November 2017 - Vol. 60 No. 11

Features

Opinion Departments Nov 1 2017

Highlights of the ACM Student Research Competition

Since 2003, ACM in conjunction with Microsoft have sponsored research competitions for undergraduate and graduate students in computing. The following process is used to select SRC winners.

Laurie Williams and Doug Baldwin

Computing Profession

Opinion Cerf's up Nov 1 2017

Heidelberg Laureate Forum

This is the fifth year of the Heidelberg Laureate Forum and it continues to be a highlight of the year for me and for about 250 others who participate. This year, computer science was heavily represented.

Vinton G. Cerf

Computing Profession

Opinion Vardi's insights Nov 1 2017

Would Turing Have Won the Turing Award?

Today, Alan Turing is widely regarded as one of the most outstanding scientists of the 20th century, but that was not the case in 1966. The question, therefore, can be posed as follows: Would Turing have won the Turing Award?

Moshe Y. Vardi

Computing Profession

Opinion Letters to the editor Nov 1 2017

They See What You See

"When Does Law Enforcement's Demand to Read Your Data Become a Demand to Read Your Mind?" (Sept. 2017) was an important contribution to the ongoing debate over electronic backdoors. I would like to outline several key aspects of that debate that also need to be addressed.

CACM Staff

Computing Applications

BLOG@CACM Nov 1 2017

Opportunities For Women, Minorities in Information Retrieval

Mei Kobayashi describes activities to support diversity and inclusion at the annual meeting of the ACM Special Interest Group on Information Retrieval in Tokyo this summer.

Mei Kobayashi

Computing Applications

News Nov 1 2017

A Block on the Old Chip

Block copolymers may help transistors shrink to tinier dimensions.

Neil Savage

Architecture and Hardware

News Nov 1 2017

Censoring Sensors

Amid growing outcry over controversial online videos, tech firms grapple with how best to police online advertising.

Alex Wright

Computing Profession

News Nov 1 2017

Overcoming Disabilities

Brain-computer interfaces hold the promise of fully featured replacements for body parts that don't work or are missing.

Esther Shein

Architecture and Hardware

Michel Fornasier uses his bionic hand prosthesis

Opinion Legally speaking Nov 1 2017

Disgorging Profits in Design Patent Cases

Does the recent U.S. Supreme Court decision in the Apple v. Samsung case represent a quagmire?

Pamela Samuelson

Computing Profession

Disgorging Profits in Design Patent Cases

Opinion Computing ethics Nov 1 2017

Engaging the Ethics of Data Science in Practice

Seeking more common ground between data scientists and their critics.

Solon Barocas and Danah Boyd

Computing Profession

Engaging the Ethics of Data Science in Practice, illustration

Opinion Education Nov 1 2017

Keeping the Machinery in Computing Education

Incorporating intellectual and developmental frameworks into a Scottish school curriculum.

Richard Connor, Quintin Cutts, and Judy Robertson

Computing Profession

Keeping the Machinery in Computing Education, illustrative photo

Opinion Viewpoint Nov 1 2017

Pay What You Want as a Pricing Model For Open Access Publishing?

Analyzing the "Pay What You Want" business model for open access publishing.

Martin Spann, Lucas Stich, and Klaus M. Schmidt

Computing Applications

Pay What You Want as a Pricing Model for Open Access Publishing? illustrative photo

Opinion Viewpoint Nov 1 2017

Social Agents: Bridging Simulation and Engineering

Seeking better integration of two research communities.

Virginia Dignum

Computing Applications

Social Agents: Bridging Simulation and Engineering, illustrative photo

Practice Nov 1 2017

Hootsuite: In Pursuit of Reactive Systems

A discussion with Edward Steel, Yanik Berube, Jonas Bonér, Ken Britton, and Terry Coatta

CACM Staff

Computing Applications

Hootsuite: In Pursuit of Reactive Systems, illustration

Practice Nov 1 2017

Breadth and Depth

We all wear many hats, but make sure you have one that fits well.

Kate Matsudaira

Computing Profession

Practice Nov 1 2017

Is There a Single Method For the Internet of Things?

Essence can keep software development for the IoT from becoming unwieldy.

Ivar Jacobson, Ian Spence, and Pan-Wei Ng

Computing Applications

Is There a Single Method for the Internet of Things? illustration

Research and Advances Contributed articles Nov 1 2017

Cambits: A Reconfigurable Camera System

Multiple computational cameras can be assembled from a common set of imaging components.

Makoto Odamaki and Shree K. Nayar

Architecture and Hardware

Research and Advances Contributed articles Nov 1 2017

User Reviews of Top Mobile Apps in Apple and Google App Stores

The varying review dynamics seen in different app stores can help guide future app development strategies.

Stuart Mcilroy, Weiyi Shang, Nasir Ali, and Ahmed E. Hassan

Computing Applications

User Reviews of Top Mobile Apps in Apple and Google App Stores, illustration

Research and Advances Review articles Nov 1 2017

Healthcare Robotics

Healthcare robotics can provide health and wellness support to billions of people.

Laurel D. Riek

Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning

Research and Advances Research highlights Nov 1 2017

Technical Perspective: Solving Imperfect Information Games

"Heads-Up Limit Hold'em Poker Is Solved," by Michael Bowling, et al., takes the counterfactual regret minimization method for approximating a Nash equilibrium to the next level.

David Silver

Computing Applications

Research and Advances Research highlights Nov 1 2017

Heads-Up Limit Hold’em Poker Is Solved

This paper is an extended version of our original 2015 Science article, with additional results showing Cepheus' in-game performance against computer and human opponents.

Michael Bowling, Neil Burch, Michael Johanson, and Oskari Tammelin

Computing Applications

Research and Advances Research highlights Nov 1 2017

Technical Perspective: Exploring a Kingdom By Geodesic Measures

"The Heat Method for Distance Computation," by Crane, Weischedel, and Wardetzky, shows that the gradient of the probability density function of a random walk is parallel to geodesics.

Marc Alexa

Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning

Research and Advances Research highlights Nov 1 2017

The Heat Method For Distance Computation

We introduce the heat method for solving the single- or multiple-source shortest path problem on both flat and curved domains.

Keenan Crane, Clarisse Weischedel, and Max Wardetzky

Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning

geodesic distance from a single point on a surface

Opinion Last byte Nov 1 2017

Butterfly Effect

But, like the weather, what can anyone do about it?

Seth Shostak

Computing Applications

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