Communications of the ACM
The blog archive provides access to past blog postings from Communications of the ACM and other sources by date.
August 2016
From The Eponymous Pickle
Towards Decision Networks
Of interest: Decision Networks ... ... Cognitive Systems Institute Group Speaker Series on Thursday, August 18, 2016 at 10:30 am ET US (9:30am CT, 7:30 am PT). Our presenter this week is Nathan Wilson from Nara Logics, Inc…
From insideHPC
SC16 to Feature 38 HPC Workshops
Today SC16 announced that the conference will feature 38 high-quality workshops to complement the overall Technical Program events, expand the knowledge base of its subject area, and extend its impact by providing greater depth…
From The Eponymous Pickle
Examples of AI in Marketing
Most of these are obvious, but I like them in a list. They also are only AI in a limited sense. Useful to think of every one of these for marketing applications.
From insideHPC
DOE to Invest $16 Million in Supercomputing Materials
Today the U.S. Department of Energy announced that it will invest $16 million over the next four years to accelerate the design of new materials through use of supercomputers. “Our simulations will rely on current petascale and…
From insideHPC
Nvidia Disputes Intel’s Maching Learning Performance Claims
"Few fields are moving faster right now than deep learning," writes Buck. "Today’s neural networks are 6x deeper and more powerful than just a few years ago. There are new techniques in multi-GPU scaling that offer even faster…
From Schneier on Security
Major NSA/Equation Group Leak
The NSA was badly hacked in 2013, and we're just now learning about it. A group of hackers called "The Shadow Brokers" claim to have hacked the NSA, and are posting data to prove it. The data is source code from "The Equation…
From insideHPC
NASA Optimizes Climate Impact Research with Cycle Computing
Today Cycle Computing announced its continued involvement in optimizing research spearheaded by NASA’s Center for Climate Simulation (NCCS) and the University of Minnesota. Currently, a biomass measurement effort is underway …
From insideHPC
TYAN Showcases NVMe Servers and Storage Platforms at IDF 2016
"In order to address data intensive workloads in need of higher performance for storage, TYAN takes full advantage of Intel NVMe technology to highlight hybrid storage configurations. TYAN server solutions with NVMe support can…
From insideHPC
Making it Easy to Introduce Liquid Cooling to the Data Center
With the release of high wattage processors liquid cooling is becoming a necessity for HPC data centers. Liquid cooling’s ability to provide the direct removal of heat from these high wattage components within the servers is …
From Phys.org Technology News
Professors see a positive relationship between gaming and human behavior
You are a gamer. The majority of us are and might not realize it. Your participation was subtly recruited by purchasing a soda with a twist top, signing up for a credit card that offers points or simply using a device to count…
From Schneier on Security
Powerful Bit-Flipping Attack
New research: "Flip Feng Shui: Hammering a Needle in the Software Stack," by Kaveh Razavi, Ben Gras, Erik Bosman Bart Preneel, Cristiano Giuffrida, and Herbert Bos. Abstract: We introduce Flip Feng Shui (FFS), a new exploitation…
From Computational Complexity
Is the examiner being pedantic? Whats really going on here?
The following are two real conversations. For each one: (1) Is the examiner correct?, and (2) Where and when do you think this conversation took place? I give the answers below so you may want to read, stop and think, and then…
From Schneier on Security
Yet Another Government-Sponsored Malware
Both Kaspersky and Symantec have uncovered another piece of malware that seems to be a government design: The malware -- known alternatively as "ProjectSauron" by researchers from Kaspersky Lab and "Remsec" by their counterparts…
From The Eponymous Pickle
Monetizing Data, Considering Risk
Data as an asset is a continued exploration, mentioned many times here. Our original view also looked at the risk of capturing and holding assets. Negative valued assets. Another view, In SiliconAngle.
From The Eponymous Pickle
An Open Data Board Game
I like the idea of using games to show how systems work. We used it to teach corporate and supply chain economics. But it does not often work very well. Not sure this one does either. Seems like its aimed at teaching something…
From The Computing Community Consortium Blog
Upcoming NIST Deadlines and Events
NIST Seeks Grant Proposals for Disaster Resilience Research Studies National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) released a Federal Funding Opportunity (FFO) on July 26, 2016 to help further President Obama’s April 2016…
From insideHPC
Trinity Supercomputer Wiring Reconfiguration Saves Millions
LANL reports that a moment of inspiration during a wiring diagram review has saved more than $2 million in material and labor costs for the Trinity supercomputer at Los Alamos National Laboratory.
The post Trinity Supercomputer…From insideHPC
Podcast: Intel Steps Up to Machine Learning with Nervana Systems Acquisition
In this Intel Chip Chat Podcast, Nidhi Chappell, the Director of Machine Learning Strategy at Intel discusses the company's planned acquisition of Nervana Systems to further drive Intel’s capabilities in the artificial intelligence…
From The Eponymous Pickle
Medical Systems are not Written from a Cognitive Perspective
Via Larry Smith in Cognitive Systems Institute. Gets to how these systems need to be written to augment, hopefully improving the systems that they model. " ... If you ever looked at the medical systems we use to manage patient…
From insideHPC
Pete Ungaro Presents: Blue Waters & the Cray Roadmap
Peter Ungaro presented this talk at the 2016 Blue Waters Symposium. "Built by Cray, Blue Waters is one of the most powerful supercomputers in the world, and is the fastest supercomputer on a university campus. Scientists and…
From Blog@Ubiquity
My Robot Wants Your Job—No
Although AI technology is posed to disrupt jobs, there isn't any real cause for alarm. The future of work doesn't mean we will be ruled by robot overlords.
The post My Robot Wants Your Job—No appeared first on BLOG@UBIQUITY.
From Blog@Ubiquity
My Robot Wants Your Job—YES
Robots could redefine the future of work, but what does that mean for the jobs that are displaced? Could a tax on labor-replacing technology be the answer?
The post My Robot Wants Your Job—YES appeared first on BLOG@UBIQUITY.
From insideHPC
Bill Gropp Named Acting Director of NCSA
"I am honored to have been asked to drive NCSA’s continuing mission as a world-class, integrative center for transdisciplinary convergent research, education, and innovation," said Gropp. "Embracing advanced computing and domain…
From insideHPC
University of Oxford Develops Logic Gate for Quantum Computing
Researchers at the University of Oxford have achieved a quantum logic gate with record-breaking 99.9% precision, reaching the benchmark required theoretically to build a quantum computer. "An analogy from conventional computing…
From The Eponymous Pickle
Game Transfer Phenomenon
A new term for me. Essentially means addictive engagement with games or even any computer screen activity. To the agree they transfer out of reality. Now being seen beyond the domain of 'games', and has the potential of…
From The Eponymous Pickle
Is AI Becoming Mainstream?
Good Bloomberg article. It still depends on the definitions involved, If by machine learning we mean better analytics, and if by AI, we mean more embedded logic in systems that improve business process, yes I agree. But if…
From Schneier on Security
Microsoft Accidentally Leaks Key to Windows Backdoor
In a cautionary tale to those who favor government-mandated backdoors to security systems, Microsoft accidentally leaked the key protecting its UEFI Secure boot feature. As we all know, the problems with backdoors are less the…
From Computer Science Teacher - Thoughts and Information From Alfred Thompson
Interesting Links 15 August 2016
Teachers report on Friday this week for back to school. The College Board was making a big thing about Advanced Placement Computer Science Principles starting for real last week. Are you back yet? Seems like just yesterday we…
From The Eponymous Pickle
Fundamentals of Evaluating Data Science Models
Via DSC: Good overview of the basic methods for evaluating models. Posted by Sandeep Raut. Not complete, but these are the fundamentals that every modeler should know and understand, and be able to explain to decision making…
From The Eponymous Pickle
Weka Mini Course
A 14 step mini course by Jason Brownlee on using the machine learning system Weka. Notable because it uses no code or math. Nice for those procedurally rather than code oriented. I can see some people liking this approach…