Meet Zig: The modern alternative to C
The Zig programming language continues its gradual advance into the world of systems programming. Even though it has yet to hit version 1.0, Zig is already in use with several production projects and attracts admirers with its slew of good ideas and ...
How to use editable installs for Python packages
When you install Python packages into a given instance of Python, the default behavior is for the package’s files to be copied into the target installation. But sometimes you don’t want to copy the files—sometimes, you want to link to them, so a...
Anonymity should not be free
I started using the Internet in the early 1990s, when it was mostly used by government officials and academics. Everyone was pretty friendly, and more importantly, everyone was themselves. There was even a system called the finger protocol, where you...
How to shift left on finops, and why you need to
One of the most frustrating experiences for IT leaders is receiving a cloud invoice with costs well above expectations. It’s not as bad as a security issue or a major incident in a critical business system, but spiking cloud costs can have a similar...
The private cloud comeback
For years, the dominant cloud narrative emphasized the scalability, flexibility, and ostensibly lower costs of public cloud solutions, compelling thousands of organizations to migrate their operations to these platforms. Today, however, there is a cle...
Three steps to boost Amazon S3 data security
The amount of data in modern systems has skyrocketed beyond what traditional security tools can handle. As organizations embrace AI to boost productivity, security teams face mounting pressure to protect sensitive information across sprawling cloud in...
Rewriting infrastructure as code for the AI data center
Generative AI has officially entered the infrastructure as code (IaC) trenches. What started as a bottom-up phenomenon — developers using ChatGPT and Copilot to avoid Googling Terraform syntax or getting bogged down in endless StackExchange threads ...
Cloud finally gets some new competition
For more than a decade “cloud” has really meant three names: Amazon, Microsoft, and Google. Yet 2025 is proving that the market is no longer a closed club. Cloudflare and Oracle, two companies with wildly different histories, are pressing legitima...
Google touts Python client library for Data Commons
Google has released version 2 of its Python client library to query the Data Commons platform, which organizes the world’s publicly available statistical data. The library supports custom instances, among other capabilities. Announced June 26, the D...
Google touts new Python client library for Data Commons
Google has released a Python client library to query the Data Commons platform, which organizes the world’s publicly available statistical data. The library supports custom instances, among other capabilities. Announced June 26, the new Data Commons...
Dumping mainframes for cloud can be a costly mistake
A certain Fortune 500 financial institution decided to fully embrace the cloud. Executive memos indicated that all their new initiatives would be “cloud-first.” Teams were encouraged to re-architect everything, including mission-critical transacti...
Rust-powered: Two new Python tools to watch
This week in Python brings us a toe-to-toe showdown between two Rust-powered Python type checking tools. We also have a gentle introduction to type hinting, a look at the perils—and promises—ahead for a free-threaded, no-GIL Python, and a shocking...
Rust 1.88 adds support for naked functions
Rust 1.88 has been released, featuring support for writing naked functions, as well as backing for Boolean literals. The update of the popular fast and safe programming language was announced June 26 by the Rust Release Team. Current Rust users can ge...
Introducing Gemma 3n: The developer guide
The Gemma 3n model has been fully released, building on the success of previous Gemma models and bringing advanced on-device multimodal capabilities to edge devices with unprecedented performance. Explore Gemma 3n's innovations, including its mobile-fi...
Eclipse Foundation releases Jakarta EE 11
Moving forward with the development of its enterprise Java application platform, the Eclipse Foundation has released Jakarta EE 11 Platform, which promises simpler data access and streamlined testing processes. Java 21 support also is featured. Rolled...
