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Current Crypto Trends with Bruce Schneier
Saint Aardvark writes "SecurityFocus has published an interview with Bruce Schneier. Fascinating stuff, especially the level-headed assessments of the NSA, spam and the impact of full disclosure: 'Q: Since most crypto protocols on the internet, such as SSL or SSH, uses public-keys to build a secure channel, wouldn't a unexpected public disclosure create a chaos on the internet ? A: No. Chaos is hard to create, even on the Internet. Here's an example. Go to Amazon.com. Buy a book without using SSL. Watch the total lack of chaos.'"
The greatest hurdle faced by those of us seeking to extend Moore's Law to the pultem calidus (atomic limit) is the exothermic waste present in today's electronics. It's no secret that computers nowadays give off terrible amounts of heat -- excessive thermal generation is a sign that not only is there resistance to cooling, but there is resistance to electricity as well!
What baffles me is that while reversible computing is a concept that has been around for decades, it has all but disappeared from the modern CS cirriculum. Reversible computing holds the key to unlock both unparalleled levels of computing performance and complex nanotechnological machinery (i.e., any that does not solely rely on chemical or physical properties of tiny matter to get the job done). The concept is nearly above my head, let alone you folks, but I'll try to simplify it as much as possible.
In the 80s (and maybe before) computer scientists determined that virtually all exothermic waste is given off by erasing bits. Some even created a language, Janus, which demonstrates reversible computing principles. The concept is that if you create a chip and a lanuage that permit you both to advance in your program (normal behavior) but also reverse to any previous execution point, you only move bits around instead of erasing them.
One of the problems with reversible computing is that occasionally you get more bits than you have space for. At the time, they felt that each chip could be loaded with as many bits as you needed like an electronic abacus at the factory, and perhaps this is practical for nanotechnology, but development hit the wall until the concept of "garbage collection" emerged as a programming idiom.
There is a step before quantum computing, or perhaps it's the other foot stepping besides it, and it is reversible computing. Tomorrow's PC will look much like today's, but reversible computing in conjunction with garbage collection will shift extra overflow bits from your CPU to your peripherals and underflow bits from your peripherals to your CPU. It will be hybrid technology with unreversible computing, as any interface to hotswap peripherals would put a reversible computer at risk of a deficit of bits if disconnected at the wrong time, but it will function much as your computer of today. But cooler -- in more ways than one.
What does reversible logic mean for cryptography? Take a look at the quantum solutions, which rely on the fact that the act of observing changes the observed: a weak photon with a particular spin can only be picked up by one detector -- an eavesdropper will be instantly spotted because the message won't get through, the communication will be broken, and the eavesdropper won't have enough of the message to do anything. I argue that the parity of reversible computing offers the same solution: apply it to a network connection, and if an extra bit appears or disappears the message is undelivered but also undisclosed to a snoop.
If there's anybody out there working on reversible computing, I'd be interested in perusing your research. It seems like a lonely field but one with lots of potential if venture capital ever comes available for IT R&D in the industry again.
Try not. Do or do not, there is no try.
-- Dr. Spock, stardate 2822-3.
I am a professor of English, but since I've been on a roll of posting +5 Funny comments, I'm sending this anonymously.
All four of the sentences you quote actually are quite readable English. Two of them are perfectly grammatical. I'll make minor modifications in asterisks and bold to show you what I mean.
Just because you can't understand it does not mean it is incoherent. In fact, it is grammaticallly correct.
While the fourth question you quote sounds like it was generated by a non-Native speaker of English, it is PERFECTLY GRAMMATICAL. The adverbial phrase "often used" would normally come at the end of a sentence in idiomatic English. However, adverbs can change their position in a sentence and it is perfectly fine for it to be immediately after the verb "is".
What were you complaining about again?
the alphabet and it's ROT13 eqiuvalent
"its".