Secret printer dots
Since the 1980s most colour printers and photocopiers add a set of secret near-invisible dots to every page they print. The dots uniquely identify the origin and timestamp of that printout.
Category: Computer science
Invisible programming
The esoteric programming language Whitespace uses only three characters: tabs, spaces, and line breaks. That makes it effectively invisible to the naked eye.
Eternal September
Usenet (the early online discussion network) saw a rush of new American users each September, when a new crop of students began university or college. But from 1993 on, the September never ended.
Polyglot programming
Polyglot programmes run in more than one programming language at the same time. One example runs in C, PHP, and Bash; another one runs in a ridiculous 282 different languages.
Return to the fold
Since 2000, millions of hours of computer time have been donated by people around the world to determine how proteins fold in the human body. This may help to understand and treat Alzheimer’s, cancer, HIV, flu, and the coronavirus.
Computer chip graffiti
The silicon chip pictured here is the central processor from a 1991 Hewlett-Packard 9000 700-series workstation. It contains 577,000 transistors… and a horse?
The hardest problem in computer science (Part 2)
The P vs. NP problem is perhaps the biggest unsolved question in computer science – but an answer would have profound implications for mathematics, cryptography, cancer research, nurse roster scheduling, and sudoku. [2 of 2]
The hardest problem in computer science (Part 1)
The P vs. NP problem is perhaps the biggest unsolved question in computer science – but an answer would have profound implications for mathematics, cryptography, cancer research, nurse roster scheduling, and sudoku. [1 of 2]
Fork bomb
The fork bomb is a single line of code that can shut down a computer.
The Microsoft Sound
“We want a piece of music that is inspiring, universal, […] optimistic, futuristic, sentimental, emotional […] and it must be 3 ¼ seconds long.”
Creeper vs. reaper
The first computer programme to replicate itself over the proto-Internet was made in 1971. And the second one was made to destroy it.
Smelly code
In computer programming, how do you know when a program is going bad? First, it begins to smell.
Metric martians
The Mars Climate Orbiter space probe cost 327 million US dollars – and it crashed because of a mix-up between the metric and imperial systems.
The queen’s duck
Have you ever had a boss who just had to contribute to your project in order to prove their worth? There’s an easy way to counteract that: just add a duck.
Cosmic election
The universe is full of cosmic rays, blasted out from neighbouring galaxies, supernovae, and the like. In 2003, they nearly changed the outcome of a local Belgian election.
Worse is better
Is it better for software to be simple or consistent? Richard P. Gabriel suggested that simplicity was the most important aspect of software design, more than consistency, correctness, or completeness. He called it “worse is better.”
The Generalist Academy 