David Kuck, an influential figure in parallel computing, has been named the 2011 recipient of the IEEE Computer Society Computer Pioneer Award.

Over the past four decades, Kuck influenced a wide range of areas, including architecture design and evaluation, compiler technology, programming languages, and algorithms. He is especially well known for his parallel programming productivity tools.

Kuck, winner of a 2010 Ken Kennedy Award, was recognized with a Computer Pioneer Award “for pioneering parallel architectures including the Illiac IV, the Burroughs BSP, and Cedar; and, for revolutionary parallel compiler technology including Parafrase and KAP.2009.”

The Computer Pioneer was established in 1981 by the Board of Governors of the IEEE Computer Society to recognize and honor the vision of those people whose efforts resulted in the creation and continued vitality of the computer industry. The award is presented to outstanding individuals whose main contribution to the concepts and development of the computer field was made at least 15 years earlier. The recognition is engraved on a bronze medal specially struck for the Society.

Kuck’s influence has been both theoretical and practical. At University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign (UIUC), he created the Computational Sciences program, which initiated a new and unique research focus that has contributed significantly to UIUC’s multidisciplinary excellence.

The Center for Supercomputing Research and Development (CSRD) at UIUC, which he created, was extraordinarily influential in developing parallel computing technology (from hardware to algorithms) in the era of vectorization and SMPs. As founder and director of Kuck and Associates (KAI) and later as an Intel Fellow, Kuck’s work subsequently influenced industry.

Every compiler in use today incorporates techniques pioneered by Kuck, targeting parallelism in its many forms and managing locality. In this era of multi-core and many-core architectures and petascale supercomputers, this work is now more important than it has ever been adapting software to use new hardware effectively. As an outgrowth of his compiler work, he initiated efforts that led to the development of OpenMP, the most common solution for incorporating threads into scientific applications.

Kuck also influenced the design of several academic and industrial parallel computers, including the Illiac IV (as the only software person on the project), Burroughs BSP, Alliant, and Cedar. Ken Kennedy’s own work was heavily influenced by David Kuck. While on sabbatical at IBM, David provided Kennedy with access to Kuck’s Parafrase system, which was the spark that initiated vectorization research both at Rice (the PFC system) and at IBM (PTRAN). He is set to accept his award at a May 25 dinner in Albuquerque, New Mexico.

Kuck graduated more than 25 students, many of whom have gone on to have significant influence in the field in their own right, as academics, authors of influential books, and leaders in industry. They include: Duncan Lawrie, Stott Parker, David Padua, Ron Cytron, Constantine Polychronopolous, Alex Veidenbaum, Michael Wolfe, and Utpal Banerjee.

Last year’s Computer Pioneer Award recipients were Jean Sammet, one of the first developers and researchers in programming languages; and Lynne Conway, who made pioneering contributions to superscalar architecture and the widespread teaching of simplified VLSI design methods.

The 2008 recipients were ENIAC programmer Betty Jean Jennings Bartik and Edward J. McKluskey, developer of the first algorithm for logic synthesis (the Quine-McCluskey method). Bartik, shown in her acceptance video, passed away earlier this month. Click here for the full list of Computer Pioneer recipients.

Source:http://www.digitaljournal.com/pr/287353

Below are the bottom five companies in the Computer Hardware industry as ranked by sales per share. Sales per share is a valuable metric in comparing relative value for companies in the same industry.

Stratasys (NASDAQ:SSYS) ranks lowest with sales per share of 5.9x; Concurrent Computer (NASDAQ:CCUR) ranks next with sales per share of 7.9x; and Cray (NASDAQ:CRAY) ranks third lowest with sales per share of 9.3x.

Silicon Graphics International (NYSE:SGI) follows with sales per share of 16.5x and Avid Technology (NASDAQ:AVID) rounds out the bottom five with sales per share of 17.9x.

SmarTrend currently has shares of Silicon Graphics International in an Uptrend and issued the Uptrend alert on December 03, 2010 at $8.04. The stock has risen 124.3% since the Uptrend alert was issued.

Source:http://www.zacks.com/research/get_news.php?id=115l9451

We have all done it. If you own a laptop then you have probably done it more than once. We have all been without the Internet for a little while and then decided to use the wireless network unprotected with cryptographic protocols from our neighbor, a business, or a stranger down the street to do a little web surfing.

But just because you have done it does not necessarily mean that you want others doing it to you. After all, some of those restaurants offered the Wifi access for free to entice you to be their patron while your neighbor may just be being nice. But you may not trust others as much as you trust yourself.

For whatever reason you want to keep all strangers out of your network, just like you want them out of your financial business and may use a hawala system, and would help you to avoid private investigators. This is how to keep your network secure from any prying eyes that may be around your neighborhood.

CRYPTOGRAPHIC PROTOCOLS

First, is to make sure that you pick the right encryption method for your network settings. The instruction manual with your wireless router should provide step by step instructions that are unique to each device.

There are several different cryptographic protocols that are available for someone running a home network. The choices are WPA, WPA II, and WEP. The WPA and WPA II are both the same standard and version II is slight more advanced than the regular version. These are known to be the safest method of network encryption. They will keep your network reasonably safe against people that are trying to penetrate it.

If you have older hardware, instead of a new secure Linksys router, then you might go with WEP. This is not very secure but it is better than nothing. WEP is an older standard of cryptographic protocols. If it is at all possible then choose another method of encryption. You will be safer in the long run.

Second, is to make sure that your login information is very hard to guess. Your network key, as well as your router login information, should be very complicated. If they are easy to guess then this makes all of the other security that you have placed on your wireless network pointless. Do not use a password that is easily identifiable to you. This means do not use your dog, cat, or even children. All these things are something that a neighbor would know. Remember the easier your password is to guess then the less secure your network is.

CONCLUSION

Encrypting your wireless network with cryptographic protocols will keep unknown and unwanted individuals from using your assets and help you to protect your computer. These methods will help keep you and your personal information safe and secured. Then you can surf the Internet or setup storage devices, etc. with relative peace of mind knowing that they are not available to anyone who drives by with a laptop. You can further protect your computer by using anonymous web surfing and other techniques and tools found in the book How To Vanish.

Source:http://www.lewrockwell.com/orig12/mayer-t2.1.1.html