DC Project Looking for PPC Help

rogue masterrogue master
Posted:
in General Discussion edited January 2014
I'm certain that I'm not the only math geek in this forum. This post goes to people who want to put their Mac to work searching for large prime numbers. By large, I mean in the 100,000 digit range, not the multi-million digit range being searched by the GIMPS project.



The PIES Project is such a project. The software used by the project optimizes on PPC far better than on x86, so it is good use of spare computing power, if you have it and want to do something with it.

Comments

  • Reply 1 of 4
    splinemodelsplinemodel Posts: 7,311member
    Is there any near-term application for large prime numbers? (or any application at all?)
  • Reply 2 of 4
    rogue masterrogue master Posts: 121member
    Yes, mainly in the field of cryptography. Most of those who expend the resources on the search for primes (i.e. geeks like me) do it for the joy of discovering something new in an area in which we take an interest.
  • Reply 3 of 4
    splinemodelsplinemodel Posts: 7,311member
    I've heard cyptography before. But for now and at least the next decade, 256bit encryption is more than enough. 2^256 is something big, but it's less than 10^100. For encryption to require hundreds of thousands of zeros. . . that presumes a much more potent computer. By the time anyone needs that (if ever, considering that totally different encryption methods may surface and become preferable) computers will be so much more powerful that the weeks of CPU time my computer spent doing the math will have been in vain.



    That's my assumption. Let me know if I'm wrong. I'm not trying to be quarrelsome, but I just think of the energy I save b putting my computer to sleep when I'm not using it.
  • Reply 4 of 4
    rogue masterrogue master Posts: 121member
    Quote:

    Originally posted by Splinemodel

    I've heard cyptography before. But for now and at least the next decade, 256bit encryption is more than enough. 2^256 is something big, but it's less than 10^100. For encryption to require hundreds of thousands of zeros. . . that presumes a much more potent computer. By the time anyone needs that (if ever, considering that totally different encryption methods may surface and become preferable) computers will be so much more powerful that the weeks of CPU time my computer spent doing the math will have been in vain.



    That's my assumption. Let me know if I'm wrong. I'm not trying to be quarrelsome, but I just think of the energy I save b putting my computer to sleep when I'm not using it.



    There are forms of cryptography that rely on algorithms other than DES, RC5, etc. Unfortunately, I not enough of a geek to know where they are. For geeks like myself, the fun is in the search and discovery and I'm hoping to find one or two in the forum.
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