Posts by ligasser@social.epfl.ch
(DIR) Post #AsulSv384cxaur6phg by ligasser@social.epfl.ch
2025-04-09T12:00:16Z
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The English word for "Ananas" (which refers to pineapple in many languages) is "pineapple". This word contains zero "n" letters.However, if you're referring to the botanical genus name Ananas (as in Ananas comosus, the scientific name for pineapple), it is spelled "Ananas" in English and contains two "n" letters.So the answer depends on context:Common term: 0 "n"s (pineapple).Scientific term: 2 "n"s (Ananas).Let me know if you need further clarification! 🌍🍍
(DIR) Post #At702xQKSDN5xYYgC0 by ligasser@social.epfl.ch
2025-04-15T10:11:43Z
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@futurebird I got this gem from a Google search:Number 40 is equal to 2 x 2 x 2 (or 2 cubed) x 5. Both 2 and 5 are primes.Ahm - prime factorization, anyone?Also, the translation '40' is actually '40' in Hebrew, and not something like "a long time" mistranslated. Mistranslations in the Bible are rare: the Bible is one of the most studied texts, specifically with regard to translations.And, there are other, higher, numbers in the Bible :) Going up to 969 years for Metuselah!
(DIR) Post #Aw7iJ5lriMH9ieJOxk by ligasser@social.epfl.ch
2025-07-14T12:03:56Z
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@futurebird He's using his bare hands to take out the frames! Then he grabs the queen, still with his bare hands.
(DIR) Post #Aw7lPm7tS204gKUfom by ligasser@social.epfl.ch
2025-07-14T12:38:48Z
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@futurebird I told my working colleague who is a second year beekeeper about this. He still prefers gloves, even though he gets stung a lot...
(DIR) Post #AxjpZkbZUaAl0lrqXg by ligasser@social.epfl.ch
2025-08-31T19:14:04Z
1 likes, 3 repeats
An explainer on #quantumcomputers explaining why the only number being factored (seriously, without a dog) is 15. And why 21 is so much harder!Spoiler alert: 15 is in many ways very special, and makes it very easy to factor with Shor's algorithm. 21 is much more "normal", and requires about 100x more gates! I guess that 25 and perhaps also 33 are as "normal" as 21, so will be about the same.Bonus: if you count for error correction, 21 requires 10'000x more gates...https://algassert.com/post/2500
(DIR) Post #Ay6tvaiHonjt9jkxlo by ligasser@social.epfl.ch
2025-09-11T22:23:40Z
1 likes, 0 repeats
@futurebird so do they know what0.11bIs in binary? I asked a room of 25 software engineers, and they didn't know! I finally found one who did, in a software engineer conference of 250 people. But he was hard to find :)
(DIR) Post #AyAT3arZE2Ajo5Wpai by ligasser@social.epfl.ch
2025-09-13T15:41:20Z
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@futurebird we need to ask Zach to add another one of "the talk":https://www.smbc-comics.com/comic/the-talk-3
(DIR) Post #Ayhr0azC4TEm57MDuS by ligasser@social.epfl.ch
2025-09-29T18:15:16Z
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@futurebird it keeps me from spending too much. For more than a year I would like to buy a sports watch, but I cannot find a good comparator website, where I can click on the features I want. So I don't buy one...
(DIR) Post #AzSwrC3x65EQKcbFIm by ligasser@social.epfl.ch
2025-10-22T11:32:11Z
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@futurebird Do you know whether there are some statistics about the size of it all? I would like to have something like the following:https://www.ecb.europa.eu/stats/money_credit_banking/monetary_aggregates/html/index.en.htmlbut also including the stock market.And then showing which percent of the population owns the different part of this money.
(DIR) Post #B0AUZXC9zi3vmNCLiq by ligasser@social.epfl.ch
2025-11-12T11:42:36Z
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@futurebird How do you count a beamer with an unfoldable screen from the ceiling?
(DIR) Post #B0vg84ur4b6h8dvlBo by ligasser@social.epfl.ch
2025-12-05T06:03:29Z
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@futurebird I taught my kids to count on the fingers, and then link it with the alphabet. Thumb is A, index is B, thumb and index is C...I even managed to tell them about the ASCII alphabet starting with 64, so you can easily write down the letters in binary, just add a 1 in "front" of your fingers...They were the hit at the hacker conference we went to.
(DIR) Post #B188CobWHDJ0bqS8Zc by ligasser@social.epfl.ch
2025-12-11T06:14:39Z
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@futurebird I was expecting it to flush!
(DIR) Post #B1Mx4B11OjiRNzSTiK by ligasser@social.epfl.ch
2025-12-18T09:50:19Z
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@futurebird I always thought it was a horse neighing :) Glad it's a saxophone, which is the instrument I've been playing for some time now. Gotta train to make that sound :)
(DIR) Post #B1i2NyZQE36N8cirQW by ligasser@social.epfl.ch
2025-12-28T13:59:05Z
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@futurebird But we're the good guys, no? So we should win?Hides in a cave...We have upcoming elections in the "canton de Vaud", a deficit in our canton, and they want to cut taxes even more! Of course, the deficit to the right just means that the expenses of the government are too high.And they don't care that public services degrade, they have the money to have their own services...
(DIR) Post #B1jaqrny37WM9YQxcm by ligasser@social.epfl.ch
2025-12-29T07:59:58Z
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@futurebird we got a vacuum bot for christmas. The first time it did its round, our cat followed it every inch for an hour. It was hillarious.Now our cat just ignores it. I should try petting the robot then, and see if she gets jealous :)
(DIR) Post #B1uOPRP92GhZkBXRA0 by ligasser@social.epfl.ch
2026-01-03T13:02:21Z
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@futurebird @ergo the things you do with your students seems to be way more involving than 90% of the teachers I know. So the question should be: Are you real?Tongue in cheek: As most of the teachers I know are white, I might be biased though. Perhaps most black teachers are just outstanding? And you're merely a mediocre black teacher, which looks outstanding to poor white people like me?
(DIR) Post #B22assBRywlqxmvejY by ligasser@social.epfl.ch
2026-01-07T11:59:50Z
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@futurebird I just asked Claude what it thinks about our half-project report:> Please play the role of an evaluator in the Innosuisse grant system. Write what you think when reading the report: are you convinced the project is on a good track? Do you agree that the project should be continued? What are dark spots where you think you would need more information in order to decide on a go/no-go?It's answer was very direct and very critical :) But really useful.
(DIR) Post #B22fCA7XusRLueYXQ0 by ligasser@social.epfl.ch
2026-01-07T12:48:11Z
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@futurebird OK, I can agree with that. We do need more human interactions. At least I see my kids going in that direction, which is nice!What I like about the LLMs is the possibility to give higher quality documents for review, because the low hanging fruits are already culled. But we should definitely profit from all the free time we get!Who said in the 60s that we'll only be working like 2 days a week?
(DIR) Post #B2AsKofFuezUdsSYzI by ligasser@social.epfl.ch
2026-01-11T11:53:03Z
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@futurebird I usually have clear me/them speaking parts in the course. While I speak, they listen, which I enforce up to the last whisper.Also, the "me" parts only take 15-20 minutes each, then it's time for questions, https://github.com/ineiti/livequiz, or other interactions. For the exercise sections, the "me" parts are of course much shorter.
(DIR) Post #B2At9CKiBgmeWosGga by ligasser@social.epfl.ch
2026-01-11T12:02:11Z
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@futurebird I'm also interested how to add LLMs to the mix: how to use them in a way we use IDEs now: we still know how to program/read code, but IDEs are so useful. This will add another level to the me/them, where sometimes I'd want them to use LLMs, other times not. But first I need to convince the school it's a good approach: I'm an external teacher, and as such have very little influence...