Hello fellow developer, a look at global tech issues, a deep dive into code assistants, and a great video about what the xz incident means for NPM security
Hello fellow developer, this time we look at some global tech issues, take a deep dive into code assistants, we have a great video about NPM security and want you to tell us your favourite code questions to use in CODE100.
Some tech news from Google: The V8 sandbox should protect Chrome users better, Jpegli is a new JPEG coding library, CodeGemma is a trained model for code LLMs and Google Gemini Code Assist should take on GitHub Copilot. More on that in the code section below.
Weird code things…
This npm package has ~700k installs, 322 packages depend on it and it racks up around 50k weekly downloads. And the code does - nothing, The reason? It is named - and if you have a typo in your npm install command, it gets pulled instead of the thing you wanted. So, npm i -g foo would globally install foo, whereas npm i - g foo would install the mystery package. Other tricky package names on npm are i, g,install and s. So let's make sure we don't add spaces where they shouldn't be.
Code and Tools
CODE100 puzzle: Unknown pleasures
To celebrate CODE100 coming to Manchester, here is our take on the classic Unknown Pleasures by Joy Division cover. In this challenge we ask you to return the amount of black or transparent pixels in the image and return it as an integer. You get the pixel data as a JSON object.
With Google releasing Gemini Code Assist, let's look at some articles and resources around AI code helpers.
Am I in The Stack? - enter your GitHub user name and see which of your code has been indexed to be used by Copilot.
Hear from Feross Aboukhadijeh of Socket about the xz backdoor kerfuffle, how we can protect against attacks, and the importance of developer responsibility in open source security. Watch it on WeAreDevelopers.
More videos:
Lachlan Miller has a great 10 minute explanation on how Vite works
WeAreDevelopers and REWE are joining forces to bring you Rethink Retail, the first of its kind retail hackathon in Vienna. Spanning over two days, we will welcome 15 development teams to take part, with the unique chance to shape the next chapter of the retail sector. Your participation in Rethink Retail is an invitation to contribute with innovative ideas and bring your creative developments to life.
You could be the winner of our appealing prizes at Rethink Retail: 1st prize: €5k, half of it in cash and half of it in REWE Group vouchers. 2nd and 3rd prize: €3k and €1k, half of it in cash and half of it in vouchers. Sustainability Prize: €1k cash
In addition, seize the chance to win tickets for the WeAreDevelopers World Congress 2024 in Berlin. Gather with us for Rethink Retail, an event where the local developer community comes together at the intersection of technology and retail excellence.
