David Letterman interfaces with the author’s first-generation iPad, in 2010. It’s been five years, and this is the last day when we can all refer to “The Late Show With David Letterman” in the present tense, so I might as well finally tell the story: David Letterman licked my iPad. Well, Apple’s…

Daily Comment May 15, 2015 PHOTOGRAPH BY ELLIOTT ERWITT/MAGNUM The horrific Amtrak derailment outside Philadelphia this week set off some predictable uncertainty about what exactly had happened—a reckless motorman? An inadequate track? A missing mechanical device? Some combination of them all?—and…

U2 Playing 40 at their LAST CONCERT OF THEIR 360 TOUR. Thank you U2, For this Music. You have played all over the world. So many people have seen you. This is the Greatest Band Ever. Again People, The best band in the world, Bono Vox, Adam Clayton, The Edge and Larry Mullen Jr. We will not forget…

In recent years, Angela Duckworth’s work around “grit” has been widely taken up in school reform circles as a way of thinking about building students “non-cognitive skills,” which are presumably critical for later life success. As with any concept that gains popularity, there have been detractors.…

The Man in the Van He throws 96. He's the Jays' No. 1 prospect. He signed for millions. And he lives in a VW camper. Meet Daniel Norris, the most interesting pitcher in baseball. ESPN The Magazine by Eli SaslowPHOTOGRAPH BY NATHANIEL WOOD 03/05/15 THE FUTURE of the Toronto Blue Jays wakes up in a…

Derrick Schultz June 11, 2014 10 Comments If you’re familiar with doing web development, you know one of the best tools in any web developers toolbox in the Web Inspector. It allows you to inspect the HTML and CSS of a live page, allowing you to debug any number of potential issues. A few weeks ago,…

I am in over my heart on the LGBTQ situation and the church. I am also in over my head. As a Christian ethicist who believes Scripture is the measure for matters of faith, doctrine, and conduct, I have to say my head hurts to the point that it aches. It aches because I know that how evangelicals…

In reading the fascinating article by @meharris about the DARPA challenge for reassembling shredded strips of documents, I was struck by how the article concluded by assuming that the failure of the team who used crowdsourcing was somehow the fault of crowdsourcing. This seems too easy a conclusion.…

Git can support your project not just with version control, but also with collaboration and release management. Understanding how Git workflow patterns can help or hinder a project will give you the knowledge to evaluate and adapt your project’s Git processes effectively. Throughout this guide I…

tl;dr — Khan Academy claims alignment with the Common Core State Standards (CCSS) but an analysis of their eighth-grade year indicates that alignment is loose. 40% of Khan Academy exercises assessed the acts of calculating and solving whereas the Smarter Balanced Assessment Consortium’s assessment…

The Hechinger Report is a national nonprofit newsroom that reports on one topic: education. Sign up for our weekly newsletters to get stories like this delivered directly to your inbox. NEW YORK – Every Saturday morning at 10 a.m., Jason Zimba begins a math tutoring session for his two young…

At GitHub, we have a very specific way of working. For one, we use GitHub to build GitHub. Not just for code, but to collaborate on things like Legal, Marketing, and internal policies. But it’s not that the medium defines the workflow (although it certainly helps), in fact, it’s the other way…

A Reporter at Large October 27, 2014 Nearly twenty million Americans now say that they regularly experience stomach problems after eating products that contain gluten.Illustration by Paul Rogers Just after Labor Day, the Gluten and Allergen Free Expo stopped for a weekend at the Meadowlands…

Everything gets cooked in one pot, making this an easy-to-make, easy-to-clean stew, perfect for a lazy Sunday or for your next camping trip.The soup gets better as it sits, developing flavor in the fridge overnight. This isn't the first kale, black-eyed pea, and sausage soup I've made, and it…

A tutorial by paper engineer Mahir Cecen, this is how to make a paper airplane that flies far. In fact, all of Cecen’s paper plane videos are titled that, so you’ll have to test them all out and let us know which one flies the farthest. This A4 paper model is named Strike Eagle. Related folding:…

Guest Post By William Hertling – williamhertling.com (Author) William Hertling is a web strategist, programmer, father, short-order cook and the author of two award-winning and best-selling techothrillers: Avogadro Corp: The Singularity is Closer than It Appears and A.I. Apocalypse. You can follow…

Apache Storm recently became a top-level project, marking a huge milestone for the project and for me personally. It's crazy to think that four years ago Storm was nothing more than an idea in my head, and now it's a thriving project with a large community used by a ton of companies. In this post I…

I may have watched my last Civil-War reenactment. We’ll see. It’s not like giving up re-enactments will leave a gaping void in my life. I only saw my first one a year ago. By that time I’d been teaching and writing on the American Civil War for over a quarter of a century, so it may seem strange…

In This Recipe Partially dehydrating canned black beans in the oven solves the problem of mushy texture that plagues most black bean burgers.Crumbled feta cheese adds moisture and seasoning right into each patty.Sautéed onions, poblano peppers, and garlic with just a touch of smoky chipotle chile…

Cultural Comment September 16, 2014 Photograph by Clemens Rikken/Hollandse-Hoogte/Redux A few years ago, I was caught up in a big research project about contemporary hymns (or “hymnody,” as they say in the trade). I listened to hundreds of hymns on Spotify; I interviewed a bunch of hymn experts.…

Ok, we didn’t exactly ban email. We still have accounts, primarily for external communication. But, people are also more than welcome to leave them on for notifications from internal apps. Email gets used for tons of things it isn’t good for. So here is how we replace it: Asking People Questions…

These days, it seems that if you want to get a nice sharp lens, you have to spend $1000 on a piece of L glass. Aside from the nifty fifty’s of the world, there are very few lenses that deliver quality results at a low price. But if you look harder, there are actually a few old lenses that still…

I’ve been using the Unix command line since 1983 and like most software developers, the Terminal app is a permanent fixture in my Dock. Over the years I’ve learned a lot of things that make working in this environment more productive, but even old dogs like me are constantly learning new tricks. As…

You’re greeted at the pearly gates to heaven by St. Peter who asks where you’d like to spend eternity. “Well, heaven of course!” you say. Peter replies: “You have to check out hell just to see what you think before you commit.” Disappointed, you shrug but agree. And to your surprise, when the…

cutest 4 yo to eat @_TFL_ “@stevehoff: @ruhlman this made me think of you… A 4 year old reviews The French Laundry: http://t.co/1C8UDYxNC8”

For chefs at the Marigold Kitchen in Philadelphia, as in most professional kitchens, it's all about order and organization. Dan Charnas/For NPR Americans are obsessed with celebrity chefs. We talk about them, tweet about them and try to eat like them. But could we learn something more from them than…

I have seen the future of iced coffee. There I was, wandering the grocery-store aisles—when suddenly, next to the kombucha, opposite the rotisserie chickens, I spotted something I never thought I’d live to see. A blue and white carton—like the half-pints of milk that come on elementary school lunch…

Draft is a series about the art and craft of writing. I gave birth to twins a little more than a year ago, and at the baby showers we received many books: colorful board books, big illustrated books, collections of Sandra Boynton and nursery rhymes and Dr. Seuss, but none multiple times except this…

I think everyone voicing opinions on current math ed needs to read this. Not short, totally worth the time. http://t.co/PD2FO5kilM #mathchat

For the best stir fries, forget the flank, go for the skirt! http://t.co/WW8NnpYYf4

Review of Piketty by @doctorow, including a useful précis for those who don’t (but should) read it. http://t.co/1ZVMmUR5tb

The philosophy of great customer service 2014-06-29 I was honestly surprised that my company, CD Baby, was such a runaway success. But I was even more surprised to find out why. CD Baby had lots of powerful well-funded competitors, but after a few years they were all but gone, and we dominated our…

@GlennF on rebeccapurple: #663399. Digital remembrance seems a sad and wonderful paradox of both loss and vitality http://t.co/WcymuuOgTN

Below is the eulogy I delivered at Rebecca’s funeral, as I wrote it. I hope that what I actually said matches the text. The same deep shock that let me speak also prevented me from retaining any clear memory of what I said, and I’m not ready to watch the archived recording of the service to find…

Recently on Facebook, my friend, nerd extraordinaire Esther Schindler, shared a photograph of herself wearing an old T-shirt and challenged her followers to identify it: Either you have no idea what that image means, or you know exactly what it is. It’s the torso, rolled-up sleeves and folded arms…

Awesome video of one of the last remaining hand-engravers of sheet music. This is true craftsmanship. http://t.co/4Jc2UFdYLj