1.2M views · Apr 1, 2017 · 5:34 · 8 HN recommenders · 13 mentions · discussed 2017–2025
A short SIGBOVIK 2017 presentation by Tom Wildenhain showing that PowerPoint animations are Turing complete, with a working Turing machine built in slides. The talk is delivered deadpan as a serious research result.
Why Hacker News points people here: HN repeatedly names it as one of the funniest and best talks, a favorite example of absurd computation.
“Nerding out should always be hilarious like that!”HN comment, 2020
“it is probably the greatest thing ever made.”
Research, talk and paper all made in PowerPoint.
This is very similar in style to my favorite presentation and paper of all time, titled On The Turing Completeness of PowerPoint [0]. The research, presentation and paper were all created inside of powerpoint and it is probably the greatest thing ever made. If you enjoyed the above video you will definitely enjoy this. [0] this video
“I can only think of one of the greatest videos[0] on Youtube”
One of the greatest videos on YouTube for unusual Turing complete systems.
I can only think of one of the greatest videos[0] on Youtube when I read about unusual Turing complete systems. [0] this video
“Nerding out should always be hilarious like that!”
Witty five-minute talk on PowerPoint's Turing completeness.
I think this drives your point with incredible wit: “On The Turing Completeness of PowerPoint (SIGBOVIK)” by Tom Wildenhain[1]. (5 minutes video) [1]: this video (Nerding out should always be hilarious like that!) [2]: Recording of a guest lecture he gave for the Esoteric Programming Languages course at CMU. (~1h) link
“On The Turing Completeness of PowerPoint”
Listed among favorite talks of 2017.
On The Turing Completeness of PowerPoint this video Compiling C to printable x86, to make an executable research paper link HDR Photography in Microsoft Excel?! link Zebras All the Way Down link Solving Layout Problems with CSS Grid and Friends link Console Security - Switch link Let's move SMM out of firmware and into the kernel link Bringing Linux back to server boot ROMs with NERF and Heads link Sharing the Chisel link (looks like the actual conference video wasn't released)
“My personal favorites are”
Personal favorite SIGBOVIK paper.
The former paper appeared in SIBVOIK 2017 ( link ), where you can find other such papers. My personal favorites are "On The Turing Completeness of PowerPoint" ( this video ) and "Automated Distributed Execution of LLVM code using SQL JIT Compilation" > Following the popularity of MapReduce, a whole ecosystem of Apache Incubator Projects has emerged that all solve the same problem. Famous examples include Apache Hadoop, Apache Spark, Apache Pikachu, Apache Pig, German Spark and Apache Hive [1]
“demonstrating the Turing completeness of PowerPoint. It is also art.”
SIGBOVIK demonstration of PowerPoint's Turing completeness.
Reminds me of a related project presented at SIGBOVIK demonstrating the Turing completeness of PowerPoint. It is also art. this video
“completely insane but kind of fun way to abuse an office application”
Insane but fun abuse of an office application.
For another completely insane but kind of fun way to abuse an office application, see "On The Turing Completeness of PowerPoint" [1]. (Gwern has a whole list of accidentally/surprisingly turing-complete things at [2]) 1. this video 2. link
“the PowerPoint presentation demonstrating the Turing-completeness of PowerPoint animations[1]”
Amusing demonstration of PowerPoint animations being Turing-complete.
If you liked the Game of Life running a Game of Life simulation you might enjoy the YT video[0] showing someone's functioning raycasting engine within the game world of Factorio using thousands of machines and parts provided by the game. It blew my mind. What I also found quite amusing was the PowerPoint presentation demonstrating the Turing-completeness of PowerPoint animations[1]. I'll never get tired of this kind of tinkering walking the line between genius and a healthy portion of crazy. [0] link [1] this video
“Also of interest may be similar attempts to create computers in other games and applications”
Someone created a bf interpreter using this game: link Also of interest may be similar attempts to create computers in other games and applications: OpenTTD: link Minecraft: link PowerPoint: this video
“Only with user interaction to step things along, similar to powerpoint”
I believe I saw something that said CSS is Turing Complete* * Only with user interaction to step things along, similar to powerpoint: this video
TeX is not a "language"; it's just a tool for typesetting when you want to go the last mile of achieving book-quality printing. The fact that it turns out to be possible to (ab)use its macros (originally designed merely to save the user some typing effort) to do "programming" shows only that it's easy for things to become "accidentally Turing complete" [1], and the cleverness/perversity of its user community. > TeX was designed for typesetting, not for programming; so it is at best “weird” when considered as a programming language. — DEK, Digital Typography , page 235 > In some sense I put in many of TeX's programming features only after kicking and screaming. — DEK, Digital Typography , page 648 > So TeX is a programming language but I had to put in those features kicking and screaming. […] In a way I resent having every language be universal because they’ll be universal in a different way. […] I was really thinking of TeX as something that the more programming it had in it, the less it was doing its real mission of typesetting. When I put in the calculation of prime numbers into the TeX manual I was not thinking of this as the way to use TeX. I was thinking, “Oh, by the way, look at this: dogs can stand on their hind legs and TeX can calculate prime numbers.” — DEK, interviewed in Peter Seibel's Coders at Work > Michael Plass, who was Don's student and worked with Don on TeX, told me once that "Don tried very hard not to make TeX a programming language. Unfortunately, he di
“Since PowerPoint was proven to be Turing complete my bet is on it and not Excel being the most commonly used”
Since PowerPoint was proven to be Turing complete my bet is on it and not Excel being the most commonly used: this video
“it should definitely be possible to generate a .pptx that will run Windows inside of an emulator inside PowerPoint slides.”
Based on important research like this video , it should definitely be possible to generate a .pptx that will run Windows inside of an emulator inside PowerPoint slides. That HTML file is lying to you!
