Communications of the ACM
The blog archive provides access to past blog postings from Communications of the ACM and other sources by date.
December 2017
From insideHPC
Job of the Week: HPC Systems Engineer at Taos
Taos is immediately hiring a HPC Systems Engineer for a cutting-edge tech company in Sunnyvale, CA! We're changing the face of some of the most innovative companies with our diverse solution offerings, exceptional talent and
…
From The Eponymous Pickle
Microsoft: from Excel, to BI, to Advanced Analytics?
Excel is a legitimate starting place, that is used by many if not most enterprises. So can it be a reasonable path for industry, when linked to right resources? Good thoughts in linked piece.
Microsoft BI: From Excel to Power…
From Daniel Lemire's Blog
Science and Technology links (December 15th, 2017)
Scientists found a human gene which, when inserted into mice, makes their brain grow larger. David Brin has a series of classical sci-fi books where we “uplift” animals so that they become as smart as we are. Coincidence? I think…
From Schneier on Security
Friday Squid Blogging: Baby Sea Otters Prefer Shrimp to Squid
At least, this one does. As usual, you can also use this squid post to talk about the security stories in the news that I haven't covered. Read my blog posting guidelines here....
From insideHPC
Video: Introduction to PASC18 Paper Track
PASC18 is soliciting high-quality original research papers related to scientific computing in any of the eight scientific domains represented at the conference (chemistry and materials, life sciences, physics, climate and weather…
From insideHPC
Blue Waters Supercomputer Crunches Data from NASA’s Terra Satellite
Researchers are using the Blue Waters supercomputer at NCSA to process new data from NASA’s Terra Satellite. Approximately the size of a small school bus, the Terra satellite explores the connections between Earth’s atmosphere…
From insideHPC
Atos Kicks off MontBlanc 2020 Project for Exascale
The MontBlanc 2020 project launched this week in Europe. As a sequel to a set of successful research projects into energy-efficient ARM-based computing, MontBlanc 2020 now begins an ambitious reach for Exascale. "The ambition…
From insideHPC
HPE Powers World’s Most Powerful Commercial Supercomputer at BP
Today BP announced that it has more than doubled the total computing power of its Center for High-Performance Computing (CHPC) in Houston, making it the most powerful supercomputer in the world for commercial research. "Our investment…
From insideHPC
SC17 Invited Talk: Gordon Bell on the Rise of Scalable Systems
Gordon Bell gave this Invited Talk at SC17. "A globally recognized pioneer in the supercomputing world, Bell will be sharing his latest reflections and insights with his fellow scientists, engineers and researchers at SC17 in…
From The Eponymous Pickle
Customer Experience with AI at Verizon
Good example of the use of delivering customer experience.
Tapping AI: The Future of Customer Experience at Verizon Fios
Podcast and transcript:
Verizon Fios's Justin Reilly discusses the future of AI in enhancing the customer
…
From The Eponymous Pickle
Embedding Software in Everything
We are moving quickly in this area, with lots of changes regarding need for better security, and architectures to ensure that. So many unexpected things will start to become connected.
Embedded Software Eating the World in
Software…
From Schneier on Security
Tracking People Without GPS
Interesting research: The trick in accurately tracking a person with this method is finding out what kind of activity they're performing. Whether they're walking, driving a car, or riding in a train or airplane, it's pretty easy…
From The Eponymous Pickle
Humans vs AI in Healthcare Vision
Google Brain chief Jeff Dean: As AI beats humans in computer vision, healthcare will never be the same
SiliconANGLE by Gina Smith
Just five years ago, artificial intelligence-enabled computers could barely recognize images fed
“In…
From ACM-W supporting, celebrating and advocating for Women in Computing
ACM-W Connections – December 2017
Letter from ACM-W chair. News from Celebrations News from Chapters News from ACM-W Europe Welcome from the ACM-W Chair December, for many, brings the end of a semester and all of the busyness that goes with it. As we look forward…
From Putting People First
The body is the missing link for truly intelligent machines
It’s tempting to think of the mind as a layer that sits on top of more primitive cognitive structures. But Ben Medlock, co-founder of SwiftKey, argues that the layered model of cognition is wrong. The point is that long before…
From Putting People First
The body is the missing link for truly intelligent machines
It’s tempting to think of the mind as a layer that sits on top of more primitive cognitive structures. But Ben Medlock, co-founder of SwiftKey, argues that the layered model of cognition is wrong. The point is that long before…
From Putting People First
Learning from today’s car-centric cities for a human-centered future of mobility
The introduction of autonomy into urban environments creates a unique opportunity to do things differently. This, writes Maya Pindeus (CEO and co-Founder of Humanising Autonomy) requires us to encourage a human-centered perspective…
From Putting People First
Learning from today’s car-centric cities for a human-centered future of mobility
The introduction of autonomy into urban environments creates a unique opportunity to do things differently. This, writes Maya Pindeus (CEO and co-Founder of Humanising Autonomy) requires us to encourage a human-centered perspective…
From Putting People First
[Book] Bit by Bit: Social Research in the Digital Age
Bit by Bit: Social Research in the Digital Age by Matthew J. Salganik Princeton University Press 2017, 448 pages [Read online] An innovative and accessible guide to doing social research in the digital age In just the past several…
From Putting People First
[Book] Bit by Bit: Social Research in the Digital Age
Bit by Bit: Social Research in the Digital Age by Matthew J. Salganik Princeton University Press 2017, 448 pages [Read online] An innovative and accessible guide to doing social research in the digital age In just the past several…
From The Eponymous Pickle
Chatbots as Customer Service Reps
Overview on the concept of retail chatbots. This time of year you have probably encountered a few. Key is doing it right. It is not easy to do them well. Participating in some design.
Will chatbots replace customer service…
From The Eponymous Pickle
More Bayesian Networks
Video, another example of using Bayesian networks.
Dr. Alta de Waal's presentation at the 5th Annual BayesiaLab Conference in Paris.
Spatially Discrete Probability Maps for Anti-Poaching Efforts
Via Stefan Conrady
Managing Partner…
From The Computing Community Consortium Blog
FDA Releases Digital Health Innovation Action Plan
The following is a statement from U.S. Food & Drug Administration (FDA) Commissioner Scott Gottlieb, M.D., on advancing new digital health policies to encourage innovation, bring efficiency, and modernization to regulation. It…
From insideHPC
Fortune 500 Firms Join IBM Q Network for Quantum Computing Research
Today IBM announced the first clients to tap into its IBM Q early-access commercial quantum computing systems to explore practical applications important to business and science. In all, twelve initial organizations joined to…
From insideHPC
Rescale Brings HPC Workloads to the Cloud at SC17
In this video from SC17, Gabriel Broner from Rescale describes how the company brings HPC Workloads to the Cloud. "Rescale offers HPC in the cloud for engineers and scientists, delivering computational performance on-demand.
…
From insideHPC
Slidecast: HPC and the Cloud – Announcing the Ellexus Container Checker
In this slidecast, Dr. Rosemary Francis describes the new Ellexus Container Checker, a pioneering cloud-based tool that provides visibility into the inner workings of Docker containers. "Container Checker will help people using…
From insideHPC
Lenovo to Build 26.7 Petaflop SuperMUC-NG Cluster for LRZ in Germany
"Upon its completion in late 2018, the new Lenovo supercomputer (called SuperMUC-NG) will support LRZ in its groundbreaking research across a variety of complex scientific disciplines, such as astrophysics, fluid dynamics and…
From insideHPC
Intel Advisor’s TBB Flow Graph Analyzer: Making Complex Layers of Parallelism More Manageable
Some deep learning applications tend to have very complex graphs with thousands of nodes and edges. To make it easier to visualize, analyze, design, and tune such complex parallel applications employing Intel TBB flow graphs,…
From The Eponymous Pickle
Cortana and Alexa as Collaborating Assistants
This was announced back in late August, and have heard little since. Reviewed some of the details here of interest. What can this look like? Do recent indications by Amazon saying they want to enter the business space…
From insideHPC
Dr. Eng Lim Goh on HPE’s Spaceborne Supercomputer
In this video from SC17 in Denver, Dr. Eng Lim Goh describes the spaceborne supercomputer that HPE built for NASA. "The research objectives of the Spaceborne Computer include a year-long experiment of operating high performance…