A note on linkers — Compiling a code is always a bit of an exciting event, especially if you just finished implementing something new. You thought about what you want to do, you built up a logical structure for the...
The CMacIonize unit system — I have certainly mentioned the importance of units before. Units are not only important for physical reasons, because they are the things that link numbers that live in the pure world of mathematics to physical...
Computing special functions — I might have mentioned this once or twice before, but computers are essentially very stupid, since all they can do is add, subtract, multiply, divide and make simple yes/no decisions. Everything else a computer can...
Numerically inverting a matrix — Suppose you have a square matrix, like the one below: $$ A = \begin{pmatrix} 0 & 5 & 5 \\ 2 & 9 & 0 \\ 6 & 8 & 8 \end{pmatrix}, $$ and that...
Rewriting legacy code — Legacy code is a general term used for software that was conceived and developed a long time ago, but that for some reason is still actively being used. Many sciences (astronomy is one of them)...
The St Andrews Monte Carlo summer school — The St Andrews Monte Carlo Summer School or SAMCSS is a biyearly summer school that is primarily aimed at PhD students based in the UK, and has been organised since 2013. I have been involved...
File systems — As a very frequent user of computer systems, there are a lot of things about a computer that I simply take for granted. I do care a lot about how fast my CPU(s) execute my...
Resolving painful git merges — git is an amazing repository system that greatly facilitates the management of large, collaborative code projects. It can store a large number of source code files and their history, and allows separate developers to work...
Template programming — Nowadays, computers can be programmed using a large variety of computing languages, with very different degrees of complexity and sometimes with a very strong fan base of enthusiastic users. Fundamentally though, computers and their CPUs...
Units and unit conversions — Units are very important in science, as they provide a mapping from the abstract realm of maths to the reality of physics. Maths tells us exactly how to compute the circumference of a circle with...
Signals and interrupts — When an operating system starts a software program, it will typically create a process for that program and hand that process control over some hardware resources. The process can then use those resources to run...
Load More