Communications of the ACM
The blog archive provides access to past blog postings from Communications of the ACM and other sources by date.
June 2012
From Wild WebMink
Can the DPL Work?
What is patents could be de-weaponized? That’s the goal of the new Defensive Patent License, released this week by law professor (and former EFF lawyer) Jason Schultz. My article for InfoWorld this week looks at the background…
From Gödel's Lost Letter and P=NP
Why The Hartmanis-Stearns Conjecture Is Still Open
A missed? or forgotten? connection from 1976 Richard Brent is an illustrious Australian mathematician and computer scientist. He is known for Brent’s Theorem, which shows that a parallel algorithm can always be adapted to run…
From The Eponymous Pickle
Can Cloud Interdependenices Cause Meltdowns?
A piece of research that suggests that over leveraged cloud services could cause service meltdowns. he suggest that these interdependencies are still little understood.
From Schneier on Security
Rare Rational Comment on al Qaeda's Capabilities
From "CNN national security analyst" Peter Bergen:
Few Americans harbor irrational fears about being killed by a lightning bolt. Abu Yahya al-Libi's death on Monday should remind them that fear of al Qaeda in its present state…From The Computing Community Consortium Blog
ACM Webcasting Turing Centenary Celebration Today, Saturday
The Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) is holding its A.M. Turing Centenary Celebration in San Francisco, CA, today and Saturday — marking the 100th anniversary of Alan Turing’s birth by bringing together 33 living Turing…
From Putting People First
Participatory design in action at Experientia
As a people-centred design company, Experientia
From Putting People First
Book: Connected Health
Connected Health: How mobile phones, cloud, and big data will reinvent healthcare by Jody Ranck, DrPH GigaOm Books, June 2012 170 pages [Amazon Kindle edition] Abstract Our current healthcare system is in need of a radical reinvention…
From The Eponymous Pickle
Designing Dashboards
Good overview about the process. Simple focused and uncluttered. " ... It
From The Eponymous Pickle
Live Online Tomorrow: Turing Celebration
From The Eponymous Pickle
Boom for Online Workers
MJ Perry reports. Increasingly, suppliers of remote online expertise are gaining acceptance. Expect this to continue as the Cloud increases its resources.
From The Eponymous Pickle
Eye Tracking Research for Food Labeling
Fairly obvious. But worth reviewing for understanding how shoppers interact with labeling. Shoppers also interact with labels differently according to the store and shelf context.
From The Eponymous Pickle
Dad's Influencing Shopping More
Dad's increase their influence on shopping, according to recent study. " ... with 52% reporting being the household's primary grocery shopper, according to the 2012 Cone Communications Year of the Dad Trend Tracker. The survey…
From The Computing Community Consortium Blog
OMB, OSTP Specify Priorities for FY 2014
Around this time every year, the White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB) and Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) typically issue a joint guidance memo to Federal agencies describing the Administration’s R&D…
From Schneier on Security
Cheating in Online Classes
Interesting article:
In the case of that student, the professor in the course had tried to prevent cheating by using a testing system that pulled questions at random from a bank of possibilities. The online tests could be taken…From The Eponymous Pickle
Spotfire Adds Hadoop and iPad Support
In a further nod to the sexiness of big data and mobile tablets, Tibco's Spotfire analytics and visualization tool has added a number of new capabilities. Spotfire has, over the years, drawn the attention of many enterprises…
From Computational Complexity
Do 50-1 longshots in the Kentucky Derby ever come in?
(I delayed posting this until after The Belmont Stakes since I wanted to see if there would be a Triple Crown winner.Alas, I'll have another was scratched. From what I've heard it was the right decision.)Watching the Kentucky…
From The Computing Community Consortium Blog
Live Webcast: Launching the US Ignite Broadband Initiative
As we described in this space yesterday, this morning at an event at the White House,
From Schneier on Security
Cyberwar Treaties
We're in the early years of a cyberwar arms race. It's expensive, it's destabilizing, and it threatens the very fabric of the Internet we use every day. Cyberwar treaties, as imperfect as they might be, are the only way to contain…
From Computer Science Teacher - Thoughts and Information From Alfred Thompson
Microsoft Store Summer Camps are Now Open for Registration!
Microsoft Store Summer Camps are Now Open for Registration!
Our 2012 Summer Camps are first come, first served. Don't wait to register your child for one of these four hands-on camps…From The Female Perspective of Computer Science
How Grad School Prepared Me For Looking After a Baby
Odd as it may seem, there are some things that grad school has done well to prepare me for surviving my maternity leave.Here are a few:I'm used to being home alone all day because I worked from home often as a student. ThisI…
From The Eponymous Pickle
Computer Science or Information Technology
On the evolution of the computer science degree. I had a discussion with a prof recently on his school's removing the CS degree and how businesses adamantly disagreed with the change. Information Science anyone?
From The Computing Community Consortium Blog
Administration Announcing US Ignite Broadband Initiative
At a White House event Thursday morning, the Administration
From Schneier on Security
Teaching the Security Mindset
In 2008 I wrote about the security mindset and how difficult it is to teach. Two professors teaching a cyberwarfare class gave an exam where they expected their students to cheat:
Our variation of the Kobayashi Maru utilized…From Apophenia
Bringing Research to Bear on the Commercial Sexual Exploitation of Minors (a.k.a.
I believe that technology can be leveraged to empower people in amazing ways, but I also recognize that it can also be used in deeply disturbing ways. All too often, when we as a society see technology being used in horrible…
From Putting People First
Who
Method principal Reuben Steiger argues that companies need to start thinking about the holistic relationship between their brands, products, and services. “Crafting an experience requires design that considers these 3 elements…
From Putting People First
SAP on visualising the future
As visual analytics architect in SAP’s User Experience team, John Armitage is responsible for creating designs and design concepts for SAP’s analytics products. In this article he talks about new and creative ways of displaying…
From The Eponymous Pickle
Coke and P&G Try the Social Money Machine
In Forbes:. A new era in advertising. A Money machine? " ... Coca-Cola and Procter & Gamble are the leading bell weather and market indicators in the advertising business. So when I saw a Coke press release with a SF based…
From Computer Science Teacher - Thoughts and Information From Alfred Thompson
My IT Department Will Not Let Me
Today on Facebook Gary Stager posted a rant of a status update:
Here's a novel idea. Don't send teachers to computing PD with laptops on which they are banned from installing software. Teachers are neither imbeciles…From The Eponymous Pickle
Midmarket Study and My Experience
Have always been interested in how smaller to mid size companies can utilize large enterprise technologies and processes. Having worked with many startups and large enterprises, I saw how technology could greatly help the midmarket…
From The Eponymous Pickle
Human Machine Collaboration in Manufacturing
MIT research work in letting machines collaborate in manufacturing processes. Safety and coordination have frequently been issues in making this happen.