acm-header
Sign In

Communications of the ACM

Blogroll


bg-corner

Lynn Conway: revolutionising chip design
From CS4FN (Computer Science For Fun)

Lynn Conway: revolutionising chip design

by Paul Curzon, Queen Mary University of London MIT professor and transgender activist, Lynn Conway along with Carver Mead, completely changed the way we thinkContinue...

Sorry to bug you: Grace Hopper
From CS4FN (Computer Science For Fun)

Sorry to bug you: Grace Hopper

by Peter W McOwan and Paul Curzon, Queen Mary University of London (from the archive) In the 2003 film The Matrix Reloaded, Neo, Morpheus, Trinity and crew continue...

The first computer music
From CS4FN (Computer Science For Fun)

The first computer music

by Paul Curzon, Queen Mary University of London (updated from the archive) The first recorded music by a computer program was the result of a flamboyant flourish...

Swat a way to drive
From CS4FN (Computer Science For Fun)

Swat a way to drive

by Peter W McOwan, Queen Mary University of London (updated from the archive) Flies are small, fast and rather cunning. Try to swat one and you will see just how...

Future Friendly: Focus on Kerstin Dautenhahn
From CS4FN (Computer Science For Fun)

Future Friendly: Focus on Kerstin Dautenhahn

by Peter W McOwan, Queen Mary University of London (from the archive) Kerstin Dautenhahn is a biologist with a mission: to help us make friends with robots. Kerstin...

The last speaker
From CS4FN (Computer Science For Fun)

The last speaker

by Paul Curzon, Queen Mary University of London (from the cs4fn archive) The languages of the world are going extinct at a rapid rate. As the numbers of peopleContinue...

The joke Turing test
From CS4FN (Computer Science For Fun)

The joke Turing test

A funny thing happened on the way to the computer by Peter W. McOwan, Queen Mary University of London (from the archive) Laugh and the world laughs with you they...

The Chinese room: zombie attack!
From CS4FN (Computer Science For Fun)

The Chinese room: zombie attack!

by Paul Curzon, Queen Mary University of London (From the cs4fn archive) Iain M Banks’s science fiction novels about ‘The Culture’ imagine a universe inhabitedContinue...

The paranoid program
From CS4FN (Computer Science For Fun)

The paranoid program

by Paul Curzon, Queen Mary University of London One of the greatest characters in Douglas Adams’ Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, science fiction radio series,...

How does Santa do it?
From CS4FN (Computer Science For Fun)

How does Santa do it?

Fast yuletide algorithms to visit all those chimneys in time by Paul Curzon, Queen Mary University of London How does Santa do it? How does he visit all those children...

Pepper’s Ghost: an 1860s illusion used in ‘head-up displays’ ^JB
From CS4FN (Computer Science For Fun)

Pepper’s Ghost: an 1860s illusion used in ‘head-up displays’ ^JB

by Paul Curzon, Queen Mary University of London (first published in 2007) When Pepper’s Ghost first appeared on the stage as part of one of Professor Pepper’s shows...

Making sense of squishiness – 3D modelling the natural world
From CS4FN (Computer Science For Fun)

Making sense of squishiness – 3D modelling the natural world

by Paul Curzon, Queen Mary University of London Look out the window at the human-made world. It’s full of hard, geometric shapes – our buildings, the roads, our...

Watching whales well – the travelling salesman problem ^JB
From CS4FN (Computer Science For Fun)

Watching whales well – the travelling salesman problem ^JB

Island-hopping your way around the Travelling Salesman Problem (and back again).

A round up of our posts for #BlackHistoryMonth 2022
From CS4FN (Computer Science For Fun)

A round up of our posts for #BlackHistoryMonth 2022

A round up of our blog posts, published during #BlackHistoryMonth 2022.

Recognising (and addressing) bias in facial recognition tech – the Gender Shades Audit #BlackHistoryMonth ^JB
From CS4FN (Computer Science For Fun)

Recognising (and addressing) bias in facial recognition tech – the Gender Shades Audit #BlackHistoryMonth ^JB

A 2018 study found that facial recognition systems were ess able to recognise darker skinned women because of bias in the data used to train them - but things are...

Happy Hallowe’en – free spooky puzzles and activities
From CS4FN (Computer Science For Fun)

Happy Hallowe’en – free spooky puzzles and activities

Free Hallowe'en activities and puzzles for the classroom or at home ^JB

Devices that work for everyone #BlackHistoryMonth ^JB
From CS4FN (Computer Science For Fun)

Devices that work for everyone #BlackHistoryMonth ^JB

Good design should take everyone into account - examples here from a variety of sensors (cameras, soap dispenser sensors and oximeters) which didn't take account...

Facing up to the problems of recognising faces #BlackHistoryMonth ^JB
From CS4FN (Computer Science For Fun)

Facing up to the problems of recognising faces #BlackHistoryMonth ^JB

How the use of facial recognition technology caused a mistaken arrest.

Hidden Figures – NASA’s brilliant calculators #BlackHistoryMonth ^JB
From CS4FN (Computer Science For Fun)

Hidden Figures – NASA’s brilliant calculators #BlackHistoryMonth ^JB

The African-American women of NASA Langley who helped programme our way to the Moon.

Writing together: Clarence ‘Skip’ Ellis #BlackHistoryMonth ^JB
From CS4FN (Computer Science For Fun)

Writing together: Clarence ‘Skip’ Ellis #BlackHistoryMonth ^JB

Back in 1956, Clarence Ellis started his career at the very bottom of the computer industry. He was given a job, at the age of 15, as a "computer operator"... because...
Sign In for Full Access
» Forgot Password? » Create an ACM Web Account