Author Archives: tim

Lot Area Calculator

Just finished a long-running development project. This one can calculate the area of an irregular polygon, and lets you set the distance and angles of the polygon’s segments by dragging them around. I’m pressing it into service as a real … Continue reading

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Core i7 CPU update

Intel started shipping the Core i7-970 3.2GHz this month (for ~$600). This after shipping the Core i7-980X (for ~$1,000). Both are Gulftown, 6-core, 130W LGA 1366 socket chips. I’m very happy with my 920 – I feel no need to … Continue reading

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Sourceforge Secret Share in Java

Last week I started my first open-source project at Sourceforge: secretsharejava. It was a small, stand-alone project that I wrote months ago, and just now got around to uploading. The command-line interface is done; soon I’ll be creating the Swing/Applet … Continue reading

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Programming Languages Vary in Power

The title is a “controversial” quote from the book Hackers and Painters. The book’s author calls it controversial; I call it blindingly obvious but still not seen by certain people. That book serves as an example that, even though programming … Continue reading

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Commoditization of Intelligence

I just ran into the phrase “commoditization of intelligence” from Accelerando (Singularity). In the book’s context it is scary enough. But it is truly scary when it manifests itself today. Like when knowledge workers are treated like replaceable cogs in … Continue reading

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Scala Research

I just read about Scala for a few hours. Mainly from Java to Scala with the Help of Experts under the sections “Scala for Java Refugees” and “The busy Java developer’s guide to Scala”. My first take-away is “Good Luck … Continue reading

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Kids on Linux

Today I’ve set the kids up with their own Ubuntu 9.04 Linux virtual machine (one VM per kid). Each got their own IP address and got to set their own password to VNC into the “machine” they now “own”. All … Continue reading

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Core i7 Dodo

I just noticed that the new Core i7 chips are out (as of September 2009). See this tom’s hardware article. The new i7-860 and i7-870 chips are 95W instead of 130W. But the thing that makes the i7-9xx series a … Continue reading

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Core i7 build

After nearly a year of waiting (and accumulating pieces like the case, power supply and video card), I finally bought the “big three” [CPU, RAM, and Motherboard] and built the Tiemens Family Core i7 machine. This machine is intended as … Continue reading

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Hello world!

Welcome to Tim On Computer Science.  This site is dedicated to various thoughts and comments on topics concerning Computer Science.

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