The Most British Guide to Quantum Computing You'll Ever Read (No Physics Degree Required, Tea Strongly Recommended

You know how British weather forecasts are always "quite likely to rain" even during a biblical flood? Well, quantum computing has been "quite possibly useful in the future" for so long that we completely missed the moment it actually became rather handy indeed.

A Bit of a Quantum Kerfuffle Last month, whilst everyone was queuing politely to use tomorrow's quantum computers, a thoroughly sensible pharmaceutical company decided to try today's quantum-inspired algorithms instead. Rather like discovering your gran's ancient Dell laptop is actually quite good at cryptocurrency mining.

They solved their molecular problem in 9 hours instead of 30 days. Which, as we say in Britain, is "not too shabby."

The Terribly Obvious Thing We All Missed It turns out that while we were all waiting for quantum computers to become as common as disappointment at Eurovision, some rather clever people had already worked out how to use quantum ideas on regular computers. A bit like discovering you can actually make a decent cup of tea in the microwave. (I apologize unreservedly for even suggesting that.)

What's Actually Working, If You'll Pardon the Expression

• The Met Office is optimizing weather predictions, though still resolutely forecasting "sunny spells" during what appears to be the second great flood
• Drug companies are accelerating research faster than you can say "but have you tried putting some Savlon on it?"
• Financial firms are finding new patterns in market data, beyond "stocks go up unless you've just bought them"

A Proper British Success Story A logistics company recently started using quantum-inspired algorithms to plan deliveries. Their efficiency improved by 20%, which they celebrated with a slightly larger than usual biscuit during tea break. One might even say they dunked it for an extra second - the absolute madlads.

The Rather Useful Bits If you're thinking of giving it a go (and why not, we've nothing better to do until the next series of Bake Off), here's what you might try:

1. Look for problems that need solving (besides why the washing machine eats socks)
2. Try some quantum-inspired tools (no need to understand Schr?dinger's cat - which is good, as neither did Schr?dinger)
3. Join the quantum computing community (they're quite friendly, in their own peculiar way)

A Bit of Perspective We're not suggesting quantum computing will solve all your problems. It won't explain why everyone walks so slowly in Tesco's, or why your neighbour's garden always looks better than yours. But it might just help with some rather tricky calculations.

The Really Rather Important Question What if the biggest quantum computing opportunity isn't about understanding the physics (thank goodness), but about solving everyday problems? Though if someone could explain why British trains are always "delayed due to the wrong kind of leaves," that would be smashing.

Ready to give it a go? Do share your thoughts below. Though not too enthusiastically - we're British, after all.