Semnoz by bike
On Monday, departing from Annecy-le-Vieux, I went up the Semnoz mountain (1699m) by bike, following the last part of the 20th stage of the next Tour de France. It was hard but the view at the summit was worth it.
Quantum Artificial Intelligence
It was announced earlier today that Google and NASA have formed a joint lab called “Quantum Artificial Intelligence Lab” to research machine learning applications of quantum computers provided by D-Wave. From the press release:
Researchers at Google, NASA and USRA expect to use the D-Wave system to develop applications for a broad range of complex problems such as machine learning, web search, speech recognition, planning and scheduling, search for exoplanets, and support operations in mission control centers.
Although Lockheed Martin recently decided to upgrade their D-Wave system (after testing an earlier version for 2 years), there is still some skepticism from Quantum Computing experts (for example, claims that the D-Wave implementation does not provide actual speedup compared to classical computing). In any case, exciting stuff…
Paris Rive Gauche
Paris Rive Gauche is the neighbourhood of Paris surrounding the National Library of France (BnF). The district is on the left bank of the Seine river and is bordered by the railway tracks of Gare d’Austerlitz and the Périphérique.
How to steal from a vending machine with a robot
It might be overkill but is clearly more refined than the old-school method:
The Singularity
It’s in the air!
Today’s Dilbert :
And SMBC :
GAMA (GIS & Agent-based Modelling Architecture)
The “GIS and Agent-Based Modeling” blog reports on GAMA, an open source GIS-ABM tool that looks quite interesting:
GAMA is a simulation platform, which aims at providing field experts, modelers, and computer scientists with a complete modeling and simulation development environment for building spatially explicit agent-based simulations. It is being developed by several French and Vietnamese research teams under the umbrella of the IRD/UPMC International Research Unit UMMISCO since 2007.
Vhils
When I took the pic above in the 13th arrondissement of Paris last Saturday, some dude who was passing by told me it was by an artist named Vhils and that I should look him up on the internet. So:
Weekend in the West: Poitiers & La Rochelle
Last weekend, I went on a trip to the west of France: Poitiers on Saturday and the port city of La Rochelle on Sunday. Above, the church of Notre-Dame-la-Grande in Poitiers.
Batch convert .mobi ebooks to .epub using Calibre
I got a Kobo Glo eBook reader some time ago. I find it quite awesome: With numerous public libraries in Paris and this device (together with sources of free books like FeedBooks, Baen Free Library or less authoritative sources), it is hard to think I will ever buy another physical book again.
Happy new year!
The photo above was taken on New Year’s eve inside the Madeleine Church. I had walked by the building a few times but I had never realized it was a church (since it looks like a Greek temple) so I entered to check it out. Inside, there was this modern-style nativity scene depicting Mary and Joseph watching a picture of baby Jesus on a flat screen TV. The faces of the white mannequins (an army of angels apparently) also change from time to time. Very strange and slightly creepy… It was designed by Gaëtan Duthu, a young French designer.