Preface

We consider ourselves lucky to be working in one of the most exciting fields of technology that our time has to offer. In a few short years, we’ve moved from a nascent internet to a fully developed World Wide Web, whereby each and every one of us have the power of communication in our pockets and the ability to answer almost any question in seconds.

The development of intelligent algorithms to make sense and utility of this information has played no small part in the development of this new paradigm. A certain beauty of symmetry strikes us: that we rely more and more on intelligent algorithms to help us lead our lives both on and off the internet, and this in turn has provided us with deeper insight and data on which to train and test our algorithms. Just a few years ago, neural networks had fallen out of favor in research circles; but now, with the advent of large, accessible datasets, we’ve been able to show their utility again.

We just about live in a world where we can talk to our phone and have it predict our needs, book our appointments, and reach our contacts. A bit further into the future, we can see self-driving cars and virtual reality. All of these applications are firmly rooted in the application of computer science to real-world problems. Intelligent algorithms are part of this and are here to stay.