[tt] the physics arXiv blog

[Eugen Leitl]

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From: the physics arXiv blog <howdy at arxivblog.com>
Date: Wed, 9 Apr 2008 17:27:20 -0500 (CDT)
To: eugen at leitl.org
Subject: the physics arXiv blog
Reply-To: the physics arXiv blog <howdy at arxivblog.com>


[1]the physics arXiv blog

   [2]A survey of quantum programming languages

   Posted: 09 Apr 2008 12:19 AM CDT

   It cannot be long before somebody breathes life into a useful quantum
   computer. And when that happens, an entirely new breed of keyboard
   monkey will be born: the quantum computer programmer.

   This strange animal will have to work with the weird and wonderful
   tools of the quantum world, such as superposition of quantum bits,
   entanglement, destructive measurement and the no-cloning theorem.

   Clearly no conventional programming language has operators and data
   structures that can handle these concepts but a growing number of
   physcists have been developing languages that can. Today, Donald Sofge
   at the Naval Research Laboratory in DC has kindly surveyed them and
   their history.

   He divides them into three categories:

   i) Imperative Programming Languages which use statements to change the
   global state of a program.  Classical examples include FORTRAN, C and
   Java. Quantum examples include QCL (quantum computation language)
   which was probably the first proper quantum programming language (it
   was developed by Bernhard Omer at the Technical University ofVienna
   about 10 years ago).

   Another example is Q Language developed by Stefano Betelli and
   colleagues at Trento University in Italy.

   ii) Functional Quantum Programming Languages by contrast,map inputs to
   outputs to perform mathematical transformations. This idea has
   influenced the development of conventional languages such as Lisp, ML
   and Haskell.

   Quantum versions include QFC (quantum flow charts) proposed by Peter
   Selinger at Dalhousie University in Canada and QML developed by
   Thorsten Altenkirch at the University of Nottignham in the UK.

   iii) Others

   A number of people have developed languages aimed specifically at
   supporting cryptographic protocols. A good example is cQPL based on
   Selinger's QP. Another language, CQP (communicating quantum
   processes), relies on quantum process algebras to model systems that
   combine both quantum and classical elements.

   Sofge's paper makes a fascinating, if technical read. But if you're a
   young programmer wondering what you'll be working on in 30 years time,
   get your Landau and Lifshitz out of the attic and start working
   through it.

   Ref: [3]arxiv.org/abs/0804.1118: A Survey of Quantum Programming
   Languages

   [4][arXivblog?i=3oWdCU] 
   [5][arXivblog?i=97PpwDG] [6][arXivblog?i=ttSxzrG]
   [7][arXivblog?i=mtgmqvg] [8][arXivblog?i=OsOycPG]
   [9][arXivblog?i=bxELHhg] [10][arXivblog?i=OL3hSnG]
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References

   1. http://arxivblog.com/
   2. http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/arXivblog/~3/266800861/
   3. http://arxiv.org/abs/0804.1118
   4. http://feeds.feedburner.com/~a/arXivblog?a=3oWdCU
   5. http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/arXivblog?a=97PpwDG
   6. http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/arXivblog?a=ttSxzrG
   7. http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/arXivblog?a=mtgmqvg
   8. http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/arXivblog?a=OsOycPG
   9. http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/arXivblog?a=bxELHhg
  10. http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/arXivblog?a=OL3hSnG
  11. http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/arXivblog?a=cQdkhzg
  12. http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/arXivblog?a=vpMBhdG
  13. http://arxivblog.com/
  14. http://www.feedburner.com/fb/a/emailunsub?id=8632699&key=kesJ612ZsV
  15. http://feeds.feedburner.com/arXivblog
  16. http://feeds.feedburner.com/arXivblog

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Eugen* Leitl <a href="http://leitl.org">leitl</a> http://leitl.org
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