The Ability Hacks is the story of two Microsoft hackathon teams, one in the summer of 2014 and one the following summer of 2015. The first would pioneer new software to revolutionize the mobility of tens of thousands of people who live with severe paralysis caused by ALS, Parkinson's, cerebral palsy and traumatic neurological injuries. The second team would pioneer software to help kids with dyslexia read and love learning for the first time in their lives. This is the story of two small groups of driven, focused and passionate software engineers, program managers, marketers and advocates. It's the story of realizing the transformative power of technology for people with disabilities, not just for traditional consumer and industrial markets. It's the story of doing something truly great -- improving outcomes for everyone, discovering a design ethos and blazing a new trail for accessibility. Read more:More than one billion people around the world live with a disability of some kind, and it's estimated two-thirds of us know someone with a disability. Almost everyone will be temporarily or permanently impaired at some point in life, and those who survive to old age will experience increasing difficulties in functioning, according to the World Health Organization. This book explores an optimistic belief that computer software and hardware can empower people with disabilities in a multitude of scenarios. As one engineer interviewed for The Ability Hacks said, "It's not about the technology. It's about the people."

Originally published in Australia by New Frontier Publishing in 2008.

With 90 detailed hacks, expert web developers Jesse Cravens and Jeff Burtoft demonstrate intriguing uses of HTML5-related technologies. Each recipe provides a clear explanation, screenshots, and complete code examples for specifications that include Canvas, SVG, CSS3, multimedia, data storage, web workers, WebSockets, and geolocation. You’ll also find hacks for HTML5 markup elements and attributes that will give you a solid foundation for creative recipes that follow. The last chapter walks you through everything you need to know to get your HTML5 app off the ground, from Node.js to deploying your server to the cloud. Here are just a few of the hacks you’ll find in this book: Make iOS-style card flips with CSS transforms and transitions Replace the background of your video with the Canvas tag Use Canvas to create high-res Retina Display-ready media Make elements on your page user-customizable with editable content Cache media resources locally with the filesystem API Reverse-geocode the location of your web app user Process image data with pixel manipulation in a dedicated web worker Push notifications to the browser with Server-Sent Events

If you want your startup to succeed, you need to understand why startups fail. “Whether you’re a first-time founder or looking to bring innovation into a corporate environment, Why Startups Fail is essential reading.”—Eric Ries, founder and CEO, LTSE, and New York Times bestselling author of The Lean Startup and The Startup Way Why do startups fail? That question caught Harvard Business School professor Tom Eisenmann by surprise when he realized he couldn’t answer it. So he launched a multiyear research project to find out. In Why Startups Fail, Eisenmann reveals his findings: six distinct patterns that account for the vast majority of startup failures. • Bad Bedfellows. Startup success is thought to rest largely on the founder’s talents and instincts. But the wrong team, investors, or partners can sink a venture just as quickly. • False Starts. In following the oft-cited advice to “fail fast” and to “launch before you’re ready,” founders risk wasting time and capital on the wrong solutions. • False Promises. Success with early adopters can be misleading and give founders unwarranted confidence to expand. • Speed Traps. Despite the pressure to “get big fast,” hypergrowth can spell disaster for even the most promising ventures. • Help Wanted. Rapidly scaling startups need lots of capital and talent, but they can make mistakes that leave them suddenly in short supply of both. • Cascading Miracles. Silicon Valley exhorts entrepreneurs to dream big. But the bigger the vision, the more things that can go wrong. Drawing on fascinating stories of ventures that failed to fulfill their early promise—from a home-furnishings retailer to a concierge dog-walking service, from a dating app to the inventor of a sophisticated social robot, from a fashion brand to a startup deploying a vast network of charging stations for electric vehicles—Eisenmann offers frameworks for detecting when a venture is vulnerable to these patterns, along with a wealth of strategies and tactics for avoiding them. A must-read for founders at any stage of their entrepreneurial journey, Why Startups Fail is not merely a guide to preventing failure but also a roadmap charting the path to startup success.

Keith Barry is the world's leading TV Hypnotist, Mentalist And Brain Hacker. He has mastered the unique ability to hack into people's minds and rewire their subconscious. In this groundbreaking book, Keith reveals how, over the course of his astonishing career, he has developed a variety of techniques that will help you to cultivate a 'magical mindset' and develop mental toughness subconsciously. These are the very techniques he uses every day to achieve the life of his dreams. If you feel you are stuck in a rut or need help in life – whether that's with your career, your finances, your personal life or anything else – this book will help you to move forward. When you master these methods, you too will discover that anything is possible when you put your mind to it!

Inside the life of a hacker and cybercrime culture. Public discourse, from pop culture to political rhetoric, portrays hackers as deceptive, digital villains. But what do we actually know about them? In Hacked, Kevin F. Steinmetz explores what it means to be a hacker and the nuances of hacker culture. Through extensive interviews with hackers, observations of hacker communities, and analyses of hacker cultural products, Steinmetz demystifies the figure of the hacker and situates the practice of hacking within the larger political and economic structures of capitalism, crime, and control.This captivating book challenges many of the common narratives of hackers, suggesting that not all forms of hacking are criminal and, contrary to popular opinion, the broader hacker community actually plays a vital role in our information economy. Hacked thus explores how governments, corporations, and other institutions attempt to manage hacker culture through the creation of ideologies and laws that protect powerful economic interests. Not content to simply critique the situation, Steinmetz ends his work by providing actionable policy recommendations that aim to redirect the focus from the individual to corporations, governments, and broader social issues. A compelling study, Hacked helps us understand not just the figure of the hacker, but also digital crime and social control in our high-tech society.

Want to take real control of your Mac? The hacks in this book help you dig below the surface to tweak system preferences, mount drives and devices, and generally do things with your system that Apple doesn’t expect you to do. With a little effort, you can make your Mac and its applications perform exactly the way you want them to. There are more than 50 hacks in this book that show you how to fine-tune the interface, work with multimedia, set up your network, boost security, and perform a few tricks with Unix. Go beyond Preferences: change the way OS X Mountain Lion behaves Customize your experience by taming browsers and making apps full screen Get information delivered right to your desktop, and automate mundane tasks Use the command line and install various Unix apps to unlock your Mac’s Unix power Increase security, monitor network traffic, and remain anonymous Play Wii games and host a Minecraft server on your Mac Modify your WiFi, move iTunes, and record TV shows Turn your MacBook into a tablet and give it a custom dye job