More from Charles Petzold
I’m sure that some pictures are worth a thousand words, but others trigger a whole lot of puzzlement. Such was the case with the cover of a book I recently bought entitled Calculating with Tones: The Logarithmic Logic of Music: ... more ...
It was once possible to detect email scams by misspellings, sloppy grammar, messy formatting, and other blunders. Now that scammers are apparently using AI to aid in their phishing emails, the tells are more subtle. ... more ...
When a government engages in deviant behavior, it is the responsibility of the people to express their opposition. That’s why I’ll be participating in the No Kings protest in New York City on Saturday. ... more ...
Am I naïve in expecting Artificial Intelligence to be smart? Is my interpretation of the word “intelligence” too literal? And when an AI behaves stupidly, who’s to blame? The programmers or the AI entity itself? Is it even proper to make a distinction between the two? Or does the AI work in so mysterious a way that the programmers need no longer take responsibility? ... more ...
More in programming
Multiple concurrent writers. Multiple processes. Same SQLite. No modifications.
New in the SumatraPDF pre-release builds: Bake PDF File New Bake PDF File command (CmdPdfBake) in the Ctrl + k command palette turns interactive form fields and annotations into static page content and saves the result as a new PDF, which then opens. Show PDF Outline New Show PDF Outline command (CmdShowPdfOutline) in the command palette shows the document’s outline (table of contents) as text in a window. Tab Groups menu Saving and restoring tab groups now has its own Tab Groups submenu (in the Favorites menu) with Save Tab Group and Restore Tab Group. Both are also in the tab right-click menu. There is also a window for managing saved groups (#4402). Screenshots include open menus Take Screenshot also captures open menus as separate windows you can pick. Menu bar improvements with tabs The custom menu bar shown when tabs are in the title bar works more like a normal menu bar, and toggling the menu bar is more reliable (#5442, #549). More: changes from April 4, 2026 and the full changelog.
Brilliant jerks, ZIRP-era managers, and how psychological safety lost the plot. Part 3 of my conversation with Dr. Cat Hicks.
Say you're deploying an AI assistant that processes online order returns. For it to work, it would need access to your store's purchase policy, item…