compsoc-announce

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Yes! Yes! A termcard!
by Will Thompson 26 Jan '07

26 Jan '07

Hi all, Uhm. It's somehow the end of second week already, and you've all heard nothing from us since the pubmeet in first week. Sorry about that. It's mostly my fault --- I wanted to wait for a few more potential speakers to get back to us rather than putting up a sparse termcard. But now I'm being harassed in lectures, so it's time to throw http://www.ox.compsoc.net/events/termcards/current/ out. With any luck a few more events will be popping up on it next week, and I'll try to throw together an iCal file and an RSS feed at some point, thereby jumping into this century. One thing which will definitely be added in the next few days is the Annual General Meeting, which will probably be in sixth or seventh week. There'll be elections for next year (TT07 to HT08)'s President, Secretary and Treasurer. The others in the committee seem to want to go to the Big Bang again; let us know if you'd rather go elsewhere, and if there are days you can't do, and we'll see if we can work around them. Next Saturday, Durham's Compsoc are going to Game On at the Science Museum in London. We're thinking it'd be fun to go down at the same time, check out Game On, and meet the Durham lot. Anyone interested? Send us (or compsoc-discuss) an email, and we'll get a group of people together. The sooner, the better! http://www.sciencemuseum.org.uk/exhibitions/gameon/ That's enough for now. Sorry for the long period of silence, and see you at an event soon, Will -- Will Thompson, Oxford University Computer Society President <http://www.ox.compsoc.net/>

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Week 1: pub, BCS malware talk; Game On exhibition in London?
by Will Thompson 16 Jan '07

16 Jan '07

Hi folks, Did you all have a good holiday? I hope so. Anyway! You might be wondering what's happening in Compsoc this term. This week, come to the Turf Tavern on Wednesday 17th at some time after 8.30pm, and we can all catch up. As for the rest of term, well, we're still working on the termcard, I'm afraid. One thing we're planning is a visit to the Game On exhibition in the Barbican Centre in London[0]. Who'd be interested in going down there in a group? Would you prefer a weeknight or a weekend? (Durham's Compsoc are going down there on Saturday 3rd February, and it'd be neat to meet up with them, but EA are organising an event there on Wednesday 24th January evening with free drinks and a Q&A session with Bing Gordon[1].) Let us know which you'd prefer, so we can get things organised. [0] http://www.gameonweb.co.uk/ [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bing_Gordon Also, on Thursday the British Computer Society's Oxfordshire Branch are running a talk at Comlab: Viruses and Malware, How many more threats are there? ----------------------------------------------------- Date: Thursday 18 January 2007 Time: 19:30 (Tea and Coffee from 19:00) Location: Computing Lab, Wolfson Building, Parks Road, Oxford OX1 3QG Speaker: Stuart Taylor, Manager SophosLabs(TM) UK. In the last ten years the number of threats has increased ten fold with approximately 5,000 new threats being seen every month. The presentation covers the rapid rise in the number of threats and the changing nature of those threats. It will discuss the issues faced by both vendors and consumers in protecting themselves against this global problem. The presentation will look at some of the myths surrounding protection and explore the reality of providing a rapid response against the unknown threat. http://www.oxon.bcs.org/program2006-7.htm#Jan has more details. Anyway, that's enough from me for now. Hope to see people at the Turf on Wednesday, wjt -- Will Thompson, Oxford University Computer Society President <http://www.ox.compsoc.net/>

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Transitive! Tonight only!
by Will Thompson 29 Nov '06

29 Nov '06

Looking at the last few days' worth of emails lying around, I see a pattern emerging: announcements of events are quickly followed by reminders for those same events! I think it may be time to jump on the bandwagon. Be astounded! Be amazed! For one night only, we bring you the final Compsoc talk this term: Hardware Virtualization Technology ================================== Date: Wednesday 29th November Time: 20:00 Place: Denis Sciama Lecture Theatre, Denys Wilkinson Building Martyn Spink and Geraint North will speak about Transitive[0]'s QuickTransit®[1] technology, which allows software compiled for one processor and operating system to run transparently on a different processor and operating system without recompilation or patching. The most famous use of this technology is probably Apple's Rosetta[2], which allows applications compiled for PowerPC Macs to run on the new Intel-based Macs. Martyn and Geraint will show this in action as well as demonstrating another use of the technology. [0] http://www.transitive.com/ [1] http://www.transitive.com/products/ [2] http://www.apple.com/rosetta/ If you are unsure where the Denys Wilkinson Building is, then http://tinyurl.com/yeqtzg should help! You have 85 minutes to prepare yourself! wjt -- Will Thompson, Oxford University Computer Society President <http://www.ox.compsoc.net/>

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Week 8: Transitive's QuickTransit
by Will Thompson 28 Nov '06

28 Nov '06

Morning, Compsoccers! We seem to have reached 8th week, which is slightly surprising. Here at Compsoc Towers, we have one final talk for you this term, which is... tomorrow night! Hardware Virtualization Technology ================================== Date: Wednesday 29th November Time: 20:00 Place: Denis Sciama Lecture Theatre, Denys Wilkinson Building Martyn Spink and Geraint North will speak about Transitive[0]'s QuickTransit®[1] technology, which allows software compiled for one processor and operating system to run transparently on a different processor and operating system without recompilation or patching. The most famous use of this technology is probably Apple's Rosetta[2], which allows applications compiled for PowerPC Macs to run on the new Intel-based Macs. Martyn and Geraint will show this in action as well as demonstrating another use of the technology. [0] http://www.transitive.com/ [1] http://www.transitive.com/products/ [2] http://www.apple.com/rosetta/ I'm still in a small amount of shock that it's even possible to do this at a reasonable speed. (They even manage to use hardware graphics acceleration on the new platform in some cases!) The PPC -> Intel switch seemed to work without any major hiccups for Apple, and tomorrow we can find out why. :-) If you are unsure where the Denys Wilkinson Building is, then http://tinyurl.com/yeqtzg should help! Right, I should stop sitting here deleting all messages with the subject line "$person wrote:" every five minutes. I was planning to include some more abysmal poetry here, but I fear the angry mob congregating outside my door with pitchforks and vats of boiling oil... See you tomorrow, wjt -- Will Thompson, Oxford University Computer Society President <http://www.ox.compsoc.net/>

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TGM: Tonight, 18.00, at the Big Bang
by Will Thompson 23 Nov '06

23 Nov '06

Ahoy! Unfortunately, chilly weather seems to make the Big Bang busy. I claimed we would start sometime after seven, but this was not to be! The table is booked from six until half seven. I hope that's okay. There will be two spare places, in case more people appear than we thought. Termly General Meeting ====================== Date: Thursday 23rd November (tonight!) Time: 18.00 - 19.30 Place: The Big Bang, 124 Walton Street[0] Come along, hear the committee report on how the term has been for Compsoc, raise and discuss any issues facing the society, then eat sausages! The idea is to arrive at Big Bang, order food, and conduct the meeting while waiting for it to arrive. You can read the minutes from past meetings at http://www.ox.compsoc.net/info/minutes/ if you like! [0] http://oxford.openguides.org/wiki/?Big_Bang I wonder if I should apologise; my haikus weren't exactly very slick. With any luck your eyes will not be scarred. With practice maybe I'll improve in time! wjt -- Will Thompson, Oxford University Computer Society President <http://www.ox.compsoc.net/>

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Week 7: TGM and Murray Stokely of Google
by Will Thompson 22 Nov '06

22 Nov '06

Hi all, You might be interested to know that David and Katherine have uploaded the slides[0] from their talk on Wednesday. They're in OpenDocument[1] format, so you might want to get a copy of OpenOffice.org[2] if your normal presentation software can't handle that format. You might also be interested in reading a number of more detailed introductions and guides[3] to some of the tools they mentioned. [0] http://www.palepurple.co.uk/files/php-oxford-compsoc-talk-November-2006.odt [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OpenDocument [2] http://download.openoffice.org/ [3] http://codepoets.co.uk/docs This week, you might be interested in: * A talk by Ian Livingstone of Eidos at the Said Business School (which is not actually anything to do with Compsoc :-)) tonight, * The Compsoc Termly General Meeting (with sausages) on Thursday, and * Murray Stokely (of Google's) talk on Friday. I'll deal with them in reverse chronological order! Google's Distributed Computation Infrastructure =============================================== Date: Friday 24rd November Time: 20:00 Place: Denis Sciama Lecture Theatre, Denys Wilkinson Building Murray Stokely of Google will introduce four of the key components used to build massively parallel applications on Google's infrastructure: GFS, MapReduce, Sawzall, and Bigtable. The talk will also describe the recent Summer of Code[4] program which several Oxford students participated in. [4] http://code.google.com/soc/ If you are unsure where the Denys Wilkinson Building is, then http://tinyurl.com/yeqtzg should help! Also, Murray mentioned that he's bringing some Google swag "to give out to anyone that wants one at the talk". Termly General Meeting ====================== Date: Thursday 23rd November Time: Sometime after 19.00 --- to be confirmed! Place: The Big Bang, 124 Walton Street[5] Come along, hear the committee report on how the term has been for Compsoc, raise and discuss any issues facing the society, then eat sausages! The idea is to arrive at Big Bang, order food, and conduct the meeting while waiting for it to arrive. I'm going to book a table later today, so if you haven't already said you want to come, push that Reply button! You can read the minutes from past meetings at http://www.ox.compsoc.net/info/minutes/ if you like! [5] http://oxford.openguides.org/wiki/?Big_Bang Ian Livingstone OBE, Exec Chairman Eidos and Director at SCi ============================================================ Oxford Enterpreneurs sent us the following: Entrepreneur Seminar - Ian Livingstone OBE, Exec Chairman Eidos and Director at SCi Wednesday the 22nd of Nov 2006 @ 7:15pm to 8:45pm Renown computer games entrepreneur, founder of Lara Croft's Tomb Raider, Ian Livingstone's 30-year entrepreneurial career in games includes the founding of The Games Workshop and White Dwarf. He is now the Executive Chairman of Eidos and a Director at SCi Entertainment plc. SCi has a market capitalization of £330m and an iconic games portfolio including Conflict, The Great Escape and Tomb Raider. Ian will be sharing his thoughts on trends and opportunities in the games industry. All welcome - please arrive at 7:15 for registration. The talk will begin at 7:30. Venue: Said Business School Event type: OE Speaker Event Provided by: Oxford Entrepreneurs Email: events(a)oxfordentrepreneurs.co.uk Please Login at www.bouncewithit.com to book a place. I don't know you actually need to book, or indeed anything other than what you just read! Thanks for reading all the way down here! :-) wjt -- Will Thompson, Oxford University Computer Society President <http://www.ox.compsoc.net/>

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Thursday is the Termly General Meeting!
by Will Thompson 19 Nov '06

19 Nov '06

G'day folks, Yes! Thursday is the Termly General Meeting! As I mentioned a few weeks ago, we're planning to have a meal afterwards in the Big Bang[0]. We were planning to have the meeting in a pub beforehand, but someone pointed out that we could just hold the meeting in the Big Bang between ordering food and said food arriving, which sounds like an excellent idea to me. The only drawback I can see is that it makes it harder to come to the meeting and not to the meal. Was anyone planning to do that? [0] http://oxford.openguides.org/wiki/?Big_Bang In any case, can you let me know in the next couple of days if you want to come to the Big Bang? This'll let me book a table so that they're not surprised when an army of computer enthusiasts appear and start demanding food. I'll let you know more about this week's talk (which is on Friday, and involves Murray Stokely of Google talking about their distributed computing infrastructure) soon! Thanks, wjt -- Will Thompson, Oxford University Computer Society President <http://www.ox.compsoc.net/>

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6th week talks
by Michael Howe 15 Nov '06

15 Nov '06

Hi all, Just a quick reminder that our talk tonight is "Applying Good Practice to a Misused Language" [0]. I know I personally have written some _hideous_ PHP, so it'll definitely be good to see how they suggest doing it better. If you aren't a member yet, and are planning on turning up, this is an _ideal_ time to become a member. Life membership is only £10, and is definitely worth it (for a start, it lets us afford to pay people's travel expenses, which makes people more likely to come and talk to us. You also get to turn up to our TGMs and tell us what you'd like to see more or less of, and the list would go on if I wasn't already late.). Feel free to grab any of the committee if you want to become a member. While plugging talks, there's also a BCS [1] talk on Thursday: "Extending existing applications for secure mobile use - how tough can that be?" "Industry analyst research reflects that mobile working is a key priority for European enterprises this year. Stef Coetzee, Senior VP International, NetMotion Wireless, will cover the many challenges which include performance and reliability, network coverage - and keeping those corporate bean-counters happy.." More info can be found at http://www.oxon.bcs.org/program2006-7.htm#Nov (I'm sure I know that speaker's name, I just can't think why...) Apologies for the slightly rushed email - lectures call. Michael 0: http://www.ox.compsoc.net/events/termcards/current/ 1: http://www.oxon.bcs.org/ -- Michael Howe Treasurer and Sysadmin, Oxford University Computer Society http://www.ox.compsoc.net/

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Week 6: PHP best practices
by Will Thompson 13 Nov '06

13 Nov '06

i'm in ur inboxes, announcin ur events! Calling all web developers: Applying Good Practice to a Misused Language ============================================ Date: Wednesday 15th November Time: 20.00 Place: Comlab, room 051 Over the past few years, PHP has become the tool of choice for aspiring web developers everywhere — picked up and misused by millions. As a language that is easy to get started with, through examples and code snippets across the web, it is cut and pasted to death, leaving a legacy of unreadability and insecurity and a reputation as a 'bad' language. David and Katherine Goodwin of Pale Purple[0] will discuss some of the pitfalls of PHP development and introduce a range of tools and techniques that can be used to transform a lacklustre PHP amateur into a polished professional. It will focus mainly on applying good design and testing to projects, and introduce some of the popular tools that will help developers to achieve clean, secure, maintainable code. [0] http://www.palepurple.co.uk/ http://oxford.openguides.org/wiki/?Computing_Laboratory has some information about Comlab (in case you're not familiar with it). There is a door into the basement to the left of the door into the main reception, which we will be using. This talk is fresh from LinuxWorld Expo a few weeks ago (where Katherine was also a judge at the 2006 Linux Awards[1]). Should be enlightening! [1] http://www.linuxawards.co.uk/ The true date of Murray Stokely =============================== Last time I mailed you all I said: > Also, while I'm here, Murray Stokely (of Google)'s talk in 7th week has > been moved from Friday 24th to Wednesday 22nd. This is, in fact, a lie. It was originally on Wednesday 22nd, and is now on Friday 24th. That'll teach me to write emails in a hurry in a coffee shop without actually reading what I've been told. Pizza for breakfast =================== Before, during and after Andy Stanford-Clark's talk, people were performing calculations on pizza. Suppose you have a θ-degree sector of pizza (which I believe is colloquially known as a "slice") and wish to share it evenly between two people. The sensible thing to do is of course to bisect the angle, but we don't care. Where should you slice the pizza horizontally to create two pieces of equal area? Correct answers from people who weren't at the talk get a copy of Linux Magazine pidged to them! I hope you don't get stuck at calculating the area of a triangle like I did... Enough. Oh, and if you didn't understand my greeting, you could read http://www.boingboing.net/2006/11/11/i_am_in_thy_library_.html and be enlightened. I never get bored of photos of cats. wjt -- Will Thompson, Oxford University Computer Society President <http://www.ox.compsoc.net/>

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Andy Stanford-Clark tonight
by Will Thompson 08 Nov '06

08 Nov '06

Hi all, Just a quick reminder about tonight's talk! Mice, llamas and IBM Pervasive Messaging middleware =================================================== Date: Wednesday 8th November (TONIGHT!) Time: 20:00 Venue: Denis Sciama Lecture Theatre, Denys Wilkinson Building (Physics, off Keble Road) Dr Andy Stanford-Clark, IBM Master Inventor, will talk about some of the more unusual applications of the Pervasive Messaging software that he and his team are developing at IBM. From monitoring oil pipelines in Alaska, to tracking llamas on the Isle of Wight! To further incentivize you to attend, Alasdair Kergon will be bringing some Linux magazines and DVDs swiped from LinuxWorld Expo! Also, while I'm here, Murray Stokely (of Google)'s talk in 7th week has been moved from Friday 24th to Wednesday 22nd. Did you like my enterprise-speak two paragraphs ago? See you tonight, wjt -- Will Thompson, Oxford University Computer Society President <http://www.ox.compsoc.net/>

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