Turing Machine - I (still) don't get it.

[etienne_marais]

I have read and re-read the wiki page on Turing completeness, but I can't get to the gist of it. Please explain in easy terms and why it is important.

We actually had to build a mechanical turing machine at TUKS long ago (however and with whatever you wanted), I never did the project.

 

[Messugga]

I have read and re-read the wiki page on Turing completeness, but I can't get to the gist of it. Please explain in easy terms and why it is important.

We actually had to build a mechanical turing machine at TUKS long ago (however and with whatever you wanted), I never did the project.

A Turing complete machine can do all the things. If it's not Turing complete, it can't do all the things. This is a problem when you need a machine that can do all the things.

 

[scudsucker]

A modern browser is both Turing complete and able to show you websites via a simple search functionality what "Turing Complete" means.

 

[konfab]

I have read and re-read the wiki page on Turing completeness, but I can't get to the gist of it. Please explain in easy terms and why it is important.

We actually had to build a mechanical turing machine at TUKS long ago (however and with whatever you wanted), I never did the project.

You can play with one here:
https://www.google.com/doodles/alan-turings-100th-birthday

Turing machines are simply a mathematical model of a computer.

Turing completeness simply refers to the ability of a machine(or a programming language) to run a certain class of algorithms.

Once you know it is Turing complete, you can use a few of Turing's theories to understand something about it. For example, it is impossible to write a program on a Turing machine that can perfectly check whether a Turing complete program will run to a halt or not.