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
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
Is MapReduce obsolete?
Last week, the Register announced that Google moved “away from MapReduce.”
From Daniel Lemire's Blog
How reliable is science?
It is not difficult find instances of fraud in science: Ranjit Chandra faked medical research results. He pocketed the money meant for running the experiments....
From Daniel Lemire's Blog
Write a Twitter application in 5 minutes
I spend much time alone, writing and thinking.
From Daniel Lemire's Blog
Manifesto for Half-Arsed Academic Research
Research results are more important than the number of publications or citations. This is fine. Yet, we don’t have time to read your papers. So, just keep publishing...
From Daniel Lemire's Blog
Counterintuitive Factors Determining Research Productivity
Permanent researchers publish more when they are in smaller labs. Having many Ph.D. students fails to improve productivity. Funding has little effect on research...
From Daniel Lemire's Blog
Working long hours is stupid
We do too much. We carry too many projects. This overproduction creates problems which we try to fix by working even more. We value most what we create (see
From Daniel Lemire's Blog