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Anyone care to comment on why this is interesting (I don't want to read it before I know what it is about)?

kbenson 8y ago
About to read it, so not sure, but if I had to guess from Alice and Bob it's something to do with Diffie-Hellman key exchange, some variation thereof, or some other security fundamentals explanation. Edit: So, much more meta than that. Looks like a fun read though. :)
- emmelaich 8y ago
  From the article: > Perhaps it would be a better idea if we looked for strong keys. In fact, why not look for THE STRONGEST POSSIBLE KEY. Then we could all standardize on it. I think that's what Debian did with their OpenSSL :-)
kurthr 8y ago
Meta- It's a coded in-joke about en-coded jokes. Pretty funny if you've read any crypto papers.
bigp3t3 8y ago
Opening lines start like this "Good evening Ladies and Gentlemen. There comes a time when people at a technical conference like this need something more relaxing. A change of pace. A shift of style. To put aside all that work stuff and think of something refreshingly different. So let's talk about coding theory. There are perhaps some of you here tonight who are not experts in coding theory, but rather have been dragged here kicking and screaming. So I thought it would be a good idea if I gave you a sort of instant, five minute graduate course in coding theory."
taserian 8y ago
It's a funny after-dinner speech (where some of the attendees aren't experts in coding theory), providing a somewhat tongue-in-cheek biography of Alice and Bob.
packet_nerd 8y ago
The bottom section is intriguing.. > Pocket calculators! Now there's something.... has sines, cosines, tangents, logarithms ... It translates from one language to another.... It is, in fact, a multiprocessor system... It has a full color, wraparound wide screen, liquid crystal, three-dimensional holographic display.... Its audio facilities include Dolby Digital Decaphonic surround sound. On the way here I watched "The Labyrinth" on it. Meant to be tongue-in-cheek in 1984, but sounds surprisingly like a smart phone.
HenryBemis 8y ago
For anyone in IT worth their salt, when Alice and Bob come up, it's reading & commenting time!! And that is a GOOD story!!! > and Alice is a two-timing speculator. Oh how I laughed at this line!!
pvaldes 8y ago
Maybe is interesting only for the right kind of people. Dunno. In case it's worth something to you I didn't understand the joke either and stopped reading after several paragraphs.
- DoctorOetker 8y ago
  if you have never read papers on cryptography you can't understand, there's typically 2 people, the intended users of the protocol, and Eve some attacker of the protocol, since these roles re-occur in different problems, the scientific community has settled on this lingo such that the reader can immediately understand which problem for whom we are trying to solve. I.e. a cryptographer reading about a new protocol would immediately understand the paper tries to solve Alice and Bob's problem...

About to read it, so not sure, but if I had to guess from Alice and Bob it's something to do with Diffie-Hellman key exchange, some variation thereof, or some other security fundamentals explanation. Edit: So, much more meta than that. Looks like a fun read though. :)

emmelaich 8y ago
From the article: > Perhaps it would be a better idea if we looked for strong keys. In fact, why not look for THE STRONGEST POSSIBLE KEY. Then we could all standardize on it. I think that's what Debian did with their OpenSSL :-)

kurthr 8y ago

Meta- It's a coded in-joke about en-coded jokes. Pretty funny if you've read any crypto papers.

bigp3t3 8y ago

Opening lines start like this "Good evening Ladies and Gentlemen. There comes a time when people at a technical conference like this need something more relaxing. A change of pace. A shift of style. To put aside all that work stuff and think of something refreshingly different. So let's talk about coding theory. There are perhaps some of you here tonight who are not experts in coding theory, but rather have been dragged here kicking and screaming. So I thought it would be a good idea if I gave you a sort of instant, five minute graduate course in coding theory."

taserian 8y ago

It's a funny after-dinner speech (where some of the attendees aren't experts in coding theory), providing a somewhat tongue-in-cheek biography of Alice and Bob.

packet_nerd 8y ago

The bottom section is intriguing.. > Pocket calculators! Now there's something.... has sines, cosines, tangents, logarithms ... It translates from one language to another.... It is, in fact, a multiprocessor system... It has a full color, wraparound wide screen, liquid crystal, three-dimensional holographic display.... Its audio facilities include Dolby Digital Decaphonic surround sound. On the way here I watched "The Labyrinth" on it. Meant to be tongue-in-cheek in 1984, but sounds surprisingly like a smart phone.

HenryBemis 8y ago

For anyone in IT worth their salt, when Alice and Bob come up, it's reading & commenting time!! And that is a GOOD story!!! > and Alice is a two-timing speculator. Oh how I laughed at this line!!

pvaldes 8y ago

Maybe is interesting only for the right kind of people. Dunno. In case it's worth something to you I didn't understand the joke either and stopped reading after several paragraphs.

DoctorOetker 8y ago
if you have never read papers on cryptography you can't understand, there's typically 2 people, the intended users of the protocol, and Eve some attacker of the protocol, since these roles re-occur in different problems, the scientific community has settled on this lingo such that the reader can immediately understand which problem for whom we are trying to solve. I.e. a cryptographer reading about a new protocol would immediately understand the paper tries to solve Alice and Bob's problem...