compsoc-announce November 2005

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Week 7
by Ken Kawamoto 19 Nov '05

19 Nov '05

Hi all, There are no more talks for the rest of the term. We have the termly general meeting this week: Termly General Meeting Wednesday 23 Nov 19:00, The Mitre B&R (High st.) ------------------------------------------------ As usual, Compsoc's Termly General Meeting provides an opportunity for the members to speak to the committee directly and find out about the running of the society. Followed by a traditional CompSoc curry at a nearby Indian restaurant. ==== Here's something from the Invariants which may be of interest to people. the Invariants, the OU Maths society, are holding a speaker event on Tuesday evening of 7th week, which should be of great interest to any computer scientist and everybody who likes beautiful fractal pictures. Title: "Indra's Pearls" Abstract: In Buddhist mythology, the heaven of Indra contained a net of pearls, each of which was reflected in its neighbours, so that the whole Universe was mirrored in each pearl. Felix Klein, one of the great nineteenth-century geometers, studied iterations of reflections or inversions, whose interactions are the mathematical embodiment of this idea. In the 1980's, David Mumford, David Wright and I embarked on the first computer exploration of Klein's ideas, recreating some of his remarkable pictures and finding further compelling fractal images of their own. This talk, illustrated with many pictures, will be a short introduction to our book "Indra's Pearls", published by CUP. Time: Tuesday evening, 8.15 prompt. Doors open at 8. Place Maths Institute on the corner of St. Giles and Keble Road Entry is free for members and 2 Pounds for non-members. Refreshments will be provided after the talk. === Have a great week! Ken

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Programming competition: Win an Xbox 360
by Ken Kawamoto 14 Nov '05

14 Nov '05

Hi all, Sorry for filling up your mailboxes; here's something I received from Blitz Games (who gave us a talk last Wednesday). Win an Xbox 360 and support charity. Retro Ball & coding competition – supported by Blitz Games. 10th November 2005. Leamington Spa, Warks, UK. Leading independent videogame developer Blitz Games and Retro Ball organisers (www.play4charity.co.uk) today remind all amateur gaming enthusiasts – that only 13 days remain to enter the coding competition. The winners of the competition, judged by industry veterans The Oliver Twins, will be announced at the forthcoming charity event - The Retro Ball – which takes place over the weekend of December 3rd and 4th in Kenilworth, Warwickshire. In addition to the competition, visitors to the event will be able to play on gaming machines dating from the early 80’s right through to the current time including classic arcade cabinets, pinball tables and a wide range of computers and consoles – from the ZX Spectrum to today’s PlayStation 2 and Xbox. Andrew Oliver, Development Director Blitz Games commented, “We’re delighted to be actively involved in The Retro Ball. The response to the event and the competition has been excellent. It’s very encouraging to see such enthusiasm for videogames from the past and the present and to know that all proceeds will be going into cancer research and support for victims of this devastating disease.” Chris Wilkins, organiser of The Retro Ball added, “ I am extremely pleased to have the Oliver Twins and Blitz Games associated with The Retro Ball event. The weekend is shaping up to be a unique gaming extravaganza with some amazing prizes to be won! ” Tickets are selling steadily and the event is due to attract over 400 people with the aim of raising and donating £2,500 to the Everyman charity in aid of cancer research. The event also has a number of gaming celebrities coming along including Jon Hare from the infamous Sensible Software responsible for such classics as Sensible Soccer, Rob Hubbard/David Whittaker (C64 musicians) and Gary Whelan (the official Galaxian world record holder). Chris Wilkins, organiser of The Retro Ball added, “ The support I have received from the games industry ‘Retro’ veterans has been amazing. All have volunteered to participate in a Q&A session at the event and also to challenge visitors to the games they were responsible for developing. If you have always thought of yourself as unbeatable at ‘Sensible Soccer”, why not come to the event and challenge the game designer himself, Jon Hare, to a game!!” About The Competition The Retro Ball (www.play4charity.co.uk) coding competition that is being run in partnership with Blitz Games (www.BlitzGames.com) and Retro Remakes (www.remakes.org). Entrants – amateur - are tasked with developing a highly playable game either of original design or based on an original idea, i.e. a remake. The developer can use any programming language and tools available to them to produce the game but the use of C or C++ is desirable. The Oliver Twins are the sole competition judges and will select the top 3 submissions after the 4-week deadline has elapsed. The top 3 authors will be invited to The Retro Ball and stay at a top 4* Hotel on the Saturday evening courtesy of the Twins. Their games will be made available for visitors to play at The Retro Ball event. The winner of the competition will be announced at The Retro Ball at 7pm on December 3rd. Prizes for the event are: 1st Prize XBOX 360 + game 2nd Prize PSP + game 3rd Prize Nintendo DS + game The 3 finalists will be assessed by Blitz Games during the weekend of the event and if suitable will be offered a career with the Oliver Twins within the games industry. If you fancy your chances at winning this competition then wander over to http://www.retroremakes.com/comp2005/index.php to read up on the rules and how to enter. For further information please contact: Alison Beasley, Lincoln Beasley T: +44 (0) 1608 645756 E: Alison(a)lincolnbeasley.co.uk M: +44(0)7966 449130 www.lincolnbeasley.co.uk About Blitz Games Blitz Games is based in Leamington Spa and was founded in 1990 by twin brothers Andrew and Philip Oliver and now boasts over 130 staff. The Oliver’s are responsible for developing over 100 games since the early 1980s and their company has three new titles planned for release in the next year, including Pac-Man World 3 and Bratz: Rock Angelz. Also currently in development is next generation original title Possession. The company continues its huge long-term investment into BlitzWare, its in-house technology, which provides one of the best game development environments of any independent developer. www.BlitzGames.com. Volatile Games is a division of Blitz Games focused on developing Mature Content Games. www.VolatileGames.com About Retro Remakes The Retro Remakes community is an extremely talented bunch of developers, designers and hobbyists that remake the classics of yesteryear on current technology. The organisers of the Retro Remakes website are organising and running the competition. Ken.

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Week 6
by Ken Kawamoto 14 Nov '05

14 Nov '05

Hi all, Here's this week's event: Algebraic reasoning in UI design Bernard Sufrin Wednesday 16 Nov 20:30, Denis Sciama Lecture Theatre, Denys Wilkinson Building (on Banbury Rd & Keble Rd) ------------------------------------------------ A riff on the design of text editors, incorporating some elements of simple algebraic reasoning. Bernard will explain the role even simple abstract forms can play in getting our head straight about design questions. Have a great week! Ken

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CompSoc Week 5
by Ken Kawamoto 06 Nov '05

06 Nov '05

Hi all, There are two events this week: Tackling the Next Generation of Consoles Andrew Oliver (Blitz Games) Wednesday 9 Nov 20:30, Denis Sciama Lecture Theatre, Denys Wilkinson Building (on Banbury Rd & Keble Rd) ------------------------------------------------ Soon we are about to hit the new wave of next generation consoles; the Xbox 360, Playstation 3 and Nintendo Revolution. What's in these super powerful new consoles? What will this mean to the video games buying market and what will it mean to the industry and developers? [Andrew Oliver, the co-founder and co-owner of Blitz Games(Fuzion Frenzy, The Mummy Returns, WarGames, etc)] The other event is from the British Computer Society: Open Source: turn on the LAMP Alan Lenton (ibgames) Thursday 10 Nov 19:30, Computing Lab ------------------------------------------------ In the last ten years Open Source software has come from being an 'interesting' plaything for hobbyists and geeks into the mainstream of business computing. The success of Open Source has been built on the rock solid components of the Linux operating system, the Apache web server, the MySQL database, and a scripting language whose name starts with 'P' - Perl, PHP or Python, depending on your religion. These components are commonly known by the acronym LAMP. This talk will look at the LAMP components, as well as Linux distributions and some of the strengths and weaknesses of Open Source software, and strategies for deploying it in business. The talk will also attempt to strip away some of the myths surrounding Open Source software - myths pushed both by fanatical supporters, and by equally fanatical opponents. Have a good week! Ken. +---------------+ Ken Kawamoto St Edmund Hall, Oxford President, Oxford University Computer Society http://www.compsoc.net/ president(a)ox.compsoc.net

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Week 4
by Ken Kawamoto 01 Nov '05

01 Nov '05

Hi all, We have just one event this week: Further Linux for beginners Adaikalavan Ramasmy Wednesday 2 Nov 20:30, Denis Sciama Lecture Theatre, Denys Wilkinson Building (on Banbury Rd & Keble Rd) ------------------------------------------------ Adaikalavan Ramasmy will give a tutorial for those Linux beginners who want to know "a little more". Starting with the benefits of using Linux, he will go through the basic and the slightly more advanced aspects of Linux. This should be of particular interest to new engineers and scientists who have limited experience in using Linux. Knoppix CDs will be distributed prior to the talk for those who want to try out. Have a good week! Ken

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compsoc-announce November 2005