The God Effect: Quantum Entanglement, Science's Strangest Phenomenon


Brian Clegg - 2006
    Once two particles are entangled, a change to one of them is reflected---instantly---in the other, be they in the same lab or light-years apart. So counterintuitive is this phenomenon and its implications that Einstein himself called it "spooky" and thought that it would lead to the downfall of quantum theory. Yet scientists have since discovered that quantum entanglement, the "God Effect," was one of Einstein's few---and perhaps one of his greatest---mistakes. What does it mean? The possibilities offered by a fuller understanding of the nature of entanglement read like something out of science fiction: communications devices that could span the stars, codes that cannot be broken, computers that dwarf today's machines in speed and power, teleportation, and more. In The God Effect, veteran science writer Brian Clegg has written an exceptionally readable and fascinating (and equation-free) account of entanglement, its history, and its application. Fans of Brian Greene and Amir Aczel and those interested in the marvelous possibilities coming down the quantum road will find much to marvel, illuminate, and delight.

Planet Bound


R.A. Mejia - 2018
    Unfortunately, the transport ship he chose is attacked by pirates and he ends up stranded on an unknown planet where the very air is toxic to him. Now John has to team up with the ship’s AI and the two have to survive on this hostile alien world and figure out some way to get off the planet or get a message out for help. Can they overcome their dwindling resources, alien life forms, and hostile space forces? Or will they die together, planet bound? This is a sci-fi survival story with augmented reality, a snarky AI, upgrade mechanics, resource gathering, crafting, alien creatures, and space pirates.

Rise of the Machines: A Cybernetic History


Thomas Rid - 2016
    Rise of the Machines reclaims the spectacular story of cybernetics, one of the twentieth century’s pivotal ideas.Springing from the mind of mathematician Norbert Wiener amid the devastation of World War II, the cybernetic vision underpinned a host of seductive myths about the future of machines. Cybernetics triggered blissful cults and military gizmos, the Whole Earth Catalog and the air force’s foray into virtual space, as well as crypto-anarchists fighting for internet freedom.In Rise of the Machines, Thomas Rid draws on unpublished sources—including interviews with hippies, anarchists, sleuths, and spies—to offer an unparalleled perspective into our anxious embrace of technology.

Big Data: A Revolution That Will Transform How We Live, Work, and Think


Viktor Mayer-Schönberger - 2013
    “Big data” refers to our burgeoning ability to crunch vast collections of information, analyze it instantly, and draw sometimes profoundly surprising conclusions from it. This emerging science can translate myriad phenomena—from the price of airline tickets to the text of millions of books—into searchable form, and uses our increasing computing power to unearth epiphanies that we never could have seen before. A revolution on par with the Internet or perhaps even the printing press, big data will change the way we think about business, health, politics, education, and innovation in the years to come. It also poses fresh threats, from the inevitable end of privacy as we know it to the prospect of being penalized for things we haven’t even done yet, based on big data’s ability to predict our future behavior.In this brilliantly clear, often surprising work, two leading experts explain what big data is, how it will change our lives, and what we can do to protect ourselves from its hazards. Big Data is the first big book about the next big thing.www.big-data-book.com

Path of the Warrior


Gav Thorpe - 2010
    When the artist Korlandril feels the call to war, he abandons peace for the Path of the Warrior. He becomes a Striking Scorpion, a deadly fighter skilled in the art of close-quarters combat. But battle is coming, as Craftworld Alaitoc comes to blows with the vengeful Imperium of Mankind, and the further Korlandril travels down the warrior's path, the closer he gets to losing his identity and becoming an avatar of war. Can he retain his sense of self and still be the weapon Alaitoc needs, or will he be consumed by one of the warrior-spirits of his race? Read it because When the eldar artist Korlandril feels the call to war, he walks the Path of the Warrior and joins the Striking Scorpions. As his craftworld is drawn into war with the Imperium, Korlandril finds that once he has begun walking that path, it may not be easy to leave it…

Cyberman: Scorpius


Nicholas Briggs - 2005
    Mankind is fighting a long and costly war with its android creations in the Orion System. The deadlock must be broken at all costs. The president of Earth must think the unthinkable.

Guardian of Night


Tony Daniel - 2012
    A Sci-Fi novel of Earth versus the strongest power in the Galaxy.

Becoming a Better Programmer


Pete Goodliffe - 2014
    Code Craft author Pete Goodliffe presents a collection of useful techniques and approaches to the art and craft of programming that will help boost your career and your well-being.Goodliffe presents sound advice that he's learned in 15 years of professional programming. The book's standalone chapters span the range of a software developer's life--dealing with code, learning the trade, and improving performance--with no language or industry bias. Whether you're a seasoned developer, a neophyte professional, or a hobbyist, you'll find valuable tips in five independent categories:Code-level techniques for crafting lines of code, testing, debugging, and coping with complexityPractices, approaches, and attitudes: keep it simple, collaborate well, reuse, and create malleable codeTactics for learning effectively, behaving ethically, finding challenges, and avoiding stagnationPractical ways to complete things: use the right tools, know what "done" looks like, and seek help from colleaguesHabits for working well with others, and pursuing development as a social activity

Serious Cryptography: A Practical Introduction to Modern Encryption


Jean-Philippe Aumasson - 2017
    You’ll learn about authenticated encryption, secure randomness, hash functions, block ciphers, and public-key techniques such as RSA and elliptic curve cryptography.You’ll also learn: - Key concepts in cryptography, such as computational security, attacker models, and forward secrecy - The strengths and limitations of the TLS protocol behind HTTPS secure websites - Quantum computation and post-quantum cryptography - About various vulnerabilities by examining numerous code examples and use cases - How to choose the best algorithm or protocol and ask vendors the right questionsEach chapter includes a discussion of common implementation mistakes using real-world examples and details what could go wrong and how to avoid these pitfalls. Whether you’re a seasoned practitioner or a beginner looking to dive into the field, Serious Cryptography will provide a complete survey of modern encryption and its applications.

Blockchain Basics: A Non-Technical Introduction in 25 Steps


Daniel Drescher - 2017
    No mathematical formulas, program code, or computer science jargon are used.No previous knowledge in computer science, mathematics, programming, or cryptography is required. Terminology is explained through pictures, analogies, and metaphors.This book bridges the gap that exists between purely technical books about the blockchain and purely business-focused books. It does so by explaining both the technical concepts that make up the blockchain and their role in business-relevant applications.What You Will Learn: • What the blockchain is• Why it is needed and what problem it solves• Why there is so much excitement about the blockchain and its potential• Major components and their purpose• How various components of the blockchain work and interact• Limitations, why they exist, and what has been done to overcome them• Major application scenariosWho This Book Is For: Everyone who wants to get a general idea of what blockchain technology is, how it works, and how it will potentially change the financial system as we know it.

Digital Cash: The Unknown History of the Anarchists, Utopians, and Technologists Who Created Cryptocurrency


Finn Brunton - 2019
    In fact, it is only the best-known recent experiment in a long line of similar efforts going back to the 1970s. But the story behind cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin and its blockchain technology has largely been untold—until now. In Digital Cash, Finn Brunton reveals how technological utopians and political radicals created experimental money to bring about their visions of the future: protecting privacy or bringing down governments, preparing for apocalypse or launching a civilization of innovation and abundance that would make its creators immortal.The incredible story of the pioneers of cryptocurrency takes us from autonomous zones on the high seas to the world’s most valuable dump, from bank runs to idea coupons, from time travelers in a San Francisco bar to the pattern securing every twenty-dollar bill, and from marketplaces for dangerous secrets to a tank of frozen heads awaiting revival in the far future. Along the way, Digital Cash explores the hard questions and challenges that these innovators faced: How do we learn to trust and use different kinds of money? What makes digital objects valuable? How does currency prove itself as real to us? What would it take to make a digital equivalent to cash, something that could be created but not forged, exchanged but not copied, and which reveals nothing about its users?Filled with marvelous characters, stories, and ideas, Digital Cash is an engaging and accessible account of the strange origins and remarkable technologies behind today’s cryptocurrency explosion.

Hacking: The Art of Exploitation


Jon Erickson - 2003
    This book explains the technical aspects of hacking, including stack based overflows, heap based overflows, string exploits, return-into-libc, shellcode, and cryptographic attacks on 802.11b.

Invent Your Own Computer Games with Python


Al Sweigart - 2009
    The 3rd edition is now available for sale or download. * * * * "Invent Your Own Computer Games with Python" teaches you computer programming in the Python programming language. Each chapter gives you the complete source code for a new game and teaches the programming concepts from these examples. The book is available under a Creative Commons license and can be downloaded in full for free from http: //inventwithpython.com "Invent with Python" was written to be understandable by kids as young as 10 to 12 years old, although it is great for anyone of any age who has never programmed before. This second edition has revised and expanded content, including using the Pygame library to make games with graphics, animation, and sound.

Grokking Algorithms An Illustrated Guide For Programmers and Other Curious People


Aditya Y. Bhargava - 2015
    The algorithms you'll use most often as a programmer have already been discovered, tested, and proven. If you want to take a hard pass on Knuth's brilliant but impenetrable theories and the dense multi-page proofs you'll find in most textbooks, this is the book for you. This fully-illustrated and engaging guide makes it easy for you to learn how to use algorithms effectively in your own programs.Grokking Algorithms is a disarming take on a core computer science topic. In it, you'll learn how to apply common algorithms to the practical problems you face in day-to-day life as a programmer. You'll start with problems like sorting and searching. As you build up your skills in thinking algorithmically, you'll tackle more complex concerns such as data compression or artificial intelligence. Whether you're writing business software, video games, mobile apps, or system utilities, you'll learn algorithmic techniques for solving problems that you thought were out of your grasp. For example, you'll be able to:Write a spell checker using graph algorithmsUnderstand how data compression works using Huffman codingIdentify problems that take too long to solve with naive algorithms, and attack them with algorithms that give you an approximate answer insteadEach carefully-presented example includes helpful diagrams and fully-annotated code samples in Python. By the end of this book, you will know some of the most widely applicable algorithms as well as how and when to use them.

The Rust Programming Language


Steve Klabnik
    This is the undisputed go-to guide to Rust, written by two members of the Rust core team, with feedback and contributions from 42 members of the community. The book assumes that you’ve written code in another programming language but makes no assumptions about which one, meaning the material is accessible and useful to developers from a wide variety of programming backgrounds.Known by the Rust community as "The Book," The Rust Programming Language includes concept chapters, where you’ll learn about a particular aspect of Rust, and project chapters, where you’ll apply what you’ve learned so far to build small programs.The Book opens with a quick hands-on project to introduce the basics then explores key concepts in depth, such as ownership, the type system, error handling, and fearless concurrency. Next come detailed explanations of Rust-oriented perspectives on topics like pattern matching, iterators, and smart pointers, with concrete examples and exercises--taking you from theory to practice.The Rust Programming Language will show you how to: Grasp important concepts unique to Rust like ownership, borrowing, and lifetimes Use Cargo, Rust’s built-in package manager, to build and maintain your code, including downloading and building dependencies Effectively use Rust’s zero-cost abstractions and employ your ownYou’ll learn to develop reliable code that’s speed and memory efficient, while avoiding the infamous and arcane programming pitfalls common at the systems level. When you need to dive down into lower-level control, this guide will show you how without taking on the customary risk of crashes or security holes and without requiring you to learn the fine points of a fickle toolchain.You’ll also learn how to create command line programs, build single- and multithreaded web servers, and much more.The Rust Programming Language fully embraces Rust’s potential to empower its users. This friendly and approachable guide will help you build not only your knowledge of Rust but also your ability to program with confidence in a wider variety of domains.