Communications of the ACM
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How the “Frontier” Became the Slogan of Uncontrolled AI
Artificial intelligence (AI) has been billed as the next frontier of humanity: the newly available expanse whose exploration …
From Daniel Lemire's Blog
If human population grew at the pace of computer storage
Between 1990 and 2010, the cost of one megabyte of disk storage went from $9 to $0.00015. Had the human population followed a similar growth, there would be 300...
From Daniel Lemire's Blog
Five surprising changes in 2010
I was among the first Canadians to own a Kindle. I justified my purchase as “research”. The Kindle was not satisfying for anything but fiction and I predicted it...
From Daniel Lemire's Blog
Make your own programmable digital thermometer in an hour
I make my own yogourt because I cannot stand commercial yogourt. You can make your own yogourt in less than 30 mintues: heat milk to 112F (34C), mix in a small...
From Daniel Lemire's Blog
For Your In-memory Databases, Do You Really Need an Index?
For large data sets on disk, indexes are often essential. However, if your data fits in RAM, indexes are often unnecessary. They may even be harmful. Consider a...
From Daniel Lemire's Blog
The Rise of Scientific Journalism
Dissidents from the Wikileaks have founded a competing organization called OpenLeaks. This new organization would differ from Wikileaks in two important ways: (1)...
From Daniel Lemire's Blog
A taxonomy for the suppression of dissent
Unless you live under a rock, you have heard about Wikileaks. Along with several newspapers, Wikileaks has been releasing confidential diplomatic documents for...
From Daniel Lemire's Blog
Who will need database administrators in 2020?
In response to my Why do we need database joins? post, many readers stressed the importance of strict database schemas to preserve data integrity. In short, we...
From Daniel Lemire's Blog
Three of my all-time most popular blog posts
Emotions killing your intellectual productivity: We all have to deal with setbacks. And even when things go our way, we can still remain frustrated. I offer pointers...
From Daniel Lemire's Blog
Over-normalization is bad for you
I took a real beating with my previous post where I argued against excessive normalization on the grounds that it increases complexity and inflexibility, and thus...
From Daniel Lemire's Blog
Why do we need database joins?
In a recent post, I argued that the current NoSQL trend could be called NoJoin. My argument boils down to the fact that SQL entices you to normalize your data which...
From Daniel Lemire's Blog
Remarkable scientists without a wikipedia page
I was surprised today to learn that Michael Ley’s wikipedia page had been deleted (because it failed to indicate the significance of the subject). I have yet to...
From Daniel Lemire's Blog
Why you may not like your job, even though everyone envies you
In a provoking post, Matt Welsh
From Daniel Lemire's Blog
You probably misunderstand XML
When I took my current position, I was invited to teach a course on unstructured data. It is a sensible topic for a course: some say that between 80% to 90% of...
From Daniel Lemire's Blog
Public funding for science?
Terence Kealey has been arguing against public funding of science. Is it efficient to fund science with government dollars? He argues that when science is mostly...
From Daniel Lemire's Blog
How do search engines handle special characters? Should you care?
Matt Cutts is Google’s search engine optimization expert. He runs a great YouTube channel called Google Webmaster Central.
From Daniel Lemire's Blog
Who is going to need a database engine in 2020?
Given the Big Data phenomenon, you might think that everyone is becoming a database engineer. Unfortunately, writing a database engine is hard: Concurrency is difficult...
From Daniel Lemire's Blog
The future is already here
It is not 9am yet. Nevertheless, I got a lot done: I attended the thesis proposal of my student Eduardo via Skype. I was literally in my basement with a fresh cup...
From Daniel Lemire's Blog
Can you trust fixed-bit computer arithmetic?
Suppose that you have 10 pictures, and all lined up, they take 100 pixels. Is it safe to say that each picture has a width of x pixels if 10 x = 100? We all know...
From Daniel Lemire's Blog
Can Science be wrong? You bet!
A common answer to my post on the reliability of science, was that fraud was marginal and that, ultimately, science is self-correcting. That is true on one condition...
From Daniel Lemire's Blog