Apple’s gotten into the game of teaching kids how to program. Last week at WWDC, the company announced Swift Playgrounds, along with the intention to teach programming classes at its Apple retail stores for free. And I’m here to tell you this is a terrible approach, a bad idea, and generally little more than a … continue reading
Sentry wants to make sure bugs don’t affect a user’s web, mobile or game experience. It is a modern error-logging and aggregation platform designed to give developers real-time crash reporting. The solution will notify developers when new issues occur or old issues resurface, ensure changes don’t have a negative impact on users, and diagnose and … continue reading
It seems almost comical to think that artificial intelligence and machine learning are becoming, or rather have become, full-blown buzzwords. First of all, according to the annals of science fiction literature, we should have already invented a smarter-than-human AI by now, and according to “Terminator,” we’re 19 years overdue for a giant, AI-based nuclear annihilation … continue reading
Neural networks can now tackle one of the most important problems our smartphone generation has ever faced: What emoji to use? On a more serious note, neural networks (a computer system that’s modeled after the neurons in the brain) have become a powerful tool for software and robotics. Facebook uses neural networks to identify faces … continue reading
If there are any developers out there who have always wanted to create big, crazy, interactive displays with any component, their opportunity has arrived. Since Google open-sourced its software and hardware library on GitHub, developers can now create their own light projects, similar to Google’s own installation in the lobby of its New York City … continue reading
There is an overabundance of devices entering the market. With these devices comes the challenge of getting them all to talk to one another, and with purpose. The Internet of Things creates a bigger challenge for developers, who need to bridge the gap between the devices themselves and the analytics of data centers. To address … continue reading
Writers have it easy for the most part when they are writing a piece. With tools like Microsoft Word, Google Docs and other spell-checking solutions, it is easy to pinpoint where you made a mistake. For developers who are writing code that looks like a foreign language to anyone else, it can be difficult catching … continue reading
Progress, according to Paul Nashawaty, has been providing software development platforms and environments for more than 35 years. It is now looking to take the next generation of developer tools forward. Nashawaty, senior director of product and solutions marketing at Progress, was discussing the new DigitalFactory solutions the company has created to bring a more … continue reading
Embrace those APIs with this week’s GitHub project of the week: hug. Hug allows you to create HTTP REST APIs on Python 3, and it consistently benchmarks among the top three performing Web frameworks for Python, beating out Flask and Django, according to its website. Hug is fraction of what is required in other frameworks, … continue reading
Society is worried that the new advancements in artificial intelligence (AI) will eventually lead to machines taking over our jobs or taking over our civilization in general. They are so fixated on the negative aspects of this technology that they don’t even realize when they are interacting with it everyday. Artificial intelligence is no longer … continue reading
The MOS 6502 is an iconic processor, at the heart of dozens of classic machines, from the Apple IIe, to the Commodore 64, to the Nintendo Entertainment System and the BBC Micro. Around the Web, there are dozens of great resources on the 6502, from the Visual 6502 to stories of the C64 and the … continue reading
In an effort to help promote cybersecurity, Facebook is open-sourcing its Capture the Flag (CTF) platform on GitHub. CTF is the company’s hacking competition platform that aims to teach about unfamiliar security technologies as well as exploitation techniques. Facebook has been using its CTF platform since 2013 to educate students about computer science and security. … continue reading
Sometimes the best way to stay up to date on the latest technologies, languages and tools for software development is to take notes from those that are actually using or testing what is out there. At SD Times, the editorial team comes across many programmer and company blogs that we find useful and insightful. The … continue reading
There was a blog post earlier this week from Nicolas Bize praising the benefits of teaching BASIC to his son. Specifically, he was speaking of QBasic as the preferred way to teach his son to program. It got me thinking about BASIC, as this was also the language I learned to program on. Here we … continue reading
