banana republic: an unstable economy; the phrase comes from the concept of trying to raise prices of a product such as bananas, which
ultimately fails, because, unlike a product such as oil, fewer people are dependent on bananas; see elasticity; also, a clothing retailer
owned by The Gap
bayou: marsh; swamp
beta software: software that is considered feature-complete, but may still contain errors; see perpetual beta software
Biberdorf, Kate: see Kate the Chemist
binary: pertaining to two
bleeding edge: too soon; precocious
Blue Man Group: a performance art company
Broca's area: the part of the human brain that produces speech; see Wernicke's area
bromine: element #35, "Br", one of only a few elements that are liquids at room temperature
C-3PO: "See-Threepio", a humanoid robot voiced by Anthony Daniels in the Star Wars movies
candidate: eligible
cardinal: counted; see nominal, ordinal, sentinel; note: not all infinite sets have the same cardinality (?)
cardinal number: used of counting; For example: "one", "two", "three"; see ordinal number
Catalan numbers: a sequence of numbers often used in recursion and combinatorics
Catalan
ChatGPT: Chat Generative Pre-trained Transformer; a chatbot
CHUD: Cannibalistic Humanoid Underground Dwellers
concurrent: simultaneous
connectionless: a type of connection in which signals are treated indvidually
connection-oriented: establishes a connection object (a software construct) before transmission
continuous: assuming an infinite number of real values (within an interval, which may be ∞); floating-point;
examples: height, weight, temperature (there are upper and lower limits, but precision can always be carried out to another decimal place)
note: Has "Absolute Zero" ever been reached?
converge: meet
cryptocurrency: anonymously-sourced currency; money whose source is supposedly untraceable
culling: removing background objects (points, lines) that wouldn't be seen anyway (to conserve resources)
data mining: digging for ___________?
deadlock: when two processes cannot proceed, because each is waiting for the other to do something; see starvation
DEC: Digital Equipment Corporation, was acquired by Compaq, which became part of HP
Deep Blue: a chess-playing computer developed at Carnegie Mellon University and IBM
delegate: function pointer
DEVO: a technology-driven rock band; "de-evolution"
dictionary: a data structure consisting of key/value pairs
Dijkstra's algorithm: (c. 1956) uses the weights/distances of edges to find the shortest path between nodes of a network
discrete: distinct; "finite of a countably infinite set" (?); examples: number of cars in a parking lot, roll of dice
dissociate: disconnect; differentiate
diverge: separate
double buffering: often used in graphics, switching between two or more frame buffers
to allow picture composition to be done simultaneously with picture display
Drew, Nancy: a fictional amateur sleuth
elasticity: buyer behavior sensitivity to price change; if a product is highly elastic, a slight price change
may cause a high increase or decrease in sales; if a product is inelastic, a price change probably won't influence sales;
two factors influencing elasticity of demand are whether the product is a luxury or a necessity and the availability of acceptable substitutes
eminent: famous
eminent domain authority: the power to take private property for public use
engineering motto: "If it ain't broke, don't fix it."
enumerate: to assign a number to; for example: "blue=1", "red=2", "yellow=3"
eunuchs: castrated men
exception: error
Fake, Caterina: businesswoman and co-founder of various technology companies, including Flickr
fallacy: a false premise constructed to produce or explain a correct result
Faustian bargain: a deal with the devil
Fiorina, Carly: American businesswoman and politician
freemium: a business model in which basic features are free and more advanced features are priced
function: method; relationship
fuzzy logic: involving more than one variable and therefore more than one solution; often uses sets of data
gambler's fallacy: "That one-in-a-hundred chance is going to happen to ME!"
gobbledygook: unintelligible; for example, a memory address: "#6545.4$89*&#"
gold: element #79, "Au"
Gold Coast: a name used for several areas around the world, including a part of West Africa, a part of Chicago and a hotel/casino in Las Vegas
greedy algorithm: chooses the best option at the moment, "short-sighted"
Gutenberg, Johannes: craftsman, inventor and developer of the printing press in Europe, circa 1450
hologram: a three-dimensional image created via the interference of particle beams
IBM Watson: a question-answering computer
iff: if and only if
Iger, Robert: current CEO of Disney
imminent: happening soon
immutable: unchangeable; a variable whose value cannot be changed once set, although its reference might be changeable, depending on the
language being used; compare constant
impute: to populate with arbitrary data; the average for that particular field is often used
integral: whole or contributing to the whole
isthmus: between two bodies of water, a small strip of land connecting two larger pieces of land
jargon: esoteric, idiosyncratic or proprietary language
Java: a programming language similar to C++, but with "wrapped" (unavailable) hardware pointers, making it safer (and slower) than C++
JavaScript: a website programming language unrelated to Java
Jexi: a self-aware smartphone voiced by Rose Byrne in the movie Jexi
Kate the Chemist: Kate Biberdorf, a chemist
Komando, Kim: radio hostess
Kubow, Ania: computer scientist and internet personality
Kuehl, Andy: drifter, drinker, womanizer and unofficial King of the Delta Blues
lambda function: a small, simple function; in math, pertaining to abstraction; see anonymous function
Lanier, Jaron: computer scientist and musician
latency: delay
library: a collection of auxiliary code; for example, Velocity and Three.js are JavaScript libraries; sometimes called "framework";
accessible via "import" statements, see API
Lovelace, Ada: British mathematician (1815-52)
Luxo Jr.: the desk lamp mascot of Pixar Animation Studios
macro: a sequence of instructions that can be assigned to a single key; in MS Office, the MacroRecorder is used to save a sequence
of keystrokes or mouseclicks as a macro (or the macro can be programmed using Visual Basic)
macro virus: malware attached to a document and run whenever the document is opened
mainframe: a proprietary server computer, sometimes called a midrange (distinction ambiguous, arguable); for example, the IBM AS/400 (c. 1990s);
clients were called dummy terminals, because they had no other capabilities than connecting to the mainframe
Mayer, Marissa: spokeswoman and former CEO of Yahoo!
memoization: another name for caching, buffering, paging; more specifically, memoization maintains a data structure of subproblem solutions;
It is often used in recursion to store previously calculated solutions. When a subproblem is encountered again, the algorithm simply reads the solution
from the maintained data structure, instead of re-calculating.
Mickey Mousing: the cinematic/animation technique of matching sound to motion. For example, "There
walks Mickey, BOOM, BOOM, BOOM, BOOM!"
mocap: motion capture
multiplexing: combining multiple signals into one signal
Nadella, Satya: current CEO of Microsoft
Nash, John: mathematician who won the 1994 Nobel Prize in economics
native: natural; original inhabitant
neural network: a computer system that models the human brain and nervous system
nibble: half a byte; 4 bits
nominal: named; categorical; can be enumerated, but is not numeric by nature
nsfw: not safe for work
number theory: the study of integers
numberific: when all the numbers are as hoped for; when the numbers make perfect logical sense
numerical analysis: the study of the uses of numbers
numerology: the puns of math
OPEC: Organization of Petroleum-Exporting Countries
ordinal: from the word "order"; pertaining to rank
ordinal number: used for ordering; example: "first", "second", "third"; see cardinal number
orthodox: usual
out-of-bounds error: attempting to access a non-existent array element; [!][0][1][2][3][4][!]
oxymoron: a contradictory phrase; for example, "mortally wounded"
paradox: a conclusion so unexpected that it is difficult to accept even though every step in the reasoning is valid
parallax: a displacement or difference in the apparent position of an object; for example, in parallax scrolling, a background
image is shifted more slowly than a foreground image, creating a more realistic effect; see first animation post below
parameter: a datum that is "passed" into a function; argument
parse: to break into parts; see substring
pcAnywhere: remote administration software made by Semantec, discontinued circa 2014
permute: alter, especially pertaining to order; arrange in all possible ways
perpetual beta software: software to which new features are continually added without establishing a final "stable" release
phloem: vascular plant tissue that transports sugars, proteins and other organic molecules made during photosynthesis ("photosynthates");
see xylem
phonon: a particle of sound
photon: a particle of light
pipe: to "feed" into; "|"
pixel pitch: pixel density; distance between pixel centers, lower = better resoution;
formerly called "dot pitch" because that could also be applied to printers (?); Note: a pixel is usually 1⁄96 inch (0.26 mm)
Powell, Jay: current chair of the Federal Reserve
protocol: standard
prototype: preliminary model
Pryor, Richard: open, honest, confused comic, lover of life and all-time King of Ghetto Hockey
recurrence relation: an equation or inequality that describes a member of a sequence by examinging previous members in the sequence
(i.e., by examining HOW a number in a sequence was calculated, subsequent numbers in the sequence can be calculated); For example, in factorial and
Fibonacci sequences, the nth term in the sequence is described via previous terms in the sequence,
going backward: (n-1), (n-2), (n-3), going forward: (n+1), (n+2), (n+3)
recurse: to call oneself
redundant: duplicate
reservoir: storage, supply, collection, reserve
Restaurant Row: an area near Lambeau Field in Green Bay with alot of eateries; Oneida Street
saccade: quick, jumpy, simultaneous movement of both eyes
saggital: splitting into left/right regions
seminal: influencing later events; from the word "semen"
sentient: capable of emotion
sentinel: a variable used as a flag; trigger; guard
silicon: element #14, "Si"
Silicon Creek: an area of Atlanta with alot of computer companies
Silicon Fen: an area of Cambridge, England with alot of computer companies
Silicon Glen: an area of Scotland with alot of computer companies
Silicon Sandbar: an area of Long Island, NY with alot of computer companies
simulation: imitation; representation; the production of a computer model, especially for the purpose of study
snake eyes: the lowest-valued roll of two standard dice; the value of the roll is 2
spaghetti code: unstructured code, often with the use of "goto"s
sparse matrix: a matrix consisting mostly of zeroes
spectrum: range
squircle: "square" + "circle"
starvation: when a task can't get access to a necessary resource, such as a block of memory
stoic: without emotion
stream: a steady, continuous flow
string: textual data
substring: a string within a string
supervised learning: with hints! (labels)
taxonomy: categorization
tertiary: pertaining to three
thrashing: a hardware problem caused by excessive, overlapping paging (swapping) between temporary memory (RAM) and the hard disk
topology: the spacial arrangement of objects, the structure, the preservation of properties after deformations
For example, after stretching ... Is the hole still there? Hey, what happened to my hole?!?!
transduction: conversion of form
tree: a type of graph with the root at the top
Udacity: an educational website
Udemy: an educational website
Unity: a video game engine
Unreal: a video game engine
unsupervised learning: no hints!
utility: functional rather than attractive
vignette: a reduction of brightness or saturation toward the edge of an image; from "vine" or "decorative border"
voxel: a 3-d pixel; volumetric pixel
Watson, Dr. John H.: a fictional character in the Sherlock Holmes stories by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
Watson, Thomas: former chairman and CEO of IBM (1914-1956)
Wernicke's area: the part of the human brain that comprehends speech/language; see Broca's area
Whitman, Meg: American businesswoman and politician
wysiwyg: what you see is what you get
xylem: vascular plant tissue that transports water-soluble molecules; see phloem
Yoshida, Kenichiro: current CEO of Sony
zero sum game: a game in which the scores sum to zero; in a two-player zero sum game, whatever one player wins, the other player loses
Excellent_Animation_Tutorial_!
YouTuber: "Keelan Jon" He doesn't talk too fast and he explains the little things that could otherwise throw off the animation.
"The only problem that can't be solved by another layer of indirection is the problem of too many layers of indirection."
"Your quote here."
~ Bjarne Stroustrup, chapter 23, "Templates"
9
Two of my favorite sets of lyrics by the band Rush:
"All the same,
we take our chances,
laughed at by time,
tricked by circumstances,"
~ "Circumstances"
"Now there's no more oak oppression,
for they passed a noble law
and the trees are all kept equal
by hatchet, axe and saw,"
~ "The Trees"
If you've read everything this far, congratulations. I'ma gonna giva you Easta egg, bebby.
Easter egg: secret, undocumented feature
In my opinionated opinion, arrogance is the biggest and most common human problem. When we eliminate it,
we get better work done ... and better fun, too!
In my opinionated opinion, humans often create a rift between two disciplines and that limits our minds.
Majoring in a liberal art, the student happily proclaims, "No math!" Majoring in math or physics or
perhaps computer programming, the student happily proclaims, "No reading!" We draw a line between
chemistry and physics. We draw a line between science and religion. We draw a line between programming
and networking. We draw a line between male and female. We draw a line between physics and physics. Why?
For Pete's sake, you shouldn't follow me every moment, but ... just to make it harder for you to stop that,
here's another page I'm developing: thehardhardstuff
Good luck!
(Andy, you shouldn't be giving away so much info for free. No ads? No spying? Pfssh! Of course they're gonna flock here!)
When you know you could just go on forever, ... ... ... ?
" ... the closer we get to full employment, the increased demand for resources will drive up their cost, the output price, and consequently
the inflation rate. We should be careful not to adopt policies that push us below the natural rate of unemployment."
~ Arleen Hoag, John Hoag, "Introductory Economics"
I'm trying to figure out what those policies are. Leave a comment below.
Some interesting/tricky concepts in JavaScript:
defining functions - the usual way: name(args){body}, inline (executed right then and there) & anonymous (unnamed)
scope quirks (inner/outer, functions, returns)
hoisting (using a variable before it is defined!)
some JavaScript "full-stack" concepts:
Angular: a library of code developed by Google
axios: a "promise-based HTTP client for the browser and node.js"; a library of code used specifically for HTTP sending/receiving
callback: a function passed to another function; see promise
DOM: Document Object Model
first-order function: treated like any other variable (can be received/returned by higher order functions)
fragment: reusable unit; indicated by empty tags: <> and </> or the word "fragment", it does not add a node to the DOM tree;
GraphQL: a querying language developed by Facebook (Meta)
higher-order function: receives/returns another function; see first-order function
hoisting: the default JavaScript behavior of moving variable/function definitions to the top of a code block
hook: a function that "hooks into" various React features; reactjs
