Thanks to some ingenious engineers at Google, you can now turn your desktop PC into a quantum computer. Well, OK, not quite: You can simulate a quantum computer on your PC by running the Quantum Computing Playground web app for Chrome. The Playground allows you to run famous quantum algorithms, such as Grover’s, or even to write your own quantum script. Short of buying your own quantum computer — which, despite what D-Wave says, you can’t — this is the next best thing. If you’re looking to get in on the ground floor of the future of computing, this is your chance: If I had kids, I feel like it would be a disservice if I didn’t make them sit in front of the Playground for at least six hours a day to teach them the intricacies of quantum computing.
The Quantum Computing Playground is a Chrome Experiment (i.e. web app) that uses WebGL to simulate up to 22 qubits on your GPU. You get a basic IDE to write, compile, and run your code; some example algorithms (Grover’s, Shor’s); and a handy debugger and 3D quantum state visualization tool, so you can see what’s going on inside your little quantum computer. The programs are written in a language called QScript, which looks a lot like any other simple Bash-like scripting language.
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