3 ms·

I'm glad there are people who understand these things. I hope some day when the field of quantum computing congeals a bit more us mere mortals can begin to und

I'm glad there are people who understand these things. I hope some day when the field of quantum computing congeals a bit more us mere mortals can begin to understand it as well.

bjhoops1 13y ago
Yeah, I felt smart until I read this. Now I know how all those "business people" feel in meetings with their devs.
- noonespecial 13y ago
  Part of the curse of being in technology (I'm an EE who does CS) is that its very hard to ever be surprised. Most of the "new" stuff you see touted, you know right away how its being done and the principles are uninteresting. Its very exciting when something comes along that seems genuinely magic. Its working and I haven't the faintest idea of how. I love magic!
flatline 13y ago
I know pretty much nothing of the physics and very little of the logic, but having listened to a few talks from the CS side of the field, it mostly looks like a combination of: - Different hardware. This boils down to different gates/primitive operations, ala [1]. There are currently lots of different proposed methods of how to build the hardware, but I don't know that much about how the physical circuits in a traditional computer work, either. - Different algorithms. See e.g. Shor's [2]. I think there are only one or two others that have been proven to be more efficiently solvable by quantum means, so a lot more work needs to be done in this area. The field is in its extreme infancy, and I think it will always be more challenging to program quantum computers by a fairly wide margin. [1] http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quantum_gate http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quantum_gate [2] http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shors_algorithm http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shors_algorithm
- marcosdumay 13y ago
  There are a few complications, like the impossibility of clonning a state, and the rsult being probabilistic. Also, there is the entire "let's operate that in a mixture of all possible integers" thing, but when I got to read about it, it was surprizinly possible to understand.
gizmo686 13y ago
Quantum computing is actually surprisingly approachable. Unfourtuantly, the written material on it is still mostly in the research paper format, which is very rarely usefull for mortals. However, many lectures on the subject are pretty approachable. I used to have a collection of links to Perimeter Institute videos, but they seem to have 404`ed, and I don't have the time to dig up the new urls. If you are just looking for the theoretical basics , this youtube series [1] is a good place to start. While I do find these videos approachable, they are fairly math heavy. Most of the lectures I've seen explain things at a level that almost anyone can get something out of, and you don't miss out if you skip over the stuff that is beyond you. For most of the talks, the math involved is only algebra and vectors. Although, the vectors are represented using bra-ket notation which may throw you off. [1]http://www.youtube.com/user/mnielsencourses?feature=watch http://www.youtube.com/user/mnielsencourses?feature=watch
- michael_nielsen 13y ago
  Glad you enjoyed the videos (I created them)! Unfortunately, that link has the videos in reverse order. Here they are in the intended order: http://michaelnielsen.org/blog/quantum-computing-for-the-determined/ http://michaelnielsen.org/blog/quantum-computing-for-the-det... The main thing that's needed to follow along is familiarity and comfort with basic linear algebra.
alxhill 13y ago
Ars Technica have written a fantastic and approachable 6 page article that introduces the concepts behind Quantum Computing. Definitely worth reading: http://arstechnica.com/science/2010/01/a-tale-of-two-qubits-how-quantum-computers-work/ http://arstechnica.com/science/2010/01/a-tale-of-two-qubits-...
hendzen 13y ago
Here's an extremely approachable chapter on quantum algorithms from an undergraduate algorithms course: http://www.cs.berkeley.edu/~vazirani/algorithms/chap10.pdf http://www.cs.berkeley.edu/~vazirani/algorithms/chap10.pdf

I'm glad there are people who understand these things. I hope some day when the field of quantum computing congeals a bit more us mere mortals can begin to understand it as well.

bjhoops1 13y ago

Yeah, I felt smart until I read this. Now I know how all those "business people" feel in meetings with their devs.

noonespecial 13y ago
Part of the curse of being in technology (I'm an EE who does CS) is that its very hard to ever be surprised. Most of the "new" stuff you see touted, you know right away how its being done and the principles are uninteresting. Its very exciting when something comes along that seems genuinely magic. Its working and I haven't the faintest idea of how. I love magic!

flatline 13y ago

I know pretty much nothing of the physics and very little of the logic, but having listened to a few talks from the CS side of the field, it mostly looks like a combination of: - Different hardware. This boils down to different gates/primitive operations, ala [1]. There are currently lots of different proposed methods of how to build the hardware, but I don't know that much about how the physical circuits in a traditional computer work, either. - Different algorithms. See e.g. Shor's [2]. I think there are only one or two others that have been proven to be more efficiently solvable by quantum means, so a lot more work needs to be done in this area. The field is in its extreme infancy, and I think it will always be more challenging to program quantum computers by a fairly wide margin. [1] http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quantum_gate http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quantum_gate [2] http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shors_algorithm http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shors_algorithm

marcosdumay 13y ago
There are a few complications, like the impossibility of clonning a state, and the rsult being probabilistic. Also, there is the entire "let's operate that in a mixture of all possible integers" thing, but when I got to read about it, it was surprizinly possible to understand.

gizmo686 13y ago

Quantum computing is actually surprisingly approachable. Unfourtuantly, the written material on it is still mostly in the research paper format, which is very rarely usefull for mortals. However, many lectures on the subject are pretty approachable. I used to have a collection of links to Perimeter Institute videos, but they seem to have 404`ed, and I don't have the time to dig up the new urls. If you are just looking for the theoretical basics , this youtube series [1] is a good place to start. While I do find these videos approachable, they are fairly math heavy. Most of the lectures I've seen explain things at a level that almost anyone can get something out of, and you don't miss out if you skip over the stuff that is beyond you. For most of the talks, the math involved is only algebra and vectors. Although, the vectors are represented using bra-ket notation which may throw you off. [1]http://www.youtube.com/user/mnielsencourses?feature=watch http://www.youtube.com/user/mnielsencourses?feature=watch

michael_nielsen 13y ago
Glad you enjoyed the videos (I created them)! Unfortunately, that link has the videos in reverse order. Here they are in the intended order: http://michaelnielsen.org/blog/quantum-computing-for-the-determined/ http://michaelnielsen.org/blog/quantum-computing-for-the-det... The main thing that's needed to follow along is familiarity and comfort with basic linear algebra.

alxhill 13y ago

Ars Technica have written a fantastic and approachable 6 page article that introduces the concepts behind Quantum Computing. Definitely worth reading: http://arstechnica.com/science/2010/01/a-tale-of-two-qubits-how-quantum-computers-work/ http://arstechnica.com/science/2010/01/a-tale-of-two-qubits-...

hendzen 13y ago

Here's an extremely approachable chapter on quantum algorithms from an undergraduate algorithms course: http://www.cs.berkeley.edu/~vazirani/algorithms/chap10.pdf http://www.cs.berkeley.edu/~vazirani/algorithms/chap10.pdf