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dateMore Than a Year Ago
subjectPerformance And Reliability
authorArs Technica
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The Unreasonable Effectiveness of the Julia Programming Language
From ACM Opinion

The Unreasonable Effectiveness of the Julia Programming Language

Fortran has ruled scientific computing, but Julia emerged for large-scale numerical work.

We Know You Hate the Internet of Things, but It's Saving Megafauna from Poachers
From ACM Opinion

We Know You Hate the Internet of Things, but It's Saving Megafauna from Poachers

For much of this decade, organizations seeking to protect wildlife have attempted to use emerging technology as a conservation tool, allowing small numbers of people...

License Expired: The Ars Technica 2018 Deathwatch
From ACM Opinion

License Expired: The Ars Technica 2018 Deathwatch

Wow, that 2017, though. Quite a year. Let's grab a Juicero and take a moment to reflect on the utter dumpster fires that we've witnessed over the past 12 months...

The Real Lesson of that Self-Driving Shuttle's First-Day Accident
From ACM Opinion

The Real Lesson of that Self-Driving Shuttle's First-Day Accident

Wednesday was supposed to be the triumphant launch of a free, driverless shuttle in downtown Las Vegas.

Hacking the Vote: Threats Keep Changing, but Election It Sadly Stays the Same
From ACM Opinion

Hacking the Vote: Threats Keep Changing, but Election It Sadly Stays the Same

The outcome of the 2016 presidential election is history. But allegations of voter fraud, election interference by foreign governments, and intrusions into state...

The End of an Era Came Long Before the End of Cassini
From ACM Opinion

The End of an Era Came Long Before the End of Cassini

I have now been writing about science for nearly a dozen years, which means my career more or less overlaps with that of the Cassini probe.

Is Beaming Down In star Trek a Death Sentence?
From ACM Opinion

Is Beaming Down In star Trek a Death Sentence?

In the 2009 movie Star Trek, Captain Kirk and Sulu plummeted down toward the planet Vulcan without a parachute. "Beam us up, beam us up!" Kirk shouted in desperation...

Zuckerberg and Musk Are Both Wrong About AI
From ACM Opinion

Zuckerberg and Musk Are Both Wrong About AI

Back in 2015, a group of business leaders and scientists published an "open letter" about how controlling artificial superintelligence might be the most urgent...

Explaining the ­pside and Downside of D-Wave's New Quantum Computer
From ACM Opinion

Explaining the ­pside and Downside of D-Wave's New Quantum Computer

D-Wave, a company based in British Columbia, has announced a new version of its quantum annealer: the D-Wave 2000Q. As the name suggests, the number of bits has...

Y2k 2.0: Is the ­.s. Government Set to 'give Away the Internet' Saturday?
From ACM Opinion

Y2k 2.0: Is the ­.s. Government Set to 'give Away the Internet' Saturday?

Remember the projected Y2K bug disaster? The world's computers would supposedly go haywire as the clock ticked to January 1, 2000, thus destroying the world and...

Pro Evolution Soccer 2017 Review: The Finest Soccer Game Ever Made
From ACM Opinion

Pro Evolution Soccer 2017 Review: The Finest Soccer Game Ever Made

There are many ways to interpret the beautiful game.

Hydrogen Molecule Falls to Quantum Computer
From ACM Opinion

Hydrogen Molecule Falls to Quantum Computer

We are at the beginning of a revolution. I've been going on about quantum computing for as long as I've been writing, but it has always been in the future tense...

Dear Apple: Please ­se These Ideas to Modernize the Mac
From ACM Opinion

Dear Apple: Please ­se These Ideas to Modernize the Mac

I took a vacation last month. I traveled some. I read a lot. And I refurbished an old late 2008 MacBook Pro, one of the original aluminum unibody models.

A Year with the Apple Watch: What Works, What Doesn't, and What Lies Ahead?
From ACM Opinion

A Year with the Apple Watch: What Works, What Doesn't, and What Lies Ahead?

About a year ago, Apple announced and released its first Apple Watch. The long-rumored product was Apple’s first all-new product category since the iPad and its...

Is D-Wave's Quantum Processor Really 10⁸ Times Faster Than a Normal Computer?
From ACM Opinion

Is D-Wave's Quantum Processor Really 10⁸ Times Faster Than a Normal Computer?

We have been following D-Wave's claims about its quantum hardware at Ars for a number of years. Over that time, my impression has oscillated between skepticism,...

We Flew a Simulated 747 at Nasa and Didn't Crash or Barf
From ACM Opinion

We Flew a Simulated 747 at Nasa and Didn't Crash or Barf

From a viewing spot in a high bay room at NASA Ames Research Center in Silicon Valley, I peer through a glass window at a cab that simulates the cockpit of a commercial...

As Moore's Law Turns 50, What Does the Future Hold For the Transistor?
From ACM Opinion

As Moore's Law Turns 50, What Does the Future Hold For the Transistor?

"The future of integrated electronics is the future of electronics itself."

Secrets Become History: Edward Snowden in Citizenfour Wins Documentary Oscar
From ACM Opinion

Secrets Become History: Edward Snowden in Citizenfour Wins Documentary Oscar

Citizenfour is filmmaker Laura Poitras' account of the first meetings between herself, Glenn Greenwald, and Edward Snowden.

The Importance of Deleting Old Stuff—another Lesson from the Sony Attack
From ACM Opinion

The Importance of Deleting Old Stuff—another Lesson from the Sony Attack


From Pc to Navy, Ars Pits Casual Flight Sim Skills Against a Real Cockpit Trainer
From ACM Opinion

From Pc to Navy, Ars Pits Casual Flight Sim Skills Against a Real Cockpit Trainer

A little over a year ago, I was lucky enough to take a short ride in a Folland Gnat trainer—a nimble little two-seat jet maintained by Rick Sharpe of Houston's ...
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