Wisereads Vol. 120 — Google's Complete Guide to Nano Banana Pro, Francesca Hogi on unlocking your flirting superpowers, and more
Last week, we shared an exclusive preview from Joel J. Miller's The Idea Machine, his latest release tracing the history and impact of our favorite technology: the book. This week, we’re highlighting a new addition to the Standard Ebooks catalogue, a selection of Isaac Asimov’s collected short science fiction stories.
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Most highlighted Articles of the week
Effective harnesses for long-running agents
Justin Young of Anthropic explains how the Claude Agent SDK coordinates across limited context windows by dividing work between an initializer agent and coding agents. "Imagine a software project staffed by engineers working in shifts, where each new engineer arrives with no memory of what happened on the previous shift. Because context windows are limited, and because most complex projects cannot be completed within a single window, agents need a way to bridge the gap between coding sessions."
Writing a good CLAUDE.md
Your CLAUDE.md file is one of the highest-leverage configuration points of Claude Code, so developer Kyle Mistele recommends spending time to get it right. His tips include: "CLAUDE.md is for onboarding Claude into your codebase. It should define your project's WHY, WHAT, and HOW," and "Less (instructions) is more. While you shouldn't omit necessary instructions, you should include as few instructions as reasonably possible in the file."
Colleges Are Preparing to Self-Lobotomize
Michael Clune, professor at Ohio State University, warns that the skills students skip by using AI to speed through coursework are the very ones they'll need most in an AI-powered world. "Only by patiently learning to master a discipline do we gain the confidence and capacity to tackle new fields. Classroom discussions, coupled with long hours of closely studying difficult material, will help students acquire that magic key to the world of AI: asking a good question."
Most highlighted YouTube Video of the week
How to Unlock Your Flirting Superpowers | Francesca Hogi | TED
Curiosity, compliments, and playfulness are at the heart of love coach Francesca Hogi’s approach to flirting, which she reimagines as a form of everyday connection. "Your genuine smile can make someone's day... Lean into being the version of you who leaves other people with a smile on their face. And notice how much more magnetic you become."
Most highlighted Twitter Thread of the week
The Complete Guide to Nano Banana Pro: 10 Tips for Professional Asset Production
There’s a new image generation model on the scene that excels at rendering text, creating high-res images, and keeping characters consistent across frames. Learn how to get the most from your prompts with tips from the team at Google. "Nano-Banana Pro is a 'Thinking' model. It doesn't just match keywords; it understands intent, physics, and composition. To get the best results, stop using 'tag soups' (e.g., dog, park, 4k, realistic) and start acting like a Creative Director."
Most highlighted PDF of the week
The Path Of A Packet Through The Linux Kernel
Researchers from the Technical University of Munich trace a packet through the Linux kernel in a detailed technical paper aimed at helping developers debug and optimize performance. "Nowadays, almost everything is networked, from a personal computer to a fridge. Although networking is essential for modern computing, few know the complexity of getting a packet to and from a wire."
Hand-picked book of the week
Short Science Fiction
Before he penned I, Robot or Foundation, science fiction master Isaac Asimov got his start writing short stories. In this collection, newly added to the Standard Ebooks catalogue, readers can sample his signature style and dive into robots and the positronic brain, subjects Asimov returns to again and again.
"The planetary target was a huge one for an oxygen-water world. Though it lacked the size of the uninhabitable hydrogen-ammonia planets and its low density made its surface gravity fairly normal, its gravitational forces fell off but slowly with distance. In short, its gravitational potential was high and the ship’s Calculator was a run-of-the-mill model not designed to plot landing trajectories at that potential range. That meant the Pilot would have to use manual controls."
This edition of Asimov's Short Science Fiction is available through Standard Ebooks. Explore their collection of high quality, carefully formatted, and free public domain ebooks here.
Handpicked RSS feed of the week
Mind Candy
On his Substack, Mind Candy, D.A. DiGerolamo shares his favorite quotes, reads, and reflection questions for practical philosophers in bite-sized form. From An Authentic True Choice: "Meaning isn’t found on the podium. It isn’t defined by the medal around our neck or the title after our name. Meaning is written in the choices we make, in the moments we realize we are the ones defining our lives."