server on Ubuntu 14.04
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The OpenStreetMap project consists of raw map data, collected and aggregated by thousands of users. This tutorial covers the configuration and maintenance of a web service using Open Source Routing Machine (OSRM), which is based on the OpenStreetMap d
The OpenStreetMap project consists of raw map data, collected and aggregated by thousands of users. However, its open access policy sparked a number of collateral projects, which collectively cover many of the features typically offered by commercial mapping services.
The most obvious advantage in using OpenStreetMap-based software over a commercial solution is economical convenience, because OpenStreetMap comes as free (both as in beer and as in speech) software. The downside is that it takes a little configuration in order to setup a working web service.
This tutorial covers the configuration and maintenance of a web service which can answer questions such as:
- What is the closest street to a given pair of coordinates?
- What’s the best way to get from point A to point B?
- How long does it take to get from point A to point B with a car, or by foot?
The software that makes this possible is an open-source project called Open Source Routing Machine (OSRM), which is based on the OpenStreetMap data. Functionalities to embed OpenStreetMaps in Web pages are already provided out-of-the-box by APIs such as OpenLayers.
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While slightly dated, I found this guide to be really valuable in my effort to set up a server that could spit out fastest walking routes around Oxford to support a PWA-driven tour of places relevant to J. R. R. Tolkien’s life, at my “day job”.
Maps Showing California as an Island The Public Domain Review
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If California were a country its economy would be the fifth largest in the world (just ahead of the UK). Yet the tech boom is not the starkest way California has ever stood apart from its neighbours. That would surely be the maps depicting it as an island, entire of itself. Below we have featured our pick of these glorious seventeenth- and eighteenth-century aberrations, from a collection of hundreds held at Stanford.
The intriguing story of how the maps came to be deserves a little mapping itself. In the 1530s Spanish explorers led by Hernán Cortés encountered the strip of land we now know as the Baja Peninsula. They mistook it for an island and called it California.
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Magician vs. Gambler vs. Cardist
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The woman who watched 300 executions in Texas
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A former employee of the state of Texas describes the profound effect the executions had on her.
Texas has executed far more people than any other US state, and one former employee of the state has watched hundreds of executions unfold. She speaks to Ben Dirs about the profound effect that had on her.
It is 18 years since Michelle Lyons watched Ricky McGinn die. But it still makes her cry.
When she least expects it, she’ll see McGinn’s mother, in her Sunday best, her hands pressed against the glass of the death chamber. Dressed to the nines to watch her son get executed. Some farewell party.
For 12 years – first as a newspaper reporter, then as a spokesperson for the Texas Department of Criminal Justice (TDCJ) – it was part of Lyons’ job to witness every execution carried out by the state.
Between 2000 and 2012, Lyons saw almost 300 men and women die on the gurney, violent lives being brought to a peaceful conclusion, two needles trumping the damage done.
Lyons witnessed her first execution when she was 22. After seeing Javier Cruz die, she wrote in her journal: “I was completely fine with it. Am I supposed to be upset?”
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The man with the golden blood
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Meet the donors, patients, doctors and scientists involved in the complex global network of rare – and very rare – blood. By Penny Bailey.
His doctor drove him over the border. It was quicker that way: if the man donated in Switzerland, his blood would be delayed while paperwork was filled out and authorisations sought.
The nurse in Annemasse, France, could tell from the label on the blood bag destined for Paris that this blood was pretty unusual. But when she read the details closely, her eyes widened. Surely it was impossible for this man seated beside her to be alive, let alone apparently healthy?
Thomas smiled to himself. Very few people in the world knew his blood type did – could – exist. And even fewer shared it. In 50 years, researchers have turned up only 40 or so other people on the planet with the same precious, life-saving blood in their veins.
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I only have pretty regular (ABO-type O, Rh D+) blood, but it pleased me to discover this article right after I’ve started donating blood again after a long dry spell.
The Quakers are right. We don’t need God.
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The group is considering dropping God from its meetings guidance. This is the new religiosity, says the Guardian columnist Simon Jenkins
The Quakers are clearly on to something. At their annual get-together this weekend they are reportedly thinking of dropping God from their “guidance to meetings”. The reason, said one of them, is because the term “makes some Quakers feel uncomfortable”. Atheists, according to a Birmingham University academic, comprise a rising 14% of professed Quakers, while a full 43% felt “unable to profess a belief in God”. They come to meetings for fellowship, rather than for higher guidance. The meeting will also consider transgenderism, same-sex marriage, climate change and social media. Religion is a tiring business.
I am not a Quaker or religious, but I have been to Quaker meetings, usually marriages or funerals, and found them deeply moving. The absence of ritual, the emphasis on silence and thought and the witness of “friends” seemed starkly modernist. Meeting houses can be beautiful spaces. The loveliest I know dates from 1700 and is lost in deep woods near Meifod, Powys. It is a place of the purest serenity, miles from any road and with only birdsong to blend with inner reflection.
The Quakers’ lack of ceremony and liturgical clutter gives them a point from which to view the no man’s land between faith and non-faith that is the “new religiosity”. A dwindling 40% of Britons claim to believe in some form of God, while a third say they are atheists. But that leaves over a quarter in a state of vaguely agnostic “spirituality”. Likewise, while well over half of Americans believe in the biblical God, nearly all believe in “a higher power or spiritual force”.
What these words mean is now the subject of intense debate…
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The Fable of the Dragon-Tyrant
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There are so many things for which this can be a metaphor. Bring-your-own-philosophy.
Timmy Muldoon and the Search for the Shadoweyes Bandit
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This is amazing, and I’ve no idea how it’s only got (at the time of writing) ~28,000 views. Seriously: push on through the first two minutes and pay atention to how the effects and filming are executed. Then keep watching.
Use a .dev domain? Not anymore.
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For years, programmers used .dev domains for testing their code. Those days are over.
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The Magma Chamber
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Compound interest and retirement
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Spectacular example of why when saving (e.g. for a pension) it’s often more important to save early than it is to save lots. So get saving! Even with an understanding of compound interest, these numbers can surprise you.
The only time better than today would have been yesterday, and you already missed that boat.
day-tight compartment
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Moscow Math Olympiad Puzzle
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How can you and a friend publicly communicate about cards you are holding without a third person knowing?
