Monthly update #0279 • July 2013
Monthly update 279 • July 2013 • 2013-07-01 - 2013-07-31
Monthly Updates
2013
109 posts
Privacy Roundup #0084 • July 2013
The Snowden disclosures reached full flood in July 2013, as fresh leaks exposed XKeyscore and corporate complicity while courts, lawmakers and breached websites scrambled to respond.
Privacy
Eurobloat #0038 • June 2013
The month Brussels discovered it was being spied on, decided the answer was more Brussels, and locked twenty-five sleepless ministers in a room to invent new ways to seize your savings.
Eurobloat
World War Z
World War Z (2013), directed by Marc Forster, shows a fast zombie plague. Brad Pitt plays Gerry Lane, a former UN worker pulled back to help. He flies from city to city. Mireille Enos acts as his wife Karin, who waits at home.
Movies
NSPredicate
NSPredicate is a Foundation class that defines logical conditions to fetch or filter data. Its syntax mixes SQL WHERE clauses with regex for expressive queries on collections.
Development
NSExpression
NSExpression is a class in Cocoa that simplifies complex data tasks. It evaluates mathematical expressions, such as 4 + 5 - 2**3, which gives 1.
Development
What is startupdiskhelper?
If you see startupdiskhelper on your Mac, here is what this boot disk helper process does.
Mac
Monthly update #0278 • June 2013
Monthly update 278 • June 2013 • 2013-06-01 - 2013-06-30
Monthly Updates
De Cock en 't wassend kwaad by A.C. Baantjer
Several hardened criminals are murdered, and a line of verse by the poet Vondel seems to be linked to the killings.
Books
Privacy Roundup #0083 • June 2013
June 2013 was the month the Snowden documents broke, exposing NSA and GCHQ mass surveillance and triggering a wave of lawsuits, corporate denials and diplomatic fury.
Privacy
NSEnumerator / NSFastEnumeration
Enumeration makes computation powerful by applying logic to collections.
Development
Eurobloat #0037 • May 2013
The month Brussels decided that the gravest threat to European civilisation was the open jug of olive oil on your restaurant table, while quietly drawing up report cards for sovereign nations.
Eurobloat
Inferno by Dan Brown
Dan Brown’s Inferno thrusts Harvard symbolist Robert Langdon into a race against time in Florence, waking with amnesia to stop a bioengineered plague linked to Dante’s Inferno.
Books
NSUUID /CFUUIDRef /UIDevice -uniqueIdentifier /-identifierForVendor
Apple stopped letting apps use the unique device identifier, called UDID, from iOS 5 onwards. Apple blocked new apps using it after May 2013.
Development
The Office
The Office is an American comedy series. It aired on NBC from 24 March 2005 to 16 May 2013. Greg Daniels adapted it from the British series by Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant. Steve Carell plays Michael Scott, the bumbling but well-meaning regional manager of Dunder Mifflin, a paper company in Scranton, Pennsylvania.
TV Series
What is cloudd?
If you see cloudd running on your Mac or using a lot of CPU, here is what this iCloud process does.
Mac
De Cock en de sluimerende dood by A.C. Baantjer
An old woman vanishes on the road between Purmerend and Amsterdam, an architect is shot at three times, and an old man has also disappeared. De Cock walks into a hornets nest.
Books
Privacy Roundup #0082 • May 2013
May 2013 brought government surveillance of journalists, corporate snooping, and a wave of breaches that exposed how loosely personal data was held.
Privacy
Monthly update #0277 • May 2013
Monthly update 277 • May 2013 • 2013-05-01 - 2013-05-31
Monthly Updates
Eurobloat #0036 • April 2013
The month Brussels capped the City's bonuses over Britain's objection, watched its own carbon market collapse, and quietly drafted rules on how restaurants may pour olive oil.
Eurobloat
What is DataDetectorsSourceAccess?
If you see DataDetectorsSourceAccess running on your Mac, here is what this data detection process does.
Mac
Pentecost
Pentecost continues to shape my adult life. The events of that first Pentecost bring lasting peace.
Christianity
NSCoding / NSKeyedArchiver
Apple gives options like Core Data or NSKeyedArchiver with NSKeyedUnarchiver. These turn objects into data and back again.
Development
Ascension Day
Ascension Day continues to shape my adult life. The events of that first Ascension Day bring lasting peace.
Christianity
De Cock en de dode meesters by A.C. Baantjer
Three lawyers are found dead in the Brouwersgracht canal within a short time of each other. De Cock takes the case.
Books