Author Archives: Corey Butler

Windows 8 on Arm

June 2, 2011 » Source

Via ArsTechnica:

ARM Windows won’t include an x86 emulator, and as such will not be able to run existing Windows programs. It is, however, the same operating system with the same APIs, meaning that it should be possible to recompile existing software and device drivers for ARM Windows with few difficulties. The same applications should, therefore, become available on both platforms, as should access to the same hardware.

So, as soon as they’re (nearly) done transitioning their user base from 32-bit -> 64-bit OS, drivers and apps, Microsoft is going to force another bifurcation, but for what benefit? The advantages of running on ARM will likely be negated by background Windows processes.

Or, maybe they’re banking on ARM Windows 8 taking a sufficient amount of time to come to market that they’ll be able to get “all day” battery life on their tablets.  Meanwhile, your iPad will last all week under full use.

Update 5:41pm: Apple has avoided issues like this in their architecture switches (most recently, PPC -> x86) by allowing for Universal Binary applications, containing the code for both architectures all in one App bundle.  For the sake of their users, Microsoft should implement this.  Or perhaps they’re expecting everyone to buy Office 2012 ARM edition for their tablets and a separate x86 edition for their laptops and desktops.

This Week in Twitter [Updated]

June 1, 2011

It’s been a big week for twitter, with some official (an unofficial) announcements:

  1. Yesterday, the introduction of the official Follow button (which you can conveniently try out in my footer).  This is iFramed out, just like the Tweet button, which allows for more information to be displayed — in this case, the number of followers.

    As an aside, I’ll be writing a post at the end of the week about how to make these iFramed buttons work correctly on AJAXed sites

  2. Today, we got the official announcement of native photo support and revamped search, active now on Twitter.com and coming soon to devices. This sparked an interesting debate I stumbled upon regarding the archiving process of tweets and their accessibility in search (quick summary: they’re not there, because it’s too hard right now, but maybe they will be there sometime):
  3. Along the lines of the twitter photo integration, there have been rumors floating around this week that twitter functionality will be fully baked into iOS5, bringing its social media sharing capibilities more inline with what we see in Windows Phone 7 or HP’s WebOS.

Whichever way it goes with iOS integration, it’s nice to see twitter taking hold of its own platform.

Update 6/2/2011: ArsTechnica puts the new Follow button to good use on the Twitter page on their site

TED Talk: Ed Boyden: A light switch for neurons

May 28, 2011 » Source

Amazing talk on optogenetics and on TED:

Ed Boyden shows how, by inserting genes for light-sensitive proteins into brain cells, he can selectively activate or de-activate specific neurons with fiber-optic implants. With this unprecedented level of control, he’s managed to cure mice of analogs of PTSD and certain forms of blindness. On the horizon: neural prosthetics.