More About D-Language, And Why Facebook Is Experimenting With It It's been nearly a decade since Mark Zuckerberg launched what would become the world's largest social network. Since those early days, Facebook's infrastructure and code have evolved, with some of it collecting dust over time. On Friday, the company took a small step in a new direction when an engineer added 5,112 lines of code written in the D language to Facebook's repository. So what's all the fuss about? 1Reaction For a member of this family of object-oriented programming languages, D is a relative youngster. "It's the first battle signaling the end of Middle Earth, and the rise of the Age of D," Walter Bright writes with geeky optimism. Explaining the impetus behind the creation of D, my colleague Kit Eaton writes: It's been created because C++ had to maintain backwards compatibility with C, and that as C++ itself has expanded the language's new features have simply added to the complexity of the standard--a document that's now over 750 pages long. This is the idea behind D.
18 Things Highly Creative People Do Differently This list has been expanded into the new book, “Wired to Create: Unravelling the Mysteries of the Creative Mind,” by Carolyn Gregoire and Scott Barry Kaufman. Creativity works in mysterious and often paradoxical ways. Creative thinking is a stable, defining characteristic in some personalities, but it may also change based on situation and context. Inspiration and ideas often arise seemingly out of nowhere and then fail to show up when we most need them, and creative thinking requires complex cognition yet is completely distinct from the thinking process. Neuroscience paints a complicated picture of creativity. As scientists now understand it, creativity is far more complex than the right-left brain distinction would have us think (the theory being that left brain = rational and analytical, right brain = creative and emotional). While there’s no “typical” creative type, there are some tell-tale characteristics and behaviors of highly creative people. They daydream. They “fail up.”
Secrets of the Creative Brain As a psychiatrist and neuroscientist who studies creativity, I’ve had the pleasure of working with many gifted and high-profile subjects over the years, but Kurt Vonnegut—dear, funny, eccentric, lovable, tormented Kurt Vonnegut—will always be one of my favorites. Kurt was a faculty member at the Iowa Writers’ Workshop in the 1960s, and participated in the first big study I did as a member of the university’s psychiatry department. I was examining the anecdotal link between creativity and mental illness, and Kurt was an excellent case study. He was intermittently depressed, but that was only the beginning. While mental illness clearly runs in the Vonnegut family, so, I found, does creativity. For many of my subjects from that first study—all writers associated with the Iowa Writers’ Workshop—mental illness and creativity went hand in hand. Compared with many of history’s creative luminaries, Vonnegut, who died of natural causes, got off relatively easy.
This Is What Happens When Top Architects Design Doll Houses A 750mm square plinth is a pretty feeble plot of land for a house-building project. It’s a good thing the clients were pint-sized because that’s all the room architects were given by U.K.-based regeneration property developers, Cathedral Group, who recently commissioned 20 architects and designers to create whimsical dolls’ houses to raise money for KIDS, a U.K. charity for disabled children. Other than miniscule proportions the only design requirement was the integration of a unique feature to make life easier for a disabled child. Cathedral’s project was inspired by the dolls' house Edwin Lutyens designed for The British Empire Exhibition at Wembley in 1922: in his nod to innovation he used a traditional dolls’ house to illustrate his vision for the future of architecture and interior design. The Grimm House: RAAD, in collaboration with artist Lara Apponyi RAAD’s James Ramsey came late to the tea party: his agency was invited to participate one week before models were due.
27 techniques de Storytelling pour booster vos écrits Storytelling par-ci, storytelling par-là…Vous l’entendez partout, mais au final, ça veut dire quoi? Ça sert à quoi? Je peux l’apprendre? Une longue plainte s’élève dans la nuit. Un cri effroyable, qui glace le sang. Je tends l’oreille, figée, mon coeur bat à tout rompre. Le cri recommence. Il semble que ce soit une phrase, comme un appel au-secours. J’ouvre la fenêtre. Je suis au aguets… Là, pas loin de moi, quelqu’un est en détresse. Puis le cri jaillit de nouveau et me fige. A présent, j’ai compris ce qu’elle dit, et je n’en reviens pas. Mais non, cela ne peut pas être un rêve… La voix a bien crié: « Jeeee neeee comprends rien au Storytelliiiiiiiiiiiing!!!!! Alors, n’écoutant que mon bon coeur, je m’élance dans la nuit noire, pour la secourir! Et lui enseigner le Storytelling, pour qu’enfin elle comprenne. Le Storytelling, c’est l’art de raconter des histoires. Cette technique de copywriting vous sera très utile pour mieux convaincre vos clients et vos lecteurs. Le saviez-vous? C’est parti! etc…
The Power of Process: What Young Mozart Teaches Us About the Secret of Cultivating Genius by Maria Popova On the “powerful blend of instruction, encouragement, and constant practice.” “The trick to creativity … is to identify your own peculiar talent and then to settle down to work with it for a good long time,” observed Denise Shekerjian in reflecting on her insightful interviews with MacArthur “genius” grantees. “Success is the product of the severest kind of mental and physical application,” attested Thomas Edison. In The Genius in All of Us: New Insights into Genetics, Talent, and IQ (public library), David Shenk presents a rigorously researched blend of historical evidence and scientific data to debunk the myth that genius is a special gift serendipitously bestowed upon the chosen few and shows, instead, that it is the product of consistent, concentrated effort, applied in the direction of one’s natural inclination. Anonymous portrait of the child Mozart, possibly by Pietro Antonio Lorenzoni; painted in 1763 on commission from Leopold Mozart (public domain)
8 Subconscious Mistakes Our Brains Make Every Day--And How To Avoid Them Editor's Note: This is one of the most-read leadership articles of 2013. Click here to see the full list. Get ready to have your mind blown. I was seriously shocked at some of these mistakes in thinking that I subconsciously make all the time. Obviously, none of them are huge, life-threatening mistakes, but they are really surprising and avoiding them could help us make more rational, sensible decisions. Especially since we strive for self-improvement at Buffer, if we look at our values, being aware of the mistakes we naturally have in our thinking can make a big difference in avoiding them. Regardless, I think it’s fascinating to learn more about how we think and make decisions every day, so let’s take a look at some of these habits of thinking that we didn’t know we had. 1. We tend to like people who think like us. This is called confirmation bias. It’s similar to how improving our body language can also actually change who we are as people. 2. 3. or 4. Well, no. 5. 6. 7. The lesson here?
Pourquoi le Storytelling Visuel? Dans les milieux de la communication, de l'éducation, du marketing et du management, nous assistons à un intérêt de plus en plus marqué pour le "visual storytelling" ou storytelling visuel. Mais de quoi s'agit-il et pourquoi est-ce si important aujourd'hui? C'est ce que nous allons aborder ici. Le storytelling visuel désigne l'utilisation d'images, de photos, d'infographies, d'illustrations, de notes graphiques, de présentations dans une logique de récit. Ces contenus visuels doivent pouvoir être racontés comme une histoire, c'est à dire qu'ils doivent permettre une succession logique de faits, de chiffres, d'évènements. Un véritable parcours visuel doit être possible dans le contenu à dominante graphique. Pour que le récit soit le plus captivant possible, il devra comporter des archétypes narratifs: situation initiale, épreuves, dénouement, héros, ennemis, ruse, etc.... Le storytelling raconté par l'image remonte à la préhistoire. Pourquoi est-ce si important aujourd'hui?
Praise versus Encouragement Most of us believe that we need to praise our children more. However, there is some controversy regarding this point. If we always reward a child with praise after a task is completed, then the child comes to expect it. However, if praise is not forthcoming, then its absence may be interpreted by the child as failure. One of the main differences between praise and encouragement is that praise often comes paired with a judgment or evaluation, such as "best" or "highest" in these examples. According to Bolton (1979, pg 181): Evaluative praise is the expression of favorable judgment about another person or his behaviors: "Eric, you are such a good boy." According to Ginott (1965): Evaluative praise.....creates anxiety, invites dependency, and evokes defensiveness. According to Taylor (1979): A real life experience, illustrating these principles, was provided by the well know cellist, Gregor Piatigorsky (1965). "Mr. "Bravo! "Splendid! Bewildered, I left the house. Sam: It's scary. Mr. Mr. Mr.
How A Company Gets Away With Stealing Independent Designers' Work You've probably never heard of Cody Foster & Co. That doesn't matter, though, because if you're an independent artist, designer, or illustrator, there's a good chance Cody Foster has heard of you. In fact, the company may already be selling works based upon your designs to retail clients such as Nordstrom, Madewell, Anthropologie, Terrain, and Fab.com. And, legally, there might not be a thing that anyone can do about it. Who Is Cody Foster & Co.? From the outside, Cody Foster seems like a quaint enough company. That's one way of putting it. Allegations Against Cody Foster In 2011 and 2012, Congdon drew a series of illustrations featuring Nordic animals (including a reindeer and a polar bear) wearing uniquely patterned red-and-green jackets. "If it had been less blatant, I would have thought twice about going public with this," says Congdon, who published a post about Cody Foster on her blog this week. Speaking to Co.Design, Abigail Brown said: "I'm furious. And those legal fees?