Four short links: 21 August 2013

Approximate Queries, Spreadsheet as Database, China Robot Plans, and Open Source Google App Engine

  1. blinkdbThe current version of BlinkDB supports a slightly constrained set of SQL-style declarative queries and provides approximate results for standard SQL aggregate queries, specifically queries involving COUNT, AVG, SUM and PERCENTILE and is being extended to support any User-Defined Functions (UDFs). Queries involving these operations can be annotated with either an error bound, or a time constraint, based on which the system selects an appropriate sample to operate on.
  2. sheetsee.js (github) — Javascript library that makes it easy to use a Google Spreadsheet as the database feeding the tables, charts and maps on a website. Once set up, any changes to the spreadsheet will auto-saved by Google and be live on your site when a visitor refreshes the page. (via Tom Armitage)
  3. China Plans to Become a Leader in Robotics (Quartz) — The ODCCC too funds high risk research initiatives through the Thousand Talent Project (TTP), a three-year term project with possible extension. The goal of the TTP is to recruit thousands of foreign researchers with strong expertise in hardware and software to help develop innovation in China. There are already more than 100 foreign researchers working in China since 2008, the year TTP started.
  4. AppScale (GitHub) — open source implementation of Google App Engine.
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