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Artificial Intelligence Cracks 4,000-Year-Old Mystery | Wired Sc. An ancient script that’s defied generations of archaeologists has yielded some of its secrets to artificially intelligent computers. Computational analysis of symbols used 4,000 years ago by a long-lost Indus Valley civilization suggests they represent a spoken language. Some frustrated linguists thought the symbols were merely pretty pictures. "The underlying grammatical structure seems similar to what’s found in many languages," said University of Washington computer scientist Rajesh Rao. The Indus script, used between 2,600 and 1,900 B.C. in what is now eastern Pakistan and northwest India, belonged to a civilization as sophisticated as its Mesopotamian and Egyptian contemporaries.

However, it left fewer linguistic remains. Archaeologists have uncovered about 1,500 unique inscriptions from fragments of pottery, tablets and seals. "One of the main questions in machine learning is how to generalize rules from a limited amount of data," said Rao. Image: J.M. See Also: Five Strangest Programming Languages. A Hello World program: What it is LOLCODE is probably what a programming language designed by lolcats would look like.

Silly and unusable, it has loops like “IM IN YR LOOP – IM OUTTA YR LOOP” and conditionals like “IZ – YARLY – NOWAI – KTHX”. It has plenty of fan-written interpreters and compilers. Brainfuck Brainf*ck is the classic “Turing tarpit” – a programming language with very few instructions. Befunge Befunge is similar to Brainf*ck in that each character represents an instruction (although it has more instructions, making it somewhat easier). Intercal is short for “Compiler Language With No Pronounceable Acronym”. Malbolge (=<`:9876Z4321UT. This is the hardest language to program in, hands down. EduFire - Live Video Language Learning. Babbel - learn languages online. Languages - Learn French. 70+ Online Language Communities and Resources.

The world wide web can be a good place to start learning a foreign language. This is a compilation of language communities, tools, and other online resources that'll help you get started. Also don't forget these resources - 30+ Language Tools For Firefox and Dictionary Toolbox: 50+ Dictionary & Reference Sites Language Communities Chaula - Chaula is a pronunciation dictionary created by the community and a social network where you can help other people learn your language.

FriendsAbroad - An online community of language learners speaking over 80 languages across 200 countries. Huitalk - This is a language learning community where you can chat with other Huitalk members, access the article resource, and join the forums to learn new languages. iTalki - Language exchange network wherein you can find a partner and practice speaking a foreign language using an instant messenger or iTalki's text and voice chat tool.

Novlet - A collaborative story writing tool in several languages.