Re:The codebreaker who saved 'millions of lives'
by ajuc on Tuesday June 19, 2012 @07:50AM
(#4131294)
Would be nice to mention the whole effort, not only Turing. Like the fact that Poles were reading Enigma encrypted messages before the WW2, and send all information they aquired to France and Great Brittain.
Re:The codebreaker who saved 'millions of lives'
by m0nty on Tuesday June 19, 2012 @08:12AM
(#4131356)
I have always felt that Tommy Flowers' incredible contribution (i.e. building the first electronic, programmable computer) is all-too-frequently overlooked. I suppose it just makes a better story to talk about a lone genius rather than a group of collaborators.
Re:The codebreaker who saved 'millions of lives'
by monk_the_dog on Tuesday June 19, 2012 @08:47AM
(#4131479)
I recently learned about Tommy Flowers and Colossus from this book: http://www.amazon.com/Colossus-secrets-Bletchley-code-breaki...
The British kept Colossus secret for a too long and Flowers did not get enough credit (and von Neumann seems to get too much).
BTW, I do recommend the above book. But we warned that it's a collection of essays by different authors so it can be uneven reading.
Re:The codebreaker who saved 'millions of lives'
by wildmXranat on Tuesday June 19, 2012 @08:44AM
(#4131467)
Indeed, and without taking away anything form Turing, it was Rejewski, Różycki and Zygalski code-breakers
working at the request of the Polish army that broke the Enigma codes. I believe they summoned numerous cryptologists, three of which were these guys.
Re:The codebreaker who saved 'millions of lives'
by pwaring on Tuesday June 19, 2012 @09:06AM
(#4131559)
It would also be good to extend the mentions beyond just codebreakers, including the Royal Navy personnel who boarded damaged U-boats in order to retrieve code books and other equipment, not knowing if the vessel would sink at any minute.
Re:The codebreaker who saved 'millions of lives'
by nicholassmith on Tuesday June 19, 2012 @08:17AM
(#4131371)
Well it does say he was a 'key player', not the only person involved. Plus as it's a retrospective on Turing's contributions I think they're allowed to focus on a sole character.
(But several other excellent Turing stories have mentioned the other players involved, Ars had an excellent article about it if I remember rightly).
Re:The codebreaker who saved 'millions of lives'
by jt2190 on Tuesday June 19, 2012 @09:53AM
(#4131778)
I once went to a birthday party. When the cake came out and everyone was singing "happy birthday", I said, in a loud, authoritative voice: "You know who really deserves a party is..."
Needless to say I wasn't invited the following year. ;-)
[The above story is totally fictitious, in order to make a point.]
Re:The codebreaker who saved 'millions of lives'
by excuse-me on Tuesday June 19, 2012 @10:55AM
(#4132103)
Also Bill Tutte made a much greater mathematical contribution to cryptography and broke the rather more complex Tunny code - between the guy with the bad moustache and his generals.
Re:The codebreaker who saved 'millions of lives'
by TazeTSchnitzel on Tuesday June 19, 2012 @12:10PM
(#4132582)
The UK Government just finished accepting entries for a consultation on plans to allow same-sex (as well as transgender marriage) in England and Wales, and the Scottish Government is also running a consultation.
Re:The codebreaker who saved 'millions of lives'
by rmc on Wednesday June 20, 2012 @05:29AM
(#4136226)
Yes, and it's very encouraging. Especially seeing Cameroon, a Conservative Prime Minister say "I support gay marriage because I'm a conservative". Thankfully things are changing. The people's attitudes are changing.
Which is about WWII in the Pacific, up to the battle of Midway. He talks about the code breaking efforts in Hawaii, and I immediately recognized one of the minor characters from Cryptonimicon - the guy in charge of the cryptanalysis efforts - who was apparently a bit eccentric, and not big on military formalities. I didn't realize that the character in the book was based on someone real.
It's a very well written book, and I'd highly recommend it, as well, as, of course, Cryptonimicon.
Re:The codebreaker who saved 'millions of lives'
by sophacles on Tuesday June 19, 2012 @10:14AM
(#4131908)
Several other characters in that book are also based on real people, albeit living (at time of writing anwyay) ones, so names and some details were changed, as well as adding some more speculation. For example the character Earl Comstock was pretty much Robert McNamara. A lot of the people in the 90's timeline seem to be based on real people Stephenson wrote about in his factual articles. (particularly the ones about cable laying in the pacific).
Re:The codebreaker who saved 'millions of lives'
by xcallmejudasx on Tuesday June 19, 2012 @10:45AM
(#4132054)
Cryptonomicon is a long but very good read. There's enough technical details to keep us hackers intrigued without scaring away the non techie folks. My dad read it and even though he didn't get some of the more subtle crypto jokes he very much enjoyed it without having any history of computing or security.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cryptanalysis_of_the_Enigma#Pol...
I mean - Turing was brilliant, but why everybody only tell the story from the middle ?
Quick! django the unix firewalls!
(But several other excellent Turing stories have mentioned the other players involved, Ars had an excellent article about it if I remember rightly).
Needless to say I wasn't invited the following year. ;-)
[The above story is totally fictitious, in order to make a point.]
Turing was English.
(also the allies of the UK & USA were occupying Poland.)
"Turing helped adapt a device originally developed by Poland to create the bombe" - under the device caption
And as someone else said, this is about celebrating Turing's 100th birthday.
But yes, indeed, it is good to see things changing. And cross-party support, with the exception of the Euroskeptics.
Some countries (e.g. Ireland) have "civil partnership" laws which does not have the same rights as marriage.
Still, "separate but equal" is not good.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B005LW5JL2/ref=as_li_ss_tl?...
Which is about WWII in the Pacific, up to the battle of Midway. He talks about the code breaking efforts in Hawaii, and I immediately recognized one of the minor characters from Cryptonimicon - the guy in charge of the cryptanalysis efforts - who was apparently a bit eccentric, and not big on military formalities. I didn't realize that the character in the book was based on someone real.
It's a very well written book, and I'd highly recommend it, as well, as, of course, Cryptonimicon.
Edit - here's a link that talks about him some:
http://www.worldwar2history.info/Midway/mission.html