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Comment · 12 years ago
Comment · 12 years ago
From github: The algorithm is iterative deepening depth first alpha-beta search. The evaluation function tries to minimize the number of tiles on the grid while keeping same/similar tiles in line with each other.

This basically means he's running an optimized version of minimax -- essentially, depth first search of game states looking for states that minimize tiles and keep them in line.

At each step, he looks several steps into the future, assigns them each a numerical score, then picks the move that leads to the best outcome.

Iterative deepening means that he evaluates all 1 move options, then all two move options, then all 3 moves options and so on. It increases the chances of finding a good move within a time constraint.

Alpha beta is a "lossless" optimization that allows you to more aggressively prune the tree when you're searching.

Comment · 12 years ago
Was that article thrown together in 10 minutes? It's filled with typos: "But federal safety regulators on Tuesday classified as a recall Tesla' move to provide upgraded wall adapters and charging software, citing the risk of fire."

"involving a Model Sin Irvine, California, which the "

"Separately,three road fires in"

Comment · 13 years ago
As a gut check, if you're solving some replication problem and you'd consider using Paxos to solve the problem, be /very/ wary and reason extremely carefully about why your weaker solution will provide the same guarantees. Chances are, it will fail in certain cases of network outage or system failure.
Comment · 13 years ago
The US hasn't adopted EMV because it isn't necessary. EMV was created because in Eastern Europe many businesses didn't have sufficiently reliable phone and internet connections to validate credit cards -- in the US we have no such problem.

The cost of rolling out EMV was determined to be greater than the cost credit card companies paying for the increase in fraud and chargebacks out of pocket.

Comment · 13 years ago
1. I'm thinking of it being connected with Google Play.

2. Once you've increased the scope beyond the apps on the device, work needs to be done to show the most relevant and useful actions.

3. Enabling flows like:

- Take file from one app, edit in another app, save back over the original file

- Take an email attachment, edit / modify in another app, then reply back on the same thread

4. But there is no reason a third party can't come in and make it happen.

Comment · 13 years ago
An Android phone is my primary device. A few key issues for me:

1. No app discovery -- I want to find out about apps that can work with my content.

2. Action curation -- I want to see the actions that other people think are most useful when dealing with my content.

3. No "Return" actions -- eg. The context knowledge necessary to reply to the same message, or overwrite an existing file.

4. Cross device and cross OS: If this is done right, there's no reason for the action to be bound to just one device or even one person.

Comment · 13 years ago
This is a good start -- http://x-callback-url.com/ is a standard and listing for apps that support it. The biggest problem is that there is a limited amount of data that you can transfer in a URL (about 80KB I believe) so even large PDFs will start to cause problems.
Comment · 13 years ago
Yes. The Ubuntu Phone / OS is a interesting byproduct of this idea.
Comment · 13 years ago
There's a difference between the performance you want in your kernel and the performance you need sharing to Facebook. It seems like creating monolithic mobile apps is premature optimization.
Comment · 13 years ago
Ah, yeah. I was talking about iOS in particular. Android intents are pretty sweet -- a couple the missing bits to make them great in my mind are -- App discovery: tell me about apps that can use my content if I don't have any? -- Action curation: What do users think are the best app for this action?
Comment · 13 years ago
We think that the key is to provide a limited and controlled interface between the apps (which is what we're trying to do). We'll see how it goes :-)

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