You might remember that one of the new features that came in with Visual Studio last year was C++ Accelerated Massive Parallelism (C++ AMP). Microsoft has now published the C++ AMP specification (PDF) to encourage others to implement it on any platform. It’s interesting to see the spec pushed out like this, before it’s even [...]Developers are invited to join Intel for an exclusive half-day event taking place in Barcelona on Tuesday 28th February, near to Mobile World Congress. The event gives you an opportunity to find out about the opportunities the Intel architecture creates for you, including business opportunities with Android and software distribution through various channels. You will [...]It seems like there are so many webinars and virtual conferences at the moment that you could spend all your time visiting them, leaving no time for the real business of programming. That said, I’ve attended a couple recently and found them really valuable. When you leave university and enter the workplace, you aren’t exposed [...]This week, 350 people will head to Microsoft’s Redmond campus to hear about C++, and in particular the C++11 update, from some leading experts, including Bjarne Stroustrup, Hans Boehm, and Herb Sutter. The event has sold out but the great news is that you don’t have to book a flight and find a babysitter for [...]A number of universities (primarily across America, but also including the UK’s Open University) are using the internet to open up their course materials to anybody who would like to study them. It means you can access lectures and notes from some of the world’s leading institutions, including Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and Stanford. [...]The Babbage column in The Economist has published a short report about parallel computing, in the context of the water-cooled machines at Supercomputing ’11. The piece makes an interesting point about the way that supercomputing didn’t invent parallel computing, but it did turn the theory into practice and kickstart the cycle of innovation we see [...]Now this is a bit of a strange one. It appears that Microsoft has created an extension to Visual Studio that will assess programmers’ work for various “achievements” and then give them badges that they can post on their blogs, Microsoft’s forum, and other places. Microsoft does have some history in this area. It created [...]Dr Dobbs has published new research (PDF) which shows that 66% of software engineers don’t use a thread checking tool of any kind. You might not be surprised at that, but 56% of those surveyed said they considered parallel programming to be important, and a further 26% said it was critical. That suggests to me that [...]If 2011 was the year of the tablet, then 2012 could well be the year of the Ultrabook. It’s the latest device category, combining the best of the tablet with the best of the laptop computer in a thin, light and elegant design. The combination of high performance graphics and processing, touch controls, and mobility [...]Computer World dares to ask whether, despite the hype around them at CES, we actually need multicore processors on tablets and phones. The argument goes that since software hasn’t been designed for mobile multicore processors, there’s no real need for the hardware. That’s a bit chicken-and-eggy for me, because nobody’s going to create apps for [...]