vinc456

Twitter thread: https://twitter.com/theshawwn/status/1456925974919004165
Hacker News thread: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29128998

November 6, 2021

How does JAX allocate memory on a TPU?

jnp.device_put(1) is deceptively simple to write in JAX. But on a TPU, what actually happens? How does a tensor containing the value 1 actually get onto a TPU?

Turns out, the answer is "C++", and a lot of it.

Dear non-executive team members,

All of my options have vested, and I haven’t been offered any new ones so my earning potential here is no longer all that great. Worse, as we’ve operated and developed better understandings of the problems we face it seems less likely than ever that we’ll achieve the vision we set out to achieve. Finally, the blackout periods are having a real negative effect on my ability to diversify my wealth and avoid the high risk of this company’s success chances. Therefore I’m leaving on a “high note” while we can still plausibly call this endeavor a success, and after I’ve left will convert all my equity in this venture into other forms of wealth while not having to report it

Linux Desktop on Apple Silicon in Practice

I bought M1 MacBook Air. It is the fastest computer I have, and I have been a GNOME/GNU/Linux user for long time. It is obvious conclusion that I need practical Linux desktop environment on Apple Silicon.

Fortunately, Linux already works on Apple Silicon/M1. But how practical is it?

Two native ports exist.

So you want to modify the text of a PDF by hand...

If you, like me, resent every dollar spent on commercial PDF tools, you might want to know how to change the text content of a PDF without having to pay for Adobe Acrobat or another PDF tool. I didn't see an obvious open-source tool that lets you dig into PDF internals, but I did discover a few useful facts about how PDFs are structured that I think may prove useful to others (or myself) in the future. They are recorded here. They are surely not universally applicable --
the PDF standard is truly Byzantine -- but they worked for my case.

	#!/usr/bin/bash -xe

	cat <<EOF > "${HOME}/.config/systemd/user/zoom.slice"
	[Slice]
	AllowedCPUs=0-4
	MemoryHigh=6G
	EOF

	cat /usr/share/applications/Zoom.desktop \| sed -E 's#^(Exec=).*$#Exec=/usr/bin/systemd-run --user --slice=zoom.slice /opt/zoom/ZoomLauncher#' > "${HOME}/.local/share/applications/Zoom.desktop"

	// ==UserScript==
	// @name Prevent link mangling on Google
	// @namespace LordBusiness.LMG
	// @match https://www.google.com/search
	// @grant none
	// @version 1.1
	// @author radiantly
	// @description Prevent google from mangling the link when copying or clicking the link on Firefox
	// ==/UserScript==

	/*
	* m1racle-poc: a basic proof of concept for the M1RACLES vulnerability in the Apple M1.
	*
	* This program allows you to read and write the state of the s3_5_c15_c10_1 CPU register.
	*
	* Please visit m1racles.com for more information.
	*
	* Licensed under the MIT license.
	*/

	#!/bin/bash

	# Attempt to set up the Nvidia GeForce GT 710 on a Pi CM4.
	#
	# I have tried both armv7l and aarch64 versions of the proprietary driver, in
	# addition to the nouveau open source driver (which needs to be compiled into
	# a custom Raspberry Pi kernel).
	#
	# tl;dr - None of the drivers worked :P

	I was drawn to programming, science, technology and science fiction
	ever since I was a little kid. I can't say it's because I wanted to
	make the world a better place. Not really. I was simply drawn to it
	because I was drawn to it. Writing programs was fun. Figuring out how
	nature works was fascinating. Science fiction felt like a grand
	adventure.

	Then I started a software company and poured every ounce of energy
	into it. It failed. That hurt, but that part is ok. I made a lot of
	mistakes and learned from them. This experience made me much, much

	/*
	Copy this into the console of any web page that is interactive and doesn't
	do hard reloads. You will hear your DOM changes as different pitches of
	audio.

	I have found this interesting for debugging, but also fun to hear web pages
	render like UIs do in movies.
	*/

	const audioCtx = new (window.AudioContext \|\| window.webkitAudioContext)()