Communications of the ACM
The blog archive provides access to past blog postings from Communications of the ACM and other sources by date.
May 2016
From insideHPC
Sign Up for Ancilliary Events at ISC 2016
With ISC 2016 coming up in June, a number of ancillary events have been scheduled in Frankfurt to take advantage of this annual gathering of over 2500 supercomputing professionals. We've compiled a full listing for what looks…
From The Eponymous Pickle
Summary of Google AI Plans
In O'Reilly: Good summary of recent Google AI announcements and predictions, positive and negative.. With links to specifics. " ... Parsey McParseface + Google's AI plans ... Google's AI plans have made the news recently…
From The Eponymous Pickle
(Simple) Data Science in the Press
My colleague Kaiser Fung, in his Junkcharts Blog, on the use of dubious fractured statistics in the press. The NYT notably has created a 'data science' team. Considering the notion of the median vs the average in effectively…
From The Eponymous Pickle
Considering Data Science Workflow
Is not the same thing as workflow which is being targeted by data science to improve. This seems to be obvious, but forgotten. Data science is a set of experiments to determine if technology, existing or proposed, can be used…
From The Eponymous Pickle
Testing Amazon Echo from a Browser
Amazon has provided a way to directly test Echo skills and other capabilities from a browser with voice input. . Useful for testing capabilities directly without the device. Makes the browser operate like a Dot device. From …
From The Eponymous Pickle
Retailer to Use Tango for Augmented Reality
I recall a number of related applications for inserting architecture elements into a space. Augmenting reality by manipulating chosen insertions. How can this be made as easy as possible? Tango would provide space sensing…
From insideHPC
Podcast: CUDA Programming for GPUs
In this Programming Throwdown podcast, Mark Harris from Nvidia describes Cuda programming for GPUs. "CUDA is a parallel computing platform and programming model invented by NVIDIA. It enables dramatic increases in computing performance…
From insideHPC
XDMoD Tool to Measure Impact of Campus Cyberinfrastructure
Thanks to a grant from the National Science Foundation, Indiana University is developing an online service that will make it easier for university administrators to understand the importance of funding related to IT systems based…
From The Eponymous Pickle
Making Chatbots at Google
Kurzweil writing chatbots for Google. This can mean many things. But mimicking the conversation and leveraging of expertise like we do with humans, with contextual focusing and modeling, adapting and learning is a powerful…
From Gödel's Lost Letter and P=NP
Progress On Modular Computation
New results on computing with modular gates Shiteng Chen and Periklis Papakonstaninou have just written an interesting paper on modular computation. Its title, “Depth Reduction for Composites,” means converting a depth-, size…
From The Eponymous Pickle
Amazon Fresh Moves Forward
It was thought that Amazon could not provide fresh delivery and experience at scale. SpartanNash looks toward growth with Amazon partnershipSpartanNash has teamed with Amazon to distribute dry and chilled groceries for the online…
From The Eponymous Pickle
More Virtual Reality Consumer Engagement
Kellogg sponsors Captain America VR gameKellogg is capitalizing on the box office success of "Captain America: Civil War" by sponsoring a mobile virtual reality game. Loyalty program members who make purchases from partner outlets…
From Schneier on Security
Friday Squid Blogging: More Squids
This research paper shows that the number of squids, and the number of cephalopods in general, has been steadily increasing over the past 60 years: Our analyses revealed that cephalopod abundance has increased over the last six…
From Schneier on Security
Skein in FreeBSD
The Skein hash function is now part of FreeBSD....
From The Eponymous Pickle
Blockchain Disruption of Financial Services
How Blockchain Technology Will Disrupt Financial Services FirmsIn the second article of the series, “The Network Revolution: Creating Value through Platforms, People and Technology,” authors Barry Libert, Megan Beck and Jerry…
From The Eponymous Pickle
Elemence
Brought to my attention. Consulting for innovation, valued change. Adjacency.Who We AreThe premise for Elemence is that innovation is able to thrive when ideas are allowed to connect and recombine across traditional boundaries…
From The Eponymous Pickle
Critical Importance of Subject Matter Experts
Absolutely. I usually call it context understanding. And that understanding comes from having subject matter expertise close at hand. In Information Management. " .... "Know thy self, know thy enemy" says Sun Tzu in 'The…
From The Eponymous Pickle
When Wifi Finds You
In Sloan Review:" ... If WiFi can find you — instead of you trying to locate a signal for it — the result could be smarter homes, more efficient businesses, and password-free WiFi. According to researchers at MIT’s Computer Science…
From insideHPC
Video: Whither Hard Disk Archives?
In this video from the 2016 MSST Conference, Dave Anderson from Seagate presents: Whither Hard Disk Archives? The talk was part of a panel discussion on Data-intensive Workflows.
The post Video: Whither Hard Disk Archives? appeared…From insideHPC
Open-source vs. Proprietary – Keeping Ideology Out of the Equation
"One of the most recurrent themes is that of open-source vs. proprietary code. This debate is often painted with the idealistic open-source evangelists on one side, and the business-focused proprietary software advocates on the…
From insideHPC
Insilico Applies Deep Learning to Drug Discovery
"The world of artificial intelligence is rapidly evolving and affecting every aspect of our daily life. And soon this progress will be felt in the pharmaceutical industry. We set up the Pharma.AI division to help pharmaceutical…
From insideHPC
Vela Software Acquires Tecplot Fluid Dynamics Software
Today Vela Software announced that it has acquired Tecplot, a leading provider of fluid dynamics visualization and analysis software for engineers and scientists in the aerospace and oil & gas vertical markets.
The post VelainsideHPC…From The Eponymous Pickle
Google Launches Free Data Viz Tool
In CWorld:" ... Google is doubling down on its commitment to the business analytics market with the launch of a new free data visualization tool. The company has launched Data Studio, a free version of the data visualization…
From Computer Science Teacher - Thoughts and Information From Alfred Thompson
You’re the Variable
One of my big goals this year has been to make my classes more interactive. I want to get kids involved and not be just passive listeners. Surprisingly students seem resistant to participate. They like sitting back and pretending…
From Schneier on Security
The Unfalsifiability of Security Claims
Interesting research paper: Cormac Herley, "Unfalsifiability of security claims: There is an inherent asymmetry in computer security: things can be declared insecure by observation, but not the reverse. There is no observation…
From The Eponymous Pickle
Misunderstanding Positive Emotions
Misunderstanding Positive Emotion A Conversation With June Gruber" ... This work we've been doing in positive emotion and psychopathology has the potential to change the way we think about all kinds of emotions. I'm focusingThat's…
From Phys.org Technology News
Hang up: Dutch look at banning use of cellphones on bikes
The Dutch government is considering banning the country's millions of cyclists from using their cellphones while riding, saying pedaling and phones are a dangerous mix.
From U.S. Public Policy Committee of the ACM
NTIA Multistakeholder Meeting on Consumer Privacy and Facial Recognition on June 15
The U.S. National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) will convene a multistakeholder meeting on the commercial use of facial recognition technology on Wednesday, June 15, from 1-5 pm in Washington, DC. The…
From insideHPC
Video: Developing, Configuring, Building, and Deploying HPC Software
"The process of developing HPC software requires consideration of issues in software design as well as practices that support the collaborative writing of well-structured code that is easy to maintain, extend, and support. This…
From XRDS
Exascale computing: Why we need it and some of the challenges to conquer it.
Exascale computing, the ability of a computer system to perform a million trillion operations per second, has been long anticipated as the next major step in computer engineering. The unprecedented levels of computing power offered…