Well, I’ve been doing a poor job of updating in the last couple of weeks. I guess we all get into slow periods.

Lately I’ve been geeking out with computers and math-type stuff. I recently finished re-reading Code, by Charles Petzold. If you want to understand how a computer works, from the ground up, this is the book for you. It starts out talking about codes: Morse code, Braille, binary code. Then it discusses how electricity works, and how telegraphs work, and how flashlights work. (The flashlight is actually a distant ancestor of the computer, as the book explains.) Then it goes into logic, and logic gates, and up and up, through simple calculations, and how computers “remember” things, and machine language, and assembly language, and high-level language, and monitors and keyboards and mice and the internet.

It starts with very simple concepts and gradually works its way up in complexity. Some parts of the book are rather hairy, but once it’s done, you really understand what a computer is doing when it’s on. (And when it’s off, for that matter.)

It’s a terrific book and I highly recommend it if you’re at all interested in this stuff.