Computing & Technology
View All‘An Act of War’: Inside America’s Silicon Blockade Against China
The Biden administration thinks it can preserve America’s technological primacy by cutting China off from advanced computer chips. Could the plan backfire?
Learning to code isn’t enough
Historically, learn-to-code efforts have provided opportunities for the few, but new efforts are aiming to be inclusive.
Shift happens: Writing about the history of keyboards
After discovering that a history of keyboards— from typewriters to iPhones—had yet to be written, designer and typographer Marcin Wichary got to work.
The inside story of New York City’s 34-year-old social network, ECHO
Stacy Horn set out to create something new and very New York. She didn’t expect it to last so long.
How AI is helping historians better understand our past
The historians of tomorrow are using computer science to analyze how people lived centuries ago.
The Software Industry Is Still the Problem
The time is way overdue for IT engineers to be subject to professional liability, like almost every other engineering profession.
CyberSecurity
View AllCISA Cybersecurity Strategic Plan
The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency’s (CISA) 2023-2025 Strategic Plan is the agency’s first, comprehensive strategic plan since CISA was established in 2018. This is a major milestone for the agency.
CISA Develops Factsheet for Free Tools for Cloud Environments
CISA has developed and published a factsheet, Free Tools for Cloud Environments, to help businesses transitioning into a cloud environment identify proper tools and techniques necessary for the protection of critical assets and data security.
The Cybersecurity Dilemma: Hacking, Trust and Fear Between Nations
Why do nations break into one another’s most important computer networks? There is an obvious answer: to steal valuable information or to attack. But this isn’t the full story.
Lamboozling Attackers: A New Generation of Deception
Imagine a world in which developers and operators of systems exploit attackers as much as attackers exploit defenders. By leveraging system-design knowledge and modern computing to deploy deception environments, software engineering teams can successfully bamboozle attackers for fun and profit while deepening systems resilience.
The secret police: Cops built a shadowy surveillance machine in Minnesota after George Floyd’s murder
An investigation by MIT Technology Review reveals a sprawling, technologically sophisticated system in Minnesota designed for closely monitoring protesters.
Climate
View AllMapping California’s ‘Zombie’ Forests
In California’s ‘zombie’ forests, conifers have become mismatched to a warming climate.
Our House Is On Fire: The Climate Emergency and Computing’s Responsibility
We will most likely never do better than a best guess at computing’s carbon footprint, but given uncertainties it would be safer and more responsible to act on the assumption that higher estimates could be closer to the truth—especially since the pace of warming has exceeded our expectations at every point. But in big-picture terms, the difference between 1.8% and 3.9% does not fundamentally change our mission: computing’s emissions must be reduced urgently and drastically. How are we going to achieve this?
Extreme Heat Is a Disease for Cities. Treat It That Way
The “urban heat island effect” creates extra-hot temperatures that kill. But cities can prescribe powerful treatments, like green spaces and reflective roofs.
Hidden beneath the surface
Digging deep into a humble lake in Canada, scientists found a spot on Earth like no other — and a record that could redefine our history of the planet
Hurricane Ian Is a Warning From the Future
Tropical storms are increasingly likely to batter the US as oceans warm—and will continue to wreak havoc so long as climate change remains unaddressed.
The Desert’s Fragile Skin Can’t Take Much More Heat
Climate change and human activity are destroying the layers of fungi, lichen, and bacteria that protect deserts from erosion.
Weather | Snow | Utah
View AllAvalanches in Big & Little Cottonwood Canyon Early April 2023
During the last week of March and first week of April, Big & Little Cottonwood Canyons saw an epic snow cycle the likes of which have never been seen before. Little Cottonwood Canyon (“LCC”) closed due to avalanche danger on Sunday April 2, 2023. The canyon generally did not open again until Saturday April 8. (There were two brief periods when the canyon was open to the public to downhill travel only, so that people who needed/wanted could leave. Otherwise, the general public was prohibited from going up or down the canyon during the period April 1-8.
Wasatch Backcountry Skiing Map, 4th Ed.
The Wasatch Backcountry Skiing Map is a full-color paper map that compliments the website, Android app, and iOS app. The map includes the names of almost 1,000 backcountry locations in the Central Wasatch.
Winter Storm Elliott – December, 2022
The United States was hit by historically cold and windy Winter weather with a rare mid-latitude mid-continent cyclone, one that would undergo a process of rapid intensification called Bombogenesis, or Bomb Cyclogenesis. The event was termed “Winter Storm Elliott.” This …
A History of Avalanche Mitigation in the Cottonwood Canyons
Big and Little Cottonwood Canyon roads carve between steep mountains that are prone to avalanches in the winter. In fact, 57% of the 9-mile Little Cottonwood Canyon Road is in an avalanche runout zone. Still, recreationalists, residents, and canyon employees need to transport themselves up and down these canyons regularly and as safely as possible.
#Avalanche: In a world obsessed with social media, avalanche centers are relying more and more on the attention-grabbing platforms to better equip backcountry skiers
“Originally, we looked at social media very much as another way of disseminating the forecast,” said Ethan Greene, director of the CAIC. “We still do that, but have been using it more to engage people and try to get out information about current conditions as well as broader education out to people. It’s been a good way for people to ask questions, and we’ve done our best to address those questions.”
Avalanche Busters: A Historical Memoir of the Snowbird and Alta Ski Patrols
This historical memoir gives the reader a mesmerizing, behind-the-scenes view of the founding of Snowbird Ski and Summer Resort and discloses how the ski patrol worked on the avalanche-ridden mountain.
Web Resources
View AllColor Blind Accessibility Manifesto
A study conducted in 2021 by Web Accessibility In Mind illustrated that 83% of the Internet’s top one million homepages failed to meet minimum color contrast requirements. That means about 860,000 of the most visited pages on the Internet aren’t designed with people with Color Vision Deficiency in mind.
Flexbox Tutorial by Sean Fioritto
This is an interactive video intro to flexbox and is comprised of 5 sections that walk through various parts of flexbox.
F.B. Purity – Clean Up and Customize Facebook
F.B. Purity is a browser extension / add-on that lets you clean up and customise Facebook. It filters out the junk you don’t want to see, leaving behind the stories and page elements you do wish to see. The list of story types that FBP hides is customizable to your taste.
WPBeginner – Beginner’s Guide for WordPress
At WPBeginner, our main goal is to provide cutting-edge helpful WordPress tutorials that are easy to understand for small businesses, bloggers, and non-techy WordPress website owners.
Auditing For Accessibility Problems With Firefox Developer Tools
The Firefox 70 Accessibility Inspector is an auditing facility to help identify and fix many common mistakes and practices to help improve site accessibility.