Using Math To Design Cities And Supercomputers

caek writes "If you've played Sim City you've wrestled with one of the problems faced by supercomputer designers. Unfortunately there's no GameFAQs.com for the technical staff at Japan's Earth Simulator or Srinidhi Varadarajan and colleagues at Virginia Tech. True enough, they won't have to deal with rising crime or Godzilla but, as hinted at in a recent paper in Journal of Physics A, the physical layout of a massively parallel supercomputer is fundamentally the same problem as minimizing the time commuters spent stuck in traffic jams. Read the rest of my kuro5hin article for a popular explanation."

Comments

Re:Does this surprise anyone?

[Marxist Hacker 42]

And thus, they shouldn't be ALLOWED to do that, should they?

Of course, I eat steak- but only that which my family raises ourselves- it's an entirely different experience when you know the name of the animal you're eating.

Likewise with lobster- if you're willing to go to sea and catch it yourself, why should we stop you?

But to spend public resources on private gain just because you believe you're better than everybody else- that's just stupid of society to fall for it.

Economy

[nuggz]

What is wrong with the current allocation system.

Yes it doesn't allow equal distribution, however the key idea behind a capitalist free market IS the unequal distribution.

Capital and resources flow to those which generate more value. This creates a net increase in total value.