Oct 10 2012

Artificial intelligence?

IBM Watson (Jeopardy at Carnegie Mellon) - How...

IBM Watson (Jeopardy at Carnegie Mellon) – How I saved humanity! (Photo credit: Anirudh Koul)

People remember Alan Turing  for many different reasons. He was a British mathematician who worked as a codebreaker at Bletchley Park during World War 2. He also went on to become one of the pioneers of computing along with Max Newman. In 1952, Alan Turing was convicted of homosexuality. He accepted treatment with female hormones (or chemical castration) rather than go to prison and 2 years later committed suicide. In short, he was a genius who became a victim of his time. Were he born today, no-one would bat an eyelid at his homosexuality.

One of the his legacies is the Turing test. A machine could be said to be intelligent if it was indistinguishable from a human in conversation. He suggested that it would be better to come up with a learning machine (like a child’s mind) that could be taught and not something that simulates an adult mind. There is some debate as to whether a machine has ever really passed this test. I can think of a few humans who would struggle too.

Whenever I’ve seen any proffered example of artificial intelligence, I could not help but be disappointed. Today, however, I attended a very interesting session on IBM’s Watson semantic supercomputer. As supercomputers go, its $3m cost and 4TB of storage are pretty modest. Built on standard hardware and software, it resembles Turing’s child-like mind that can be taught. Indeed, before it can answer any sensible questions in a  particular domain, it needs to be fed with information. Lots of it. Even that’s not enough, Watson needs to do further research on everything it reads.

English: IBM's Watson computer, Yorktown Heigh...

English: IBM’s Watson computer, Yorktown Heights, NY (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Once loaded up with information, Watson is ready for questions. The first step in being able to answer any question is to parse it into the component elements. From this, Watson can determine the type of question being asked and what sort of answer is expected. It then generates many different permutations of the question to give the greatest chance of coming up with the right answer. For each interpretation of the question, Watson searches (in parallel) its knowledge base to see what answers it can find, coming up with as many as possible.

For each of the possible answers, Watson goes on the hunt for evidence, both for and against. Based on this evidence, obviously incorrect answers are discarded and the remainder scored based on the quality and reliability of the evidence. Finally, Watson uses the experience it as gained in the past in answering similar questions to gauge the value of the different types of evidence and comes up with a final confidence rating for each answer and ranks them accordingly. The process is very similar to that used by Doctor Gregory House in the hit TV program. You write-up all the possible answers and cross them out as the evidence goes against them.

The first outing for Watson was to win the TV quiz game Jeopardy against two former champions. IBM admit that this was little more than a bit of fun and a publicity exercise. Watson is now being geared up for much more serious applications such as medical research and diagnosis support. The applications for such technology are legion and the team freely admit that there are far more valid use cases than they have the time to exploit right now.

For the first time in my life, I am genuinely inspired by an example of artificial intelligence and I will follow Watson’s progress with interest.

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Oct 8 2012

A helping hand

Noir

Noir (Photo credit: Ontario Wanderer)

He stepped down from the train onto the snow encrusted platform, impeccably coiffured and dressed in expensive Italian clothes. The steam from the engine swirled around him, mingling with the surrounding mist. He stood waiting for the other passengers to clear as the train noisily forced its way out of the station. Unlike the other passengers, if he felt the cold, he gave no outward sign.

Surveying the single platform, he marked the Soviet propaganda posters and the taped up windows. His gaze fell upon a vagrant sleeping on a bench under a pile of untidy newspapers. He took slow deliberate steps across the platform and sat down next to the supine figure.

“You don’t smell any better” the man announced as he removed his wide rimmed hat.

The vagrant sat up sending the newspapers sliding to the ground. “All part of the act old chum, all part of the act – how long has it been?” he replied as he scratched his unshaven chin.

“A hundred years – same as last time Jim” the man said as he pulled out a cigarette case.

“Doesn’t time fly Captain.” the vagrant said as he took one of the offered cigarettes.

The Captain tried and failed to bring his lighter to life. “Technical problems sir?” Jim asked cheekily, chuckling at his own joke whilst pulling out a box of matches from somewhere. The man smiled in reply, taking a big drag of the cigarette before blowing out a series of perfectly formed smoke rings.

“How are things going?” Jim asked – genuinely curious.

For the first time, the Captain looked at his companion, “Not good. Sometimes I wonder about this planet. Do you know they haven’t even got nuclear power yet?”

“I see – well behind schedule. What are we going to do?” Jim said, concern lacing his voice.

The Captain stubbed out his cigarette in the snow whilst blowing out a long jet of smoke. “Nothing else for it, we’re going to have to give them a helping hand.”

It took a while for Jim to take it in. “Oh. Who’s it going to be this time?”

“It’s either you or me this time Jim, you or me. I’m feeling generous… and… tired. Let’s toss a coin. Don’t worry, I never win.”

He reached inside his coat, pulling out a silver coin. “Heads or tails Jim?”

“Tails” barely audible.

The coin span through the air before settling in the snow at their feet. They looked down in tandem before sitting slowly back. Wordlessly, the Captain handed Jim his briefcase and then a pistol.

“So long Jim.”

Jim didn’t respond as the Captain stood up and walked slowly down the platform. He’d barely taken 10 paces before a single gunshot pierced the otherwise still night air. He froze for a moment as a single tear dribbled down his cheek, before resuming his walk into the mist.

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Oct 7 2012

A change of identity

Baileys

Baileys (Photo credit: Ivana Di Carlo)

Changing a name is a risky business. Especially if you have an established brand name that’s known around the industry and yet some of the most famous corporations around us have been through a name change. Ever heard of Backrub? Probably not, and yet, that was the chosen name for the corporation that today is known as Google. What about Computing Tabulating Recording Corporation? It has to be said, IBM is a lot snappier.

When I was growing up, the name Datsun was synonymous with rusty old bangers that were reliable, but unfortunately fell to bits. Daewoos used to be the reliable but dreadful cars from Korea that were basically reincarnated Vauxhalls. Today, these cars are bang up to date and adorned with the name “Chevrolet“, which used to be synonymous with American muscle cars.

Her Majesty’s Royal Mail is a fine name for a postal service, in place since Charles the 1st, but the management thought differently. This fine moniker was superseded by “Consignia” because it was modern, meaningful and entirely relevant. The public didn’t think so, and the name quickly reverted to the one that had been in place for centuries.

It’s not just companies that change their names. Somehow, I doubt Michael Sinclair Vincent would have made it, so it’s probably just as well he changed his name to Vin Diesel. How about Frances Ethel Gumm? Somehow, Judy Garland has more star quality.

During a routine meeting the other day, we established that a third of the people were no longer known by the name they were given and I was one of them. I grew up as Martin Grimes. Mum remarried when we were kids and everyone took the new surname of Bailey, except me. I don’t really remember why, probably because I was in the middle of secondary school.

When we came to get married, we talked about names. I wasn’t attached to Grimes. I remember having to spell it out to a call centre worker three times once before the penny dropped and she said “Oh – Grimes. As in dirt”. I tried on my wife’s name for size; “Emburey”. I wasn’t sure about that either, so we agreed to take the name “Bailey” when we got married.

Every so often, I get a reminder of my past moniker when I find an old exam certificate or some old correspondence. Some of my friends I’ve known for a long time will occasionally call me Grimesy. I can’t say I miss my old name, and yet whenever I sign anything, it is my earlier name I scratch out in barely legible writing. Old habits die hard.

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Oct 4 2012

The hypocrisy of hotels

Towels on a rack in a hotel room

Towels on a rack in a hotel room (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

I am not a raving tree hugger, nor do I walk the streets campaigning on green issues, but I do appreciate the little efforts here and there to make our lives on the planet a bit more ecologically sound. Everyone should do their little bit and all those little bits should add up to something.

Invariably, when you stay in a hotel, there will be a notice tucked away somewhere in the bathroom which explains the hotel’s policy on cleaning towels. It will wax lyrical about how seriously the hotel chain takes environmental issues before petitioning that guests help in this endeavour by choosing when to have their towels washed, thus saving on all that nasty ecologically unsound detergent.

Sometimes, it’s not just the towels that get this treatment, in the hotel I am currently writing this, they also ask you to be a bit more economical with the sheets too. I don’t have a problem with the policy because who washes their sheets and towels every single day at home?

But I can’t help feeling that this practise must save the hotel a fortune in laundry costs, so they are not making this plea out of the goodness of their hearts. I would be a lot more impressed with their green credentials if they donated the money saved by this laundry frugality to some worthy ecological cause.

I find it amusing that the very same hotel that is lecturing me on my impact on the planet, with no sense of irony, replaces my soap every day with a brand new freshly wrapped bar. I can cope with using the same soap two days in a row. If they really cared about saving the planet, they wouldn’t make the tap water so poisonous that you are left with no choice but to imbibe the bottled variety which can be as much as 1,000x more damaging to the environment. Not only that – but it’s damned expensive too.

I like the individual jars of jam and honey – but they can’t be too good for the environment either. Nor can the two-inch bottle of ketchup that contains exactly enough for one breakfast. My room has 11 light bulbs and they are annoyingly controlled by a complex interplay of switches that means you need to go through a painful deductive process to get them all to switch off at once. I suspect most people try for a while then give up and go out leaving some on.

Maybe I’ll bring a tent next time.

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Sep 30 2012

Updates needed

raw data snapshot

raw data snapshot (Photo credit: MelvinSchlubman)

Do you think CT scanners in hospitals pop up messages in the middle of a brain scan telling the operator that there is a software update available? When was the last time your car stopped and flashed up a message saying software update needed? What about your TV? Or your satellite receiver? Probably never.

What about your computer? It seems like I get a message several times a week telling me that something needs an update. If it’s not the operating system, it’s the office software or the virus checking software or maybe a plug-in for my browser. It drives me nuts!

I have a laptop at home and a machine at work. Between them, I probably update some piece of software every day. On one day last week, my laptop needed an update as did the office software running on it and the flash player in the browser oh, and Adobe Acrobat Reader. Not only that, but my iPhone joined in the party and decided that what I really needed was an inferior maps application, so along came iOS6.

It’s a mess. All the time you spend updating all these software components compromises your productivity. Not only that, but all this change is risky. Software vendors seem to have improved at testing their updates, but even so, you always feel like you are taking a gamble when applying all these updates. At the end of the process – will you end up with a working machine or a nice looking brick.

And why does the software update process have to be so damned invasive? OK – so Acrobat may need an update – but do you think that I really want to know about it when I’ve just opened a document? Some update mechanisms allow you to specify options such as how often to check for updates and how to apply them – which is an improvement, but why do I have to do it separately for every application on the system.

I like the update system for apps on the iPhone and iPad. No painful pop up messages when you are trying to do something, just a little number hovering over the corner of the app store. If you are curious, you can go and see what the updates are and what they do. You can choose when to apply them – like when you plug your phone in for the night to charge. All in all, a very elegant system.

When can we have it in OSX and Windows? A single central source of software updates for the entire machine. No piece of software would be allowed to apply software updates any other way. Simple, elegant and non-invasive. Perfect.

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Sep 25 2012

The freedom of wifi

English: This is a 1987 Madge Networks Token R...

English: This is a 1987 Madge Networks Token Ring 4/16Mbps switchable Network Interface card. It can be slotted in any ISA compatible bus. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Look behind pretty much any office computer these days and the chances are that it is connected to the network by an ethernet cable. I can remember when the connectors on the end of ethernet cables were round and when there were other competing network types.

The way ethernet protocol works is rather like a drunken barroom conversation. Your computer waits for a gap and then shouts whatever it wants to send. If someone shouts at the same time, your machine will stop shouting and wait again for a gap. All in all, it’s a terribly impolite conversation.

IBM used to have a network protocol called token ring. That was much more polite. There was a token that whizzed around the network. If a computer on the network wants to say something, they have to wait for the token to come round, grab it and then say what they want to say. Every computer waited it’s turn and there was no shouting. The downfall of the token ring network was speed. Being polite is not as efficient as shouting. Token Ring was harder to set up as unlike ethernet, a token ring network had to be “started up” to get a token into the network.

Wi-Fi Signal logo

Wi-Fi Signal logo (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Now that we have 3G cellular networks and wi-fi, there is no need for a wire at all, which is just as well. It would be incredibly dull if you had to plug a cable into your mobile every time you wanted to do a google search or look at where you are on a map.

Most hotels will charge you for wi-fi access and it seems like the posher the hotel, the higher the cost. I don’t know how a hotel receptionist can keep a straight face when they explain to you that not only does your $250 room rate not include wi-fi, but the charge is $25 per day for access. I have no objection to anyone making a living, but I do object to profiteering.

Of course some places offer free wi-fi, but it is rarely free in both senses of the word; cost and freedom. More and more, free wi-fi will require you to register. Often, they will need you to click on a link in an email to confirm your email address. Sometimes, they will even send you a completely random user ID and password – something you don’t have a hope of remembering. If you are on a mobile, it means you are going to need to hunt around for a pen and paper to make a note of it.

Not only that – but many of them will kick you out after a predetermined time, which means that pretty much every time you go to use the Internet – you have to go through the whole palaver of logging back in again. If you are going to offer free wi-fi – please make it completely free.

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Sep 23 2012

The rise and fall of the apple empire

Roman Forum and surroundings

Roman Forum and surroundings (Photo credit: KayYen)

History is littered with stories of civilisations that have grown in stature until they are too big to sustain. Once the edges are so far from the heart, people forget what it was all about and the empire implodes more dramatically than it grew. We studied two of them in history at school; the Greeks and the Romans.

Today, in a way, it’s difficult to imagine Greece having that much power which is ironic because they probably have more influence on the fate of Europe than any other country right now. The same goes for the Romans. As I was growing up, I was fed on a diet of World War 2 films and commando comics. In these, Italians were the guys with rubbish equipment who spent half their time retreating and the other half surrendering.

We British have had our imperial moments, but we are very much in decline as far as empires go. One by one, the countries that were once coloured pink on my ancient, dented globe have decided that they want to be independent of British rule.

The same thing is happening more and more to big companies now. If you travelled back in time a few years, Nokia and RIM were unstoppable in the mobile phone market. Today, they seem to be in terminal decline. When I was growing up, the word Kodak was synonymous with cameras. It looks like they will wink out of existence once they milk the last bit of value out of their patent portfolio.

There are some eternal survivors out there. IBM have been in trouble before but bounced back. Microsoft had a near death experience when they dismissed the Internet as a fad before waking up and smelling the coffee. Apple have been on the ropes before in the years between Steve Jobs leaving and rejoining, but today they are going from strength to strength.

But Steve Jobs is no more.

I have just upgraded to iOS 6, and although, in general, I am a fan of all things Apple – I am not happy. As part of iOS 6, the once fantastic maps app powered by Google has been replaced by an app produced by Apple. It is inferior in just about every way you can imagine. Yes it has 3D views of the major cities in the world, which is a neat trick where it works, but it feels like a gimmick you play with for half an hour and forget about.

Steve Jobs would never have let it out the door. I can’t help but feel that this is the turning point in the fate of Apple. Of course they have huge resources upon which to draw as did the Romans.

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Sep 22 2012

If you throw away half your stuff, you’ll end up with twice as much left as you think

Cluttered shed

Cluttered shed (Photo credit: UnnarYmir)

Both myself and my wife are inveterate hoarders. Neither of us can throw away anything. This is not a good combination, because what happens is that you fill up your house and then you start to look for elaborate storage solutions to deal with all the clutter. You think you’re being organised, but all you’re doing is turning your house into a Tardis. Somehow, you squeeze in twice as much stuff into your house as really ought to fit.

Of course this persists until some kind of traumatic event. For many people, it’s a house move. Moving house is one of the most unpleasant experiences I think I’ve ever had, but if there is a good side, it’s that it forces you to reassess your belongings because one way or another, they either have to make the transition to your new abode, or they need to be discarded. I’ve had my fair share of house moves when we were growing up, and when we moved into our current home, I vowed that we would never move again.

So for us, the traumatic event this time was not a house move, but a flood. If the entire ground floor of your house floods, somehow, you need to get rid of everything damaged by the flood – including the carpets. Discarding the carpets invariably means disturbing everything that lies on top of them. It’s like a house move without the transition but with all the trauma.

Cluttered shed

Cluttered shed (Photo credit: UnnarYmir)

We have been busy. My Volvo holds a hell of a lot of stuff, and we have filled it again and again. Car boot sales, the local recycling centre, the charity shop and the storage place. You name it – we’ve tried it. And yet, by observation, you would never guess. The house still looks cluttered. I’m starting to wonder if every time we leave the house with a car full of stuff whether burglars are breaking in and leaving more.

This morning, I looked at my bookshelves in my games room and made a quick calculation – I’ll need 4 large archive boxes to store all that stuff. No – hold on a minute, better make it 6 to be safe, or should it be 8? Sod it – I’ll get 10 large archive boxes. After a whole day of back-breaking labour, I came to the crushing conclusion that I was going to need another 10.

Maisie was helping. She took to throwing stuff into the boxes with gusto. Thankfully, there wasn’t too much damage. If you are going to ask for help with such a gargantuan task – my recommendation is not to ask a 3-year-old. They will enjoy the experience, but you probably won’t.

That’s it – I’m not buying any more stuff ever. But I did get an email today with a link to something tempting…

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Sep 19 2012

Too much baggage

English: This image is licensed to use under t...

English: This image is licensed to use under the terms outlined below. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

I had only just started secondary school when my headmaster once overheard me calling our needlework teacher, Mrs Morrison, a nazi. She was ridiculously strict and if you were no good at needlework (I was terrible), every lesson came with a guarantee of a good tongue-lashing.

The headmaster was furious and took me up to his office. He asked me if I knew exactly what a nazi was. The sum total of my knowledge of nazis at the time was that they were the bad guys in my commando comics. At the end of the conversation, I knew exactly what nazis were and I also knew that Mrs Morrison had been a resistance fighter in France during the war. I have never been so ashamed.

The luggage police at the front of the queue on budget airlines remind me of Mrs Morrison sometimes. They have their luggage gauge and they are not afraid to use it. Anyone whose bag doesn’t fit or is too heavy is going in the hold for some extortionate fee or is it the luggage – I can never remember. On normal carriers, they seem more relaxed about hand luggage. Some of the cases I’ve seen people take on to a plane are absolutely enormous.

There are lots of good reasons for travelling with hand baggage only. It can save you money on a low-cost airline. You know the airline can’t lose your bag if it’s safely stowed above your head. It saves time at the other end, but the main reason is that collecting luggage is the most mind-numbingly tedious activity known to man.

You hike the mile from the gate into the terminal, then queue up for ages at immigration before arriving in the baggage hall. You walk over to the screens to find out which carousel is yours only to find that your luggage still hasn’t appeared. As you wait for the luggage from your flight to start spewing forth onto the carousel, a rugby scrum of people will build up. No matter how close you stand to the carousel – someone will stand in front of you blocking your view.

If I built an airport, I would offer a service to text the passengers as their luggage appeared. I would also provide a relaxing environment in which to wait. I might even offer food and drink. Entertainment would be laid on for people as they patiently waited to receive their text message. I would also offer a service whereby you could leave a forwarding address and I would courier your luggage to you so you didn’t have to wait.

Everyone would want to fly from my airport. Even Mrs Morrison would be happy.

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Sep 17 2012

I thought slavery had been abolished

Two girls protesting child labour (by calling ...

Two girls protesting child labour (by calling it child slavery) in the 1909 New York City Labor Day parade. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Contrary to popular belief, the British did not invent slavery. We certainly brought it back into fashion in the 1600s but slavery has existed in many different forms since before written records began. To be fair to us, we did our bit to bring it to an end too. Only slavery wasn’t eradicated at all and unfortunately anything up to 27 million people still exist in some sort of slavery today.

No reasonable person would agree that slavery is a good thing and yet still it exists and is widespread. No-one is openly condoning the practise, but there are shades of grey. Many people (like me) who condemn slavery will quite happily go into a shop and buy a smart phone or a tablet.

Allegations often crop up about the appalling working conditions in the factories that make such devices and yet Apple have sold 2 million of the new iPhone already. It’s not quite slavery by the purest definition of the word, but somehow it doesn’t feel quite right.

We turn a blind eye because it happens such a long way away. There are many labour laws that prevent it but if it happened in Western countries, we would be up in arms. If we were subjected to the same conditions in our workplaces, then industrial relations would be at an all time low.

I don’t think that technology companies are the only ones at fault. I would imagine that working conditions are poor in factories producing almost everything that’s on sale in our shops today. For the most part automotive manufacturers have a pretty good record, but what about all the components that go into making a car?

Sometimes poor pay and conditions are justified by saying that conditions are poor everywhere else in that particular geography. Effectively, that is what the people who come from that region are used to, so it must be OK. I imagine the British Captains that picked up some African tradesmen and swapped them for tobacco and coffee thought something similar.

I don’t know what the answer is. Maybe the Western governments need to come up with a scheme whereby any goods on sale would need to display a rating which would indicate the conditions in which those goods were made. Many of the countries that contain such manufacturing centres are highly corrupt so the assessments would need to be impartially carried out. Such a scheme would cost a lot of money to implement and would almost certainly increase the cost of the goods themselves as working conditions in the factories are inevitably improved.

Somehow with the Euro crisis high on the agenda and the rising economic might of China, I suppose they have bigger fish to fry, but I hope we look back on the abolition of such working practises in the same way as we look on the abolition of the slave trade in the 1700s.

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