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Flower Power
The Wasatch Range peaks are 7000′ higher than the nearby Salt Lake Valley. This has many nice side effects but one of my favorites is that a wide variety of micro-climates is available within a small geographical region. In late Fall or early Spring it can be calmly drizzling in the city, but in the…
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Compilers and Termination Revisited
My earlier post C compilers Disprove Fermat’s Last Theorem generated a good amount of discussion both here and on Reddit. Unfortunately, the discussion was riddled with misunderstandings. Some of this was because the topic is subtle, but some was my fault: the post was intended to be lightweight and I failed to explain the underlying…
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Book Review: Street-Fighting Mathematics
The Trinity test occurred on a calm morning. Enrico Fermi, one of the observers, began dropping bits of paper about 40 seconds after the explosion; pieces in the air when the blast wave arrived were deflected by about 2.5 meters. From this crude measurement, Fermi estimated the bomb’s yield to be ten kilotons; he was…