Month: September 2024
Qualcomm Asked Rival Intel if It Would Consider Sale
While Intel has struggled in recent years, other chipmakers are thriving because of a boom in demand.
While Intel has struggled in recent years, other chipmakers are thriving because of a boom in demand.
Quordle today – hints and answers for Saturday, September 21 (game #971)
Looking for Quordle clues? We can help. Plus get the answers to Quordle today and past solutions.
Quordle was one of the original Wordle alternatives and is still going strong now nearly 1,000 games later. It offers a genuine challenge, though, so read on if you need some Quordle hints today – or scroll down further for the answers.
Enjoy playing word games? You can also check out my Wordle today, NYT Connections today and NYT Strands today pages for hints and answers for those puzzles.
SPOILER WARNING: Information about Quordle today is below, so don’t read on if you don’t want to know the answers.
Quordle today (game #971) – hint #1 – Vowels
How many different vowels are in Quordle today?
• The number of different vowels in Quordle today is 3*.
* Note that by vowel we mean the five standard vowels (A, E, I, O, U), not Y (which is sometimes counted as a vowel too).
Quordle today (game #971) – hint #2 – repeated letters
Do any of today’s Quordle answers contain repeated letters?
• The number of Quordle answers containing a repeated letter today is 1.
Quordle today (game #971) – hint #3 – uncommon letters
Do the letters Q, Z, X or J appear in Quordle today?
• No. None of Q, Z, X or J appear among today’s Quordle answers.
Quordle today (game #971) – hint #4 – starting letters (1)
Do any of today’s Quordle puzzles start with the same letter?
• The number of today’s Quordle answers starting with the same letter is 0.
If you just want to know the answers at this stage, simply scroll down. If you’re not ready yet then here’s one more clue to make things a lot easier:
Quordle today (game #971) – hint #5 – starting letters (2)
What letters do today’s Quordle answers start with?
• V
• F
• S
• E
Right, the answers are below, so DO NOT SCROLL ANY FURTHER IF YOU DON’T WANT TO SEE THEM.
Quordle today (game #971) – the answers
(Image credit: Merriam-Webster)
The answers to today’s Quordle, game #971, are…
VITALFRAILSPEAREERIE
There aren’t many words in Wordle (and therefore Quordle) that contain three of the same letter. My analysis of every Wordle answer shows that there are a mere 20 out of the original 2,309 solutions that contain a triple letter, and of those five have a trio of Es. EERIE is one of them, and it’s a hard word to solve in this game. Fortunately, FRAIL, SPEAR and VITAL are not so bad, so assuming you didn’t lose too many guesses on EERIE you should have been OK here.
How did you do today? Send me an email and let me know.
Daily Sequence today (game #971) – the answers
(Image credit: Merriam-Webster)
The answers to today’s Quordle Daily Sequence, game #971, are…
SEDANBASTEVITALCORER
Quordle answers: The past 20
Quordle #970, Friday 20 September: ELIDE, DITTO, SHAWL, BONUSQuordle #969, Thursday 19 September: MARRY, OWING, DICEY, LUCKYQuordle #968, Wednesday 18 September: CEDAR, VENOM, MIGHT, MEDICQuordle #967, Tuesday 17 September: ETHOS, COUNT, PRINT, THREEQuordle #966, Monday 16 September: ROUGE, SWAMP, FUGUE, UNDUEQuordle #965, Sunday 15 September: VILLA, SMOKE, BULKY, THRUMQuordle #964, Saturday 14 September: ESSAY, GENRE, WIMPY, CHUTEQuordle #963, Friday 13 September: LEANT, ORGAN, FILLY, PLAITQuordle #962, Thursday 12 September: ARBOR, STARK, LEAVE, GOOFYQuordle #961, Wednesday 11 September: ROUGH, CACTI, SAVOY, ODDERQuordle #960, Tuesday 10 September: PLUMB, SEIZE, EARLY, ASSET Quordle #959, Monday 9 September: CHIRP, BEADY, THETA, MINUSQuordle #958, Sunday 8 September: TEASE, AGATE, PRIDE, PLATE Quordle #957, Saturday 7 September: LASSO, TILDE, BUNCH, PRONGQuordle #956, Friday 6 September: FARCE, WOOLY, LOCAL, NIGHTQuordle #955, Thursday 5 September: SNIDE, EGRET, AMONG, SHINYQuordle #954, Wednesday 4 September: POINT, WITTY, GAFFE, ABUSEQuordle #953, Tuesday 3 September: ATOLL, ANGER, OCEAN, SWEEPQuordle #952, Monday 2 September: HABIT, LODGE, PLAIN, DRIFTQuordle #951, Sunday 1 September: RABBI, CRAWL, GUPPY, BRAND
NYT Strands today — hints, answers and spangram for Saturday, September 21 (game #202)
Looking for NYT Strands answers and hints? Here’s all you need to know to solve today’s game, including the spangram.
Strands is the NYT’s latest word game after the likes of Wordle, Spelling Bee and Connections – and it’s great fun. It can be difficult, though, so read on for my Strands hints.
Want more word-based fun? Then check out my Wordle today, NYT Connections today and Quordle today pages for hints and answers for those games.
SPOILER WARNING: Information about NYT Strands today is below, so don’t read on if you don’t want to know the answers.
NYT Strands today (game #202) – hint #1 – today’s theme
What is the theme of today’s NYT Strands?
• Today’s NYT Strands theme is… I’ve got the music in me!
NYT Strands today (game #202) – hint #2 – clue words
Play any of these words to unlock the in-game hints system.
STUDDUNEETCHRATETARESTONE
NYT Strands today (game #202) – hint #3 – spangram
What is a hint for today’s spangram?
• Temple of music
NYT Strands today (game #202) – hint #4 – spangram position
What are two sides of the board that today’s spangram touches?
First: left, 5th row
Last: right, 3rd row
Right, the answers are below, so DO NOT SCROLL ANY FURTHER IF YOU DON’T WANT TO SEE THEM.
NYT Strands today (game #202) – the answers
(Image credit: New York Times)
The answers to today’s Strands, game #202, are…
ARENASTADIUMNIGHTCLUBTHEATERFESTIVALSPANGRAM: CONCERTVENUE
My rating: ModerateMy score: 1 hint
I’ve marked this one as moderate simply because I couldn’t get started without a hint; the theme clue of ‘I’ve got the music in me!’ seemed too obtuse, despite the fact that with hindsight it was really rather obvious. Once I asked for help and was given ARENA it all became much easier, and I ticked off the likes of STADIUM, NIGHTCLUB and THEATER with no issues.
How did you do today? Send me an email and let me know.
Yesterday’s NYT Strands answers (Friday 20 September, game #201)
RHYMEVERSEMETERSTANZASYNTAXDICTIONSCANSIONSPANGRAM: POETRY
What is NYT Strands?
Strands is the NYT’s new word game, following Wordle and Connections. It’s now out of beta so is a fully fledged member of the NYT’s games stable and can be played on the NYT Games site on desktop or mobile.
I’ve got a full guide to how to play NYT Strands, complete with tips for solving it, so check that out if you’re struggling to beat it each day.
NYT Connections today — hints and answers for Saturday, September 21 (game #468)
Looking for NYT Connections answers and hints? Here’s all you need to know to solve today’s game, plus my commentary on the puzzles.
Good morning! Let’s play Connections, the NYT’s clever word game that challenges you to group answers in various categories. It can be tough, so read on if you need clues.
What should you do once you’ve finished? Why, play some more word games of course. I’ve also got daily Wordle hints and answers, Strands hints and answers and Quordle hints and answers articles if you need help for those too.
SPOILER WARNING: Information about NYT Connections today is below, so don’t read on if you don’t want to know the answers.
NYT Connections today (game #468) – today’s words
(Image credit: New York Times)
Today’s NYT Connections words are…
REALMEDIUMIMPRESSIVEEXCLUSIVENICERAREAWFULMYSTICWAYWELL DONEBLOODYLIMITEDORACLEPROPSCOLLECTIBLEPSYCHIC
NYT Connections today (game #468) – hint #1 – group hints
What are some clues for today’s NYT Connections groups?
Yellow: Future-gazerGreen: Reason to want somethingBlue: Excellent!Purple: Very
Need more clues?
We’re firmly in spoiler territory now, but read on if you want to know what the four theme answers are for today’s NYT Connections puzzles…
NYT Connections today (game #468) – hint #2 – group answers
What are the answers for today’s NYT Connections groups?
YELLOW: CLAIRVOYANTGREEN: SPECIAL EDITION ADJECTIVESBLUE: “GREAT JOB!”PURPLE: EXTREMELY
Right, the answers are below, so DO NOT SCROLL ANY FURTHER IF YOU DON’T WANT TO SEE THEM.
NYT Connections today (game #468) – the answers
(Image credit: New York Times)
The answers to today’s Connections, game #468, are…
YELLOW: CLAIRVOYANT MEDIUM, MYSTIC, ORACLE, PSYCHICGREEN: SPECIAL EDITION ADJECTIVES COLLECTIBLE, EXCLUSIVE, LIMITED, RAREBLUE: “GREAT JOB!” IMPRESSIVE, NICE, PROPS, WELL DONEPURPLE: EXTREMELY AWFUL, BLOODY, REAL, WAY
My rating: EasyMy score: 1 mistake
This was a surprisingly easy Connections puzzle even by recent examples, although I still contrived to make one mistake. That was a silly one; I’m sure the misdirection was intended by the NYT, and I walked right into the trap. I’m talking, of course, about BLOODY, RARE, WELL DONE and MEDIUM – which could have been ‘Ways to cook a steak’. But no, all four words actually belonged to alternative groups.
That quickly became apparent, when I looked again and realized that MEDIUM, MYSTIC, ORACLE and PSYCHIC were all words for a CLAIRVOYANT (yellow) and that COLLECTIBLE, EXCLUSIVE, LIMITED, RARE all formed a green group for SPECIAL EDITION ADJECTIVES.
That left blue and purple, and this time neither was too complicated. No ‘blank something’ type, no clever cryptic connections – simply a couple of groups, both of which were fairly obvious.
How did you do today? Send me an email and let me know.
Yesterday’s NYT Connections answers (Friday, 20 September, game #467)
YELLOW: PRESUME FIGURE, IMAGINE, SUSPECT, THINKGREEN: SOMEBODY CHARACTER, INDIVIDUAL, PARTY, PERSONBLUE: CHARACTERS IN “THE EMPIRE STRIKES BACK,” FAMILIARLY BOBA, CHEWY, EMPEROR, SOLOPURPLE: WORDS AFTER “KITTY” CAT, CORNER, HAWK, LITTER
What is NYT Connections?
NYT Connections is one of several increasingly popular word games made by the New York Times. It challenges you to find groups of four items that share something in common, and each group has a different difficulty level: green is easy, yellow a little harder, blue often quite tough and purple usually very difficult.
On the plus side, you don’t technically need to solve the final one, as you’ll be able to answer that one by a process of elimination. What’s more, you can make up to four mistakes, which gives you a little bit of breathing room.
It’s a little more involved than something like Wordle, however, and there are plenty of opportunities for the game to trip you up with tricks. For instance, watch out for homophones and other word games that could disguise the answers.
It’s playable for free via the NYT Games site on desktop or mobile.
Project Analyzing Human Language Usage Shuts Down Because ‘Generative AI Has Polluted the Data’
The creator of an open source project that scraped the internet to determine the ever-changing popularity of different words in human language usage says that they are sunsetting the project because generative AI spam has poisoned the internet to a level where the project no longer has any utility. 404 Media: Wordfreq is a program that tracked the ever-changing ways people used more than 40 different languages by analyzing millions of sources across Wikipedia, movie and TV subtitles, news articles, books, websites, Twitter, and Reddit. The system could be used to analyze changing language habits as slang and popular culture changed and language evolved, and was a resource for academics who study such things. In a note on the project’s GitHub, creator Robyn Speer wrote that the project “will not be updated anymore.”
“Generative AI has polluted the data,” she wrote. “I don’t think anyone has reliable information about post-2021 language usage by humans.” She said that open web scraping was an important part of the project’s data sources and “now the web at large is full of slop generated by large language models, written by no one to communicate nothing. Including this slop in the data skews the word frequencies.” While there has always been spam on the internet and in the datasets that Wordfreq used, “it was manageable and often identifiable. Large language models generate text that masquerades as real language with intention behind it, even though there is none, and their output crops up everywhere,” she wrote.
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
The creator of an open source project that scraped the internet to determine the ever-changing popularity of different words in human language usage says that they are sunsetting the project because generative AI spam has poisoned the internet to a level where the project no longer has any utility. 404 Media: Wordfreq is a program that tracked the ever-changing ways people used more than 40 different languages by analyzing millions of sources across Wikipedia, movie and TV subtitles, news articles, books, websites, Twitter, and Reddit. The system could be used to analyze changing language habits as slang and popular culture changed and language evolved, and was a resource for academics who study such things. In a note on the project’s GitHub, creator Robyn Speer wrote that the project “will not be updated anymore.”
“Generative AI has polluted the data,” she wrote. “I don’t think anyone has reliable information about post-2021 language usage by humans.” She said that open web scraping was an important part of the project’s data sources and “now the web at large is full of slop generated by large language models, written by no one to communicate nothing. Including this slop in the data skews the word frequencies.” While there has always been spam on the internet and in the datasets that Wordfreq used, “it was manageable and often identifiable. Large language models generate text that masquerades as real language with intention behind it, even though there is none, and their output crops up everywhere,” she wrote.
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Danny Boyle’s ‘28 Years Later’, a $75 Million Feature Film, Was Shot Using iPhone 15 Pro Max
Carlton Reid, writing for Wired:
The use of Apple smartphones as the principal camera system on 28
Years Later was subsequently confirmed to Wired by several people
connected with the movie, detailing that the particular model used
to shoot was the iPhone 15 Pro Max. […]
Several arthouse films have been shot with iPhones, including Sean
Baker’s Tangerine (2015) and the Steven Soderbergh drama
Unsane (2018), but these movies were limited-release, low-budget
offerings compared to 28 Years Later. The new film’s $75 million
budget is only part of the franchise’s total, with 28 Years
Later being the first of a new trilogy; all three coming zombie
films are being scripted by screenwriter Alex Garland, who is
reuniting with Boyle and Mantle after helming Civil War,
released earlier this year.
Right there, in your pocket, all day every day.
★
Carlton Reid, writing for Wired:
The use of Apple smartphones as the principal camera system on 28
Years Later was subsequently confirmed to Wired by several people
connected with the movie, detailing that the particular model used
to shoot was the iPhone 15 Pro Max. […]
Several arthouse films have been shot with iPhones, including Sean
Baker’s Tangerine (2015) and the Steven Soderbergh drama
Unsane (2018), but these movies were limited-release, low-budget
offerings compared to 28 Years Later. The new film’s $75 million
budget is only part of the franchise’s total, with 28 Years
Later being the first of a new trilogy; all three coming zombie
films are being scripted by screenwriter Alex Garland, who is
reuniting with Boyle and Mantle after helming Civil War,
released earlier this year.
Right there, in your pocket, all day every day.
OceanGate’s ill-fated Titan sub relied on a hand-typed Excel spreadsheet
Image: OceanGate
A former OceanGate contractor, Antonella Wilby, testified before a U.S. Coast Guard panel on Friday that the company’s Titan submarine, which imploded last year during a dive to the Titanic’s wreckage, relied on an incredibly convoluted navigation system.
As Wilby described it during the US Coast Guard Marine Board of Investigation hearing, the Titan’s GPS-like ultra-short baseline (USBL) acoustic positioning system generated data on a sub’s velocity, depth, and position using sound pings.
Screenshot: U.S. Coast Guard video courtesy of Pelagic Research Services
Images of the remains of the Titan submarine lying on the floor of the Atlantic Ocean were shared as part of the US Coast Guard hearing,
That information is typically automatically loaded into mapping software to keep track of a sub’s position. But Wilby said that for the Titan, the coordinate data was transcribed into a notebook by hand and then entered into Excel before loading the spreadsheet into mapping software to track the sub’s position on a hand-drawn map of the wreckage.
The OceanGate team tried to perform these updates at least every five minutes, but it was a slow, manual process done while communicating with the gamepad-controlled sub via short text messages. When Wilby recommended the company use standard software to process ping data and plot the sub’s telemetry automatically, the response was that the company wanted to develop an in-house system, but didn’t have enough time.
Wilby was later taken off the team and flew home after telling supervisors, “This is an idiotic way to do navigation.” She also testified that after Dive 80 in 2022, a loud bang / explosion was heard during the Titan’s ascent and that it was loud enough to be heard from the surface.
This mirrors testimony given yesterday by OceanGate’s former scientific director, Steven Ross. Like Wilby, he said that the sound was attributed to a shifting of the pressure hull in its plastic cradle, although Wilby testified that there were only “a few microns” of damage.
According to Ross, six days before the Titan submarine imploded, the sub’s pilot and the company’s co-founder, Stockton Rush, crashed the vessel into a launch mechanism bulkhead while the vessel was attempting to resurface from Dive 87. The incident was caused by a malfunction with a ballast tank, which inverted the submarine, causing other passengers to “tumble about,” according to the Associated Press. No one was injured during the incident, but Ross said he did not know if an inspection of the sub was carried out afterward.
Image: OceanGate
A former OceanGate contractor, Antonella Wilby, testified before a U.S. Coast Guard panel on Friday that the company’s Titan submarine, which imploded last year during a dive to the Titanic’s wreckage, relied on an incredibly convoluted navigation system.
As Wilby described it during the US Coast Guard Marine Board of Investigation hearing, the Titan’s GPS-like ultra-short baseline (USBL) acoustic positioning system generated data on a sub’s velocity, depth, and position using sound pings.
Screenshot: U.S. Coast Guard video courtesy of Pelagic Research Services
Images of the remains of the Titan submarine lying on the floor of the Atlantic Ocean were shared as part of the US Coast Guard hearing,
That information is typically automatically loaded into mapping software to keep track of a sub’s position. But Wilby said that for the Titan, the coordinate data was transcribed into a notebook by hand and then entered into Excel before loading the spreadsheet into mapping software to track the sub’s position on a hand-drawn map of the wreckage.
The OceanGate team tried to perform these updates at least every five minutes, but it was a slow, manual process done while communicating with the gamepad-controlled sub via short text messages. When Wilby recommended the company use standard software to process ping data and plot the sub’s telemetry automatically, the response was that the company wanted to develop an in-house system, but didn’t have enough time.
Wilby was later taken off the team and flew home after telling supervisors, “This is an idiotic way to do navigation.” She also testified that after Dive 80 in 2022, a loud bang / explosion was heard during the Titan’s ascent and that it was loud enough to be heard from the surface.
This mirrors testimony given yesterday by OceanGate’s former scientific director, Steven Ross. Like Wilby, he said that the sound was attributed to a shifting of the pressure hull in its plastic cradle, although Wilby testified that there were only “a few microns” of damage.
According to Ross, six days before the Titan submarine imploded, the sub’s pilot and the company’s co-founder, Stockton Rush, crashed the vessel into a launch mechanism bulkhead while the vessel was attempting to resurface from Dive 87. The incident was caused by a malfunction with a ballast tank, which inverted the submarine, causing other passengers to “tumble about,” according to the Associated Press. No one was injured during the incident, but Ross said he did not know if an inspection of the sub was carried out afterward.
Grid-scale batteries: They’re not just lithium
When size and weight don’t matter, lots of other battery chemistries can work.
As power utilities and industrial companies seek to use more renewable energy, the market for grid-scale batteries is expanding rapidly. Alternatives to lithium-ion technology may provide environmental, labor, and safety benefits. And these new chemistries can work in markets like the electric grid and industrial applications that lithium doesn’t address well.
“I think the market for longer-duration storage is just now emerging,” said Mark Higgins, chief commercial officer and president of North America at Redflow. “We have a lot of… very rapid scale-up in the types of projects that we’re working on and the size of projects that we’re working on. We’ve deployed about 270 projects around the world. Most of them have been small off-grid or remote-grid systems. What we’re seeing today is much more grid-connected types of projects.”
“Demand… seems to be increasing every day,” said Giovanni Damato, president of CMBlu Energy. Media projections of growth in this space are huge. “We’re really excited about the opportunity to… just be able to play in that space and provide as much capacity as possible.”
Trump shares fake photo of Harris with Diddy in now-deleted Truth Social post
submitted by /u/Fit-Requirement6701 [link] [comments]
submitted by /u/Fit-Requirement6701
[link] [comments]
Human cases of raccoon parasite may be your best excuse to buy a flamethrower
The infection is very rare, but it’s definitely one you want to avoid.
Enlarge / Young raccoon looking out from a tree. (credit: Getty | Camerique)
If you were looking for a reason to keep a flamethrower around the house, you may have just found one.
This week, the Los Angeles County health department reported that two people were infected with a raccoon parasite that causes severe, frequently fatal, infections of the eyes, organs, and central nervous system. Those who survive are often left with severe neurological outcomes, including blindness, paralysis, loss of coordination, seizures, cognitive impairments, and brain atrophy.
The parasitic roundworm behind the infection, called Baylisascaris procyonis, spreads via eggs in raccoons feces. Adult worms live in the intestines of the masked trash scavengers, and each female worm can produce nearly 200,000 eggs per day. Once in the environment, those eggs can remain infectious for years. They can survive drying out as well as most chemical treatments and disinfectants, including bleach.