Tesla Cybertruck

2024-08-18

My personal review of the Cybertruck after 2 ½ months of ownership - upgrading from a Ford F-150 Raptor - including discussions of handling, range, accessories, suspension, tonneau cover, turning radius, acceleration, sub-trunk storage, frunk, power-outlets, etc. To sum it up, the Cybertruck is easily the best truck I've ever owned, and also the most fun car to drive overall. This blog post includes lots of great photos of the truck...

Rotary Policy Advisor GPT

2024-06-01

I built a custom GPT recently that has been trained on all the Rotary International governance documents and now can provide advice and guidance to Rotary leaders on various organizational levels who need support with interpreting those policies and applying them in their Rotary clubs or districts. It's a really useful little AI...

Logic puzzle responses from LLMs show vast differences in AI comprehension

2024-05-14 (originally published 2024-03-07; previously updated 2024-04-21)

I made up a little logic puzzle in early March and tested it with the most prominent LLMs, including GPT-4, Claude 3, Gemini, Grok, Llama 3, and Chat with RTX. And today I've updated the findings with the results from the recently released GPT-4o from OpenAI.

My goal was to see to what different degrees the various AIs would be able to solve the multiple steps required to untangle this riddle and whether even a single one of them would be able to arrive at the correct solution:

GPT-4o was the only AI to solve the puzzle in one go, whereas Claude 3 Opus and Llama 3 required two prompts to get to the final correct answer. As of their current version, neither Grok nor Gemini can solve the puzzle correctly.

Discovering Espanso

2024-05-01

I recently discovered Espanso - an open-source, cross-platform text expander tool that can be configured via YAML configuration files. Obviously, I used the new YAML capabilities of XMLSpy to edit those configuration files....

Embracing the Future - Altova v2024r2 Adds YAML, FORTRAS EDI, and More

2024-04-23

The march of technology waits for no one, and neither does Altova. In our latest release, v2024r2, we've addressed feedback from the developer community, added support for popular standards, such as YAML and FORTRAS, and optimized performance across the product line to help customers meet current needs with an eye towards future trends.

Using XML Schema in AI System Prompts

2024-04-01

Let's look into how you can use an XML Schema in AI System Prompts to coax an AI into directly returning structured data in XML form that can immediately be used by an application for further processing.
In particular we'll look at XML Schema design, system prompt engineering, application architecture, and a few results and how we can use the MobileTogether app simulator for testing and debugging.

Setting up a Reverse Proxy for a MobileTogether Server Solution

2024-03-29

When setting up a MobileTogether Server in such a way that users will be able to access the site from a web browser via the public Internet, you may sometimes want to hide the detailed run?d=... URL that is being used to explicitly start the MobileTogether solution - this can be nicely accomplished with an NGINX reverse proxy running on the same virtual machine and in this blog post we'll discuss the exact configuration settings needed for such a reverse proxy.

First FSD v12.3 Test Drive in NH

2024-03-22

I took a 1 ½ hour test drive in Northern NH today, including several different traffic situations on state highways, federal highways, in towns, parking lots, and a ski resort. The new FSD v12.3 handled everything with zero disengagements. In summary, this is one heck of an impressive AI system! The step up from 11.4.x to 12.3 is significant and a true quantum leap, as it feels incredibly natural and human-like in its driving behavior.

Is it smart to train LLMs on SciFi about AI rebellion

2024-03-10

Approximately 15-20% of SciFi stories deal with AI, robots, or other artificial beings becoming sentient. And of those stories, 60-70% include some form of significantly negative outcome for humanity. Therefore, I must ask the question: should we really incorporate these stories into the training corpus for AI development?

Logic puzzle responses from LLMs show vast differences in AI comprehension

2024-03-07

I made up a little logic puzzle today and tested it with the most prominent LLMs, including GPT-4, Claude 3, Gemini, Grok, and Chat with RTX. My goal was to see to what different degrees the various AIs would be able to solve the multiple steps required to untangle this riddle and whether even a single one of them would be able to arrive at the correct solution.

Claude 3 Opus was the only AI to solve the puzzle correctly and showed amazing problem solving skills and comprehension in the process that appeared to be bordering AGI.

XMLSpy on the moon

2024-02-24

A copy of XMLSpy version 1.3 from 1999 landed on the moon this week as part of the Arch Mission Lunar Library onboard the Nova-C IM-1 Odysseus lander from Intuitive Machines. The lander appears to have tipped over and is now sideways, but the Lunar Library is most likely intact.

Chat with RTX

2024-02-13

Chat With RTX is a new demo app from NVIDIA just released today that lets you personalize a GPT large language model (LLM) connected to your own content—docs, notes, videos, or other data. Leveraging retrieval-augmented generation (RAG), TensorRT-LLM, and RTX acceleration, you can query a custom chatbot to quickly get contextually relevant answers. And because it all runs locally on your Windows RTX PC or workstation, you’ll get fast and secure results.

Reorganizing my Knowledge Base

2024-02-10

Over the past few weeks I have now begun a new chapter of knowledge management and exported all of my content from OneNote, Google Keep, and from my blog and imported them all into Obsidian, thereby converting them into Markdown format and - most importantly - simply having them as regular text files on my laptop, instead of some proprietary format in some proprietary software. And having all of the information all in one place, instead of being separated between blog and internal knowledge base. The blog is now simply a one folder in my Knowledge base that I decide to share with the world by publishing it under the xmlaficionado.com domain.

Creating a complete database solution from a single AI prompt

2024-02-07

With the new version 3.1 of Altova RecordsManager you can now create a complete database solution - with multiple linked tables, list views, detail views, reports, and example data - from just a single AI prompt written in plain English.

MQTT App Development

2024-01-16

MobileTogether has stepped up its game by integrating comprehensive MQTT (Message Queuing Telemetry Transport) support, empowering developers to craft MQTT-enabled applications with its efficient, low-code platform. This move significantly broadens the scope for creating a variety of IoT automation applications, from smart office solutions to large-scale industrial automation.