Monday Links from the Science Park vol. CLXXXI

[OwlHoot]

EXE was great! I've got a few copies knocking around somewhere. I was very sad to see it go

I have a stack of those among others in plastic chests in a friend's garden shed. Been meaning to scan them for years, but will never get round to it.

Ditto my old issues of Dobbsy, although most Dr Dobbs seem to have dated rather more.

[NickFitz]

Gone, but not forgotten:

EXE magazine:

EXE Magazine (1986-2000)

However, "Program Now" doesn't seem to have much in the way of references at all.

EXE was great! I've got a few copies knocking around somewhere. I was very sad to see it go

[Mich the Tester]

[*]My Dad Was In a Band - People submitting photos, recordings, videos, and stories of the bands their dads were in many years ago. For example, Emily Chatton writes of her dad Brian: "My dad wore a leather catsuit with domino buttons when he married my mum and his platform shoes were taller than his brides. His first band of many was called Flaming Youth, he was the lead singer and Phil Collins (third from the left in the photo) was the drummer."

Bad hair day for this lot;

[NickFitz]

Went out to get some lunch, and there was a fire on the A14; cost me about a quarter of an hour :-( Ho hum.

• Drink Beer for Big Ideas, Coffee to Get Them Done - Mikael Cho explains the optimal strategy for getting the creative juices flowing: "The best time to have a beer (or two) would be when you’re searching for an initial idea. Because alcohol helps decrease your working memory (making you feel relaxed and less worried about what’s going on around you), you’ll have more brain power dedicated to making deeper connections... after you have an initial idea or a plan laid out, a cup of coffee can help you execute and follow through on your concept faster without compromising quality."
  
  
• Somalia: Pray before, during and after your flight - "The teenage-looking steward in a half-buttoned baggy pink shirt said “welcome on board” and proceeded to recite a prayer at the top of his voice (the plane had no PA system and the steward had no megaphone). It was the kind of prayer Somalis normally recite at the graves of their long-gone great grandparents... A few minutes later, two old, pot-bellied, sun-burnt, sweat-covered, cigarette-smoking, booze-smelling, Eastern European male pilots wearing only shorts climbed up the creaky metal ladder attached to the emergency exit." Finally, an airline that makes RyanAir look - well, not good exactly, but not that bad.
  
  
• The First Vikings - Recent archaeological discoveries on Estonia are changing ideas about how, and when, the Vikings became such a dominant force in Europe: "Between them, the two boats contain the remains of dozens of men. Seven lay haphazardly in the smaller of the two boats, which was found first. Nearby, in the larger vessel, 33 men were buried in a neat pile, stacked like wood, together with their weapons and animals. The site seems to be a hastily arranged mass grave... The archaeologists believe the men died in a battle some time between 700 and 750, perhaps almost as much as a century before the Viking Age officially began."
  
  
• Discouragement for young writers - Freddie deBoer offers a pragmatic assessment of the situation for those who would write: "Nobody gives a tulip that you used to cut yourself. Nobody gives a tulip that your parents divorced. Nobody gives a tulip that you have cancer. Nobody cares. Can you make them know what it’s like to be you for awhile? Then, they’ll care. But it’s always on their terms, through their own metaphor. That’s the deal: you write the words. They make it about themselves."
  
  
• Hipster in Stone - In this project, photographer Léo Caillard has put modern clothing on great statues of antiquity:
  
  
  
  
  
• What is Unconscious? - "The primary problem is in dealing with consciousness as a binary state, and therefore any flicker of consciousness is not “unconscious.”... Consciousness is more of a continuum, and there are various states of consciousness. To answer what is unconscious, however, we need to first ask what does it mean to be conscious." Steven Novella looks at the intriguing question of what it means to be, or not to be, conscious; and how that relates to sleep.
  
  
• The Stranger’s Guide to London - From "the gentle author" come some excerpts from "The Stranger's Guide; or, the London Sharper Detected: Being a Complete Exposure of All the Frauds of London, practised by Bawds, Bullies, Fortune-Tellers, Footpads, Gamblers, Gossips, Highwaymen, Housebreakers, Jilts, Kidnappers, Ring-Droppers, Pimps, Procuresses, Pickpockets, Quacks, Sharpers, Swindlers, Smugglers, Shop-lifters, Street-Robbers, Trappers, Waggon Hunters, Women of Pleasure, &c. &c. &c."
  
  
• Searching for Nessie: Project Urquhart - The official Loch Ness Monster web site is a rich resource for cryptozoologists. This is its page about a monster-hunting project started by Nicholas Witchell - yes, that one, the BBC's Royal Correspondent: "While cruising the loch Simrad noticed a line of objects, dubbed the footprints, running from Foyers to Fort Augustus at about 60 metres apart. A small remotely operated submersible fitted with a video camera was sent down to look at one of them and it turned out to be a large metal wheel barrow." So we know the monster has an allotment
  
  
• The Luddite: Dot Matrix Printers - Tip of the hat to alreadypacked for pointing me to the Science Friday site, which is full of good stuff, such as Ira Flatow asking an important question: "Why do the airlines still use those old fashioned dot matrix printers at the gates? The ones where tiny pins smack a ribbon and create letters and numbers in a matrix form. Popular circa 1983."
  
  
• My Dad Was In a Band - People submitting photos, recordings, videos, and stories of the bands their dads were in many years ago. For example, Emily Chatton writes of her dad Brian: "My dad wore a leather catsuit with domino buttons when he married my mum and his platform shoes were taller than his brides. His first band of many was called Flaming Youth, he was the lead singer and Phil Collins (third from the left in the photo) was the drummer."
  
  
  

Happy invoicing!