A swiss company has recently announced a commercial product allowing a fiber optic channel to be secured with quantum cryptography; this would make tapping (without detection) impossible.
Of course, they could get meaner and ban anyone's right to secure outgoing fiber, which I suppose they would.
Ironically enough, I'm pulling this out of a book oriented around computer architectures ("Advanced Computer Architectures - A Design Space Approach", Dezso Sima, Terence Fountain , Peter Kacsuk), but what I mean by the von Meumann model is that: "A programming language corresponding to this model should allow variables to be declared and their values to be manipulated (altered) by means of a proper set of instructions as many times as required during computation (according to the state transition semantics...). Furthermore the language should provide control structures to allow explicit control of the execution sequence." (pg. 11)
So C/BASIC/PASCAL all fit this model. It's probably the same idea you had in mind with the procedural model, but I think it grows out of the basic von Neumann model (of which a computer architecture is a specific facilitating implementation).
It's actually not that bad. In my experience as TA for first year programming, the students who have difficulties seem to have more problems grasping the concept of what a loop or function is, rather than with the crazy symbols they're required to type in order to get one.
Although, putting ';' at the end of each line, and dealing with printf format strings can be a source of headaches.
In my experience, it seems best to introduce some sort of usefull example first, and then show how it fits into an overal paradigm of computing.
ie. Introduce C/PASCAL/BASIC then talk about the von Neumann model (which seems to be the most popular model, but possible not the easiest to understand)
In fact, since the von Neumann model is so popular, perhaps you should start of with a functional or declarative language first, like prolog just to open their minds before they get stuck into one way of thinking.
Thanks for clearing that up; the original article mislead me into thinking that Microvision had an exclusive hold on the technology, by using words like 'microsoft' and '200 patents' within the same block of text. The site you listed gives a much clearer picture of the industry.
The last time I checked my usage with Sympatico's new tool, I found out that apparently I had downloaded about 20GB worth of data within the last month - leaving me with a bill, in theory, of about $100 CDN! Good thing it doesn't start until June.
The best part is the email they send out, in which is says that 'based on your activity over the last three months, this shouldn't affect you' (paraphrasing).
In theory, it seems reasonable to me to charge based on usage (since I'm fairly certain that ISPs pay their bills based on their member's usage), but not without a fair pricing scheme.
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I'm curious: what's a Fibonacci heap?
Well put. The only good pop-up is a dead pop-up.
Just in time, quantum cryptography for the masses.
A swiss company has recently announced a commercial product allowing a fiber optic channel to be secured with quantum cryptography; this would make tapping (without detection) impossible.
Of course, they could get meaner and ban anyone's right to secure outgoing fiber, which I suppose they would.
Ironically enough, I'm pulling this out of a book oriented around computer architectures ("Advanced Computer Architectures - A Design Space Approach", Dezso Sima, Terence Fountain , Peter Kacsuk), but what I mean by the von Meumann model is that: ...). Furthermore the language should provide control structures to allow explicit control of the execution sequence." (pg. 11)
"A programming language corresponding to this model should allow variables to be declared and their values to be manipulated (altered) by means of a proper set of instructions as many times as required during computation (according to the state transition semantics
So C/BASIC/PASCAL all fit this model. It's probably the same idea you had in mind with the procedural model, but I think it grows out of the basic von Neumann model (of which a computer architecture is a specific facilitating implementation).
It's actually not that bad. In my experience as TA for first year programming, the students who have difficulties seem to have more problems grasping the concept of what a loop or function is, rather than with the crazy symbols they're required to type in order to get one.
Although, putting ';' at the end of each line, and dealing with printf format strings can be a source of headaches.
In my experience, it seems best to introduce some sort of usefull example first, and then show how it fits into an overal paradigm of computing.
ie. Introduce C/PASCAL/BASIC then talk about the von Neumann model (which seems to be the most popular model, but possible not the easiest to understand)
In fact, since the von Neumann model is so popular, perhaps you should start of with a functional or declarative language first, like prolog just to open their minds before they get stuck into one way of thinking.
Thanks for clearing that up; the original article mislead me into thinking that Microvision had an exclusive hold on the technology, by using words like 'microsoft' and '200 patents' within the same block of text. The site you listed gives a much clearer picture of the industry.
So one company seems to be holding all the patents. I'm not holding my breath waiting for the prices to 'plummet'.
The last time I checked my usage with Sympatico's new tool, I found out that apparently I had downloaded about 20GB worth of data within the last month - leaving me with a bill, in theory, of about $100 CDN! Good thing it doesn't start until June.
The best part is the email they send out, in which is says that 'based on your activity over the last three months, this shouldn't affect you' (paraphrasing).
In theory, it seems reasonable to me to charge based on usage (since I'm fairly certain that ISPs pay their bills based on their member's usage), but not without a fair pricing scheme.