Interesting Stuff

I was surprised to discover that less than 2 miles from my house is a shop called the Giant Robot Store! Unfortunately, they seem to sell only comic books and Japanese action figures. Oh, well. I think I’m gonna try getting into another FIRST program here… it looks like the Lego League actually focuses on autonomous robots, which could be pretty great. In case you haven’t heard of them, The Bobs are a pretty fun a cappella group, who inspired the title of this post.

I read an article the other day about Chrysalis, a company that helps the homeless find jobs. They believe that many homeless people want jobs, but cannot get them because they have no home address (which they can’t afford without a job…). Chrysalis finds them a local, unskilled job (and gives the employing company a guarantee that they will have a worker). I believe that many of the people seen on the streets advertising local restaurants and businesses with large signs are employed through Chrysalis. According to their website, people who go through their program really change their lives. They operate throughout the western LA area. I think I might print out some “business” cards about Chrysalis to give to the people on the street who ask me for money.

Finally, I’ve mentioned tries to several different people (it’s a data structure that’s kind of like a cross between a tree and a hash table). If you’re interested in learning more about them, here is the first paper I read about them. It’s not the original trie paper, but it’s a pretty good overview, if you overlook the fact that this person doesn’t really know English. On a semi-related note, here’s the original paper on V-Lists, which are like a cross between a linked list and an array.