sohkamyung

sohkamyung, 1 month ago to Japan

"Tourists to Japan from Singapore and seven other Asian countries will soon find it easier to pay for their purchases using their local QR code wallets under a new joint payment scheme.
[...]
The countries are Singapore (SGQR), Malaysia (DuitNow QR), Indonesia (QRIS), the Philippines (QRPh), Thailand (Thai QR Payment), Cambodia (KHQR), Vietnam (VietQR) and India (BharatQR)."

https://www.straitstimes.com/asia/east-asia/japan-aims-to-launch-joint-qr-code-payment-system-with-asian-countries-including-s-pore-by-april-2025

#QRCodes #PaymentSystems #Japan #Singapore #Malaysia #SEAsia #India

sohkamyung, 10 months ago to vim

RIP. :-(

"Dear all,

It is with a heavy heart that we have to inform you that Bram Moolenaar passed away on 3 August 2023.

Bram was suffering from a medical condition that progressed quickly over the last few weeks.

Bram dedicated a large part of his life to VIM and he was very proud of the VIM community that you are all part of."

https://groups.google.com/g/vim_announce/c/tWahca9zkt4

Via Hacker News [ https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37011324 ]

#Editors #VIM

sohkamyung, 1 month ago to nature

"The insect world is full of species of parasitic wasps that spend their infancy eating other insects alive. And for reasons that scientists don’t fully understand, they have repeatedly adopted and tamed wild, disease-causing viruses and turned them into biological weapons. Half a dozen examples already are described, and new research hints at many more."

https://knowablemagazine.org/content/article/living-world/2024/parasitoid-wasps-domesticate-viruses

#Nature #Biology #Wasps #Parasitoids #Viruses #Evolution

sohkamyung, 8 months ago to books

Such wonderful timing. A memoir by Katalin Karikó, who just won the Nobel Prize, to be out soon.

"Breaking Through isn’t just the story of an extraordinary woman. It’s an indictment of closed-minded thinking and a testament to one woman’s commitment to laboring intensely in obscurity [...] because she believed her work would save lives."

https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/706251/breaking-through-by-katalin-kariko/

#Books #Memoirs #NobelPrize2023 #Medicine #messengerRNA

sohkamyung, 11 months ago to Malaysia

It may be older than Borobudur (8th century) in Indonesia and Angkor Wat (12th century) in Cambodia.

"A retired researcher who discovered the oldest dated evidence in Bujang Valley is calling for young archaeologists to continue his mission and uncover the true extent of this ancient civilisation."

https://www.channelnewsasia.com/asia/malaysia-kedah-oldest-civilisation-bujang-valley-archeology-history-3589106

#Malaysia #Archeology #Civilisations #Artifacts

sohkamyung, 1 year ago to random

"After four generations of modular smartphones, Fairphone is turning its repairable design smarts to headphones. Meet the Fairbuds XL, a €249 (£219) pair of over-ear wireless noise-canceling headphones that are designed to be easy to repair when parts break or wear out over time. They’re available from today in European markets, but much like Fairphone’s existing smartphones, they won’t be sold in the US."

https://www.theverge.com/2023/5/11/23718030/fairphone-fairbuds-xl-price-release-date-specs-features-repairable

#Headphones #Repairable #Hardware

sohkamyung, 10 months ago to books

I suppose no time better than the present, on Singapore's Independence Day. I've put up a website for my book, magazine and on-line fiction reviews. It currently covers what I've read from the present back to 2019, with further back-dated reviews (my Goodreads reviews) to be added from time to time.

The reviews are simple markdown formatted text files. They are hosted on Github with Github Pages being used to generate the final HTML files.

https://sohkamyung.github.io/reviews/README.html

#Reviews #Books #Stories

sohkamyung, 10 months ago to Malaysia

"KUALA LUMPUR: Malaysia has issued a licence to Starlink, the satellite communications service started by Elon Musk, to provide internet services in the country, particularly in remote areas, its communications minister said on Thursday (Jul 20)."

https://www.channelnewsasia.com/asia/malaysia-issue-licence-elon-musk-internet-services-3642761

#Malaysia #Starlink #Comunications #Networks #Connectivity #Telecommunications

sohkamyung, 9 months ago to random

Cool.

"An online library of over 1000 classic short stories. Read and download history’s best."

https://www.libraryofshortstories.com/

@libreture

sohkamyung, 5 months ago to Cosmology

The distances involved are still mind-boggling. By @startswithabang

"What if we shrunk everything down, however, so that the Sun were merely the size of a single grain of sand? From our Solar System to stars in the Universe to galaxies and more, here's what the cosmic story would look like if everything were shrunk down billions of times in scale."

https://bigthink.com/start
s-with-a-bang/sun-grain-of-sand/

#Cosmology #Astronomy #Space

sohkamyung, 6 months ago to singapore

"SINGAPORE - It takes, on average, $20,000 over five years to get a child from a disadvantaged background to be on an equal footing with his more well-off peers.
[...]
This investment is likely to bear fruit later on, with a $136,000 boost in these children’s earning power over the 45 years they are likely to be in the workforce."

https://www.straitstimes.com/singapore/investing-in-disadvantaged-young-children-could-pay-off-sevenfold-in-the-future-study-on-circle-of-care-programme

#Singapore #Society #Disadvantage #Education #Development

sohkamyung, 6 months ago to Birds

A long and nice post on observing this pair of birds raising chicks over several seasons in Singapore.

"This pair of birds are so happy with this situation that they came back repeatedly and to this date, has successfully raised 5 chicks in total. In this post, I note the interesting events and observations throughout the breeding season."

https://besgroup.org/2023/11/24/spotted-neck-dove-reproductive-history/

#Birds #Doves #Singapore #NaturalHistory #Observations

sohkamyung, 1 month ago to technology

"Atomic clocks are usually either ultra-precise or sturdy, but not both. Now, scientists have created a precise clock that, when put through its paces aboard a naval ship, wavered by only 300-trillionths of a second per day."

https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-024-01166-6

#Clocks #TimeKeeping #AtomicClocks #Technology

sohkamyung, 8 months ago to singapore

Ugh. Today's air quality map shows fire hot spots. Forecast is for hazy conditions.

#Singapore #Malaysia #Indonesia #Haze #AirQuality

sohkamyung, 6 months ago to random

By @startswithabang

"Although Roger Penrose won the Nobel Prize in physics just a few years ago for demonstrating how black holes come to exist in our Universe, singularities and all, the subject isn't closed. We've never peered beneath the event horizon, and have no way of detecting what's inside. Using a powerful mathematical argument, [Roy] Kerr argues that singularities shouldn't physically exist. He may be right."

https://bigthink.com/starts-with-a-bang/singularities-dont-exist-roy-kerr/

#BlackHoles #Singularities

@gregeganSF

sohkamyung, 7 months ago to worldwithoutus

"To heighten their colour, the rhizomes from which the spice [tumeric] is extracted are routinely dusted with lead chromate, a neurotoxin. The practice helps explain why South Asia has the highest rates of lead poisoning in the world.[...] Yet it turns out that with clever policies, enlightened leadership and astute messaging this blight can be greatly reduced. Bangladesh has shown how."

https://www.economist.com/leaders/2023/11/02/how-to-stop-turmeric-from-killing-people

#Culture #Toxins #Lead #Spices #Tumeric #SouthAsia

sohkamyung, 3 months ago to eink

After reading the review of the Onyx BOOX Poke3 by @KelsonV I had a look at the BOOX range and ordered the BOOX Page. Here it is, on the right, next to my Kobo Clara HD.

So far, it has been good. I've installed the Android versions of Libby, Pocket and, yes, Firefox and they work fine. I've adjusted the E Ink refresh rates and button settings for the apps to work correctly.

Now on to more reading. 🙂

#EReaders #Kobo #ClaraHD #Onxy #Boox #BooxPage #EInk

sohkamyung, 8 months ago to singapore

"Using photography to document indigenous people of Malaya afflicted by diseases, the young doctor would go on to amass a collection of almost 40,000 photos, 400 audio recordings and 25 hours of film footage from around South-east Asia.

The work also captured various facets of Singapore in its nascent years before and after Independence."

https://www.straitstimes.com/multimedia/graphics/2023/09/ivan-polunin-singapore/index.html

#Singapore #Malaya #History #Society #Culture #Images

sohkamyung, 3 months ago to physics

Cool. Positronium 'atoms' are made up of an electron and a positron.

"Researchers are [...] actively seeking tricks to make sources of positronium atoms that live longer. In a paper published today in the journal Physical Review A, the AEgIS collaboration at CERN describes a new way of making long-lived positronium."

https://home.cern/news/news/physics/aegis-makes-positronium-antimatter-gravity-experiments

#Physics #Particles #Positronium #Electrons #Positrons

@johncarlosbaez @gregeganSF

sohkamyung, 5 months ago to singapore

A document prepared by various Singapore organizations to guide action to preserve the Critically Endangered Straw-headed Bulbul (Pycnonotus zeylanicus).

"This body of work by the SHBWG [Straw-headed Bulbul Working Group] will guide local conservation actions in the years ahead that will benefit both the Straw-headed Bulbul and other local biodiversity."

PDF link: https://www.nparks.gov.sg/-/media/shb-sap-final.ashx

#Singapore #Documents #Nature #Biodiversity #Conservation #Birds

sohkamyung, 4 months ago to ArtificialIntelligence

"Today we have released a series of rare and never-before-seen images of Colossus, in celebration of the 80th anniversary of the code-breaking computer that played a pivotal role in the Second World War effort.
[…]
The release of these images sheds new light on the genesis and workings of Colossus, which was over two metres tall and considered by many to be the first ever digital computer."

#Computers #ComputerHistory #Colossus #History

https://www.gchq.gov.uk/news/colossus-80

sohkamyung, 9 months ago to singapore

"SINGAPORE: A new reef restoration initiative to plant 100,000 corals in Singapore’s waters is “an ambitious project” that the country has taken towards marine conservation, said coral reef biologist Karenne Tun.

The corals will be progressively planted and grown in the nation’s waters from 2024 to bolster biodiversity and improve the resilience of coral communities and reefs."

https://www.channelnewsasia.com/singapore/restoring-coral-reefs-marine-conservation-singapore-global-warming-human-activities-3737916

#Singapore #Nature #Marine #Biodiversity #CoralReefs

sohkamyung, 5 months ago to singapore

"SINGAPORE: By the end of the century, Singapore could experience more weather extremes under a worst-case climate change scenario, with more frequent very hot days, more extreme daily rainfall as well as longer and more frequent dry spells."

https://www.channelnewsasia.com/singapore/very-hot-days-nights-climate-change-singapore-study-end-century-4020401

Climate projections at [ https://www.mss-int.sg/V3-climate-projections/ ].

#Singapore #ClimateChange #Temperature #Rainfall #Humidity #Projections

gregeganSF, 5 months ago to random

Wireless keyboards shouldn’t need to be charged, they should just power themselves by trapping and metabolising spilt crumbs.

sohkamyung, 5 months ago to macrophotography

Lots of amazing macro shots. By Nicky Bay.

"2023 went by in a flash, but not without a bang. I managed to document lots of amazing lifers and did field trips in Borneo and Thailand as well."

https://www.nickybay.com/macro-highlights-the-best-of-2023/

#NickyBay #MacroPhotography #Nature #Photography