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NeB : 7 years and now an iPad App

Published December 31, 2010 by lieven

Exactly 7 years ago I wrote my first post. This blog wasn’t called NeB yet and it used pMachine, a then free blogging tool (later transformed into expression engine), rather than WordPress.

Over the years NeB survived three hardware-upgrades of ‘the Matrix’ (the webserver hosting it), more themes than I care to remember, and a couple of dramatic closure announcements…

But then we’re still here, soldiering on, still uncertain whether there’s a point to it, but grateful for tiny tokens of appreciation.

Such as this morning’s story: Chandan deemed it necessary to correct two spelling mistakes in a 2 year old Fun-math post on Weil and the Riemann hypothesis (also reposted on Neb here). Often there’s a story behind such sudden comments, and a quick check of MathOverflow revealed this answer and the comments following it.

I thank Ed Dean for linking to the Fun-post, Chandan for correcting the misspellings and Georges for the kind words. I agree with Georges that a cut&copy of a blogpost-quoted text does not require a link to that post (though it is always much appreciated). It is rewarding to see such old posts getting a second chance…

Above the Google Analytics graph of the visitors coming here via a mobile device (at most 5 on a good day…). Anticipating much more iPads around after tonights presents-session I’ve made NeB more accessible for iPods, iPhones, iPads and other mobile devices.

The first time you get here via your Mac-device of choice you’ll be given the option of saving NeB as an App. It has its own icon (lowest row middle, also the favicon of NeB) and flashy start-up screen.

Of course, the whole point trying to make NeB more readable for Mobile users you get an overview of the latest posts together with links to categories and tags and the number of comments. Sliding through you can read the post, optimized for the device.

I do hope you will use the two buttons at the end of each post, the first to share or save it and the second to leave a comment.

I wish you all a lot of mathematical (and other) fun in 2011 :: lieven.

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Lists 2010 : StackExchange sites

Published December 27, 2010 by lieven

One of the trends of 2010 was the proliferation of StackExchange sites. I guess by now most of us visit MathOverflow along with the arXiv daily. But, there are plenty of other StackExchange sites around that may be of interest to the mathematics-community :

Mathematics somewhat less high-brow than MathO.
Physics still in the beta-phase (see below)
Theoretical computer science
TeX for TeX and LaTeX-lovers
iPad 4 edu for those who want to use their iPad in the classroom
etc. etc.

“Opening a StackExchange site is damn hard. First you have to find at least 60 people interested in the site. Then, when this limit is reached, a large amount of people (in the hundreds, but it really depends on the reputation of each participant) must commit and promise to create momentum for the site, adding questions and answers. When this amount is reached, the site is open and stays in closed beta for seven days. During this time, the committers have to enrich the site so that the public beta (which starts after the first seven days) gets enough hits and participants to show a self-sustained community.” (quote from ForTheScience’s StackExchange sites proliferation, this post also contains a list of StackExchange-projects in almost every corner of Life)

The site keeping you up to date with StackExchange proposals and their progress is area51. Perhaps, you want to commit to some of these proposals

or simply browse around area51 until you find the ideal community for you to belong to…

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Lists 2010 : MathOverflow bookmarks

Published December 26, 2010 by lieven

A few MathOverflow threads I bookmarked in 2010 for various reasons.

Honest answer : Applications of algebraic geometry over a field with one element. James Borger’s answer : “I’m confident that the answer to the original question is no. There are hardly any theorems at all in the subject, much less ones with external applications! In other words, if no further progress is ever made in any of the directions people have pursued, everything will likely be forgotten”
Unknown result (at least to me) : Irreducibility of polynomials in two variables. Graham Leuschke’s “all-time leading candidate for Most Preposterous Theorem Ever”, proved using the classification of the finite simple groups.
Should know example (but don’t) : Algebra A with Spec(A) reduced and Rep_n(A) non-reduced. Algebras being commutative here and even the existence of an example with Spec(A) is smooth is open. Peter Samuelson : ” My guess would be yes for both, but I’m not sure how to find one for either one.”
Great list : The Frobenius morphism. David Ben-Zvi’s “outdated collection of intuitive ways to think about raising to the p-th power”.
Overrated answer : who fixed the topology on ideles?. John Tate’s answer “When I wrote my thesis I used what seemed to me to be the obvious topology without going into the history of the matter.” got 73 votes…
Langlands for dummies : What is the L-function version of quadratic reciprocity?. Sometimes working through the easiest non-trivial example gives more insight than several survey papers.

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Category: web

NeB : 7 years and now an iPad App

Lists 2010 : StackExchange sites

Lists 2010 : MathOverflow bookmarks