Twenty Problems
of
Information Technology

  1. Taking a glance at the 3 billion pages of the Web. It is not just the huge number of pages that is the problem, but also the disorganized state of the Web.

  2. Isolating a few thousand pages of the Web, which are worth looking at. The technology for clearly spelling out the content of a page is only just developing.

  3. Analyzing 3 billion base pairs in the human DNA. Having a sequence of letters is obviously not useful, unless we have some idea of the language used.

  4. Isolating the estimated 30 thousand human genes from the DNA sequence. Since the physical and mental characteristics of humans depend on the genes the importance of this is obvious.

  5. Understanding the functions of all the human genes. Functions of more than half the discovered genes remain unknown.

  6. Making 6 billion people literate and providing at least an elementary education.

  7. Designing e-learning management systems for the Web to ease the burden of tutoring 6 billion people.

  8. Looking at the individual atoms of the protein molecule to learn about the mechanism of protein folding.

  9. Peer-to-peer computing, to ease the computational complexity of problems like protein folding.

  10. Developing database management systems that can deal with the terabyte databases that are mushrooming on the Web.

  11. Developing a theory of search engines to make a judgment on the quality of 3 billion Web pages.

  12. Developing standards for the metadata in Web pages to provide more clarity for the content.

  13. Using the vast resources of the Internet for social functions like voting, so that election results will not be left dangling.

  14. Developing a theory of voting to circumvent inherent problems like Arrow's paradox.

  15. Developing exemplary core courses for higher education so that the same courses can be taught around the world through the Web.

  16. Developing an exemplary course management system and making it free so that the delivery of courses will be uniform throughout the world.

  17. Developing a comprehensive course archives network for the free use of the Web community, so that all courses can be accessed anytime anywhere using a common course management system.

  18. Developing wireless communications software so that the mobile computer can transform itself into a home computer or office computer. Note that there is commercial software available which will transform a home computer into an office computer or vice versa.

  19. Publishing mathematics on the Web. Even though there has been attempts to enhance HTML to make it suitable for mathematics, the real choice we have is only the TeX typesetting. Note that it is possible to have hyper referencing in TeX.

  20. A familiar but unemphasized fact is that string manipulation of the four Maxwell's equations is what allowed us to predict electromagnetic waves. From this we can surmise that proper use of language can be a powerful tool to gain information and knowledge about nature. A derivation in mathematical logic in nothing but a step by step procedure to gain information about the subject matter until we arrive at certainties. Thus, linguistics, metamathematics, and information theory are all inextricably intertwined. It follows that information technology can greatly benefit by the study of these subjects.
K. K. Nambiar
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