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Communications of the ACM

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DEPARTMENT: Cerf's up

In Debt to the NSF

In 1980, the National Science Foundation sponsored the development of CSNET to connect a number of computer science departments together that had not already been connected to the ARPANET. NSF continues its vigorous support for …
DEPARTMENT: BLOG@CACM

Pondering Variables and Direct Instruction

Robin K. Hill considers the nature of variables, while Mark Guzdial reflects on renewed interest in the "direct instruction model."
COLUMN: News

Soft Robots Look to New Environments

These non-standard automatons appear best suited for applications under water and in space.

The Future of Data Storage

Research into next-generation storage techniques marches forward, yet tape remains the most viable, dependable medium.

The Fine Line Between Coercion and Care

Employers monitoring their workforce must balance productivity and security considerations with employee privacy and welfare concerns.
COLUMN: Technology strategy and management

Free Trade in a Digital World

Considering the possible implications for free trade, traditionally based on non-digital goods, for a modern global economy that is increasingly based on intangible products and services enabled by digital technologies.
COLUMN: Kode Vicious

Know Your Algorithms

Stop using hardware to solve software problems.
COLUMN: Viewpoint

The Web Is Missing an Essential Part of Infrastructure: An Open Web Index

A proposal for building an index of the Web that separates the infrastructure part of the search engine—the index—from the services part that will form the basis for myriad search engines and other services utilizing Web data …
SECTION: Europe region

Welcome to the Europe Region Special Section

Europe provides a unique environment for the development of a distinctive computing landscape. You will see this reflected in the Europe Region Special Section.
SECTION: Europe Region Special Section: Hot topics

A Demographic Snapshot of the IT Workforce in Europe

The number of ICT specialists in the EU workforce has grown over 36% in the last 10 years. This increase helps explain why ICT employment has resisted the effects of the region's overall financial crisis.

Enterprises Lead ICT Innovation in Europe

Europe's tech ecosystem is renewing itself: $3.5 billion was invested in so-called deep tech companies in 2017 across more than 600 deals, up from $2.5 billion in 2016.

Europe's Ambitious ICT Agenda

With an aging population and a shrinking workforce, Europe needs to tap artificial intelligence, 5G wireless connectivity, quantum computing, and other ICT technologies that could drive the next step change in productivity.

Europe's Well-Connected Consumers

Europeans have mixed feelings about the direction in which ICT is headed.

New European Data Privacy and Cyber Security Laws: One Year Later

Two landmark pieces of legislation taking effect in Europe this year represent a major shift in the European industry's approach to privacy and security compliance.

Incorporating Europe's Values in Future Research

Increasing digitalization and automation, growing globalization, and improved financial durability offer many excellent opportunities for development.

HiPEAC: A European Network Built to Last

High Performance and Embedded Architecture and Compilation (HiPEAC) has grown from 70 to 2,000 computing specialists in the last 15 years, including 200 from industry, making it the largest such network in the world.

ACM Europe Council's Best Paper Awards

The ACM Europe Council's Best Paper Awards recognize authors of outstanding technical contributions to ACM-sponsored conferences held in Europe.
SECTION: Europe Region Special Section: Big trends

Connected Things Connecting Europe

Modern embedded system microcontroller and transceiver technology advancements have brought forth the kinds of systems we have defined for some time in Europe as "embedded intelligence."

Women Are Needed in STEM: European Policies and Incentives

In Europe, gender balance in research and innovation is understood as a social justice and equality issue.

Informatics as a Fundamental Discipline for the 21st Century

Informatics should be recognized by all as a truly foundational discipline that plays a significant role in education for the 21st century.

The European Perspective on Responsible Computing

Europe is at the forefront of the regulation and reflections on digital systems through its institutional bodies.

Toward a European Exascale Ecosystem: The EuroHPC Joint Undertaking

European supercomputing infrastructures represent a strategic resource for understanding and responding to the increasing challenges European citizens will face in the years to come.

Web Science in Europe: Beyond Boundaries

There is increasing concern in Europe—and beyond—that the Web has become a vehicle of disintegration, polarization, and exploitation. Web Science seeks to investigate, analyze, and intervene in the Web from a sociotechnical perspective …
SECTION: Practice

Identity by Any Other Name

The complex cacophony of intertwined systems.

Metrics That Matter

Critical but oft-neglected service metrics that every SRE and product owner should care about.

Research for Practice: Edge Computing

Scaling resources within multiple administrative domains.
SECTION: Contributed articles

Analytics for Managerial Work

Work in finance, marketing, human resources, and operations increasingly relies on analytics—with more to come.
SECTION: Review articles

Neural Algorithms and Computing Beyond Moore's Law

Advances in neurotechnologies are reigniting opportunities to bring neural computation insights into broader computing applications.

Cyber Security in the Quantum Era

Quantum systems will significantly affect the field of cyber security research.
SECTION: Research highlights

Technical Perspective: Was Edgar Allan Poe Wrong After All?

Umesh Vazirani and Thomas Vidick's "Fully Device Independent Quantum Key Distribution" provides an unexpectedly simple and elegant secure protocol solution, indeed one that is almost within reach of current technology.

Fully Device Independent Quantum Key Distribution

We rigorously provide the device-independent security of an entanglement-based protocol building on Ekert's original proposal for quantum key distribution.
COLUMN: Last byte

Fighting for Lava

There are vast underground lava fields in the western U.S. Imagine a pair of tunnelboring energy-extraction companies are competing to cool the lava, make some money, and provide carbon-free energy besides.