Opening Quantum Computing To the Public

director_mr writes "Tom's Hardware is running a story with an interesting description of a 28-qubit quantum computer that was developed by D-Wave Systems. They intend to open up use of their quantum computer to the public. It is particularly good at pattern recognition, it operates at 10 milliKelvin, and it is shielded to limit electromagnetic interference to one nanotesla in three dimensions across the whole chip. Could this be the first successful commercial quantum computer?"

Comments

28 Qubits ought to be enough for everybody

[Anonymous Coward]

There's only a market for at most 10 of these computers, and only big companies will need one.

Re:28 Qubits ought to be enough for everybody

[AmigaMMC]

"640 Kb should be enough for even the most demanding tasks".

Re:28 Qubits ought to be enough for everybody

[4D6963]

No encryption key cracking. Bigger than a PDP-7. Lame.

Re:28 Qubits ought to be enough for everybody

[Anonymous Coward]

Oh, I don't know about that. Can it run crysis?

Re:28 Qubits ought to be enough for everybody

[ernstjason]

Isn't that the same thing people said when the first computers were being developed?

Re:28 Qubits ought to be enough for everybody

[happyemoticon]

*whoosh*

Re:28 Qubits ought to be enough for everybody

[ArAgost]

Isn't that the same thing people said when the first computers were being developed?

*WOOOOSH*

Re:28 Qubits ought to be enough for everybody

[Hojima]

Your statement is ironically close to the truth. Quantum computers actually function in parallel to conventional devices when it comes to the simple tasks that they perform, such as rendering intricate scenes, or estimating series values. What quantum computers are better at is taking advantage of quantum effects to exponentially outperform conventional computers at things such as factoring immense integers. They will most likely be used for decryption and quantum simulations, or other mathematically novel applications. In other words, it benefits businesses and scientists the most. They will most likely have commercial value in the future, but that is when they develop more uses for it, such as emulating the human mind to make ultra-realistic (if not realistic) AI. At the moment however, it is still in the computer equivalent stage of useless behemoth. Someone in some field will most likely make a huge discovery similar to the silicon transistors of the past, win a Nobel prize, and set the stage for a new revolution. Feels like a long way from now, but I'll probably be proved wrong.

Re:28 Qubits ought to be enough for everybody

[Anonymous Coward]

Why don't they just simulate the qubits on standard computers?

Re:28 Qubits ought to be enough for everybody

[b4upoo]

Maybe when the technology is inexpensive we can all own such a rig!
              But I'll bet that all kinds of research could benefit from use of this computer.
              My best guess is that government will control who has access to quantum computers as they just could not stand communications that they could not spy on.

Re:28 Qubits ought to be enough for everybody

[Anonymous Coward]

And they will run Linux, BSD, Windows, OSX all at the same time.

Re:28 Qubits ought to be enough for everybody

[GigaHurtsMyRobot]

Because then the speed advantage will not be realized. That's the whole benefit to quantum computing. If we tried simulating the quantum properties in software, the task at hand would take even longer than a standard software approach.

Re:28 Qubits ought to be enough for everybody

[speedtux]

What quantum computers are better at is taking advantage of quantum effects to exponentially outperform conventional computers at things such as factoring immense integers.

That's a little misleading; it's unknown how fast classical factoring is, so it's impossible to say that quantum factoring "exponentially outperforms" it.

but that is when they develop more uses for it, such as emulating the human mind to make ultra-realistic (if not realistic) AI.

It's unlikely that quantum computers are needed for AI; the problem with AI is not that we don't have enough computer power, but that we don't know what to do.

Someone in some field will most likely make a huge discovery similar to the silicon transistors of the past

Or it will turn out that quantum computing just isn't feasible for some physical reason.

Re:28 Qubits ought to be enough for everybody

[Geldon]

Your statement is ironically close to the truth. Quantum computers actually function in parallel to conventional devices when it comes to the simple tasks that they perform, such as rendering intricate scenes, or estimating series values. What quantum computers are better at is taking advantage of quantum effects to exponentially outperform conventional computers at things such as factoring immense integers. They will most likely be used for decryption and quantum simulations, or other mathematically novel applications. In other words, it benefits businesses and scientists the most. They will most likely have commercial value in the future, but that is when they develop more uses for it, such as emulating the human mind to make ultra-realistic (if not realistic) AI. At the moment however, it is still in the computer equivalent stage of useless behemoth. Someone in some field will most likely make a huge discovery similar to the silicon transistors of the past, win a Nobel prize, and set the stage for a new revolution. Feels like a long way from now, but I'll probably be proved wrong.

I actually am inclined not to agree with you. Back when people were making similar statements about the computer in general, they weren't small enough, powerful enough, or cheap enough for anyone to afford them who wasn't going to set up some sort of business unit around them. But I say give it 20-30 years. What will probably end up happening is that they'll be making quantum processors that run along side traditional processors, working much like today's GPUs, or yesterday's "Math Co-processors." Programmers will take particularly complex mathematical tasks and offload them to the quantum processor. My money says that 50-60 years from now, you'll be running a hybrid quantum/traditional computer on a mobile device you carry in your pocket.

Don't believe me? Try going to someone in the 1950's and explaining to them that in 50-60 years, people will have computers that fit in their pockets and instead of solving the world's mathematical problems with these computers, we've created MySpace... *shutter*

Re:28 Qubits ought to be enough for everybody

[Anonymous Coward]

> *shutter*

Click!

Re:28 Qubits ought to be enough for everybody

[lenski]

You have just received the ancient reference of the day award!

Well played! :-)

Re:28 Qubits ought to be enough for everybody

[Hojima]

Actually, it doesn't matter how fast a classical computer operates, a quantum computer WILL go exponentially faster regardless. I researched quantum computers in a laureate report I did a few year back. Quantum computers are able to achieve a dual state as a result of calculations. Also, quantum computers operate on the mathematical principles of a unitary matrix. One of the properties of a unitary matrix is it's reversibility, so that any operation that can be perform can be "unperformed". So take the ability to reverse calculations and achieve more than one answer at once, and you can "unperform" at an exponential rate. For example, you have a matrix with an "and" gate. If you where to reverse the and gate on the value '0', superposition will allow you to get the answers '10', '01', and '00' all at the same time. This means that a 64-qubit computer and theoretically "unrun" 2^64 (more than the molecules in the universe) times faster than a 64-bit computer. Now that is just a simplified gist of things. I don't want any physicists saying "you forgot the Hademard gate etc." The process is much more elaborate, and much more prone to other factors.
  Now as for you other comments: 1) quantum computers will be a better candidate for simulating AI on a common commercial scale, and 2) quantum computing already is possible. The discovery that will most likely be made is the ability to create a room-temperature equivalent of a Bose-Einstein condensate so that topological quantum computers (the most reliable model so far) can be fit onto something the size of a thumb.

Re:28 Qubits ought to be enough for everybody

[davester666]

Finally, I'll be able to find Waldo!

Re:28 Qubits ought to be enough for everybody

[Anonymous Coward]

def middle():
        But I'll bet that all kinds of research could benefit from use of this computer.
        My best guess is that government will control who has access to quantum computers as they just could not stand
Maybe when the technology is inexpensive we can all own such a rig!:
        middle()
communications that they could not spy on.

Fixed.

Re:28 Qubits ought to be enough for everybody

[Hojima]

I don't like replying to my own comment, but I felt that I should have been a bit more proficient (not just in my bad grammar and typos) in explaining that mathematics also has to evolve to take advantage of the quantum principles. As you can imagine, the field of "uncalculating" isn't very big, just as Boolean algebra wasn't so big before transistors. That is another factor in making quantum computers that will be incorporated into every-day use.

Re:28 Qubits ought to be enough for everybody

[speedtux]

Sorry, but that's not how it works; quantum computers don't give exponential speedups on arbitrary computations.

Re:28 Qubits ought to be enough for everybody

[qcomp]

Hojima wrote: Actually, it doesn't matter how fast a classical computer operates, a quantum computer WILL go exponentially faster regardless.
this has so far not been proven. What is proven is that a quantum computer can outperform a classical computer polynomially (in algorithms based on unstructured search) and that it can outperform the best currently known classical algorithms for some problems (factoring, quantum simulation) exponentially. Moreover, exponential separation has been proven in terms of "query complexity" for "oracle problems" (in which a quantum black box is assumed to be available and only the number of accesses to the black box is counted as cost) and in terms of "communication complexity" in quantum communication (where the number of (qu)bits that need to be exchanged between two locations is counted as cost).

Quantum computers are able to achieve a dual state as a result of calculations. Also, quantum computers operate on the mathematical principles of a unitary matrix. One of the properties of a unitary matrix is it's reversibility, so that any operation that can be perform can be "unperformed". So take the ability to reverse calculations and achieve more than one answer at once, and you can "unperform" at an exponential rate.
that does not follow. having a superposition of 2^100 answers doesn't help you to get out a single one (since when you perform a measurement (and a quantum computer is supposed to give us a conventional ("classical") answer to our problem) each answer occurs with exponentially small probability only. The hard part is to make all these many "answers" to interfere such that the right answer comes out with high probabiliy (that decreases only polynomially in the number of bits used as input). Also, reversibility is not needed for a quantum speed-up.

Re:28 Qubits ought to be enough for everybody

[stephentyrone]

Actually, it doesn't matter how fast a classical computer operates, a quantum computer WILL go exponentially faster regardless.

I really, really hope that you failed whatever course the report was for. There is not, at present, any known problem which for which a quantum-computing algorithm is known to be exponentially faster than the fastest classical algorithm.

Factoring is known to be sub-exponential, so Shor's O(n^3) quantum algorithm does not provide an exponential speedup.

The strongest known result in terms of speedup for quantum algorithms is for unordered search, from O(n) to O(sqrt(n)), which, again, is not an exponential speedup.

There are some intuitive arguments for why an exponential speedup might be possible. There are also some intuitive arguments for why it shouldn't be. There is no proof either way, as things currently stand.

(Note: I am not an expert in the field. This reflects my understanding, which was current as of about 5 years ago. To the best of my knowledge, things have not changed, but I don't read the literature like I do in other areas).

Re:28 Qubits ought to be enough for everybody

[stephentyrone]

What is proven is that a quantum computer can outperform a classical computer polynomially (in algorithms based on unstructured search) and that it can outperform the best currently known classical algorithms for some problems (factoring, quantum simulation) exponentially.

Not even for factoring, actually. Factoring is known to be sub-exponential. =)

Re:28 Qubits ought to be enough for everybody

[qcomp]

Not even for factoring, actually. Factoring is known to be sub-exponential.
yes, you're right. I should have said "outperforms super-polynomially" (I guess it is poly(n) for a QC vs n^log(n) classically, n beinig the input size in bits)

Re:28 Qubits ought to be enough for everybody

[Anonymous Coward]

There's only a market for at most 10 of these computers, and only big companies will need one.

so how much would you bet that only 10 of these will be needed? cause I'll take the over, for upto $10,000

cause once 1 finac firm get once they all want one.

google will buy 10 by it's self

and the gov will want at least 12

then MIT, Duke and any big U is going to want one

so were up to about 50.

oh yeah remember the PC in the 80's only nerds had one in they house. now most people have two or 3

Re:28 Qubits ought to be enough for everybody

[nanostuff]

You're been reading quantum-brain hogwash again haven't you?

Re:28 Qubits ought to be enough for everybody

[Anonymous Coward]

"So take the ability to reverse calculations and achieve more than one answer at once, "

So there goes all that functional programming I've been learning about :(

Re:28 Qubits ought to be enough for everybody

[JosKarith]

Nope. Nothing can.

Re:28 Qubits ought to be enough for everybody

[aexsar]

Wouldn't using quantum computing in the AI field more closely simulate actual physical brains (strong-AI) then modern processors that only have 2 values? I don't think this would cut down on the number of processors/nodes needed, but would most likely make them more efficient in modeling signal flows and values then current modern processors.

Re:28 Qubits ought to be enough for everybody

[Anonymous Coward]

There's only a market for at most 10 of these computers, and only big companies will need one.

Haha, and no one needs more then 512kb of memory :)

Re:28 Qubits ought to be enough for everybody

[tenco]

My money says that 50-60 years from now, you'll be running a hybrid quantum/traditional computer on a mobile device you carry in your pocket.

50-60 years from now, i will most probably be dead, you insensitive clod!

Re:28 Qubits ought to be enough for everybody

[tenco]

...with a probability of 0.25

A: "Oh, cool. A quantuum computer! But does it run Linux?
B: "Dunno. Let me see..."

Re:28 Qubits ought to be enough for everybody

[Anonymous Coward]

What quantum computers are better at is taking advantage of quantum effects to exponentially outperform conventional computers at things such as factoring immense integers.

That's a little misleading; it's unknown how fast classical factoring is, so it's impossible to say that quantum factoring "exponentially outperforms" it.

Totally agree.

but that is when they develop more uses for it, such as emulating the human mind to make ultra-realistic (if not realistic) AI.

It's unlikely that quantum computers are needed for AI; the problem with AI is not that we don't have enough computer power, but that we don't know what to do.

You should follow the same reasoning as above: we are not sure whether our computing model is limited or our knowledge is limited (or maybe both), so right now, regarding AI, quantum computing only complicates a difficult situation.

Someone in some field will most likely make a huge discovery similar to the silicon transistors of the past

Or it will turn out that quantum computing just isn't feasible for some physical reason.

I think that the feasibility is proven (i recall reading an article on Slashdot about factoring 15), what remains to be proven is the efficiency of the concept.

Re:28 Qubits ought to be enough for everybody

[SilentBob0727]

Wouldn't using quantum computing in the AI field more closely simulate actual physical brains (strong-AI) then modern processors that only have 2 values?

A neuron has only two "values" -- signal or don't. Damn primitive technology...

Re:28 Qubits ought to be enough for everybody

[Anonymous Coward]

There's only a market for at most 10 of these computers, and only big companies will need one.

That is similar to the assessed need of the early dinosaur computers in their day.

Still not easy to build at home

[Mornedhel]

FTFA : "These things [quantum computers] can be very small and very cold, and they can be built out of exotic materials" - emphasis mine.

He makes this sound as a good thing.

Re:Still not easy to build at home

[kestasjk]

• There's no access to the computer to scientists
• They say it'll be able to do more than "pattern matching" if they get more funding (but until then that's all it can do)
• They give their own definition of quantum computing, which is much broader than most would give
• They claim they can do "quantum computing" without needing the qubits to be interconnected, which is the main problem all other major research teams are trying to tackle
• Big claims, big predictions, few results
• Who ever heard of a quantum computer only capable of pattern matching?!

Thanks to scam companies like this more qualification is needed when referring to "quantum computing".

This is only a little better than the quacks who talk about "quantum healing energy"; they're exploiting the vague term "quantum computing" and the small amount of understanding to try and make a quick buck from investors.

Re:Still not easy to build at home

[Thing 1]

This is only a little better than the quacks who talk about "quantum healing energy"; they're exploiting the vague term "quantum computing" and the small amount of understanding to try and make a quick buck from investors.

While I agree with you that this device may not be all that it is advertised to be, I must strongly object to your analogy.

I can feel a tingling in my fingertips when I'm "running the energy". There are several methods that I have studied, Jin Shin Jyustu, the book Quantum Touch, and Donna Eden's methods (both books and videos).

It took me about 40 hours of practice before I began feeling the tingling. It's similar to a body part falling asleep, but it is not numb, just tinging. Other people feel it as a temperature difference (either warmer or colder), and others feel it as pressure. There is no "sixth sense"; it comes to you in a form of your existing senses.

I say all this, because I know that energy is part of my human existence, and although I only have a short amount of practice, I have seen benefits. Perhaps I'm overreacting to your wording; perhaps you also agree that energy healing is real, but merely object to practitioners using the trendy term "quantum" along with it. In that case, no worries. But if you meant that there is no such thing as energy or healing benefits from breathing deeply and placing your fingers lightly on specific parts of the body, I can say that I have direct experience that proves the existence of energy.

Just because our instruments are not yet capable of measuring it, doesn't mean that it doesn't exist; just as hundreds of years ago, we couldn't measure bacteria, but they still infected us. The difference is that hundreds of years ago, nobody could "detect" bacteria, whereas I can feel the energy as it's moving. I cannot see it; others can. I want to develop that skill.

Re:Still not easy to build at home

[sokoban]

FTFA : "These things [quantum computers] can be very small and very cold, and they can be built out of exotic materials" - emphasis mine.

He makes this sound as a good thing.

Oh, it is a great thing for the marketing folks.

Re:Still not easy to build at home

[Anonymous Coward]

Okay, you're nuts, we get it.

Seriously, energy is pretty well defined in physics. There are some foundational issues, but what you're feeling is not "energy", at best you've trained yourself to control capillary dilation semiconsciously to some extent (possible with biofeedback; some Raynaud's sufferers learn it).

Re:Still not easy to build at home

[Cyberax]

Probably, their Hamiltonian phase-space is severely limited. I.e. their quantum computer can't explore all possible configurations of phase-space.

That means it'll need a lot more qubits than an 'ideal' computer for some tasks.

Re:Still not easy to build at home

[Anonymous Coward]

go back to your selftouching you wacko. believing in nebulous 'energy' is the same as the supposed benefit of prayer. if you're so convinced of your para-normal energy powers go talk to Randi and show him all the great benefits it's giving you and collect your million dollar reward. I'm pretty sure his money is safe from your type.

Re:Still not easy to build at home

[Anonymous Coward]

Your first two points are correct, and I don't see why that is a problem. D-Wave isn't a charity.

On the definition of quantum computing: It's not so diffferent from everyone else's: Use quantum effects to achieve asymptotic speedups over classical algorithms. I don't think many scientists would disagree with that definition.

You 4th point is just plain wrong, in fact D-Wave very much relies on the qubits being interconnected, and they published a paper on how they do it.

There are plenty of D-Wave results out there, just look at Geordie Rose's blog, they're all linked from there.

There have been other kinds of specialized Hardware before. Who ever heard of a computer that can only play chess? It's just a question of where the funding for your research comes from.

In general I suggest reading up on the information that is actually out there before commenting on subjects that you know nothing about.

Re:Still not easy to build at home

[kestasjk]

The current chip, Leda, has 28 rings, giving 28 qubits, but theyâ(TM)re not all interconnected to each other, only to a number of âneighboursâ(TM). The Cooper pair in the niobium are technically bosons so they all exist in the same quantum state, Rose claims, which gives the entire superconductor quantum properties even without interconnecting every qubit.

From Rose himself; they're not interconnected, but they still have "quantum properties". So every other approach to quantum computing is wasting time, because you don't actually have to interconnect the qubits?

That doesn't seem a little hard to believe from a company trying to get investors which won't open their hardware up to scientists?

I suggest getting your information from somewhere other than Rose's blog.

Re:Still not easy to build at home

[Walkingshark]

I can say that I have direct experience that proves the existence of energy.

Well, thats a rigorous enough sample size for me, bring on the crystals and pyramids!

Re:Still not easy to build at home

[Anonymous Coward]

OH YEAH!!!??? HOW ABOUT EROTIC MATERIALS!!!!!????? EMPHASIS MINE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

the small print here comes a lot of of lowercase letters to fool the silly slashdot filter i wonder why they put those in seriously its really daft what if i really wanted or needed to write some big ass letters why do they censor that a dumb bot cant figure that out hell even a human moderator cant always they ought to just let go of all those stupid filters its stupid really did you notice how i did not use ones for exclamation marks

Re:Still not easy to build at home

[sir fer]

Yes there is that.

And the fact that the word "quantum" has absolutely nothing to do with healing and 99% of the other terms and fields where it is abused.

Re:Still not easy to build at home

[Anonymous Coward]

Posting as AC because, well, this is /., but far and away the easiest way to see it is by either staying awake (ideally without chemical assistance) for at least 40 hours, or by self-administering a decent recreational dose of MDMA (or to a lesser extent, codeine. It might work with other opiates, I haven't tried). Some people report success with LSD but I find there's too much visual interference. Of course you shouldn't break the law, drugs won't induce permanent enlightenment by any stretch of the imagination, this is all at your own risk etc. etc., but this will give you a temporary taste of what you're after.

Hold your hand up between your face and a blank surface or the sky with your fingers splayed, and focus on the space between your fingers; sometimes moving your hand slowly from side to side helps. You'll see a transparent webbing between your fingers that looks a bit like a soap bubble, or patterned static. You can poke your finger through it and get tactile feedback, you can pinch and stretch it, and it'll snap back to its original shape, and if you hold a finger on each hand an inch or two from each other, they'll 'link' with a thin tube of the stuff.

I'll admit the possibility that this is some sort of neural short-circuiting or psychosomatic suggestion-induced hallucination, since it can only be confirmed subjectively, but I've shown it to at least 50 people (most of whom were under the influence of MDMA) and all bar two or three could see it clear as day within a few seconds. I can be quite persuasive at times, but I don't think I'm so convincing that I can induce mass hallucinations at the drop of a hat.

As far as the tactile stuff goes, congrats on getting that far. If you haven't already, try downloading some 'binaural beat' meditation music tracks and trying the touch stuff after a few minutes of listening to that. Good luck!

Re:Still not easy to build at home

[SilentBob0727]

I don't think I'm so convincing that I can induce mass hallucinations at the drop of a hat.

I can.

Re:Still not easy to build at home

[Thing 1]

I know you're probably not listening, but thanks for the binaural beat pointer. The tactile feedback has nothing to do with drugs, in my case, but it's interesting that you have found a working method. The rest of the responses were fairly negative, from people who likely never spent the 40 hours that (at least in my case) was required in order to begin to feel it. Interestingly, when I first felt it, it was in my upper lip. A few days later, I was able to feel it in my fingertips.

Re:Still not easy to build at home

[Thing 1]

Mock all you want. One day, you will feel it too. Or you'll die unenlightened. Those are the options; but it's obvious that the moderators cheer the skeptic and boo the one with experience. That's fine, I'll take the karma hit; I know that I'm a happier, more productive person because of my new finding. I'm in my late 30s and have only known this for 2 years, and it is something that I experience. I don't know much about crystals and pyramids, sorry.

Like most people here, I have a healthy dose of skepticism. I very reluctantly saw the healer who began my enlightenment two years ago, and only then because I was in so much pain that I would try anything. Generally, that's how most people end up there, again due to the skepticism of anything "non-pill" built into our culture. The Chinese have an ancient medicine system that incorporates energy pathways; and their system works so well that they are able to use only acupuncture for anesthesia during medical procedures. Here's one link of many.

But really, this is more like wasting my time and annoying the pig. Oh well, you'll hear it when you're ready.

Re:Still not easy to build at home

[Thing 1]

Randi will never pay out. He's got a great thing going: once it's been proven to exist, then it's no longer super-natural, it's just natural; so, he doesn't have to pay. And thanks for the kind words.

Re:Still not easy to build at home

[Thing 1]

And the fact that the word "quantum" has absolutely nothing to do with healing and 99% of the other terms and fields where it is abused.

Actually, I think that the word "quantum" does have to do with healing. Back in 1998, I read an article stating that the human brain worked not only on chemical, electrical, and mechanical processes, but also on quantum processes. The gist of the article was that if we are going to make a copy of a human brain (or an accurate simulation/AI), then we are going to need to understand quantum processes.

The brain is responsible for much of the healing in the body, so I would venture that quantum processes have greater than 0 participation there.

I find it interesting the (other) vitriolic responses that my sharing of my experience has garnered.

Re:Still not easy to build at home

[Anonymous Coward]

Heh, just realised I'd bookmarked this in case you did reply =p To clarify - I've had the tactile ability at least since I was twelve - my mother was reading a hippy magazine and mentioned an article on energy stuff, and it just sort of worked when I tried it. The visual stuff I'm just not naturally wired for, so it doesn't happen unless I'm in an altered state of some sort. It's possible meditation and practice would get me there (cleaning up my diet probably wouldn't hurt either) but I'm lazy, and this way I still get to play with it now and then, which is fine for the time being.

Protip: check out http://www.transparentcorp.com/ for more brainwave entrainment toys =)

linux?

[Anonymous Coward]

yadaa yadda

Re:linux?

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes/No

pretzel stand

[Anonymous Coward]

Something about uses for it seem best compared to a banquet table that would sell just pretzels, and everyone in line would know exactly what they want, except when they get there, they'd have know clue what they'd get to use the public terminal for.

Except a quantum computer is probably not just for providing pretzels, or truly random calculations.

Qbert vs. Qubit

[Anonymous Coward]

I can tell you which I'd rather tap.

Re:Qbert vs. Qubit

[Drinking Bleach]

^%$#@!

Re:Qbert vs. Qubit

[laejoh]

That's Perl, isn't it?

Re:Qbert vs. Qubit

[aproposofwhat]

In fact, that's a Perl one-liner for factoring arbitrarily large numbers :o)

But does it work?

[VincenzoRomano]

From an earlier experiment was even not clear whether the factorisation of 15 had really happened!

Re:But does it work?

[VincenzoRomano]

Links forgotten: This and this one.

Re:But does it work?

[Glonoinha]

All I know is that every time I even mention quantum computing my cat gets nervous and absolutely refuses to get in the box.

Re:But does it work?

[Anonymous Coward]

How do you know he's not already in the box, too?

Re:But does it work?

[coresnake]

Maybe.

Re:But does it work?

[Anonymous Coward]

All I know is that every time I even mention quantum computing my cat gets nervous and absolutely refuses to get in the box.

Glonoinha's Cat? Wait, that's not right...

Was I the only one?

[f2x]

I'm going to have to turn in my geek license once and for all...

"operates at 10 milliKelvin"?

"...electromagnetic interference to one nanotesla in three dimensions..."?

Throw in a few universal phase detractors and you've got one heck of a retroencabulator!

Re:Was I the only one?

[Anonymous Coward]

It runs near absolute zero, and shields electromagnetic radiation (which can knock electrons loose among other things to cause problems) to an insane degree. At first I was like "that's cool!" but then I read that and figured the thing must be large and room-like, and they probably only give remote access to it's usage... haven't RTFA of course.

What does this mean for encryption?

[eternalDRIVEL]

Won't this make standard encryption useless?

Re:What does this mean for encryption?

[Wonda]

Probably not IIRC you need a quantum computer with enough bits to hold the number you're trying to factor, so that'll need over a thousand bits for most encryption in use today.

it also seems pretty hard to add more bits to these quantum computers, so it looks like traditional encryption might be here to stay after all.

Re:What does this mean for encryption?

[norton_I]

No, their device is *NOT* a universal quantum computer. So far as I know, no reputable quantum physicist not in their employ has been allowed to examine what they actually do. Examples of performing calculations impractical on a classical computer are not available as far as I know.

They are something of a joke among the QC people I know. While people acknowledge that their device may be possible of doing some interesting things, everything they do is acting like they have something to hide.

Re:What does this mean for encryption?

[gweihir]

it also seems pretty hard to add more bits to these quantum computers, so it looks like traditional encryption might be here to stay after all.

That is exactly the point. Qhantum-computers scale much, much worse than traditional computers. The problem is that tweo of these do basically give you the same maximum problem size as one does. (for traditional computers you can break problems into smaller steps. For Quantum computers you cannot, without loosing all the advanatges.) So you cannot use just more to break encryption. You need to build one with more qbits that are all entangled wich each other. My present impression is that the effort of adding qbits grows quadratically or the like, as each qbit has to be entangled with each other qbit (that is n*n entanglements). If that is true, even 100 qbits are far out of reach. This means that all modern encryption is perfectly safe from this quantum nonsense.

Re:What does this mean for encryption?

[gweihir]

No impact on encryption, unless you use ROT-13.

Re:What does this mean for encryption?

[Gazzonyx]

Hah! I just switched over to ROT-26. Twice the security of ROT-13, and I hear it's quicker, too!

Yeah; I sleep well at night knowing my secrets are safe.

Re:What does this mean for encryption?

[MrNaz]

Not that I'm passing comment either way, as I don't know, but:

"acting like they have something to hide"

Something like intellectual property?

Re:What does this mean for encryption?

[TeknoHog]

No, their device is *NOT* a universal quantum computer. So far as I know, no reputable quantum physicist not in their employ has been allowed to examine what they actually do.

Duh, of course you can't examine what a quantum computer is doing. That would change the outcome.

Re:What does this mean for encryption?

[Ihmhi]

So far as I know, no reputable quantum physicist not in their employ has been allowed to examine what they actually do.

Well if they did go ahead and examine it, wouldn't the system change anyway?

Re:What does this mean for encryption?

[KGIII]

On a more serious note, does anyone actually understand all of this quantum computing or quantum encryption? My eyes just sort of glaze over and I somehow doubt there's going to be an O'Reily or Quantum Computing for Dummies book out any time soon. I've done some searching and, at best, I find sites that I feel like I'm almost getting it but not quite. I understand some of the goals and they seem like great ideas but I really just don't get it.

Re:What does this mean for encryption?

[smallfries]

This has no impact on cryptography whatsoever. Symmetric encryption has never been shown to be a problem that quantum computing can help with. A *large* QC would affect the use of public key algorithms as both factoring and discrete logs can be sped up.

However:
1. 28 is not a large number. Current asymmetric key sizes would takes thousands of qubits.
2. This is not a "quantum computer". Shor's algorithm requires entangled qubits that stay coherent during the length of the algorithm. The 28 cubits in this system are not entangled so it is useless for the (almost) only proven quantum algorithm.

Summary:
Lots of hype, no practical benefits.

Re:What does this mean for encryption?

[Captain Segfault]

The problem is that tweo of these do basically give you the same maximum problem size as one does.

This only holds if the two computers can only communicate clasically and have no prior entanglement -- and right now we're better at communicating qubits than building them. (see "quantum encryption", which relies on precisely this operation!)

My present impression is that the effort of adding qbits grows quadratically or the like, as each qbit has to be entangled with each other qbit (that is n*n entanglements).

No. It's only a constant amount of work to entangle an unentangled n'th qubit with n-1 others -- any quantum operation will do it.

While you are producing the complicated state you can use error correction to preserve that state, which adds only a constant factor overhead. The problem thus far is that the best techniques previously simply do not scale, although we have plenty of ideas that would. This is largely a matter of engineering, but that takes time.

Re:What does this mean for encryption?

[gweihir]

No. It's only a constant amount of work to entangle an unentangled n'th qubit with n-1 others -- any quantum operation will do it.

I am not talking about entangling them. I am talking about keeping them entangled and performing operations. Inciodentially, the effort for error correction is only constant, if the per-bit error probability is constant. I find it highly doubtful that th error probability can be made independent of overall size for these devices.

Anyways, with what has been built so far, not even the underlying theory can be validated. Far too small. So while there are a lot of ideas, nobody know if any of them habve merit. Would not surprise me at all, if none have, because building quantum computers iof meaningful size may be impossible in this universe.

Re:What does this mean for encryption?

[norton_I]

The simplest example of a quantum computing algorithm is Deutsch's algorithm.

Here is how it works. Consider a simple boolean function b_out = f(b_in). It takes an argument that can be 1 or 0 and returns a 1 or 0. There are four possibilities: always zero, always 1, the identify, and logical not.

Now imagine that I give you a black box that computes 'f'. However, it is very, very slow --maybe internally it is computing some NP-complete problem. If you want to know which of the four functions the box calculates, you need to run it twice, once for zero and once for one.

However, suppose you simply want to find out whether zero and one map to the same or different values, i.e., the parity of f. With classical computers, you are screwed. You still have to run the box twice to find that even though you only want to get a single bit of information.

However, you can do better if the black box I gave you is a quantum implementation of f(x). By feeding in a input state that is a superposition of 0 and 1, I can detect in a single evaluation plus some simple operations whether the function is constant or not. However, in doing so I get no information about the specific value. Effectively I can ask any one-bit question about f(x) as efficiently as a specific value.

It unlikely this will every be useful as stated. While it is known how to efficiently translate every classical computing algorithm into a quantum version it is unlikely a real implementation would be within a factor of 2 in speed or cost. I believe it illustrates the basic idea. The character of other quantum algorithms is similar, you often feed in a superposition of all possible inputs and read a single output which is the specific answer you want with high probability without having to ever compute the values you don't want.

Re:What does this mean for encryption?

[Captain Segfault]

No, because this isn't a quantum computer, in the sense we generally think of it.

It is an interesting device, and at scale it may well be able to do interesting computation. However, there is no reason to believe it can break current asymmetric cryptography.

Real quantum computers will break current asymmetric cryptosystems, although lattice based cryptography is shaping up as a replacement. Quantum computers, afawk, will /not/ break eg AES, although they will provide a quadratic speedup effectively halving the key size -- so if you want your AES encrypted data to be safe against attack by a quantum computer you should use at least 192 bit AES and not 128.

(Note that breaking asymmetric crypto makes doing interesting symmetric crypto hard. Although encrypting your hard drive might be easy, you can't share keys over an untrusted network unless you already have exchanged keys.)

Re:What does this mean for encryption?

[Captain Segfault]

the effort for error correction is only constant, if the per-bit error probability is constant.

By what mechanism would the per-bit error probability not be constant? (Interesting question)

At worst I'd expect the error probability to not be more than linear, just leaving us at the n^2 case you were referring to earlier.

Anyways, with what has been built so far, not even the underlying theory can be validated. Far too small.

The "underlying theory" is quantum mechanics -- which has held up extremely well thus far. Not that my imagination isn't limited, but it is hard to imagine ways in which quantum computers would /not/ work but anything resembling quantum mechanics would.

In other words, I view the test the other way. We haven't yet been able to build devices that /should/ act as large enough quantum computers to see that they don't. That is, I view impossibility of quantum computing as the surprising result that needs experimental proof! Such proof would be fairly straightforward -- either build something which should function as a quantum computer and see that it doesn't, or find unforeseen fundamental difficulties in the current incremental process. At that point we can step back to quantum mechanics and try to figure out what we've got wrong.

Re:What does this mean for encryption?

[KGIII]

Thank you - that helped quite a bit actually.

Re:What does this mean for encryption?

[Anonymous Coward]

the parent is exactly that type of troll, who insisted that railways, or heavier-than-air planes are not possible and that there is worrldwide market for just about 10 computers

Re:What does this mean for encryption?

[gweihir]

By what mechanism would the per-bit error probability not be constant? (Interesting question)

This is a physical device, with bit errors resulting from noise, inadequate cooling, EMI and other things that grow with size.

The "underlying theory" is quantum mechanics -- which has held up extremely well thus far.

Oh, for single particles and low-complexity effects it has. But up to now nobody knows whether it is actually the thing the theory predicts, or something more complex, but in fact not able to scale or do complex calculations. Most simple pysical theories got more complex in the past, when looke ad very closely and with high precision. For example, with classical mechanix you can build analog calculators with arbitrary precision. Obviously that is not true in practice. But you can get up to the precision of todays "quantum computers" without problem.

In other words, I view the test the other way. We haven't yet been able to build devices that /should/ act as large enough quantum computers to see that they don't. That is, I view impossibility of quantum computing as the surprising result that needs experimental proof!

That is of course your choice. However, if scientific history is any indicator, itr is the wrong approach. Also note that there have been hugely inflated claims about any new technology and it being in a completely different class as anything before. Look up the history of electicity, for example. Or nuclear power. None of these claims have ever come true, as severe practical limitations were always encountered. I expect quantum computing will go the same way, and I believe there is already strong indication, namely the lack of any working scalability technique. Also it is unclear owhether the quentum effects scale well enough. it is just quite possible that some yet undiscoverd noise effect will limmit them to, say, 50 qbits in practice, and error correction will not help.

How does it work?

[Kohath]

Can someone post a link that describes the benefits of a quantum architecture and how software can be written to take advantage of them?

And by "benefits", I don't mean hype.

Re:How does it work?

[matria]

Considering that UNIX was developed to play a game on a pdp7, I'd say it doesn't much matter. It will grow.

Re:How does it work?

[Anonymous Coward]

Can someone post a link that describes the benefits of a quantum architecture and how software can be written to take advantage of them?

And by "benefits", I don't mean hype.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shor%27s_algorithm
^The big one.

Re:How does it work?

[norton_I]

The wikipedia article is not bad, though it is fairly technical.

A very small number of algorithms are known for universal quantum computers (which the D-wave device does not claim to be) that are asymptotically faster than any known algorithm for classical computers.

The most widely known of these is Shor's factoring algorithm. Mostly it would be useful for breaking public key cryptography. The others are: Grovers search algorithm which can give a small speed boost to any classical algorithm that involves enumerating all possibilities and checking some property and quantum simulation: simulating the behavior of systems of many particles where quantum effects are important.

In the past 10 years, considerable progress has been made, but nobody still has a good handle on when scalable universal quantum computing might be a reality, though it no longer looks impossible--only very hard. D-wave does not claim their device is universal. In particular they don't say they can do factoring. They claim to be able to efficiently do quantum simulation and also traveling salesman type optimization problems. Evidence of them actually solving any hard problems is not widely available.

Re:How does it work?

[Ceriel Nosforit]

I dunno... Producing a working device seems to be plenty hard. There's vaporware, and then there's university research that doesn't even bother leave the lab. No use if it just remains theory.

Re:How does it work?

[the_brobdingnagian]

Grovers search algorithm which can give a small speed boost to any classical algorithm...

I wouldn't call the step from O(N) to O(sqrt(N)) a small speed boost. You can even be pretty fast when your qubits are ramdomly (but not too fast) change state using error correction techniques. So you don't even need a perfect quantum computer to do usefull work.
That said; I know a few people who do actual research on quantum computing and I've never even heard them talk about D-Wave.

Re:How does it work?

[Mad Hughagi]

Good luck with that - it's all hype.

Quantum computing is the new string-theory, ie. a theoretical physics quagmire. It's soaking up funding and diverting graduate student talent that could be better utilized in other areas.

Re:How does it work?

[ndnspongebob]

quantum computing basically means coders can create black holes from the comfort of a couch

Re:How does it work?

[Anonymous Coward]

These will help you somewhat.
more general:
http://www.stanford.edu/class/ee380/Abstracts/080521-SpookytechnologyStanfordFull11.pdf
little hypy (that damned brain reference):
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I56UugZ_8DI

Re:How does it work?

[norton_I]

sqrt(N) is small compared to the other promised speedups of quantum computers which are typically reduction from super-polynomial or exponential time to polynomial time.

The real crux is that the type of problems that you often want to apply Grover's algorithm to are already O(2^n). Grovers algorithm reduces that to O(2^(n/2)). With a similar size quantum computer you could only solve problems of roughly twice the size.

Still interesting and potentially useful, The main advantage is its wide applicability. Many classical algorithms can simply be directly translated to a quantum equivalent, then have Grover's algorithm applied. Finding a special-purpose quantum algorithm is typically very hard or impossible.

Re:How does it work?

[bap]

D-wave does not claim their device is universal. In particular they don't say they can do factoring. They claim to be able to efficiently do quantum simulation...

Being able to "efficiently do quantum simulation" makes a device a universal quantum computer. That is what "universal" means.

Re:How does it work?

[oodaloop]

The wikipedia article is not bad, though it is fairly technical.

You must be new here. And to Wikipedia.

Re:How does it work?

[whatami]

The following link is an interesitng lecture about quantum computing. http://video.google.ca/videoplay?docid=2566652364341637170&q=quantum+computing&ei=kLKMSKDhHIqS-gGVgrm7Aw&hl=en

But can it run Q*bert?

[cpu_fusion]

But can it run Q*bert? ???

Re:But can it run Q*bert?

[Drinking Bleach]

When someone ports MAME to it, yes.

Really a Quantum Computer?

[Adam Hazzlebank]

Last time I heard about the DWare stuff it generally wasn't considered a quantum computer, more like a very small analog computer. Is this still the case?

Re:Really a Quantum Computer?

[qcomp]

for all I know they have not shown any proof that their computer works in the quantum regime: they have not given quantitative data showing that they have produced quantum superpositions, entanglement, or a quantum speed-up. So by the standards applied to other work in this area: no, it's not a quantum computer - they have not even demonstrated that they have a single qubit, much less 28. (This is not to say that they are not doing good work. The D-wave folks have some publications in peer-reviewed journals and I think they are serious. But they have not provided evidence for "extremely impressive performance gains" or for any "quantum information processing" in their device.)

28 qbits? Can do less than a pocket calculator..

[gweihir]

This ir several orders of magintude from from useful size. Invest the same money into a normal CPU and get much, much more power, even if you use it to simuulate the 28 qbit device.

Google Temp Conversions

[Anonymous Coward]

For anyone who is interested

10 millikelvin = -459.65200 degrees Fahrenheit
10 millikelvin = -273.14 degrees Celsius

Re:Google Temp Conversions

[4D6963]

But how much is it in degrees Rankin? /sarcasm

By the way you cannot really understand what a temperature this close to 0 kelvins represents if you don't know what 0 K is, and when you do not only you know how much 0 K is but it also makes the conversion irrelevant because 10 mK = 0.01 K = 0.01 Celsius above 0 K = 0.018 F above 0 K

It is if you are the NSA

[Kupfernigk]

No chance of having one running off a Honda generator in a cave somewhere in the Pakistan Tribal Territories, or Somalia.

To keep our security agencies happy, quantum computers need to be almost impossible to make. The inventor of a really simple, cheap one is unlikely to have a successful career selling them to Joe Public.

Re:It is if you are the NSA

[coresnake]

Tony Start built this in a cave... WITH A BUNCH OF SCRAPS!

Re:It is if you are the NSA

[Metasquares]

The same reasoning applies to classical computers as well, and yet they're ubiquitous these days.

Re:28 qbits? Can do less than a pocket calculator.

[samurphy21]

By the same token, you could have performed calculations easier on a slide rule than on the first binary computers built. I think the point of this is proof-of-concept of a new technology rather than this particular unit taking over for modern systems.

If no one had bothered to use, abuse, and continue to develop binary computers half a century ago, then we'd still be using abacus and slide rule to perform all our calculations.

Obligatory

[strelitsa]

Beowulf and nut cluster reference.

You may now mod this post down into its quantum components.

South Korea

[Anonymous Coward]

In South Korea, quantum computing is for old people...

Re:28 qbits? Can do less than a pocket calculator.

[Godji]

Yeah, I mean imagine running Crysis on that.

1st thing I'd get it to compute...

[dos4who]

"What is the answer to life, the universe and everything?"

Re:1st thing I'd get it to compute...

[Ihmhi]

I'd write a Jeopardy program and have the only clue be "42". I'd like to see what the thing churns out.

Re:1st thing I'd get it to compute...

[Anonymous Coward]

42

Re:1st thing I'd get it to compute...

[UncleTogie]

I'd write a Jeopardy program and have the only clue be "42". I'd like to see what the thing churns out.

Answer: "How many roads must a man walk down?"

Re:1st thing I'd get it to compute...

[Anonymous Coward]

How about "To be, or not to be?" Shakespeare must have had a quantum quill pen.

Re:1st thing I'd get it to compute...

[jaminJay]

That we already know the answer, let's skip the first millions of years of calculation and get it to design a computer that will come up with the correct question.

Nice cooling

[kno3]

I don't think my water cooling system will be up for the task of cooling that chip. Yet more expenses!

The real question is...

[erKURITA]

Does it run GNU/Linux?

Re:The real question is...

[laejoh]

It does, and does not!

Re:The real question is...

[Migity]

And at the same time!

D-Wave a bit of scam

[Anonymous Coward]

I work with the IQC, we specialize in quantum computing, quantum crypto, and many other things like that. We are also joined partially with the Perimeter Institute (and they do mostly theoretical physics). Anyway, when I first joined the institute, we had a discussion about d-wave. No one believed that it was real, and in fact considers d-wave to be bad for the field. Many of you will probably remember the cold fusion controversy. What happened was that experiment that could not be reproduced was published. This enraged the scientific community. Also, this led to massive funding cuts, and killed off the field. QC has a more stable base, but if d-wave keeps on been publicized like this, and they can never prove their claims (remember that all the experiments and functioning of the QC are considered "trade secrets", they let no one look at it), then we may end up with skepticism from the funders. Keep in mind that the ones who donate have usually no clue what is happening in the field (politicians, ceos, etc, so they are "stupid" enough to be affected by this. Everyone in the field is in the back of their head hoping that its real, but with that chance being so low, we want d-wave to be forgotten.

Re:D-Wave a bit of scam

[Adeptus_Luminati]

So are you saying that they haven't yet passed a series of tests that would prove their computer is working?

One would think that it should be possible to design tests which they could pass if they possessed the working technology, without them having to reveal how exactly they achieved the result.

Very high level example: For instance, perform X number of Z type calculations in Y seconds, where Z type calculations would normally take present-day computers Y * 10 months of time but through quantum computing can be done in mere seconds.

So long as they produce the desired results, they should have a right to keep their technology confidential for trade secret/monetary reasons. Although of course, for the sake of the advancement of humanity/technology, it would be nice to give out the info.

Adeptus

Re:D-Wave a bit of scam

[Ihmhi]

[CITATION NEEDED]

You state that you work for the Institute for Quantum Computing". How are we to know that you are not just badmouthing a company that may have gotten on your bad site?

Sources and facts, please.

Re:D-Wave a bit of scam

[qcomp]

One would think that it should be possible to design tests which they could pass if they possessed the working technology, without them having to reveal how exactly they achieved the result.

This is actually quite hard (and I'm not sure any such test exists).

One can distinguish two scenarios: (1) a quantum computer tas a box that gets a classical input, processes it and outputs a classical result. Then the only distinction between classical and quantum is speed - or rather "computational complexity" in the sense that the number of required computational steps sclaes differently with the size (in bits) of the input - hence by sending a series of queries with varying length and plotting the scaling one might conclude "this device is better than any known classical machine". But there are two caveats. one needs to go to really large input to see such a scaling and there's no proof that there does not exist a clever classical algorithm with the same scaling.

(2) one can demand more of a quantum computer, namely the capability to perform a universal set of gates and therefor prepare a large class of quantum states. There are well-developed criteria to verify that such states have been produced and that certain gates have been performed. If a universal set of gates has been implemented with sufficient quality one knows that the device is capable of performing quantum computations (but maybe this capability is not needed for QC). To apply this criterion, however, one needs to "look into the box" and perform measurements on the qubits.

This problem could be circumvented, if their supposed quantum computer would also have a "quantum interface" that allows input and output of quantum information (e.g., I send them a bunch of photons, they map their state into their computer, perfom a set of operations I ask them to do and then they write back the state ofthe qubits to photons and send them back to me for analysis. Then I could verify (not me, but experimentalists with the proper equipment) if the desired operation has indeed been performed.

Of course, d-wave does not claim that their device is a "universal quantum computer" or that it can prepare these kind of states. How their claims can be verified without looking into their device, I don't know.

Re:D-Wave a bit of scam

[1 a bee]

Though I'd google for citations and ran into this PCWorld article. Quoting the article

The U.S. National Aeronautics and Space Administration confirmed Thursday that it built a special chip used in a disputed demonstration of quantum computing in February.

NASA engineers used their experience with sub-micrometer dimensions and ultra-low temperatures to build a quantum processor for Canadian startup D-Wave Systems Inc., said Alan Kleinsasser, principal investigator in the quantum chip program at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California.

To judge the veracity of that article, I googled nasa + d-wave, and found a lot of articles corroborating the opposite conclusion: it appears a good number of people in the QC field take these guys seriously.

Sure...

[edalytical]

I'm using a quantum preprocessor for my /. post as a result I may or may not have told you about the benefits of quantum computing. Unfortunately you can't verify its validity, but I can tell you the state of this post depends in some probabilistic way on you reading it, maybe.

Call me when it can run a useful program...

[Joce640k]

...then we'll discuss the word "successful".

Try "something which would stop the grant cheque"

[Joce640k]

You'll be closer to the mark.

QC is a lucrative research subject, much like artificial intelligence. The best way to approach it is to always act as if your department is on the brink of a major breakthrough. Under no circumstances hint that the emperor's winkle is showing.

AI has managed to keep up the facade since the 1960s. Parapsychology was weeded out after a mere decade.

How long will QC last, I wonder...

Uh

[justinlee37]

It is particularly good at pattern recognition, it operates at 10 milliKelvin, and it is shielded to limit electromagnetic interference to one nanotesla in three dimensions across the whole chip. Could this be the first successful commercial quantum computer?

Based on that description? No. I don't even know what the fuck any of that stuff you just said even means, man (except for the bit about pattern recognition, which was an unquantified statement anyway and about as useful as "the computer is fast"). Speak in a language I can understand, like, the average framerate it can run Crysis at.

Re:Uh

[cowscows]

I'll translate for you:

It's fairly useless but less useless at pattern recognition than it is for anything else. To make it work we have to make it really really cold. It won't get cancer from cell phones. We won't make any money off of this particular machine.

Re:Uh

[pla]

I don't even know what the fuck any of that stuff you just said even means

Do you understand what it means to say that the CPU in your desktop has a 14-stage execution pipeline? That it has a TLB hit rate over 98%? That it has a double-pumped ALU?


Based on that description? No.

Whether or not you understand the specs has no relation to commercial viability. As you say, you (or Joe Average) only care how it will affect your frame rate in the latest FPS.

Re:Uh

[justinlee37]

It might be valuable as a specialized research tool, or in industry as a component of production, but it isn't consumer-viable. It will never be a "final product" (as counted in the GDP), at least not in this decade.

Also, no, I didn't understand any of that stuff either, haha. I'm a student of economics and a consumer, not a hardware engineer.

Re:Uh

[DanJ_UK]

Perfect, kudos.

Re:Uh

[kumanopuusan]

This is not an article about video games. If all of science and technology had to be dumbed down so that you personally could understand it, there wouldn't be any video games for you to play (modelling motion and optics), let alone computers, cars or the controlled use of fire.

If you don't understand something, either educate yourself so you can understand it, or leave it alone. The correct response is not a call to remove the hard sciences from public discussion.

How did you get modded up, anyway? If the average slashdot user agrees with Barbie that "math is hard," it's probably time to let slashdot drown in its own stupidity.

Re:Uh

[justinlee37]

I don't think that saying "I am uneducated in the field of hardware engineering" is exactly the same as saying "math is hard." Get off of your pedestal; the point is that if the average person doesn't understand the specs, then it isn't going to have widespread commercial appeal. Which, if you recall, was the question posed to us in the summary.

Re:Uh

[kumanopuusan]

There's a big difference between "I am not an engineer" and "I don't understand basic units of measure." The concept of absolute zero is something you should have learned in elementary school. I'm not on any pedestal. Maybe you're standing in a ditch.

Even ignoring that, your argument is pretty nonsensical. You say that if the average person doesn't understand the specs it will never have widespread commercial appeal. It doesn't follow that if you don't understand the article summary, that no one else will understand the applications of quantum computers in the future. Unless you think that the summary of this article is the single current and future source of information about quantum computing...

Even if no one understood the specs or even the utility of quantum computers, they could still be commercially successful. Popular understanding of quantum physics wasn't required before personal computers (using transistors) and CDs (using lasers) became successful.

Re:Uh

[justinlee37]

Who said I didn't understand the concept of absolute zero? You're putting words in my mouth, again. Understanding absolute zero is one thing; understanding the technical significance of "it operates at 10 milliKelvins" is something else entirely.

Utilizing quantum entanglement to transfer information over great distances, instantly, is obviously a genius idea. But that article summary means nothing to anyone who isn't a hardware engineer. Whoever wrote it should have kept a more general audience in mind, and left the technical details in the article itself for people actually interested enough to RTFA.

Stop being pretentious, slashdotter.

Wait, I must be new here.

Re:Uh

[kumanopuusan]

I really ought to just drop it, but I'm waiting for a backup to finish and the following was irresistible.

Utilizing quantum entanglement to transfer information over great distances, instantly, is obviously a genius idea.

The article, and the summary, are about quantum computing, not quantum cryptography or quantum teleportation. That's the significance of the word "computing" in the title. (Here comes the "I already knew that," right?)

But that article summary means nothing to anyone who isn't a hardware engineer.

I'm not an engineer at all, and there was nothing in the least bit difficult to understand about the summary. Does everything have to be dumbed down? How far should we all sink, and to whose standard? If it isn't in pictographs, the illiterate will be excluded!

Re:Uh

[justinlee37]

Just because you understand what each word means on its own doesn't mean that you understand the significance of the statement as a whole. Personally, I'm capable of admitting when I don't know what a sentence implies. Observe: I'm incapable of knowing the significance of the statement "it is shielded to limit electromagnetic interference to one nanotesla in three dimensions across the whole chip" because I'm not aware of how shielded against electromagnetic interference any processor is. I'm also not aware of whether or not electromagnetic interference is a bigger problem in quantum computing than traditional computing. Without knowing how shielded any other processor is to interference in order to draw a comparison, or even knowing whether or not shielding is more or less important in quantum computing, a quantification of this chip's shielding is meaningless to me, and anyone else who doesn't know those things.

Do you know those things, without being a hardware engineer? Or do you just enjoy pretending to know more than you do? Or maybe you thought that when I was using some humor and said "I don't even understand what anything you just said means, man," that I literally meant that I didn't know what a milliKelvin or a nanotesla was. Not so. I just don't understand the significance of those measurements in this context.

You should waste your time on someone who will actually get riled up by base and trite insults, random internet person. Go troll /b/ or something.

Sounds interesting

[bperkins]

But their claims are so far of everyone else's and there are so few details about how it works that it also sounds like an investment scam.

Quantum computer tech support

[yorkshiredale]

"Hello, Quantum Computer Tech Support"

"My new QC is not working, I'd like a replacement under the warranty"

"What makes you think it's broken?"

"It keeps giving wrong results"

"But it's giving the right results in lots of nearby parallel universes. The computer is not broken - you're not observing from the recommended viewing position. This is user error." CLICK.

No proof

[bugnotme]

D-Wave has provided neither proof nor convincing evidence that they have, or are capable of building a quantum computer. There are several theoretical limitations that experts remain skeptical have been overcome. Their demonstrations have been suspicious and not open for peer review. In sum, I will believe it when I see it.

See some skepticism here:
http://scottaaronson.com/blog/?p=306
http://scottaaronson.com/blog/?p=291
http://scottaaronson.com/blog/?s=d-wave

Re:No proof

[Easy2RememberNick]

"D-Wave has provided neither proof nor convincing evidence..."

  Quantum computing is not a black or white or a yes or no type of field, D-Wave's response to your accusation could be 'Maybe'.

Re:28 qbits? Can do less than a pocket calculator.

[Free the Cowards]

This is very much not the case. Computing developed for entirely practical reasons, performing computations which were either difficult or impossible to perform without them: brute forcing the Enigma codes, calculating artillery tables, etc.

In any case, the summary (I haven't bothered to read the article) makes it sound like they're presenting it as a practical, useful device, in which case saying that it's too weak to be useful is an entirely valid criticism.

WTF

[Anonymous Coward]

But will it run Crysis?

You must build it

[Jayemji]

Almost got it, but not quite. We're looking for 300 qubits, by 80 qubits, by 40 qubits.

Sounds like smoke and mirrors/snake oil BS

[DeafDumbBlind]

D-Wave sounds like a classic scam to lure investors.
IF they really had a working QC, they could patent the tech and license the patents for Billions of dollars.

All they're doing is saying 'Trust me, it works, ignore the man under the table'.

I bet that in 2 or 3 years we'll be reading a story like this about D-Wave.
http://trashotron.com/agony/columns/05-21-02.htm/

Re:Sounds like smoke and mirrors/snake oil BS

[DeafDumbBlind]

Sorry, bad link...
this one should work
http://trashotron.com/agony/columns/05-21-02.htm

Re:How does it work? Parallel universes.

[uassholes]

David Deutsch's Home Page (http://www.qubit.org/people/david/David.html) is a good place to start. Not only is he an active scientist in the field, he has written an excellent popular book(http://www.qubit.org/people/david/FabricOfReality/FoR.html); "The Fabric Of Reality".

A good reason to look there is to get an intuition of the concept of computing using parallel universes.

Call me when someone makes a 2048-qubit computer

[Myria]

Because I've got a date with the Xbox public key.

"milliKelvin?"

[Guppy06]

"it operates at 10 milliKelvin"

First off, "kelvin" as a unit of measure is not a proper noun, any more than "meter" is (read me). But even if it was, it'd be "Millikelvin," you don't capitalize letters in the middle of words!

Hadamard gate

[HiggsBison]

I don't want any physicists saying "you forgot the Hademard gate etc."

I think you meant "Hadamard gate".

-- Any Physicist

(Much easier to google for the wikipedia article with that spelling.)

Headline is wrong and you are wrong too

[Kupfernigk]

The headline is wrong. A kelvin is a unit of temperature difference, a defined fraction of the temperature of the triple point of water above absolute zero. It is not a scale referenced to Absolute Zero. You are right in that, as an SI unit, it is not capitalised.

But the milli prefix is not capitalised, because capital M implies the Mega prefix - 1E6 rather than 1E-3.

The correct, pedantic version is "10 mk above Absolute Zero", or "10 millikelvins above Absolute Zero".

Re:Headline is wrong and you are wrong too

[Guppy06]

"A kelvin is a unit of temperature difference,"

It is a unit of thermodynamic temperature.

"a defined fraction of the temperature of the triple point of water above absolute zero."

Note the inclusion of absolute zero in the definition.

"It is not a scale referenced to Absolute Zero."

Yes, it is; it is a unit of thermodynamic temperature. Didn't you pay attention in your basic chemistry class?

"But the milli prefix is not capitalised, because capital M implies the Mega prefix"

If you spent more time reading my post rather than rushing off to be "right," you'd have noticed that I was arguing that the term "millikelvin" is not a proper noun, and that if it was, the first letter of the word "millikelvin" would be capitalized. And while the symbol for the prefix "mega-" is capitalized, when it is spelled out it follows the same rules of capitalization as the rest of English; you'd only capitalize "megakelivin" if it appeared at the beginning of the sentence, was used in a title, or the like.

"The correct, pedantic version is "10 mk above Absolute Zero", or "10 millikelvins above Absolute Zero"."

The symbol for kelvin needs to be capitalized, "above absolute zero" is redundant, and "absolute zero" (at least as thermodynamic temperatures go) is not a proper noun or title and should not be capitalized. The temperature was 10 mK.

Let me try the HTML link again: here

It's a Scam

[Louis Savain]

D-Wave is obviously running an elaborate hoax or scam. In my opinion, any company that claims to have a working quantum computer is either perpetrating a fraud or is fooled by its own crackpottery. Quantum computing is one of the biggest hoaxes in the history of science, second only to anthropogenic global warming. And by the way, Oxford's David Deutsch, the most visible proponent of quantum computing, is a known time travel believing crackpot. You can mod me down as much as you want but it is the truth. No amount of censorship can suppress the truth forever.

Re:It's a Scam

[DirePickle]

Dude. That guy is the crackpot. And I guess you are, too, if those are all of your comments there. What utter Time-Cubian drivel.

Re:Try "something which would stop the grant chequ

[Cairnarvon]

I don't know who modded you Insightful, but AI research has produced many useful results. The fact that it hasn't produced HAL 9000 very much does not mean it's on the same level as parapsychology.
Similarly, quantum physics is a real field of science, and quantum computing is based on solid scientific principles. This company may be a bunch of frauds, but if you want to suggest quantum physics is a massive conspiracy among the physicists of the world you're going to need more than just handwaving and pointing to a field of pseudoscience that never had the support of mainstream scientists.

D-Wave's Quantum Computing Crackpottery

[Louis Savain]

D-Wave's Quantum Computing Crackpottery

The whole field of quantum computing is crackpottery at best and an elaborate scam/hoax at worst. One man's opinion.

Re:D-Wave's Quantum Computing Crackpottery

[ORBAT]

Speaking of crackpots...
Honestly, mr. Savain, if your ideas were in fact anything but complete bullshit (and you weren't such a complete asshole when it comes to presenting those ideas) someone might actually take you seriously. You remind me of Gene Ray and his Time Cube, and I don't think I'm the only one.

Re:D-Wave's Quantum Computing Crackpottery

[Louis Savain]

Honestly, mr. Savain, if your ideas were in fact anything but complete bullshit (and you weren't such a complete asshole when it comes to presenting those ideas) someone might actually take you seriously. You remind me of Gene Ray and his Time Cube, and I don't think I'm the only one.

As I wrote elsewhere, opinions are like assholes. Everybody's got one. You forgot to explain why your opinion matters to me. The last time I checked, you don't put food on my table. Neither do D-Wave, David Deutsch, Stephen Hawking and all the other crackpots in the physics community who believe in time travel and quantum computing. LOL. And yet, nothing moves in spacetime.

There is no dynamics within space-time itself: nothing ever moves therein; nothing happens; nothing changes. [...] In particular, one does not think of particles as "moving through" space-time, or as "following along" their world-lines. Rather, particles are just "in" space-time, once and for all, and the world-line represents, all at once the complete life history of the particle.

From "Relativity from A to B" by Dr. Robert Geroch, U. of Chicago

[Spacetime is] Einstein's block universe (in which, too, nothing ever happens, since everything is, four-dimensionally speaking, determined and laid down from the beginning).

Karl Popper, Conjectures and Refutations

I myself believe that there will one day be time travel because when we find that something isn't forbidden by the over-arching laws of physics we usually eventually find a technological way of doing it.

David Deutsch (source: NOVA OnLine)

Now who is the crackpot, me (who, like Popper and Geroch, does not accept time travel and insists that nothing can move in spacetime) or David Deutsch? The answer depends on whether you are an ass kisser or you are on the side of truth and honesty.

Re:D-Wave's Quantum Computing Crackpottery

[bh_doc]

I started reading your linked blog, but got stuck at this:

Quantum computing is the only "scientific" field that is not only based on zero evidence but the evidence, if it did exist, can never be observed by definition. The entire quantum computing field is based on the conjecture that certain quantum properties can have multiple states simultaneously, even though the property in question only has room for one. Worse, this property can never be observed in its superposed states because, as soon as you try to observe it, nature does some weird magic called the "collapse of the wave function" and the property instantly takes on one state or another. Amazing, isnâ(TM)t it?

Quite clearly you have insufficient understanding of quantum mechanics to be able to make any justifiable criticism of it.

Superposition can be observed by comparing measurements of multiple copies of identically prepared systems done in the superposition basis to measurements done in the "standard" (for lack of a better word) basis. The results you get defy a probabilistic explanation.

To illustrate that admittedly daunting sentence above, here's an example that you might be able to understand, in terms of polarized light. The principles, however, apply to any system:

Start with a light source that's unpolarized. If you were to measure the polarization of its photons in the horizontal/vertical basis (take a polarizing beamsplitter, and put single-photon detectors at the outputs), you get 50% horizontal, and 50% vertical results. Say you rotate your measuring apparatus 45%, so now you're measuring in the "diagonal" and "antidiagonal" basis. Of course, you'll still get 50/50 results because the light is unpolarized. No matter what angle you measure at, you'll always get 50/50. Makes sense, right? Sounds probabilistic, and it is.

Stick in a polarizer at the light source, set so that the photons coming out are horizontally polarized. Now rotate the polarizer 45 degrees. What you've created is "diagonally" polarized photons. You can think of it as being in a superposition of horizontal and vertical polarizations (diagonal is, afterall, the sum of 1/sqrt(2) horizontal and 1/sqrt(2) vertical).

Or, if you're taking a probabilistic view, half the time a photon is horizontally polarized, and half the time its vertically polarized.

Do your measurements again, you'll find that measurements in the horizontal/vertical basis give 50/50 results. Hang on, that sounds probabilistic! Why yes, at that point it is. But then, getting even results is consistent with having equally superposed amounts of horizontal and vertical, too.

Now rotate your measurement device 45 degrees, and you find your results are diagonal/antidiagonal 100/0. This is how you measure superposition states, and shows the difference between them and probabilistic mixture states. You cannot obtain this result with a probabilistic picture, yet this is the result that you will get.

Light isn't in any way special. Many principles of quantum computers (as well as general quantum mechanics) have been demonstrated using light, and notably they completely agree with similar experiments done in other quantum systems, ion traps for example.

And I haven't even talked about interference experiments.

Claiming that there is no evidence for quantum superposition, or that it has never been observed, is just breathtakingly ignorant. But I'm sure you've been told all that before. Here's hoping someone learns something from this, if not yourself.

Re:D-Wave's Quantum Computing Crackpottery

[Louis Savain]

Like most physicists (and wannabes), you're just a pompous condescending asshole. You haven't the faintest clue as to what is really going on in the light experiment you proposed. You have no idea what the real properties of light are at the particle level. You are just guessing. Light isn't in any way special. Please! Are you fucking kidding me? Light is special to the extreme and none of you pompous asses are close to understanding what light is and how it really works. The experiment you suggested has nothing to do with observing state superposition. You have not observed any kind of superposition. You are just interpreting the result of an experiment using assertion as proof. Superposition is unobservable by definition. It is a mere interpretation, goddamnit, a billion quantum computing fanatics jumping up and down and foaming at the mouth notwithstanding. LOL. Before you can even begin to talk about superposition, you need to explain why the decay interval of subatomic particle is probabilistic. You haven't a clue. Until you get one, you are all a bunch of ignoramuses and scam artists braying at the moon.

PS. You crackpots need to show that you have guts and sign your names to your articles. I face the music and so should you.

Re:D-Wave's Quantum Computing Crackpottery

[tucuxi]

You sir, are a troll if I ever read one. However, I'll feed you some just for the amusement value.

In your opinion, what exactly is it that *can* be known, given the fact that our senses are quite limited? Does ultraviolet light exist, even if you can't see it, touch it or smell it? Does magnetism exist, even if you can't explain how it works and we have no built-in senses to detect it? What's so difficult to believe about quantum physics, given the huge mass of experiments that sustain it?

Perhaps you would care to point out a different interpretation of the experimental results. I'm sure there's a nobel prize waiting for you -- should your explanation be more helpful than the current one (which has allowed the development of working products, such as quantum cryptography).

And of course, if you manage to find a way to peer into subatomic particles using your naked eyes -- hey, imagine the look on the face of those CERN guys, who are just finishing their 5 bn Euro collider.

Re:D-Wave's Quantum Computing Crackpottery

[Rosy At Random]

One man. And that man would be... oh, right, you.

Well, I know another man whose opinion is that you don't know what you're talking about and base your objections on an aesthetic inability to really contemplate non-classical phenomena.

Re:D-Wave's Quantum Computing Crackpottery

[Louis Savain]

You sir, are a troll if I ever read one. However, I'll feed you some just for the amusement value.
In your opinion, what exactly is it that *can* be known, given the fact that our senses are quite limited? Does ultraviolet light exist, even if you can't see it, touch it or smell it? Does magnetism exist, even if you can't explain how it works and we have no built-in senses to detect it? What's so difficult to believe about quantum physics, given the huge mass of experiments that sustain it?

Fuck you, jackass. I don't remember ever saying that I rejected quantum physics. Why the strawman? Do you people work for D-Waves? Or are you all ass kissers by nature?

Re:D-Wave's Quantum Computing Crackpottery

[Anonymous Coward]

How is this insightful? There is no real content here, just flames and rabid screams about time travel... In particular, the discussion about time travel is totally offtopic! We are discussing quantum mechanics, not philosophy, Mr. Savain.

Re:D-Wave's Quantum Computing Crackpottery

[cobaltnova]

The experiment you suggested has nothing to do with observing state superposition. You have not observed any kind of superposition. You are just interpreting the result of an experiment using assertion as proof.

Sounds like you are guilty of the last sentence as well.

I don't remember ever saying that I rejected quantum physics.

What do you believe then? Superposition of wave functions is implicit in Schroedinger's equation. In fact, it's implicit in any differential equation of a wave function (if this is not obvious, I will gladly explain in a later post). What exactly is your version of "Quantum physics" that doesn't allow for superposition?

Furthermore, don't try the "more than one _ at the same time" trick with me: it won't work. Quantum mechanics does NOT advocate that any object is ever in two states at the same time; it suggests that it is in some other "state" which is not logically "compatible" with your other notions of "state." Try reading Robert Griffiths' "Consistent Quantum Theory." You will agree with him on philosophical issues (he's also Christian).

Re:D-Wave's Quantum Computing Crackpottery

[tucuxi]

I don't remember ever saying that I rejected quantum physics. Why the strawman?

Read your own blog, Mr. Troll. You *do* say that quantum physics is crackpottery. Please keep your ravings straight.

Do you people work for D-Waves? Or are you all ass kissers by nature?

I don't have any opinion on D-Waves. They are probably selling snake-oil. As for the personal attacks, you sure have an interesting blog and post history. Most trolls forget create a blog that advertises the fact (maybe they troll for kicks, but you seem to be after the page hits). From the blog's "about me", first item:

I am a crackpot and a crank. Those are my credentials.

Re:D-Wave's Quantum Computing Crackpottery

[Louis Savain]

Read your own blog, Mr. Troll. You *do* say that quantum physics is crackpottery. Please keep your ravings straight.

Fuck you one more time, jackass. And the stinking mule you sleep with. In the article you point to I write that quantum computing is crackpottery. Since when did quantum physics equate to quantum computing? QC is based on the Copenhagen interpretation of quantum physics. An interpretation does not a theory make.

Regarding your interpretation of what I write on my blog, fuck you again. LOL. The problem with assholes like you is that you're all humour-challenged. In addition, you believe in the possibility of time travel and the existence of zillions of parallel universes. A chicken-shit Star-Trek cult is what you idiots belong to. ahahaha...

Opinions Are Like Assholes

[Louis Savain]

Opinions are like assholes. Everybody's got one. Who's more likely to be a crackpot, David Deutsch who believes in time travel and the existence of an infinite number of universes or someone who does not? In my opinion, Deutsch is the crackpot and everybody like you who supports his quantum computing crackpottery and his chicken shit Star-Trek physics. LOL.

Re:Opinions Are Like Assholes

[DirePickle]

I'm a physicist. It seems that you are widely-regarded as a crackpot. And, what, you're a programmer or something? And--if this one website is correct--you're trying to program a Christian AI based on Revelation?

Saying belief or disbelief in major branches of physics, tested and proven numerous times over, is an opinion is a major disservice to... science. I'm sorry. You're a crackpot.

Re:Opinions Are Like Assholes

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm sorry. You're a crackpot.

Like the man says, opinions are like assholes. You think he's a crackpot but he thinks your support of time travel believing crackpots like David Deutsch makes you a crackpot. Looks like the case of a trained time travel believing crackpot calling someone else a crackpot because the other rejects time travel and quantum computing. Opinions, opinions. Opinions and assholes. LOL.

Re:Opinions Are Like Assholes

[DirePickle]

I'm going to guess that you're actually the same person that I was just talking to, since you use the same sort of phrasing. (Not to mention your response coming just a minute or two after I posted). And so, of course, this is just feeding the trolls, but I want anyone else that reads this to understand what's actually going on: The uber-parent isn't just saying that science-fiction time travel is impossible. He is stating that Einstein's theories of relativity are wrong, that things in the universe do not progress forward in time. He also does not disbelieve in quantum computing. He disbelieves quantum mechanics and all of quantum physics.

Re:Opinions Are Like Assholes

[Louis Savain]

I'm going to guess that you're actually the same person that I was just talking to, since you use the same sort of phrasing. (Not to mention your response coming just a minute or two after I posted). And so, of course, this is just feeding the trolls, but I want anyone else that reads this to understand what's actually going on: The uber-parent isn't just saying that science-fiction time travel is impossible. He is stating that Einstein's theories of relativity are wrong, that things in the universe do not progress forward in time. He also does not disbelieve in quantum computing. He disbelieves quantum mechanics and all of quantum physics.

Why lie to make a lame point? I never said that Einstein's theories are wrong. I say exactly what Sir Karl Popper said about Einstein's spacetime, that nothing can move in spacetime. Popper was a lot smarter than you'll ever be. I am saying exactly the same thing that well-known relativity author Robert Geroch said in his text book, Relatvity from A to B:

There is no dynamics within space-time itself: nothing ever moves therein; nothing happens; nothing changes. [...] In particular, one does not think of particles as "moving through" space-time, or as "following along" their world-lines. Rather, particles are just "in" space-time, once and for all, and the world-line represents, all at once the complete life history of the particle.

You call yourself a trained physicist and you did not know that nothing can move in spacetime, forward or backward? What kind of physicist are you? A Star-Trek physicist, obviously. And a liar to boot. And yes, I disbelieve quantum computing. There is no doubt in my mind that it is both a hoax and unmitigated crackpottery. Just like time travel and the like.

Why Was Parent Modded Down as a Troll?

[Anonymous Coward]

The man is clearly on topic and he is merely expressing his opinion about D-Wave and quantum computing, just like everybody else. Has Slashdot turned into a fascist site where politically incorrect viewpoints are censored into oblivion? It sure seems like it.

No, this isn't commercially useful

[adamkennedy]

Purely by chance, I recently ended up sitting next to a D-wave employee while travelling from Philly to New York, and we got to talking about commercial viability.

I was curious at what point they would reach the commercial tipping point, where it would be cheaper to use quantum computation than to do it on regularly processors.

According to him, the point at which they planned to be commercially viable was somewhere in the vicinity of 512 qubits, at that point there was a number of problems that started to become worthwhile doing.

So they still have quite a ways to go.

Re:No, this isn't commercially useful

[tehcyder]

You don't happen to recall the employee's name do you?

There might be, er, a bonus waiting for them.

Signed, D-wave HR department.

Ridiculous

[iris-n]

FTFA: Computers are constrained by the laws of physics; what you can do with information is no more than the laws of physics, when you operate at classical level. On a quantum computer, information processing is done on devices that obey the laws of quantum mechanics.

So, quantum mechanics is not physics, or it just doesn't obey its laws?

The problem is, this quote is from the company's CTO. Or he used a very unhappy wording, or he has no idea what he's talking about. Scam? Oh no, wouldn't think about it. How can i tag this vaporware?

D-wave

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm a PhD student at the University of British Columbia in Condensed Matter (Superconductivity) in the Physics department. D-wave has come to us for advice (mostly at the start) and for the use of some of our equipment/expertise.

I am as a great skeptic of D-wave, and being a researcher it frustrates me to no end that they wont disclose any of their inner workings. I am not the only one: D-wave has lost many of their top theoreticians because of conflicting interests in this project.

I CAN tell you, however, that this is by no means a scam company. It may not be a "universal quantum computer", but by the number of quality people they have working for them (some of whom i've worked with and known for years) you can be sure that they DO have a product and are in no way trying to "Scam their investors". Comments like that are made out of complete ignorance.

Quantum Co-Processor?

[aexsar]

Instead of using a quantum processor to totally replace current processors; wouldn't a logical first step be to use current processor technologies with a quantum co-processor to handle specific quantum tasks? Then who cares that you only have (2, 4, 8, 16, whatever) qubits to play with, you can setup the problem or task using current technology, then make specific requests when you actually have a problem where using a quantum processor would beneficial.

Yeah but..

[Anonymous Coward]

does it run Linux?

Programming a QC

[Anonymous Coward]

Error on line 3, -3, and 3i. (Error 281)
You left the gas on. (Error 6701)
That isn't a mole. (Error 91831)

The answer is...

[Anonymous Coward]

To maximize the joy experienced by every sentient being over all time and all space.

That's the easy part. The difficult part is calculating the joy function. Maybe that's where the quantum computer would help?

Nothing - Real QC would affect key distro

[billstewart]

As Captain Segfault says, real quantum computers will break factoring-based asymmetric crypto (i.e. RSA and DH key exchange and signatures) and can effectively halve the key size for some kinds of symmetric crypto. So this not only means using longer keys for symmetric algorithms, but pushes us towards traditional Key Distribution Center methodologies such as Kerberos and similar things we forgot during the 90s, and possibly to HMAC-based signatures (which are a more annoying loss.)

But D-Wave's system, if I understand their blurbs correctly, can't do the Shor's-Algorithm things that radically speed up factoring, so it's not going to do that. On the other hand, it may be useful for other search-based security attacks, such as finding your phone records in the NSA's big database or whatever.