Communications of the ACM
The blog archive provides access to past blog postings from Communications of the ACM and other sources by date.
May 2020
From Schneier on Security
Friday Squid Blogging: Squid Can Edit Their Own Genomes
This is new news: Revealing yet another super-power in the skillful squid, scientists have discovered that squid massively edit their own genetic instructions not only within the nucleus of their neurons, but also within the…
From The Eponymous Pickle
A Virtual Innovation Challenge
My former employer puts on a challenge:
P&G Ventures Announces Procter & Gamble's First-Ever Virtual Innovation Challenge
CINCINNATI, May 21, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- P&G Ventures, the early-stage startup studio within P&G (NYSE:PG)…
From Daniel Lemire's Blog
Programming inside in a container
I have a small collection of servers, laptops and desktops. My servers were purchased and configured at different times. By design, they have different hardware and software configurations. I have processors from AMD, Intel,Continue…
From Computer Science Teacher - Thoughts and Information From Alfred Thompson
Am I Retired Now?
My last class of the school year just ended. My grades and report card comments are in the system. I am not going back to school in the fall. Am I retired now? I guess so. It feels weird as if there is no real closure. It doesn…
From Gödel's Lost Letter and P=NP
Math Tells
How to tell what part of math you are from Gerolamo Cardano is often credited with introducing the notion of complex numbers. In 1545, he wrote a book titled Ars Magna. He introduced us to numbers like in his quest to understand…
From The Eponymous Pickle
Another Take on the Search for Quantum Supremacy
This has come up a few times since last year with claims from major Tech. IEEE Spectrum looks at the supremacy claim again, intro below and more at the link. How do we measure real results on real problems of value?
How Many…
From The Eponymous Pickle
USAF Looks at Blockchain Database for Data Share
Novel approach with implications for supply chain applications as well as other sensor based input of data.
U.S. Air Force to pilot blockchain-based database for data sharing
The blockchain ledger will enable data ingest from legacy…
From The Eponymous Pickle
Deloitte Resilience Podcast
Overall have liked the Deloitte writings on corporate strategic responses and risk analysis.
Resilient podcast: How businesses can confront the COVID-19 crisis
Actionable insights to help businesses respond and recover
In this special…
From The Computing Community Consortium Blog
NSF DCL: Announcing the CIFellows 2020 Postdocs Project
The following is a letter to the community from Margaret Martonosi (Assistant Director) and Erwin Gianchandani (Deputy Assistant Director) of the National Science Foundation (NSF) Directorate of Computer & Information Science…
From The Eponymous Pickle
Better Bionic Eye
New imaging capabilities to improve eyesight.
New Bionic Eye Might See Better Than We Do
By Joel Hruska in Extremetech
The ability to restore sight to the blind is one of the most profound acts of healing medicine can achieve, in…
From insideHPC
NVIDIA Mellanox ConnectX-6 Lx SmartNIC Accelerates Cloud and Enterprise Workloads
Today NVIDIA launched the NVIDIA Mellanox ConnectX-6 Lx SmartNIC — a highly secure and efficient 25/50 gigabit per second (Gb/s) Ethernet smart network interface controller (SmartNIC) — to meet surging growth in enterprise and…
From The Eponymous Pickle
IBM Invests in Blockchain Network
More indications of the seriousness of the technology
IBM Takes 7% in Trade-Finance Blockchain Network We.Trade
IBM has become a shareholder in we.trade, the blockchain-based trade-finance platform jointly owned by 12 European
Ciaran…
From The Eponymous Pickle
How Significant is Climate on Coronavirus Transmission?
Considerable depth in this piece about the topic.
The Trillion-Dollar Question With COVID-19
How significant is climate on coronavirus transmission?
by Luke Shors and Michael Ferrari
Right now, India is completing more than a month…
From The Eponymous Pickle
Albertsons to Launch Virtual Assistant
Details of its use and depth will be of interest.
So far, Albertsons has implemented the Nuance virtual assistant and live chat at its Vons supermarkets in Southern California.
Russell Redman
With online grocery sales booming
Albertsons…
From insideHPC
Supercomputing Drug Screening for Deadly Heart Arrhythmias
Using XSEDE supercomputers, scientists have developed for the first time a way to screen drugs through their chemical structures for induced arrhythmias. Death from sudden cardiac arrest causes the most deaths by natural causes…
From Schneier on Security
Ann Mitchell, Bletchley Park Cryptanalyst, Dies
Obituary....
From The Eponymous Pickle
Surge of Secondary Brands
Speculation as to how surging demands for new and secondary brands will effect the market and the supply chain. And can be better controlled with digital strategies.
As secondary brands surge, CPG leaders need a digital playbook…
From The Eponymous Pickle
GE Bores Like an Earthworm
Novel kind of robotic task and environment, example of biomimicry.
GE’s soft robot bores holes like a giant earthworm by Brian Heater in TechCrunch
A giant earthworm robot was not on the list of things I expected to see when I
…
From insideHPC
Paperspace Joins NVIDIA DGX-Ready Software Program
Today AI cloud computing Paperspace announced Paperspace Gradient is certified under the new NVIDIA DGX-Ready Software program. The program offers proven solutions that complement NVIDIA DGX systems, including the new NVIDIA
…
From The Eponymous Pickle
Geometry Points to Drug Target Candidates
The fact that geomety and math are indicative of targets is intriguing . Points perhaps to similarity to folding problems, with huge combinatorics.
Geometry Points to Coronavirus Drug Target Candidates
Scientific American
Michael…
From Schneier on Security
Bart Gellman on Snowden
Bart Gellman's long-awaited (at least by me) book on Edward Snowden, Dark Mirror: Edward Snowden and the American Surveillance State, will finally be published in a couple of weeks. There is an adapted excerpt in the Atlantic…
From The Eponymous Pickle
Can AI tell Moral right from Wrong?
As suggested moral choices have much to do with context, and are hard to extract from just words. I like that changes over time are being considered. Time is often the most important metadata, and infers the trajectories
Scientists…
From The Eponymous Pickle
Masks as Apparel
The thought came to mind as I walked retail yesterday, made me shudder as I counted the mask wearers in the aisle. Gathering data. There seems to be no end in sight. As I tried to smile at a helpful employee. Masks are…
From The Eponymous Pickle
Google Knowledge Graphs, Knowledge Panels
Want to build from these basics. an introduction:
A reintroduction to our Knowledge Graph and knowledge panels
Danny Sullivan In Google Blog
Public Liaison for Search
Sometimes Google Search will show special boxes with information…
From The Computing Community Consortium Blog
CIFellows 2020 Application Guidelines Updated and May 26th Webinar
Last week the Computing Research Association (CRA) and Computing Community Consortium (CCC) announced the new Computing Innovation Fellows (CIFellows) Program for 2020. This program recognizes the significant disruption to the…
From Schneier on Security
Criminals and the Normalization of Masks
I was wondering about this: Masks that have made criminals stand apart long before bandanna-wearing robbers knocked over stagecoaches in the Old West and ski-masked bandits held up banks now allow them to blend in like concerned…
From The Eponymous Pickle
Like People, AI will also Fail.
A very nicely done, non-technical and usefully skeptical view of AI. Making the case that even if your AI solves a problem today, it is likely to fail tomorrow, when time and context drift and shift. Just like human problem
What…
From The Eponymous Pickle
Forestry System for Growth Prediction
Another example of my previous work in forestry. Would have been useful to manage harvesting schedules.
Researcher to Receive Top Global Forestry Award From Swedish King
Oregon State University News
by Steve Ludeberg
Oregon State…
From Computational Complexity
Obit for Richard Dudley
From The Computing Community Consortium Blog
CCC Embedded Security Workshop Report Released
The Computing Community Consortium (CCC) recently released the Leadership in Embedded Security workshop report. The workshop was organized by former CCC Council Member Kevin Fu (University of Michigan), Wayne Burleson (UMass…