Communications of the ACM
Latest Research
From Communications of the ACM
Technical Perspective: Combining Logic and Probability
In "Probabilistic Theorem Proving," Gogate and Domingos suggest how PTP could be turned in a fast approximate algorithm by sampling from the set of children of...
From Communications of the ACM
Probabilistic Theorem Proving
Many representation schemes combining first-order logic and probability have been proposed in recent years. We propose the first method that has the full power...
From Communications of the ACM
Technical Perspective: Computing with the Crowd
What kinds of problems can be solved with combined human and machine computation? "AutoMan: A Platform for Integrating Human-Based and Digital Computation," by...
From Communications of the ACM
Automan: A Platform For Integrating Human-Based and Digital Computation
We introduce AutoMan, the first fully automatic crowdprogramming system.
From Communications of the ACM
Technical Perspective: Software Is Natural
"On the Naturalness of Software" by Hindle et al. takes an entirely new approach to providing tools to help build software.
From Communications of the ACM
On the Naturalness of Software
We begin with the conjecture that most software is natural, with all the attendant constraints and limitations — and thus, like natural language, it is also likely...
From Communications of the ACM
Technical Perspective: Taming the Name Game
In "Learning to Name Objects," the authors offer a method to determine a basic-level category name for an object in an image.
From Communications of the ACM
Learning to Name Objects
This paper looks at the problem of predicting category labels that mimic how human observers would name objects.
From Communications of the ACM
Technical Perspective: Enlisting the Power of the Crowd
An important contribution of "Answering Enumeration Queries with the Crowd" is the observation that by using the crowd for the collection of new data, we are departing...
From Communications of the ACM
Answering Enumeration Queries with the Crowd
Hybrid human/computer database systems promise to greatly expand the usefulness of query processing by incorporating the crowd. Such systems raise many implementation...
From Communications of the ACM
Technical Perspective: Paris Beyond Frommer's
Can a computer automatically discover and tell us what makes Paris look so much like Paris? "What Makes Paris Look Like Paris?" offers a creative, inspiring new...
From Communications of the ACM
What Makes Paris Look Like Paris?
Given a large repository of geo-tagged imagery, we seek to automatically find visual elements, for example windows, balconies, and street signs, that are most distinctive...
From Communications of the ACM
Technical Perspective: The Path to Light Transport
"Geometric Tools for Exploring Manifolds of Light Transport Paths" presents a technique to address the challenging problems of light transport.
From Communications of the ACM
Geometric Tools For Exploring Manifolds of Light Transport Paths
We provide a geometric solution to the longstanding problem of light simulations by representing light paths as points in an abstract high-dimensional configuration...
From Communications of the ACM
Technical Perspective: A Woodworker's Easy Fix
The authors of "Guided Exploration of Physically Valid Shapes for Furniture Design" have found a way to provide the user with instant feedback on how to fix unstable...
From Communications of the ACM
Guided Exploration of Physically Valid Shapes For Furniture Design
The authors propose an interactive design framework for the efficient and intuitive exploration of geometrically and physically valid shapes.
From Communications of the ACM
Technical Perspective: The Specialization Trend in Computer Hardware
Specialization improves energy-efficiency in computing but only makes economic sense if there is significant demand. A balance can often be found by designing...
From Communications of the ACM
Convolution Engine: Balancing Efficiency and Flexibility in Specialized Computing
We present the Convolution Engine (CE) — a programmable processor specialized for the convolution-like data-flow prevalent in computational photography, computer...
From Communications of the ACM
Technical Perspective: Image Processing Goes Back to Basics
In "Local Laplacian Filters," Paris et al. made a surprising move. They chose to build a system on the Laplacian pyramid, which is a very simple multiscale representation...
From Communications of the ACM