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πŸ”— Kimchi Refrigerator

πŸ”— Korea πŸ”— Food and drink πŸ”— Korea/one or more inactive working groups

A kimchi refrigerator is a refrigerator designed specifically to meet the storage requirements of kimchi and facilitate different fermentation processes. The kimchi refrigerator aims to be colder, with more consistent temperature, more humidity, and less moving air than a conventional refrigerator, providing the ideal environment for fermentation of kimchi. Some models may include features such as a UV Sterilizer.

In a consumer survey aimed at South Korean homemakers conducted by a top-ranking Korean media agency in 2004, the kimchi refrigerator was ranked first for most wanted household appliance.

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πŸ”— Excess-3

πŸ”— Computing

Excess-3, 3-excess or 10-excess-3 binary code (often abbreviated as XS-3, 3XS or X3), shifted binary or Stibitz code (after George Stibitz, who built a relay-based adding machine in 1937) is a self-complementary binary-coded decimal (BCD) code and numeral system. It is a biased representation. Excess-3 code was used on some older computers as well as in cash registers and hand-held portable electronic calculators of the 1970s, among other uses.

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πŸ”— Unum, a Better Number Format

πŸ”— Computing πŸ”— Computer science πŸ”— Computing/Software

Unums (universal numbers) are a family of number formats and arithmetic for implementing real numbers on a computer, proposed by John L. Gustafson in 2015. They are designed as an alternative to the ubiquitous IEEE 754 floating-point standard. The latest version is known as posits.

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πŸ”— History of software engineering

πŸ”— Computing πŸ”— Systems πŸ”— Computing/Software πŸ”— Systems/Software engineering

From its beginnings in the 1960s, writing software has evolved into a profession concerned with how best to maximize the quality of software and of how to create it. Quality can refer to how maintainable software is, to its stability, speed, usability, testability, readability, size, cost, security, and number of flaws or "bugs", as well as to less measurable qualities like elegance, conciseness, and customer satisfaction, among many other attributes. How best to create high quality software is a separate and controversial problem covering software design principles, so-called "best practices" for writing code, as well as broader management issues such as optimal team size, process, how best to deliver software on time and as quickly as possible, work-place "culture", hiring practices, and so forth. All this falls under the broad rubric of software engineering.

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πŸ”— Neuromancer was released 40 years ago today

πŸ”— Novels πŸ”— Novels/Science fiction πŸ”— Science Fiction πŸ”— Transhumanism

Neuromancer is a 1984 science fiction novel by American-Canadian writer William Gibson. Considered one of the earliest and best-known works in the cyberpunk genre, it is the only novel to win the Nebula Award, the Philip K. Dick Award, and the Hugo Award. It was Gibson's debut novel and the beginning of the Sprawl trilogy. Set in the future, the novel follows Henry Case, a washed-up hacker hired for one last job, which brings him in contact with a powerful artificial intelligence.

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πŸ”— Ski rental problem

In computer science, the ski rental problem is a name given to a class of problems in which there is a choice between continuing to pay a repeating cost or paying a one-time cost which eliminates or reduces the repeating cost.

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πŸ”— Tell HN: Happy Solstice

πŸ”— Astronomy πŸ”— Time πŸ”— Holidays πŸ”— Festivals

The winter solstice, hiemal solstice or hibernal solstice, also known as midwinter, occurs when one of the Earth's poles has its maximum tilt away from the Sun. It happens twice yearly, once in each hemisphere (Northern and Southern). For that hemisphere, the winter solstice is the day with the shortest period of daylight and longest night of the year, when the Sun is at its lowest daily maximum elevation in the sky. At the pole, there is continuous darkness or twilight around the winter solstice. Its opposite is the summer solstice.

The winter solstice occurs during the hemisphere's winter. In the Northern Hemisphere, this is the December solstice (usually 21 or 22 December) and in the Southern Hemisphere, this is the June solstice (usually 20 or 21 June). Although the winter solstice itself lasts only a moment, the term sometimes refers to the day on which it occurs. Other names are "midwinter", the "extreme of winter" (Dongzhi), or the "shortest day". Traditionally, in many temperate regions, the winter solstice is seen as the middle of winter, but today in some countries and calendars, it is seen as the beginning of winter. In meteorology, winter is reckoned as beginning about three weeks before the winter solstice.

Since prehistory, the winter solstice has been seen as a significant time of year in many cultures, and has been marked by festivals and rituals. It marked the symbolic death and rebirth of the Sun. The seasonal significance of the winter solstice is in the reversal of the gradual lengthening of nights and shortening of days.

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πŸ”— Bibi-binary

The Bibi-binary system for numeric notation (in French systΓ¨me Bibi-binaire, or abbreviated "systΓ¨me Bibi") is a hexadecimal numeral system first described in 1968 by singer/mathematician Robert "Boby" Lapointe (1922–1972). At the time, it attracted the attention of AndrΓ© Lichnerowicz, then engaged in studies at the University of Lyon. It found some use in a variety of unforeseen applications: stochastic poetry, stochastic art, colour classification, aleatory music, architectural symbolism, etc.

The notational system directly and logically encodes the binary representations of the digits in a hexadecimal (base sixteen) numeral. In place of the Arabic numerals 0–9 and letters A–F currently used in writing hexadecimal numerals, it presents sixteen newly devised symbols (thus evading any risk of confusion with the decimal system). The graphical and phonetic conception of these symbols is meant to render the use of the Bibi-binary "language" simple and fast.

The description of the language first appeared in Les Cerveaux non-humains ("Non-human brains"), and the system can also be found in Boby Lapointe by Huguette Long Lapointe.

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πŸ”— Breaking a Monopoly

πŸ”— United States πŸ”— Biography πŸ”— Canada πŸ”— Business

Herbert Henry Dow (February 26, 1866 – October 15, 1930) was a Canadian-born American chemical industrialist, best known as the founder of the American multinational conglomerate Dow Chemical. He was a graduate of Case School of Applied Science in Cleveland, Ohio. He was a prolific inventor of chemical processes, compounds, and products, and was a successful businessman.

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πŸ”— Thompson sampling

πŸ”— Statistics πŸ”— Robotics

Thompson sampling, named after William R. Thompson, is a heuristic for choosing actions that address the exploration-exploitation dilemma in the multi-armed bandit problem. It consists of choosing the action that maximizes the expected reward with respect to a randomly drawn belief.

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