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PyPy Development: First results of the JIT
Hi all, Just a quick note to tell you that we are progressing on the JIT front. Here are the running times of the richards benchmark on my laptop: 8.18 seconds with CPython 2.5.2; 2.61 seconds with pypy-c-jit (3x faster than CPython); 1.04 seconds if you ignore the time spent making assembler (8x faster than […]
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Processors: More, yes, but better?
Last week’s Intel Developers’ Forum brought the expected crop of new CPU chips. The simplest way to summarize what’s taking place is this: We’re stuck at 3GHz, so we add more processors on the CPU chip. Intel continues to lead with small “geometries”, 32 nanometers today, 22 nm tomorrow. The company pitches its x-86 processors […]
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The Long Tail: Coming Up Short.
The Long Tail is a beautiful intellectual construct. Beautiful, therefore right. Who wouldn’t want to see it succeed? Chris Anderson coined the term back in 2004, in a Wired magazine article. A skillfully marketed book followed, which turned out to be a bestseller (i.e. the the Tail’s profitable head). When the concept began to gain […]
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Code Release: Language Detection and Translation
Google Language Python Module By Jon Beilin One of the tenets of Web Ecology is accessibility to the field through open tools and open data. At the Web Ecology Project, we’re working to get more of our code in a clean, commented, and releasable state. The first tool that we have queued up for release […]
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Brussels buzzes with ideas for the future
Brussels is buzzing with ideas for a new technology agenda. The European Commission recently distributed a questionnaire on the post-i2010 Initiative and the EU’s Swedish Presidency is seeking views on a Green Knowledge Society. Not to be outdone, the European Parliament’s European Internet Foundation (EIF) has just published a paper on the Europe of 2025, […]
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The Contradictor
In my recent post about bad personality traits, reader Littlepo mentioned The Contradictor. That’s the person who disagrees with everything you say, no matter what you say. I used to find that trait maddening until I took a hypnosis class. My hypnosis teacher taught us how to control that type of personality like a puppet. […]
