from the built-by-quantum-mechanics-using-really-tiny-tools dept.
Two Soylentils have submitted stories about IBM's progress in building a quantum computer:
IBM has a quantum computer you can play with for free.
PC World is running a story today about IBM's new advancements in quantum computing. http://www.pcworld.com/article/3065654/hardware/ibms-quantum-computing-processor-comes-out-of-hiding.html
This is good news for science, but really bad news for crypto including most crypto currencies. With just a few more iterations on this technology, Shors algorithm becomes tractable. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shor%27s_algorithm
But there is a good side as well.
From the article... IBM has built a quantum processor with five qubits, or quantum bits. Even better, IBM isn't hiding the quantum processor in its labs—it will be accessible through the cloud for the public to run experiments and test applications.
The goal is to unwrap decades-old mysteries around quantum computers and let people play with the hardware, said Jay Gambetta, manager of quantum computing theory and information at IBM.
Lots more good stuff in the article.
IBM to Allow Public Access to 5-Qubit Quantum Computer
IBM says it will allow just about anybody to access and program a 5-qubit quantum computer:
IBM has made a functioning quantum processor available to the public over the internet. [...] IBM's quantum processor is located in its TJ Watson Research Centre in New York. Quantum processors are notoriously sensitive, so it is being kept at supercooled temperatures in a cryogenic refrigerator. It has just five qubits that can be manipulated, but the company expects processors of 50-100 qubits to emerge within the next decade. General-purpose machines, which IBM calls "universal" quantum computers, will eventually use more than 100,000 qubits. IBM's cloud solution allows users to drag and drop logic gates - a core principle of processors - on to the individual qubits to form algorithms or experiments. Those can then be sent to a simulator, or added to a queue for the real quantum processor to work on.
The Register's Chris Williams has criticized the "Cloud" spin surrounding the announcement, the need for an invitation, the utility of a five qubit system, and the usual media hype.
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 05 2016, @10:19AM
Can I throw my market research database at this thing and get a sense of which gullible idiots are most likely to spend money on my cheap plastic crap?
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 05 2016, @10:58AM
Ooh, let me give you my contact info and you can let me know how that works out. Will you be selling your results?
(Score: 2) by ikanreed on Thursday May 05 2016, @04:05PM
This is extremely expensive mostly silicon crap, thank you very much.
(Score: 3, Informative) by maxwell demon on Thursday May 05 2016, @10:45AM
So the publicly accessible quantum computer has merely 5 qubits. Sure, the ability to factor 15 will be terrible for cryptography.</sarcasm>A 5-qubit quantum computer could conveniently be simulated on your desktop — its state can be described using a vector of 32 complex numbers, and its basic operations can be described by complex 32×32 matrices which are multiplied on that vector; there are virtually no computers today which wouldn't be able to do that in no noticeable time.
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 05 2016, @11:04AM
This is not about the qubits.
First, this is for publicity, branding and the stock market. IBM hasn't had much to crow about lately so now they get to be the first to do this and they get to prove they actually have a quantum computer.
Second, this is a talent magnet. Who can write programs for quantum computers? Only people who have access to one. So now IBM gets to dangle a carrot to attract programmers who may turn out as targets for hiring using their quantum computer code as their application & resume.
(Score: 3, Informative) by maxwell demon on Thursday May 05 2016, @11:38AM
Or people who have access to a simulator. As I wrote, a simulator for 5 qubits is trivial; you don't even have to think much about optimization at that size.
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
(Score: 2) by devlux on Thursday May 05 2016, @04:01PM
You're still missing the point.
The point is that commercial availability of quantum computers can form a feedback loop similar to Moore's law driving towards cheaper hardware and wider availability.
If this is really the advent of commercial scale quantum computing, then a lot of things we rely on will be failing much sooner than originally thought. Only instead of it just being the Feds and large actors doing it, it will be script kiddies and the like.
(Score: 2) by maxwell demon on Thursday May 05 2016, @08:12PM
The fundamental problem of scaling quantum computers is not yet solved. We are not yet at the point at which Moore's law could kick in. If I were to compare the state we are currently at in quantum computing with the time scale of classical computing, I'd say we're currently at the level of the Analytical Engine. We know in principle how to build a quantum computer, and we can build small examples, but we haven't yet found a good way to build quantum computers that are more than merely expensive toys.
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 05 2016, @11:25AM
Yes, if quantum computers were a viable technology, they should've immediately obsoleted the classical computers. It's best we give up, just as we gave up when first cars were slower than horses, first airplanes couldn't fly more then a few hundred feet and first rockets couldn't reach Alpha Centauri.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by maxwell demon on Thursday May 05 2016, @11:49AM
Yes, they shall explore the technology, and figure out how to build bigger ones. What is pointless is the public access to it. There's absolutely nothing the public can gain from having access to it which it couldn't gain from having access to a simulator.
The analogy is, if after having built the first car that's slower than a horse, you'd have opened a parcel transportation service with it. Mind you, they never get to see your car with their own eyes by using that service, the parcel size is limited severely, the parcels will arrive slower than with horses, and you're not even cheaper. So what's the point? Instead of wasting your time with the parcel service, better concentrate on making the car better.
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
(Score: 2) by devlux on Thursday May 05 2016, @04:33PM
I concede this point. At the moment it doesn't make sense except for early adopters.
Keep in mind that your comment reminds me a lot of this one from a few years back...
https://slashdot.org/story/01/10/23/1816257/apple-releases-ipod [slashdot.org]
Wonder if it will be as prescient :D
(Score: 2) by fishybell on Thursday May 05 2016, @04:37PM
Except to verify that the simulations are accurate in all cases, and to test situations the simulators don't cover.
(Score: 2) by TK on Thursday May 05 2016, @08:30PM
And to allow a test bed for university students interested in the field.
The fleas have smaller fleas, upon their backs to bite them, and those fleas have lesser fleas, and so ad infinitum
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Nerdfest on Thursday May 05 2016, @11:30AM
Yes, but how would that help you get ready for some good old-fashioned IBM lock-in?
(Score: 2) by bitstream on Thursday May 05 2016, @03:56PM
The quantum access made me wonder if it's possible to crack cryptos by some divide and conquer method just as is used for FFT algorithms. To enable the use of fewer qubits for problems that really would need more qubits.
(Score: 2, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 05 2016, @11:02AM
Qloud!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 05 2016, @11:55AM
qloud qumputing?
(Score: 2) by devlux on Thursday May 05 2016, @02:05PM
How about Qontinuum?
(Score: 2) by JNCF on Thursday May 05 2016, @05:59PM
Qumulus?
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 05 2016, @01:45PM
I'm surprised that a quantum computer would send me a message asking for the score of the Spurs-Thunder game, though.