Coffee Klatch

One of the problems with using passwords to get access to secure websites is that the human mind has a limited capacity to remember things like “Rt84bananaQ5″ and often defaults to easily cracked passwords like “password.”

In contrast to this is the amazing ability for the human mind to remember faces. Even faces that have changed a bit and which haven’t been seen in many years. There’s a company that’s taking advantage of this ability. Passfaces.

You are given five “random” faces to memorize, and then you go through five logon screens, each one a grid like the one to the right, where you have to pick the one face that’s “yours.”

It’s java-based, so easily accessed by any web browser, and it can be tied into other authentication processes like passwords or ID cards. You can read about it at CNN-Money (FORTUNE Small Business Magazine).

You can also visit the Passfaces website, read a white paper about the science behind the technology, and even try a demo to see just how easy it is to set up and to remember your faces.

The Passfaces demonstration is divided into two sections; Initial Sign Up / Familiarization and Logon for returning users. The Initial Sign Up is for first time users and takes you through a simple registration and familiarization process (2 to 4 minutes). Logon is for Registered Users and takes you through a sample logon process (10 to 20 seconds). You can logon anytime after signup and test your ability to recognized assigned Passfaces.

Several weeks ago, I blogged about BOINC and Distributed Computing. BOINC is the program that runs the upload/download of the project data files and it stands for Berkeley Open Infrastructure for Network Computing. I thought I’d post an update and point out that there is a variety of projects available. SETI@Home was the one that I mentioned, but there are quite a few others which are very interesting, beneficial to humanity in a variety of ways, and which have cool screensavers as a part of their data processing.

Einstein@Home is a cool one that looks for pulsars. It has a very cool-looking screensaver, too, featuring (what else?) stars and constellations.

“Einstein@Home is a program that uses your computer’s idle time to search for spinning neutron stars (also called pulsars) using data from the LIGO and GEO gravitational wave detectors. Einstein@Home is a World Year of Physics 2005 project supported by the American Physical Society (APS) and by a number of international organizations.”

Climateprediction.net “is the largest experiment to try and produce a forecast of the climate in the 21st century.”

You can download a climate model from this website. It will run automatically as a background process on your computer whenever you switch your computer on. It should not affect any other tasks you use your computer for. As the model runs, you can watch the weather patterns on your, unique, [sic] version of the world evolve. The results are sent back to us via the internet, and you will be able to see a summary of your results on this web site.

World Community Grid works to advance our knowledge of human disease.

mission is to create the largest public computing grid benefiting humanity. Our work is built on the belief that technological innovation combined with visionary scientific research and large-scale volunteerism can change our world for the better.

Sztaki Desktop Grid searches for generalized binary number systems up to dimension 11. A description of the project and the theory behind it is available here.

Rosetta@home helps researchers develop cures for human diseases.

Rosetta@home needs your help to determine the 3-dimensional shapes of proteins in research that may ultimately lead to finding cures for some major human diseases. By running the Rosetta program on your computer while you don’t need it you will help us speed up and extend our research in ways we couldn’t possibly attempt without your help. You will also be helping our efforts at designing new proteins to fight diseases such as HIV, Malaria, Cancer, and Alzheimer’s.

QMC@Home (Quantum Monte Carlo at Home) studies the structure and reactivity of molecules using Quantum Chemistry. They’re just beginning their beta-test phase this month, but it looks promising.

Reactions between molecules are important for virtually all parts of our lives. The structure and reactivity of molecules can be predicted by Quantum Chemistry, but the solution of the vastly complex equations of Quantum Theory often requires huge amounts of computing power. In our project we want to raise the necessary computing time to further develop the very promising Quantum Monte Carlo (QMC) method for general use in Quantum Chemistry.

These are just a few. You can get a complete list at BOINC’s website.

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