LLMs for software development can go way beyond Github Copilot. In this episode, we talk about how these models could change the workflow for existing developers, but more importantly how they could change the very idea of what software is. Links/Resources: https://simonwillison.net/2023/Mar/11/llama/ https://github.com/RootbeerComputer/backend-GPT…

Dependent types are a more expressive type system in programming languages used to catch a larger class of errors at compile time. What are would be typically assertions at runtime can now be caught at compile time. Show notes: Proposition as Types Parse, Don’t Validation “Scala vs Idris: Dependent types, now and in the future” Resources: http://ww…

Activity Pub is a decentralized social networking protocol. It allows different web applications to interact so that their users can share information, even if the websites or applications are running different software. 00:00 S04E07 Activitypub 02:13 What is Activity Pub? 15:02 Interoperability 33:00 A New Kind of Social 43:53 Providing Distributi…

APL is an array based programming language developed by Kenneth Iverson in the 1960s. Its central data type is the multi-dimensional array and hence it's very useful for workloads involving a lot of matrix math. APL predominantly uses symbols and it leverages consistent composability and execution rules to enable it as a notation as a tool for thou…

io_uring is a new asynchronous, API to enable fast and efficient system calls in the Linux kernel. It promises faster user-land programs that heavily use file system IO on Linux, for all applications, not just databases. 00:00 S04 E05 io_uring 02:55 What is io_uring? 05:59 What's wrong with existing async interfaces? 17:25 Copying is slow 19:05 Two…

Xanadu was the first hypertext project founded in 1960 by Ted Nelson. It aims to facilitate a type of media called hypermedia, which is non-sequential writing in which the reader can choose their own path through an electronic document. Links/Resources: http://www.rheingold.com/texts/tft/14.html https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Xanadu https://…

ChatGPT is a language model by OpenAI which interacts in a conversational way. The dialogue format makes it possible for ChatGPT to answer followup questions, admit its mistakes, challenge incorrect premises, and reject inappropriate requests. 00:00 S04E03 ChatGPT Part 2 02:30 Expanding Humanity's Limits 11:33 Tool-assisted speedrun of Science 16:1…

ChatGPT is a language model by OpenAI which interacts in a conversational way. The dialogue format makes it possible for ChatGPT to answer followup questions, admit its mistakes, challenge incorrect premises, and reject inappropriate requests. 00:00 S04E03 ChatGPT Part 1 02:58 What is ChatGPT? 06:17 Lineage of ChatGPT 10:01 General Reasoning from T…

Nix is a functional package manager. It creates completely reproducible builds and package management, including support for multiple versions of packages side-by-size with no issues. Chapters: [00:00:00] Intro [00:02:41] What is Nix? [00:05:01] The Problem with Package Management [00:09:41] How Nix Works [00:15:08] Reproducible Environment = Less …

'Visual Programming' refers a style of programming that allows the user to specify a programs in a two-(or more)-dimensional fashion. Visual programming environments represent the data, control flow, or program state in a graphical way, allowing them to be directly manipulated. It has been a hot area of research from the very beginning of personal …

Lightning Network is a network of payment forwarders layered on top of Bitcoin to enable small, fast micropayments with low fees. Links/Resources: - https://lightning.network/ - https://www.swanbitcoin.com/a-look-at-the-lightning-network/ - [https://web.archive.org/web/20150301190111/http://lightning.network/lightning-network.pdf](https://web.archi…

Hypercore is a set of building blocks to build distributed peer-to-peer applications. It provides a variety of data structures, as well as a discovery mechanism to share data between peers. It is a suite of tools that are the Lego blocks to build peer-to-peer apps. Chapters: [00:00:00] Intros [00:02:16] What is Hypercore? [00:12:58] HyperDrive: A P…

Datomic is an immutable database that borrows ideas from functional programming. We discuss how an immutable database changes the architectural possibilities of web apps. Links/Resources: - [Datomic with Rich Hickey](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9TYfcyvSpEQ) - [Database as Values with Rich Hickey](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V6DKjEbdYos) - […

Urbit is an operating system for a global networked computer with a global filesystem. It has its own virtual machine, programming language, OS kernel, and identity layer. It dubs itself as “A clean-slate OS and network for the 21st century.” Links/Resources: - https://media.urbit.org/whitepaper.pdf - https://developers.urbit.org/overview - https:/…

Hyperfiddle is an app builder in Clojure/Clojurescript that uses a compiler to manage the network connections in the app for you. We discuss what makes code easy vs simple, arches for software, home-cooked apps, and the implications of a compiler for everything. Links/Resources: - [https://www.hyperfiddle.net/](https://www.hyperfiddle.net/) - [http…

Generative AI models are quickly reaching the point where their work is indistinguishable from that of humans. This include 3D models, voice, and other media types that were not previously possible to create without significant expertise Resources [Google's New AI: Flying Through Virtual Worlds! 🕊️](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N-Pf9lCFi4E) [Ope…

Zig is a system programming language without the ugliness of C. We discuss its compile time features, its strive towards simplicity, and the potential for resource-efficient software. Links/Resources: • https://ziglang.org/learn/overview/ • https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gv2I7qTux7g • https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z4oYSByyRak • https://www.scatt…

Multimodal and multitask models are machine learning models that can generalize. Multimodal models can generalize to understand different types of input, for example images and text. Multitask models can generalize their knowledge by applying what they’ve learned about one task to solve another task. Links/Resources: • MUM: https://blog.google/prod…

Plan 9 is distributed operating system and it is designed to make a network of disparate computers function as a single system no matter where they are. Links/Resources: https://9p.io/wiki/plan9/papers/ Chapters: 0:00 Intros 2:49 What is Plan 9? 6:15 Unique Features 9:23 Everything is a File 16:53 Assembling a Distributed Computer 21:42 Powerful Ab…

Matrix is a decentralized chat protocol that is end-to-end encrypted. It lets users communicate with each other using different clients and even run their own independent chat servers. Links/Resources: - https://matrix.org/docs/guides/introduction - https://salibra.com/p/the-death-of-jabber-8ea395e82f5b- http://jabbermania.blogspot.com/2013/06/how-…

The semantic web was an effort to mark up webpages with facts about their content. The dream was to enable computers, to understand the world by reading these webpages. We discuss why the effort failed, how it relates to symbolic AI/knowledge graphs, and how the vision could still be realized today. Links/Resources: Introducing the Knowledge Graph …

TLA+ is a language for formally modeling and verifying the correctness of programs, especially concurrent and distributed ones. We discuss how it could be used to improve the practice of software engineering and what it would take for formal methods to gain more popularity. Links/Resources: TLA+ Homepage https://lamport.azurewebsites.net/tla/tla.ht…

Transformers are a building block of Machine Learning systems that have seen great success recently at subsuming all other techniques. We discuss at a high level, its attention mechanism and its multimodal properties, and the types of applications this can be put to use now and in the future. Links/Resources: Introductions to transformers https://w…

CORBA is an acronym that stands for common object request, broker architecture. It provides interoperability among distributed objects regardless of whether they're remote or local, regardless of whether they're written in different languages or in different locations of the network. We discuss its influence on distributed systems, and where we are…

Unison is a programming language for distributed systems by leveraging immutable and content addressable code. We discuss the many implications of a language whose code is content addressable, from fast rename, easy caching, to feature flagging. Links/Resources: - Unison Lang https://www.unisonweb.org/ - Unison at StrangeLoop https://www.youtube.co…

Smalltalk was one of the first object oriented programming languages and a software authoring environment that was highly influential in the history of computing. We discuss its designer Alan Kay, his vision of personal computing, and the lasting influence of Smalltalk despite its limited commercial adoption. Links/Resources: Actor Model - https://…

Dynamicland is a communal computer where the computer is the room. It's a new dynamic, medium to think about systems with other people. We discuss taking computation out of the realm of abstraction and putting it in the realm of the physical world, it, and how it breaks down barriers to entry. Chapters: 0:00 Intros 2:10 What is Dynamicland? 11:17 T…

Non-Fungible Tokens (NFTs) are unique digital collectibles that are represented on a blockchain in the form of a token. NFTs make it possible to own digital media assets in the same way that you can own a digital currency asset, like Bitcoin. We discuss various applications of NFTs outside of art, and its potential as a building block for future ap…

IPFS is a distributed storage network. The content is accessible through peers located anywhere in the world that might relay information store it or both, and IPFS finds data by its content address rather than its locations. We discuss the main principles behind IPFS, the current use cases, and how it changes the basic unit economics of some busin…

End-user programming is a vision of computing that allows people who are not professional software developers to program their own computers. We discuss some of our favorite end-user programming environments, the qualities that make an end-user programming environment successful and what the world would look like if everyone could program. Chapters…

This week, we mull on an obscure programming language called Datalog and its outsized impact on the worldAf The Technium Podcast

In this episode, we muse about the creativity of machine learning models and what it means for the future of content creation/ownershipAf The Technium Podcast

This week on The Technium, we talk about Zero Knowledge Proofs, a relatively new cryptographic primitive that lets people prove they know a secret without divulging it.Af The Technium Podcast

In this week's episode, we ruminate on Webassembly and the dream of writing once and running everywhere.Af The Technium Podcast

This week, we talk about the Decentralized Autonomous Organization. How could they bring a new flavor to collective action without a centralized authority?Af The Technium Podcast

This week on the Technium, we talk about functional programming invading mainstream programming languagesAf The Technium Podcast

In this week's episode, we talk about the React Reconciler. What is it? How would it help with building cross-platform frontends? What else could it be applied to?Af The Technium Podcast

In this week's episode, we talk about "The Metaverse". What is it, and why it excites technologists about a possible vision of the future.Af The Technium Podcast

In this week's episode, we talk about Ink and Switch's manifesto on local-first software, a vision on building software that merges the best parts of both web apps and desktop apps.Af The Technium Podcast

In this week's episode, we talk about tools for thinking, note taking apps, and the retro vision for the web.Af The Technium Podcast