Your weekly round-up of undergraduate life in The University
of Manchester
Department of Computer Science
from Paul Nutter, Director of Undergraduate Studies.
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Good morning UG! It's Monday 1 June, and it’s the final week of exams – I hope they’ve been going well. This is the last Monday Mail for this academic year, so I'll wish you a happy and rewarding summer. If you’re graduating, we hope to see you and your families on Graduation Day (Weds 8 July). If you’re about to start a year's Industrial Experience, good luck for what I’m sure will be a fantastic time for you. If you’re returning for your next year of study with us in September, have a great summer and we look forward to seeing you again. On with today’s news...
Toby Howard → http://www.cs.man.ac.uk/~toby
Director of Undergraduate Studies
TOP TEN.
Hurrah! The School is now in the top 10 in the Guardian’s University League Table for Computer Science → http://goo.gl/OyZWsm
COURSE UNIT SELECTION.
If you're returning to Y2 or Y3 next academic year, please make your course unit selections ASAP after the system opens in July (especially if you wish to take External courses, which can fill up quickly) → http://studentnet.cs.manchester.ac.uk/ugt/options.php
DATES FOR YOUR DIARY.
Exam results publication dates and more are here → http://goo.gl/ZCFkgE
UNDERGRAD AWARDS.
If you have some coursework, or maybe your 3rd year Project, that you’re proud of, why not submit it to the Undergraduate Awards? You could win a trip to Ireland to the UA Global Summit in Dublin – a three-day long networking and brainstorming event which brings together the brightest and most innovative students in the world. The word count for written work must be between 1,750-12,000 words → http://www.undergraduateawards.com/about-us
* DATA ON THE MOVE. Kilburn is not only home to the School. The ground floor hosts IT Services, and they’re moving to an off-site data centre. Interesting story here about “6.5km of cables, 430 devices and 3,000 nuts and bolts“ → http://goo.gl/EirGtk
JOBSEEKERS FAIR.
Looking for a job? If you’re graduating this summer and looking for a job, take a look at the graduate recruitment fair next week – Weds 10 and Thurs 11 June, 10:30 - 16:00 at the Armitage Centre, Fallowfield. Different exhibitors each day → http://www.careers.manchester.ac.uk/events/graduaterecruitmentfair
JOBSEEKERS VACANCIES.
We get approached by lots of organisations recruiting Computer Science graduates at this time of year. As usual, a selection of the better opportunties are on Moodle → https://moodle.cs.man.ac.uk/mod/forum/view.php?f=599
* INFOSEC MANCHESTER. If you’re in Manchester over the summer and have in interest in Information Security (who doesn’t?) you might be interested in B Sides Manchester – a free conference by the community for the community on 25 August → http://www.bsidesmcr.org.uk
Good morning UG! It’s Monday 25 May and it’s the third of the 4 exam weeks – and it's the Spring Bank holiday today, so have a few minutes break from revision! I hope the exams are going well for you. A reminder to know your exam schedule and locations. In case of emergencies contact SSO immediately → compsci-sso@listserv.manchester.ac.uk or 0161 306 6625. On with today’s news!
Toby Howard → http://www.cs.man.ac.uk/~toby
Director of Undergraduate Studies
LAB SURVEY RESULTS.
A few weeks ago we asked you to tell us what you thought about the way we run UG labs, and the results are now in. We’ll be feeding your opinions and comments into a review of our Lab practice and the roles of TAs. See a summary of your opinions → http://goo.gl/E1k0j4
* SCHOOL PODCAST. The School has launched its own monthly CS@Manchester podcast (on iTunes and SoundCloud) which will cover events, interviews with staff about their research, reflect our student experience and feature alumni profiles. Episode One kicks off with a recent panel discussion on the future of computing from the Kilburn Club, featuring Professors Steve Furber and Ross King, with Tom Higham (Future Everything) and Mark Ewart (Barclays Bank). If you have any ideas for content for future editions, contact Jez Lloyd → jez.lloyd@manchester.ac.uk. Listen to the first podcast → https://goo.gl/gBWwoC (iTunes) or https://soundcloud.com/cs-manchester-podcast (SoundCloud)
SCHOOL RESEARCH UPDATE.
Curious about the research that goes on in the School? Thinking of doing a PhD? Check out our latest Research Newsletter → http://www.cs.manchester.ac.uk/our-research/news/
EXAM SUPPORT.
The University is running a programme of wellbeing workshops and academic skills revision support throughout the exam period → http://goo.gl/TTspQN
QUIET ROOM.
Room 1.12 is a quiet study space for all UG students. You get to it through the 3rd Year Lab, Room 1.8. It's specifically for quiet, personal study.
DATES FOR YOUR DIARY.
Exam results publication dates and more are here → http://goo.gl/ZCFkgE
EMBEDDED SYSTEMS COMP.
The final of the University Contest on Embedded Systems Design is coming up and registration to attend is now open. This is a great opportunity to see this year's exciting ideas, and to inspire you to enter next year. Friday 5 June 10:15–15:00 at Manchester Metropolitan University New Business School, refreshments included in free registration → http://www.soe.mmu.ac.uk/ucesd/
SOMETHING TO SHARE?
Deadline for Monday Mail items: 17:00 Friday → toby.howard@manchester.ac.uk
Good morning UG! It’s Monday 18 May and it’s the second of the 4 exam weeks. I hope all is going well. Remember to know your exam schedule – it's your responsibility to be in the right place at the right time! In case of emergencies contact SSO immediately → compsci-sso@listserv.manchester.ac.uk or 0161 306 6625. On with today’s news...
Toby Howard → http://www.cs.man.ac.uk/~toby
Director of Undergraduate Studies
* STRESS MANAGEMENT. While we offer free duck-watching as a stress-relieving service here in the School, it seems that other Universities around the country have got similar ideas. At the University of Central Lancashire the Students Union organised a Puppy Room to help stressed students wind down. The University of Leicester offers a bouncy castle, at Exeter University the SU is working with a local petting farm to bring micro-pigs onto campus, and at Bath Spa University they have a Shetland pony. → http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/education-32690644
EXAM SUPPORT.
The University is running a programme of well-being workshops, and academic skills revision support throughout the exam period → http://goo.gl/TTspQN
QUIET ROOM.
Room 1.12 is a quiet study space for UG students. You get to it through the 3rd Year Lab (Room 1.8). It's specifically for quiet, personal study.
DATES FOR YOUR DIARY.
Exam results publication dates and more are here → http://goo.gl/ZCFkgE
* THE ROBOTS ARE NOT COMING TO KILL US. Join Gavin Brown and John Gigg (Faculty of Life Sciences) and as they take you on a stroll down memory lane, exploring both the biology of memory and its implications for machine learning. Today Monday 18 May at 19:00, The Old Monkey, 90-92 Portland Street, Manchester, M1 4GX → http://pintofscience.co.uk/event/hold-that-thought/
TEACHER TRAINING.
David Rydeheard writes: Why not become a teacher of computing? Several training places are available to start this September at Manchester Metropolitan University. This is a high-quality, well-established education course. Funding is available for this training → http://goo.gl/bHikH9
* IP EXPO. Europe's leading Cloud and IT Infrastructure Event Series arrives in Manchester this week (20 & 21 May). Keynote speakers include our very own Professor Steve Furber, and Microsoft's James Akrigg, Head of Technology for Partners. Well worth attending if you have an interest in the cloud, data virtualization & analytics, devops, cyber-security and more. Free tickets are available until 19:00 tomorrow Tues 19 May → http://www.ipexpomanchester.com/
SCHOOL SEMINAR.
Tomorrow 19 May at 15:30 in Kilburn LT1.4, Tom Murphy from ncryptedCloud.com will talk about Encrypting Files Stored on Cloud-based Storage Services. The University currently has a site-wide licence to use the encryption service provided by ncryptedcloud.com. The service works with Dropbox, Google Drive and OneDrive. Tom will demonstrate the system → http://www.cs.manchester.ac.uk/our-research/seminars/
SOMETHING TO SHARE?
Deadline for Monday Mail items: 17:00 Friday → toby.howard@manchester.ac.uk
Good morning UG! It’s Monday 11 May and it’s the first of the 4 exam weeks. I hope all goes well. Make sure you know your exam schedule and locations precisely – it's your responsibility to be in the right place at the right time! In case of emergencies the central contact point is SSO, and you should contact them immediately if you think you have any issues → compsci-sso@listserv.manchester.ac.uk or 0161 306 8155. On with today’s news ...
Toby Howard → http://www.cs.man.ac.uk/~toby
Director of Undergraduate Studies
* LATHAMS = LATHAMS + 1. As you might have heard, a few weeks ago John and his wife Alison became the proud parents of Monty, who weighed in at 6lbs 7oz (2.92kg). I’m sure you'll join me in sending John and his family congratulations!
SUMMER VACATION WORK.
A reminder that we have paid work opportunities in the School during the summer vacation. It’s a great opportunity to enhance your CV by learning new skills and tech, and do important development and support work for the School too. Application deadline is 09:00 next Monday 18 May → http://goo.gl/Mun0ll
EXAM SUPPORT.
The University is running a programme of wellbeing workshops and academic skills revision support sessions throughout the exam period. Book your place → http://goo.gl/TTspQN
DATES FOR YOUR DIARY.
Exam results publication dates and more are here → http://goo.gl/ZCFkgE
* AWARDS FINALIST. Congratulations to Daniela Florescu (Y3, CSwIE) on her fantastic achievement of getting as far as the final in the TARGETjobs Undergraduate of the Year awards. Daniela (front row, left) was among 109 undergraduates from across the UK invited to the final in Canary Wharf, London. The University of Manchester had ten finalists in the twelve award categories – more than any other university. Well done Daniela!
MIT CIRCS.
If you feel that any aspects of your studies so far have been affected by any mitigating circumstances, please note that the deadline for notifying the School is this Thurs 14 May. If you’re affected during the exams period (14 May - 3 June), the deadline is 5 June → http://goo.gl/hBiEhf
* SLEEPYTIME. If you need a power nap during your revision, why not pop over to the Alan Gilbert Learning Commons and try a sleeping pod. You can have a 20 minute snooze inside the pod, in the “Zzz Zone” on Floor 2. The pod was designed by Y1 Psychology student Grace Bamber for the University’s Eureka! 2014 competition → http://goo.gl/cU9YDg
QUIET ROOM.
We don’t yet have sleeping pods here in Kilburn, but we do have a quiet study space for all UG students. It's Room 1.12, and you get to it through the 3rd Year Lab, Room 1.8. It's specifically for quiet, personal study.
* COURSE UNIT FEEDBACK. Last chance! Please take a few moments to give us your feedback on each of your Semester 2 course units – deadline end of tomorrow Tues 12 May. We want your feedback and we take it seriously, and we react. We also publish responses from staff to your comments (see for example our responses to your Semester 1 comments → http://goo.gl/iyuUlT). Send your feedback using the app, or do it online → http://goo.gl/g3YWiH.
SOMETHING TO SHARE?
Deadline for Monday Mail items: 17:00 Friday → toby.howard@manchester.ac.uk
Good morning UG! It’s Monday 4 May and it’s Week 12, a B week, and the final teaching week of the year. It's the Early May Bank Holiday today too – so no timetabled activities in the School today, but back to normal tomorrow. Have a nice day whatever you’re doing. On with today’s news!
Toby Howard → http://www.cs.man.ac.uk/~toby
Director of Undergraduate Studies
PASS AWARDS SUCCESS.
Congratulations to Zac Hamid (Y3, CMwIE), Sarah King (Y3, CMwIE), Matt Akerman (Y4, CSE4) and Dan Underwood (Y3, CS) who each received awards for their outstanding contributions to the School’s PASS scheme at the Peer Support Evening last week, attended by over 100 students and staff from across the University. And thank you to everyone in the School who has helped to make our PASS scheme a huge success again this year!
MAY BALL.
Bryn Hanby-Roberts (Y2, CSwIE) writes: the May Ball 2015 was a huge success on Saturday night! Thank you to everybody in CSSoc that helped organise it. We hope you all had a great time, and have recovered fully by now! That was CSSoc’s last event of the year, which means it’s time for us to hand over to the new chairs Sami Alabed (Y1, CSwIE) and Shane Booth (Y2, CS4). It’s been great being co-chair with Josh Langley (Y2, CS4wIE), so thank you from both of us for making it a great year!
DATES FOR YOUR DIARY.
Exam results publication dates and more are here → http://goo.gl/ZCFkgE
* DUCK NEWS. As you probably know, the ducks are back! This year Mrs Duck has 13 ducklings, and they must be the best looked after (and most photographed) in Manchester, with a duck-house, regular gourmet duckfood, a ramp up to the garden, and their own paddling pool.
NSS WINNER.
Congratulations to Mincho Petkov (Y3, SE) who wins the final £100 Amazon voucher in our series of National Student Survey prize draws. And thank you to all final-year students who completed the NSS survey.
GREAT UNI HACK WANTS YOU.
Sami Alabed (Y1, CSwIE) writes: after the success of the last GreatUniHack, we’re already working on the next one! For that we’re looking for enthusiastic students to fill officers and members roles. Interested in applying? → http://goo.gl/forms/7mr0kcPbMJ
1ST YEAR PROJECT SHOWCASE.
The event last Thursday was a huge success and the work on show was as original and imaginative as ever. Well done to all First Year students, and congratulations to the winners – voted for by you! Best Visual Appeal: W4 for Cooklab; Best User Interface and Best Data Content: M2 for Mancshacks.com; Best Implementation Quality: Y9 for UDo; Best Implementation Quantity: X7 for Roomies; and Most Professional: Y7 for UniChat. Well done winners and well done all groups!
STAFF-STUDENT COMP.
Tudor Morar (PhD) writes: The third annual Staff vs Students programming competition took place last Wednesday, and was the largest so far, with 58 participants! 23 student teams and 6 staff teams attempting to solve 6 problems (see them here → http://goo.gl/hpHhPp) over the course of 3 hours. Congratulations to everyone taking part, and of course to the winning teams (left to right, below): 1st Prize went to team "[bell character]" – Dave Lester and Jonathan Heathcote (PhD); 2nd Prize to team Breaking Bad – Hikmat Hajiyev (Y1,CS) and Ramin Jafarov (Y2, CS); and 3rd Prize & Best 1st Year Team Prize to team Sandy – Andi Zhang (Y1, CM) and Qingyang Feng (Y1, CM). We hope everyone enjoyed the competition as much as we enjoyed organising it, and thank you all for attending! Read Sean Bechhoffer’s blog entry → https://goo.gl/tIBuJX
JVM PROGRAMMING.
Chris Seaton, final-year PhD student in the School and a research manager in the VM research group at Oracle Labs, writes: Oracle Labs is working on a project to make implementing programming languages much easier and much more powerful on the JVM. This Weds 6 May in Kilburn LT1.5. We’ll give you a high level introduction to the tools we’re developing and dig down into some of the details and show how a VM goes from language to machine code bytes → https://www.facebook.com/events/1589900717932419/
* COURSE UNIT FEEDBACK. Please take a few moments to give us your feedback on each of your Semester 2 course units – deadline next Tues 12 May. We want your feedback and we take it seriously, and we react. We also publish responses from staff to your comments (see for example our responses to your Semester 1 comments → http://goo.gl/iyuUlT). Send your feedback using the app, or do it online → http://goo.gl/g3YWiH
MIT CIRCS.
If you feel that any aspects of your studies so far have been affected by any mitigating circumstances, please note that the deadline for notifying the School is Thurs 14 May. If you’re affected during the exams period (16 May – 3 June), the deadline is 5 June → http://goo.gl/hBiEhf
MBA PROJECT.
Carlos Herquinio, a student at Manchester Business School writes: as part of my MBA project I would like to collect insights on Computer Science students' concerns and expectations about the labour market. Please fill a short survey to have a chance to win £10 Amazon vouchers → http://goo.gl/nrc09x
* IBM COMP. IEEE and IBM are searching for creative, forward-thinking students to participate in an exciting team-based showcase, with an opportunity to work with IBM's Watson to develop an innovative app, and a chance to win up to $2000 in cash prizes. Register your team now → http://goo.gl/52WU1h
PHD OPPORTUNITIES.
Fully-funded multi-disciplinary PhD places are available for Computer Science students in the areas of Power Networks or Materials for Demanding Environments → http://www.power-networks-cdt.manchester.ac.uk and → http://www.m4de.manchester.ac.uk
SCHOOL SEMINAR.
This Weds 6 May at 14:00 in Kilburn LT1.4, Prof Witold Charatonik from the University of Wrocław, Poland, will talk about “Two-variable logics and trees”: two-variable logic (FO2) is particularly important in computer science because of its decidability and connections with other formalisms, and applications in XML or ontology reasoning. However, even very simple properties, like being a tree, transitivity or connectedness are not expressible in FO2. I will discuss several extensions of two-variable logic with trees and some of their applications, e.g. in program verification. → http://www.cs.manchester.ac.uk/our-research/seminars/
SOMETHING TO SHARE?
Deadline for Monday Mail items: 17:00 Friday → toby.howard@manchester.ac.uk
Good morning UG! It’s Monday 27 April and it’s Week 11, an A week. I hope everything is going well. As you know we’re now into the last two weeks of teaching, so now is a good time to make sure you have all your lab marking up to date, to help avoid a last-minute panic next week! Lots to tell you about today – have a good week!
Toby Howard → http://www.cs.man.ac.uk/~toby
Director of Undergraduate Studies
* GREAT UNI HACK. Last week Great Uni Hack took place at Granada Studios in Manchester. The event, co-funded by the School, was organised by a team of our UG students in conjunction with Major League Hacking (→ https://mlh.io). As well as running the event, we had amazing success winning it too! Four of our teams won! Team Bloomopoly – Sami Alabed (Y1, CSwIE), Adrian Culea (Y2, CSwIE, out at GSK, London), Adrian Nenu (Y2, CSwIE) and Vlad Berianu (Y2, CSwIE, out at ISA Software, Paris) – won the best use of Bloomberg API with their stock market-based monopoly game (→ http://bloomopoly.codevolution.com/bloomopoly.html). They also won 2nd place overall and a silver MLH medal, plus tickets to the Techsylvania Hackthon in Romania in June. Team Aria – Mark Larah (Y3, CS) – won the Funniest Hack and the Barclays Challenge. Team Dungeon Master – Jack Winstanley (ex-Anthropology student), Ion Diaconu (Y2, CS4), Ettore Torti (Y2, CSwIE), Andrei Tomeci (Y2, Architecture) – won the Apadmi Best Retro Challenge. And team PyPly – George Vanburgh (Y2, CSwIE, out at Credit Suisse), Tom Robinson (Y4, CS4), Matt Akerman (Y4, CS4) and Prakhar Bahuguna (Y4, CS4) – won the Layershift challenge. See all the submissions → http://guh.challengepost.com/submissions. Huge congratulatons to all the winners, and to all the organisers for making this major event such a success: Sami Alabed (Y1, CSwIE), Mihai Bujanca (Y1, CS4wIE), Pez Cuckow (CSBMwIE, graduated 2014), Josh Langely (Y1, CS4wIE), Miso Zmiric (Y4, CS4), Diana Bite (Y1, CSwIE), Jonathon Dilworth (Y3, CS4wIE), Dainis Gorbunovs (Y1, CS4wIE), Mark Larah (Y3, CS), Daniel Ma (Y2, CSwIE), Sebastian Mararu (Y1, CS), Charlie Reynolds (Y2, AI4wIE), Cornelia Secelean (Y1, CS4wIE), Tim Xiao (Y1, CS).
RESIT PERIOD.
Please note that the exams resit period dates have changed since the UG Handbook ( → http://studentnet.cs.manchester.ac.uk/ugt/2014/handbook ) was published: it’s now 17-28 August 2015.
COURSE UNIT SELECTION.
If you're returning to Y2 or Y3 next academic year, please make your course unit selections ASAP after the system opens in July (especially if you want to take External courses, which can fill up quickly) → http://studentnet.cs.manchester.ac.uk/ugt/options.php
* STAFF-STUDENT COMP. Ettore Torti (Y2, CSwIE) writes: Coding Dojo's annual Staff vs Student competition is this Wednesday at 15:00 in Collab. Don't miss out on the fun and free pizza by signing up at http://codingdojo.cs.man.ac.uk/svs. There will be cash prizes for the top teams, and a free drink for all sponsored by our Head of School, Prof Jim Miles, at Kro Bar after the competition. There are only a limited number of places left and they'll be filled on a first come first served basis, so sign up early!
* PASS VIDEO COMP. PASS Coordinators Dan Underwood (Y3, CS) and Sarah King (Y3, CMwIE) write: The School’s PASS team has entered the annual Peer Support Video competition! If we win we get £100 to help grow PASS (so, more socials!). Please look at all the entries and vote for your favourite – voting is open to all students and staff (only one vote per person; staff: use your staff ID number where it asks for student ID, and enter Computer Science for subject). See all the entries → http://goo.gl/R7Fcst. But hurry, the voting deadline is 12:00 TODAY! → https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/VideoCompetition2015
3RD YEAR PROJECT SHOWCASE.
At last week’s Project Showcase we saw some fantastic and inspiring work from 3rd Year Project students. Thanks to everyone who took part and congratulations on your excellent project work!
* COURSE UNIT FEEDBACK. Please take a few moments to give us your feedback on each of your Semester 2 course units – deadline Fri 12 May. We want your feedback and we take it seriously, and we react. We also publish responses from staff to your comments (see for example our responses to your Semester 1 comments → http://goo.gl/iyuUlT). Send your feedback using the app, or do it online → http://goo.gl/g3YWiH.
COOL LAB SOFTWARE.
Did you know that lurking in the depths of our lab machines are some great productivity tools? Anchal Garg (PhD student) and Mary McGee Wood are working to get these better known and better used. To find out more, please take a moment to fill in this short questionnaire (include your name and email if you want to know more) → http://mbs.az1.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_eqvElsPPmsXCEnz
MIT CIRCS.
If you feel that any aspect of your studies so far have been affected by any mitigating circumstances, please note that the deadline for notifying the School is Thurs 14 May. If you’re affected during the exams period (16 May – 3 June), the deadline is 5 June → http://goo.gl/hBiEhf
* NEW CSSOC CHAIRS. Bryn Hanby-Roberts (Y2, CSwIE) and Josh Langley (Y2, CS4wIE) write: Sami Alabed (Y1, CSwIE) (left) and Shane Booth (Y2, CS4) (right) are the new co-Chairs for next year’s CSSoc. We wish you all the best, we all can't wait to see you at the May Ball!
SCHOOL SEMINAR.
This Weds 29 April at 14:00 in Kilburn LT1.4, Dr Lora Aroyo from VU University Amsterdam will talk about “Truth is Lie: Rules & Semantics from a Crowd Perspectives”. Processing real-world data with the crowd leaves one thing absolutely clear: there is no single notion of truth, but rather a spectrum that has to account for context, opinions, perspectives and shades of grey. CrowdTruth is a new framework for processing of human semantics drawn more from the notion of consensus then from set theory → http://www.cs.manchester.ac.uk/our-research/seminars/
SOMETHING TO SHARE?
Deadline for Monday Mail items: 17:00 Friday → toby.howard@manchester.ac.uk
Good morning UG! It’s Monday 20 April and it’s Week 10, a B week. I hope everything is going well. Lots to tell you about today (yes, I know I say that every week!). The weather forecast promises yet another sunny week in Manchester, so I hope you enjoy it!
Toby Howard → http://www.cs.man.ac.uk/~toby
Director of Undergraduate Studies
SSC REPORT.
The Staff-Student Committee had another very productive – and long! – meeting last week, with pizza, where we discussed a lot of issues. Paul Nutter has written some notes about the meeting and they're now up on Blackboard ( → http://tinyurl.com/staffstudentBB > School of Computer Science SSC). That was the final SSC meeting for this academic year, so I’m sure you’ll join me in thanking all the reps (below), and of course Paul, for all their hard work on your behalf.
* GREAT UNI HACK. By all accounts last weekend's Great Uni Hack, organised by Sami Alabed (Y1, CSwIE) and his team at Granada Studios in Manchester was a great success. Over 170 international attendees hacked for 36 hours, downloading over 1TB of data in the process. We'll have a full report in next week's Monday Mail.
3RD YEAR PROJECT SHOWCASE.
This Weds 22 April in Collab 13:00-15:00, come and see some of the final-year projects Y3 students have been working on since last September. Third year students, if you haven’t yet registered to take part in the showcase, please do, and show off your work! → http://goo.gl/fd225s
* PASS BLOG. SSO’s Gavin Donald (pictured here in his student days at Liverpool) has a new blog post looking back at this year’s PASS. He says “it’s a great testament to our PASS teams that they do so well and have established CS PASS as one of the top schemes in the University". Read in full → http://goo.gl/gMSmFN
SUMMER PLACEMENTS.
Duncan Hull writes: looking for a summer placement? Imagination Technology has placements available, including for a PowerVR developer with experience of computer graphics and C/C++ → www.imgtec.com/placements and → www.imgtec.com/graduates. The BBC are also looking for summer vacation students (penultimate year students only) → http://www.cs.manchester.ac.uk/industry/news/full-article/?articleid=2166
* MEET THE PRESIDENT. The President of the University, Nancy Rothwell, is visiting the School this Weds 22 April, and she's holding an informal open 30-minute meeting for all students (no staff, just for students) at 15:00 in Kilburn 2.19 (second floor). If you’d like to have the chance to talk directly to the President, here’s your opportunity!
HOW TO BREAK A HACKER'S MIND.
Morgan Stanley will be visiting the school this Thurs 23 April at 11:00 in LT1.1 to give a guest lecture as part of COMP10120 on “How to break a hacker's mind”. This is an interactive lecture, all welcome (not just first years).
SUMMER VACATION WORK.
Interested in some paid work (approx £9 per hour) here in the School during the summer vacation? It’s a great opportunity to gain experience for your CV, learn new skills and tech, and do important dev and support work for the School. We’ll be announcing the positions available and how to apply on Tues 5 May (applications deadline Mon 18 May, positions confirmed by end of May).
* NSS PRIZEWINNER. Congratulations to Lorin Nicolae (Y3, CSBM) who wins a £100 Amazon voucher in our fortnightly National Student Survey prize draw. Y3 students: when you’ve done your NSS, just take your ack page to SSO for a free bar of chocolate and entry in the prize draw for the one remaining £100 prize! – the NSS closes on 30 April.
CSSOC.
Bryn Hanby-Roberts (Y2, CSwIE) writes: CSSoc is holding its AGM this Weds 22 April in LF15, at 13:00 (with pizza) where people can tell us how the year went and give us useful feedback. We’ll also elect next year's officers – chairs, secretary, treasurer. Everyone welcome.
* STAFF-STUDENT COMP. The third annual Staff vs Students coding competition ( → http://codingdojo.cs.man.ac.uk/svs ) is next Weds 29 April 15:00–18:30 in Collab. Organize in teams of 2, solve up to 5-6 problems in 3 hours, get some free pizza and win prizes! And free drinks from the Head of School afterwards! Pre-registration required → http://goo.gl/forms/oNhf0sshGc
CELEBRATING OUR AMBASSADORS.
David Rydeheard writes: A big thank-you to everyone involved in school outreach activities over the last academic year, enabling us to work with schools locally and nationally, running the annual UK Schools Computer Animation Competition → http://animation15.cs.manchester.ac.uk ), presenting “Discover Computing” days, and a new co-operative venture with the BBC. The School has also been appointed a regional centre for the Computing At School group (→ http://www.computingatschool.org.uk ), which is a major achievement! The pix below show programming daleks to navigate a maze at BBC Stargazing Live, developed in the School by a team of students led by Charlie Reynolds (Y2, AI4wIE); creating immersive virtual landscapes using recursive functions and randomness,a workshop for schools developed by Dan Underwood (Y3, CS); and a robotic Rubik’s Cube solver developed in a local girls’ school by Sakina Valiyeva (Y3, CSBM), for her 3rd Year Project (each year we have several 3rd Year Projects on this area). Why not get involved?. It’s great fun, great for your CV, great for schools and great for the School! Register (no obligation) → http://studentnet.cs.manchester.ac.uk/volunteering
MBA EMPLOYMENT PROJECT.
Carlos Herquinio, a student in Manchester Business School writes: As part of my MBA project I would like to collect insights on Computer Science students' concerns and expectations regarding the labour market. If you're interested in taking part, and can spare a few minutes for a quick chat this Weds 22 April sometime in 09:00-13:00 I’ll be in the Byte Cafe → carlos.herquinio@mba.mbs.ac.uk
* UNDERGRADUATE AWARDS. The Undergraduate Awards is the world's only pan-disciplinary academic awards programme. Students submit their work (coursework/project) to a panel of international judges. The winners are published in an academic journal, flown to Ireland for the UA Global Summit 4-day networking event, and recognised as the best in their field. Think you could be a winner? Go for it! → http://www.undergraduateawards.com
IMPROVING STUDENT LIFE.
Have you got an idea that could improve student life using digital technology? You could get up to £5,000 to develop it this summer. Check out the annual JISC Student Ideas competition (deadline 18 May) → http://goo.gl/gBQ4Uz
ENGLISH WRITING HELP.
Are you an International student and feel you could benefit from some one-to-one help with your written English? Book your free place with the University’s Academic Writing Tutorial Service → http://goo.gl/UoyZuv
SOMETHING TO SHARE?
Deadline for Monday Mail items: 17:00 Friday → toby.howard@manchester.ac.uk
Good morning UG! It’s Monday 13 April and it’s Week 9, an A week. I hope you've had a refreshing three weeks break over Easter. So welcome back! We have another 4 weeks of teaching, and then it’s the exams. And after that, yes, it's the Summer! So lots to look forward to! Have a good week. On with today’s news…
Toby Howard → http://www.cs.man.ac.uk/~toby
Director of Undergraduate Studies
STAFF-STUDENT COMP.
Karol Jurasinski (Y2, CMwIE) writes: Coding Dojo is pleased to announce the third annual Staff vs Students coding competition – Weds 29 April 15:00–18:30 in Collab. Organise in teams of 2, solve up to 6 problems in 3 hours, get some free pizza and win some medals with serious bragging rights. Prizes: 1st place – 2x £50 Amazon vouchers; Runner-up team – 2x £30 vouchers; Best 1st year team (UG) - 2x £20 vouchers. We allow mixed teams (staff and students). Please bring a laptop along! There will also be an informal meeting after the competition in Kro Bar with a pint of beer (or alternative) for everyone sponsored by our Head of School, Jim Miles! Pre-registration required → http://goo.gl/forms/oNhf0sshGc
LAB SURVEY.
What do you think of our lab organisation? As part of our regular efforts to improve the way we do things, we're looking at the way labs are organised, but before we think about making any changes we want to find out what you think about the way things currently run. So it would be very helpful if you could please take a few minutes to complete our survey → http://goo.gl/aBCrDQ
SCC.
The next Staff-Student committee is this Weds 15 April, so if you have anything you'd like raising please contact your reps ASAP → http://studentnet.cs.manchester.ac.uk/sscc
PASS NEWS.
Dan Underwood (Y3, CS) writes: we’re pleased to announce that, following a rigorous application process, the new PASS Coordinators for the next academic year 2015/16 are: Devin Ridgway (Y3, CS4) and George Vanburgh (Y2, CSwIE, currently on industrial placement with Credit Suisse) for first year PASS; and for second year PASS Liam Breeze (Y2, CS) and David Green (Y2, CSwIE, also out with Credit Suisse). Also, PASS for Y1 is restarting this week at the usual time. The Semester 2 exams are approaching fast, so come along if you need help with concepts – anything from Turing Machines through to Java inheritance and recursion!
* MEET THE PRESIDENT. The President of the University, Nancy Rothwell, is visiting the School in the afternoon of next Weds 22 April, and she's holding an informal open 30-minute meeting for all students. This is your chance to talk directly to the President! We’ll confirm the time and location ASAP.
EXAM TIMETABLES.
The Semester 2 exam timetable is now published on Blackboard. Pez Cuckow (graduated last year) wrote a handy tool for exporting the data into .ics format → www.pezcuckow.com/examiCal.php
ENGLISH WRITING HELP.
Are you an International student and feel you could benefit from some one-to-one help with your written English? Book your free place with the University’s Academic Writing Tutorial Service → http://goo.gl/UoyZuv
* CSSOC NEWS. Bryn Hanby-Roberts (Y2, CSwIE) writes: This is our final week for selling May Ball tickets – they're £32 and include a bucks fizz reception and 3 course meal with a few bottles of wine/soft drinks per table. We'll be in the Byte Cafe, so keep an eye out. If you can't make it this week, message CSSoc on Facebook and we'll sort something out. If you think CSSoc have done a good job this year, why not nominate us for the Best Academic/Departmental Society award in the SU? Last year we won Event of the Year for the Hackathon, let's try and win again! You can nominate here → http://goo.gl/MjNhBq. And finally, CSSoc are holding our AGM where people can tell us how the year went and give us useful feedback. We also elect people to next year's senior positions (Chairs, Secretary, Treasurer, some officers). If you've got something to say, come along. There will be pizza! The AGM will be held next Weds 22 April in LF15, at 13:00.
* GREAT UNI HACK. Sami Alabed (Y1, CSwIE) writes: The Great Uni Hack takes place this coming weekend 17-19 April, here in Manchester. We’ve released more tickets specially for Manchester students ( → http://goo.gl/pUQXS1 ). We have amazing prizes which include VIP tix to the Techsylvania conference in Rumania this June, plane tickets for a winning team of 4 to visit Korea, a drone, bluetooth speakers… and more to be announced. Selected winners from The University of Manchester will be offered a working space in an office. Full details → http://greatunihack.co.uk
CODECADEMY.
Irina Prioteasa (Y3, CSBM) writes: I’m an Ambassador for Codecademy ( → http://www.codecademy.com ) and they want to recruit more ambassadors. It’s a great opportunity to do some volunteering work and teach kids how to code. Let me know if you have any questions → irina.prioteasa@student.manchester.ac.uk
* CODEBUG. CodeBug is a fun, engaging, entry-level introduction to coding and physical electronics. It’s the work of Andrew Robinson, Tom Preston and Tom MacPherson-Pope, the people behind Pi-Face ( → www.piface.org.uk ) and they're all recent graduates from the School. They’re looking for backers on Kickstarter to get Codebug off the ground. Check it out → http://goo.gl/ULF7AY
MAKEFEST 2015.
MakeFest is an annual summer fair held on 8/9 August at MOSI in Manchester. If you're a techie, crafter, educator, hobbyist, engineer, artist, science club, student, tinker, tailor or even a candlestick maker then MOSI want you to be part of MakeFest to run a workshop or give demonstrations. Sign up before 17 May → http://www.mosi.org.uk/whats-on/makefest.aspx
CODE THAT CHANGED THE WORLD.
Aleks Krotoski is currently presenting an interesting series of 15-minute programmes on BBC Radio about how Java, COBOL, Basic and Fortran have changed the world – worth a listen! → http://goo.gl/Hdhy0L
SCHOOL SEMINAR.
This Weds 15 April at 14:00 in Kilburn LT1.4, Dr Olaf Beyersdorff (University of Leeds) will talk about Proof Complexity of Quantified Boolean Formulas → http://www.cs.manchester.ac.uk/our-research/seminars
SOMETHING TO SHARE?
Deadline for Monday Mail items: 17:00 Friday → toby.howard@manchester.ac.uk
Good morning UG! It’s Monday 23 March, and it’s the first week of the 3-week Easter vacation. I hope you’re enjoying a well-earned rest and perhaps doing a bit of catch-up. Year 3 students, good luck with writing your project reports and making your screencasts, and remember to ask your Supervisor for comments on drafts of each. The Monday Mail is having an Easter break, but will be back again on Monday 13 April (Week 9, an A week). Meanwhile, on with today’s news...
Toby Howard → http://www.cs.man.ac.uk/~toby
Director of Undergraduate Studies
EASTER OPENING HOURS.
A reminder that during the Easter vacation 21 March – 12 April you’ll need your out-of hours pass to use the Kilburn building, at all times, not just out-of-hours. Labs open are Tootill and 1.8 (3rd Year Lab).
* DUCK ERROR. Image processing (COMP27112) and internationally-renowned duck expert Dr Tim Morris has pointed out an error in last week’s Monday Mail. An error in the Monday Mail, I hear you cry in disbelief, how can this be possible?! Well, it turns out that the picture by Alyson Owens of Mrs Duck wasn’t of Mrs Duck at all. It was Mr Duck. As the photo here shows, male ducks (below right) are generally much more colourful than female ducks (above left). Perhaps Mr Duck was sent on an advance mission by Mrs Duck? We just don’t know. We will, of course, keep you posted.
STUDENTS UNION AWARDS.
This Friday 27 Mar is the deadline for nominating someone in the School who you feel has given you inspirational teaching (academic staff) or support (eg SSO staff). If someone has impressed you, why not nominate them? It would mean a lot to them → http://manchesterstudentsunion.com/teachingawards
NORTHERN QUARTER.
Thanks to Edward Bennigden (Y2, CSwiE) for the alert that the government has injected £4M into a tech incubator in the Northern Quarter, pushing towards Manchester's goal of being a top 5 European startup destination. This is good news for students wanting to launch or join fledgling companies! Read more → http://goo.gl/zRXCcn
ENGLISH WRITING HELP.
Are you an International student and feel you could benefit from some help with your written English? Free places are available at the University’s Academic Writing Tutorial Service → http://goo.gl/UoyZuv
SOMETHING TO SHARE?
Deadline for Monday Mail items: 17:00 Friday → toby.howard@manchester.ac.uk
CREDITS AND LICENSING.
Duck photo by Wikipedia user Weblars. This edition of the Monday Mail is licenced under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 2.5 Generic license. The Monday Mail archives are at http://tinyurl.com/themondaymail
Good morning UG! It’s Monday 16 March, and it’s Week 8, a B week. It’s the last week before the Easter Vacation, but you probably know that! It's been a long Semester so far, and I hope it's been successful and enoyable for you. Have a good week!
Toby Howard → http://www.cs.man.ac.uk/~toby
Director of Undergraduate Studies
OUR RESPONSE TO YOUR FEEDBACK.
We’ve now looked in detail at the Course Unit Survey results from Semester 1. We take your views seriously, and we’ve asked all the Course Unit lecturers to respond to your comments. You can read their comments, and also look at how each Course Unit scored → https://wiki.cs.manchester.ac.uk/index.php/US_Response_AY1415_Semester_1
* MLH PRIZEGIVING. Last Weds 11 March, Major League Hacking visited us for the awards ceremony, where we received the 1st Prize cup for the Fall Major League Hacking Europe competition. Well done again everyone who took part! In the photo are Sami Alabed (Y1, CSwIE) and Mihai Bujanca (Y1, CS4wIE) at the awards event. The cup will soon go on prominent display!
EXAM FEEDBACK SESSIONS.
A reminder that the Semester 1 exam feedback sessions are this Weds 18 March from 13:00-15:00. Year 1 is in IT406, and Years 2 and 3 are in 2.19 (Kilburn 2nd Floor).
EASTER OPENING HOURS.
During the Easter vacation 21 March - 12 April you’ll need your out-of hours pass to use the Kilburn building, at all times, not just out-of-hours. Labs open are Tootill and 1.8 (3rd Year Lab).
* CSSOC. Bryn Hanby-Roberts (Y2, CSwIE) writes: this Friday 20 March is Karaoke night. We're still finalising the details so keep an eye out for the posters and check on Facebook! We're also selling tickets for the May Ball all this week, 12:00-15:00 in the Byte Cafe. All the early bird tickets were sold on the first day, but there's still discounted tickets available for CS students and staff. The tickets could well sell out so get them while you still can! Don't forget to bring the £32 for your ticket with you.
* HERONS AND DUCKS. You may have noticed two herons have mysteriously appeared in the courtyard. They're fairly static, and don’t seem to do very much at all really, but that’s because they’re made of plastic. The idea is that their presence will discourage Mrs Duck from choosing our courtyard again this year as her home for starting a family. Mrs Duck, however, spotted last Friday by Alyson Owens from our External Affairs office, does not seem particularly bothered so far.
STUDENTS UNION AWARDS.
Friday 27 Mar is the deadline for nominating someone in the School who you feel has given you inspirational teaching (academic staff) or support (eg SSO staff). If someone has impressed you, why not nominate them? It would mean a lot to them → http://manchesterstudentsunion.com/teachingawards
* NSS PRIZEWINNER. Congratulations to Naseem Alswainy (Y3, CSwIE) who wins a £100 Amazon voucher in our fortnightly National Student Survey prize draw. Y3 students: when you’ve done your NSS, just take your ack page to SSO for a free bar of chocolate and entry in the prize draw for the next £100!
TDD TESTERS WANTED.
Laura Armitage (Y3, CSwIE) writes: For my 3rd year project I would like to collect some data on the typical coding step taken by human programmers in simple TDD (test driven development) exercises. If you’re interested in taking part please come to the Third Year Lab (1.8) 11:00-13:00 this Thurs 19 March (TDD experience preferred but not necessary). There will be refreshments! → http://tinyurl.com/testonlydevelopment
* ECLIPSE. Thank you to Struan McDonough (Y2, CMwIE) for the alert that this Friday 20 March there's going to be a total solar eclipse in Manchester, and the next one won't be until 2026. The eclipse begins at 08:26 with maximum eclipse at 09:35 when the Sun will be 93 per cent covered → http://www.timeanddate.com/eclipse/in/uk/manchester
UGANDA PROJECT.
The University’s new flagship International Volunteering project needs 12 student volunteers to go to Uganda this summer (5 August - 6 September) with S.A.L.V.E. (Support and Love Via Education) International, a charity based in Manchester and working in Uganda with children on the streets, using the power of education to provide opportunities for them to leave their difficult pasts behind them and move off the streets towards a brighter future. This is your chance to sign up for a life changing experience this summer, to step out of your comfort zone and to leave a lasting impact! → www.manchester.ac.uk/teamugandavolunteering
WORKSHOPS.
The University is running a series of workshops to support students. There’s too many topics to list here, but they include “Calming your busy brain”, “Managing procrastination”, and “Finding motivation”. See what’s on offer → http://goo.gl/z7Xx0e
* GOOGLE SUMMER OF CODE. A reminder that GSoC opens for applications today Monday 16 March. This summer you can develop your experience and skill set, enhance your CV, and earn money too (a stipend of $5500), working on open source projects for organisations including Apache, CERN, FreeBSD, Github, GNU, Google, KDE, LibreOffice, MIT Media Lab, Python, Ruby and over 100 others. One project, lowRISC (→ www.lowrisc.org) includes alumni from our APT research group. GSoc details → http://goo.gl/9rmiKg
CAREERS DROP-INS THIS WEEK.
Jannine Andrew and Dominic Laing from the University’s Careers Service are running bookable one-to-one sessions in the Mercury room (next to the Atlas rooms) in Kilburn every Monday 12:00-13:00 to help you with your job/internship/postgrad applications. Email Dominic to book an appointment → Dominic.Laing@manchester.ac.uk
* SNEEZE APP. A team in the Faculty of Life Sciences wants to make a smartphone app to get data about breathing, wheezing and sneezing from members of the public going about their everyday lives. They’re running a workshop on Saturday 28 March, 12:30-15:30, to try and develop the app. If you’re an allergy sufferer and would like to help, come along – there’s a free lunch, £40, and you’ll be helping science! You don’t need any experience or tech skills to take part, just be ready to share your opinions. Sign up → lamiece.hassan@manchester.ac.uk
BIG CHIP AWARDS.
Have you built an interesting digital artefact as part of your study or industrial experience placement? Why not enter it for this year’s BIG CHIP awards in Manchester? Deadline today Monday 16 March → http://goo.gl/ReYgle
SCHOOL SEMINAR.
This Weds 18 March at 14:00 in Kilburn LT1.4 Professor Jeremy Wyatt from the University of Birmingham will talk about “Robots in Our World: Uncertain, Incomplete and Unfamiliar”. To function in everyday domains robots require the ability to cope with novelty, incomplete information and uncertainty. Jeremy will describe the Dora and Boris robots. Dora is one of the first mobile robots able to plan in open worlds. Boris is a robot system for manipulation that learns to grasp novel objects from a very small number of examples. All welcome → http://www.cs.manchester.ac.uk/our-research/seminars
SOMETHING TO SHARE?
Deadline for Monday Mail items: 17:00 Friday → toby.howard@manchester.ac.uk
MONDAY MAIL ONLINE.
→ http://tinyurl.com/themondaymail
Good morning UG! It’s Monday 9 March, and it’s Week 7, an A week. Spring is here, the flowers are coming up, and I am sure the long hot summer days that Manchester is famous for are just around the corner! I hope things are going well for everyone – and good luck to all 3rd year students doing their project demos at the moment. Have a good week!
Toby Howard → http://www.cs.man.ac.uk/~toby
Director of Undergraduate Studies
MAY BALL 2015.
Josh Langley (Y2, CS4wIE) writes: It’s here again! Every year CSSoc teams up with the Languages, Religion and Theology Socs to organise the famous May Ball for all students and staff. This year it’s at the Midland Hotel on Saturday 2 May and tickets go on sale this Thurs 12 March in Byte Cafe at 13:00. The first 100 early-bird tickets will be £27, and thereafter £32 so get your tickets quick! Your ticket includes entry, a three course meal, a couple of bottles of wine per table, and entertainment and dancing till late.
MLH PRIZEGIVING.
Following our recent outstanding win in the Fall 2014 Major League Hacking Europe competition, the MLH organisation is hosting a prizegiving event this Weds 11 March from 14:00-16:00 in IT407 when the MLH trophy (below) will be awarded. If you participated in any of the MLH events over the last year please come along. Food and refreshments provided!
CODING DOJO.
Ettore Torti (Y2, CSwIE) writes: this Thurs 12 Mar at 16:00 in Collab, Coding Dojo will be hosting an implementation workshop for all the algorithms we've covered so far. Some of these are: 0/1 knapsack, Djikstra's algorithm, toposort, and longest increasing subsequence. There’ll be an online judging system to test your solutions against, and we'll be there to help out. Come along if you're interested in algorithmic challenges, competitions such as Google Code Jam, the Facebook Hacker Cup, and the upcoming Staff vs Students Competition, or if you want to improve your technical interview skills. Bring your own laptop or pair up with someone who has one.
GCHQ SUMMER SCHOOL.
If you’re interested in working in computer security at GCHQ, their “Cyber Insiders” Summer School may be for you. To be eligible, you should be expecting to graduate with a 1st or 2.1, have outstanding problem-solving skills, and be strong in at least one of C/C++, Perl, JavaScript or Python. On completion you’ll receive £2,500, as well as a certificate of completion. GCHQ will provide free accommodation for your time in Cheltenham. But hurry, deadline for applications is midnight today 9 Mar! → http://www.gchq-careers.co.uk/cyber-summer-schools.html
* CALLING ALL BAKERS. This Friday 13 March is Red Nose Day, and at 15:00 in the Staff/Postgrad Common Room, it’s the inaugural Computer Science Bake-off! Bakers: you can bake a team or individual entry. Non-bakers: you can still enter the competition with a shop-bought cake but you must decorate it yourself! Eaters – everyone is welcome! Come along and eat, and make a donation. If you want to enter the comp, just tell ACSO → acso@cs.man.ac.uk
MEET THE AMBASSADORS.
Jez Lloyd from the School’s External Affairs Office has made a new recruitment video featuring six of our student ambassadors. Clockwise below from left: Irina Prioteasa (Y3, CSBM), Sarah King (Y3, CMwIE), Marios Katsakioris (Y2, CSE), Dan Underwood (Y3, CS), Zac Hamid (Y3, CMwIE) and Rebecca Doran (Y3, CMwIE). Check out the video → http://goo.gl/V9gAZX
BE AN AMBASSADOR.
And speaking of ambassadors, the University is recruiting current students for paid work on the Orientation and Welcome Programme in September 2015. The scheme helps new students transitioning into life and study in Manchester, offering support and guidance from fellow students. Successful applicants will be part of a large team providing a world-class and friendly welcome to The University of Manchester. Apply → http://www.smartsurvey.co.uk/s/SAapplication
* NSS. The School is doing well in completion of the important annual NSS Survey. At the last count we’re second only to the School of Geography at 65% completion rate. We’re at 63% (Single Hons) and 56% (Joint Hons). Third year students, please help us get 100% completion! Don’t forget there’s free choccy and chance to win £100 for all completers – just take your ack page to ACSO.
TDD TESTERS WANTED.
Laura Armitage (Y3, CSwIE) writes: For my 3rd year project I would like to collect some data on the typical coding step taken by human programmers in simple TDD (test driven development) exercises. If you’re interested in taking part please come to the Third Year Lab (1.8) 11:00-13:00 next Thurs 19 March (TDD experience preferred but not necessary). There will be refreshments! → laura.armitage-2@student.manchester.ac.uk
* GOOGLE SUMMER OF CODE. This summer you can develop your experience and skill set, enhance your CV, and earn money too, working on open source projects for organisations including Apache, CERN, FreeBSD, Github, GNU, Google, KDE, LibreOffice, MIT Media Lab, Python, Ruby and over 100 others. The scheme opens for applications next Monday 16 March → http://goo.gl/9rmiKg
PHD STUDY.
The School’s Centre for Doctoral Training (CDT) in Computer Science provides a six month “foundation” period consisting of taught units, followed by a 3.5 year period of focused PhD level research. The CDT has studentships available for UK and EU students, which cover tuition fees and a stipend for 4 years. We’re hosting a CDT Open Event this Thurs 12 March 2015, from 17:00 in the Atlas Rooms (Kilburn). As well as opportunities to talk to CDT director Jon Shapiro and current CDT students, there’s free pizza! Spaces are limited so advance sign up → Anthony.morris-2@manchester.ac.uk
MASTERS STUDY.
There’s a PGT Open Day this Weds 18 March. To find out more about opportunities in our School, visit our stand in the Schuster Building 14:00-15:00. Register now → http://goo.gl/6l9eq4 The University has just announced a new scholarship scheme for PGT study → http://goo.gl/KLsh9a
CAREERS DROP-INS THIS WEEK.
Jannine Andrew and Dominic Laing from the University’s Careers Service are running bookable one-to-one sessions in the Mercury room (next to the Atlas rooms) in Kilburn every Monday 12:00-13:00 to help you with your job/internship/postgrad applications. Email Dominic to book an appointment → Dominic.Laing@manchester.ac.uk
DISCOVER ISLAM.
Mohamad Agil (Y2, CS4) writes: I’m on the committee of the Islamic Society, and this week is Discover Islam Week with the aim of raising awareness about Islam and breaking the negative stereotypes associated with it. We've got a marquee outside Uni Place all week with all sorts of interactive stalls inside as well as daily events so get involved! → facebook.com/manchesterisoc
* HOMER-GENIUS. On Tuesday 14 April at 19:00 physicist and author Simon Singh (“Fermat’s Last Theorem”, ‘The Code Book” ) will speaking at the Manchester Conference Centre (Sackville Street) about his latest book The Simpsons and Their Mathematical Secrets. Free booking → http://goo.gl/FpQKmV
THE HUT CHALLENGE.
Following their COMP101 guest lecture last year, The Hut Group are offering £5,000 for their machine learning challenge. Can you improve personal retail recommendations using their big data? Deadline this Sunday 15 March → http://www.thehutchallenge.com
BIG CHIP AWARDS.
Have you built an interesting digital artefact as part of your study or industrial experience placement? Why not enter it for this year’s BIG CHIP awards in Manchester? Deadline next Monday 16 March → http://goo.gl/ReYgle
SCHOOL SEMINAR.
This Weds 11 March at 14:00 in Kilburn LT1.4 Dr Tingting Mu from the University of Liverpool will talk about “Learning Co-embedded Spaces from Relations for Heterogeneous Objects”, presenting his recent research with examples in text mining. All welcome → http://www.cs.manchester.ac.uk/our-research/seminars
SOMETHING TO SHARE?
Deadline for Monday Mail items: 17:00 Friday → toby.howard@manchester.ac.uk
MONDAY MAIL ONLINE.
→ http://tinyurl.com/themondaymail
Good morning UG! It’s Monday 2 March, and it’s Week 6, a B week. I hope things are going well. Time marches on – it’s only 3 weeks to the Easter vacation. Lots of news today – have a good week!
Toby Howard → http://www.cs.man.ac.uk/~toby
Director of Undergraduate Studies
SSC.
Paul Nutter has written some notes from the last Staff-Student Committee meeting, and they're now up on Blackboard ( → http://tinyurl.com/staffstudentBB > School of Computer Science SSC). A reminder that the next SSC meeting is Weds 15 April, so if you’d like anything raising please contact your reps → http://studentnet.cs.manchester.ac.uk/sscc
GRADUATION DAY.
Our graduation ceremony this year will be held at 10:00 on Weds 8 July, with a party to follow. Year 3 students can register to attend from 19 April, and we’ll email you nearer the time.
STUDENT TEACHING AWARDS.
Have you had inspirational teaching or support? Why not nominate someone for the Students Union Teaching Awards 2015? Deadline 27 March → http://manchesterstudentsunion.com/teachingawards
GAVIN ON THE TELLY.
Gavin Brown was interviewed for BBC’s Newsround last Thursday, explaining how Google built a neural network that can learn to play Atari video games.The story has had much media attention in the last few days. See for example → http://www.wired.com/2015/02/google-ai-plays-atari-like-pros/
IOS WORKSHOP.
Mark Larah (Y3, CS) writes: Come to the 2nd iOS workshop where we'll be continuing making our app together! If you weren't present last time, not to worry! Just come and we'll get you up to speed. Please note: those who had technical difficulties logging on last time, we're assured these problems have been fixed. This Friday 6 Mar at 16:00 in the iOS Dev Lab, Kilburn LF17 → https://www.facebook.com/events/1551090621818251
MEET PAUL AND STEVE.
A reminder that there's support available to you in the labs should you need it. We have two full-time members of staff, Paul Waring and Steve Rhodes, both based in LF10 (accessed via Tootill 2). Paul is the School's Software Support Officer, there to help you with any queries about software installation and support. Steve is the School's Hardware Support Officer, and can help you with any hardware queries. Do pop in and see them, anytime, they're happy to help. Or email → paul.waring@manchester.ac.uk or stephen.m.rhodes@manchester.ac.uk
NSS PRIZEWINNER.
Congratulations to Duc Nguyen (Y3, CSBM) who wins a £100 Amazon voucher in our fortnightly National Student Survey prize draw. Y3 students: when you’ve done your NSS, just take your ack page to SSO for a free bar of chocolate and entry in the prize draw for the next £100!
EXAM FEEDBACK SESSION.
Final call for the Semester 1 feedback session on Weds 18 March in IT407, from 14:00-16:00. You can view your marked COMP scripts to help you understand how you did. You need to register in advance. Email SSO with your name, student ID number and the list of COMP scripts you’d like to view. Deadline to register: 12:00 this Weds 4 March → compsci-sso@listserv.manchester.ac.uk
* GREAT UNI HACK. Sami Alabed (Y1, SEwIE) writes: Great Uni Hack invites you to its second edition. Come join us to hack, learn and connect with fellow hackers in a 36-hour hackathon starting on 17 April at a Manchester venue. Judges will pick the top 10 teams to present on stage, and there are prizes and swag. Come up with an idea, and turn it into reality. We’ll provide you with coffee, hardware, talented team members and mentors! → greatunihack.co.uk Check out Sami’s talk on Great Uni Hack at last week’s COMP101 lecture → https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=776804245745834
PASS1.
Dan Underwood (Y3, CS) writes: For first year PASS this week, some of the PASS leaders will be available to help you out with any technical issues in your team project! This will be at the same time as your normal PASS session and will be in Collab 1, look out for the table with the “Hot Topics” sign on the whiteboard! Feel free to either go to that session or to your normal PASS group. Last week saw Aerospace PASS take on Computer Science PASS in the first joint games night. Unfortunately for Computer Science the Aerospace PASS team prevailed however we will likely have a rematch in the future so keep an eye out!
CODING DOJO.
Ettore Torti (Y2, CSwIE) writes: this Thurs 5 Mar at 16:00 in Collab, Coding Dojo will be hosting another workshop on graph algorithms following last week's introduction. We'll be covering Djikstra's algorithm and topological sorting. Come along if you're interested in algorithmic challenges, competitions such as Google Code Jam, Facebook Hackercup, the ACM ICPC, and the upcoming Staff vs Students Competition, or if you want to improve your technical interview skills. You’ll need to bring your own laptop or pair up with someone who has one.
CSSOC.
Bryn Hanby-Roberts (Y2, CSwIE) writes: CSSoc are going to the buffet this week in celebration of the exam results! We’ll be at Red Hot World Buffet on Deansgate, so bring your student card for the discount. It’s usually around £12. We’ll be booking for Wednesday evening 4 March, so check FB for the details. See you there! → https://www.facebook.com/cssoc.man
* INFINITE PLAYLIST. Charlie Reynolds (Y2, AI4wIE) writes: Today Mon 2 Mar at 17:00 in LT1.5, 1-UP will be hosting Liam Maloney, a PhD student from The University of York for a guest talk about his research. Part of the topic and demonstration will be on composing an infinite playlist based on measurements of your own neuronal activity. The other part will be on building “sunshine machines” which convert light, location, weather changes into sound (for example → https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n8o081veL90 ) Details →
https://www.facebook.com/events/1551295251803293
* STREET MARKET IS BACK. The weekly pop-up street market is back, starting tomorrow Tues 3 March from 10:00. It’s just behind the Kilburn building and sells locally sourced and produced products like organic coffees, BBQ food, wood-fired pizza, meaty and vegan hot dogs and pies, pulled pork sandwiches, and Burmese curry. If you have a sweet tooth, there’s marshmallows, cake and ice cream too. Something for everyone!
THALES.
Fancy a tour of the Thales office in Stockport? Find out what it’s like to work at one of the most innovative companies in the world. Sign up by 12:00 today 2 March → ukearlycareers.thalesgroup.com/events
CAREERS DROP-INS THIS WEEK.
Jannine Andrew and Dominic Laing from the University’s Careers Service are running bookable one-to-one sessions in the Mercury room (next to the Atlas rooms) in Kilburn every Monday 12:00-13:00 to help you with your job/internship/postgrad applications. To book an appointment email Dominic → Dominic.Laing@manchester.ac.uk
SCHOOL SEMINAR.
This Weds 4 March at 14:00 in Kilburn LT1.4 Dr Elena Simperl of the University of Southampton will talk about “Crowdsourcing the Semantic Web: a story of technology and incentives”. Crowdsourcing offers a powerful and scalable way of outsourcing knowledge-intensive tasks to a large group of remote contributors over the Internet. This talk will explore ways to solve Semantic Web problems through crowdsourcing. All welcome → http://www.cs.manchester.ac.uk/our-research/seminars
LEARNING ESSENTIALS.
The My Learning Essentials open training programme has several new workshops and online resources available for students → http://bit.ly/MLEworkshops
SOMETHING TO SHARE?
Deadline for Monday Mail items: 17:00 Friday → toby.howard@manchester.ac.uk
MONDAY MAIL ONLINE.
→ http://tinyurl.com/themondaymail
Good morning UG! It’s Monday 23 February, and it’s Week 5, an A week. I hope things are going well. Lots of news today – have a good week!
Toby Howard → http://www.cs.man.ac.uk/~toby
Director of Undergraduate Studies
ROBOT HACKATHON.
Last Saturday 21 Feb MAN-UP hosted a Robotics Hackathon, titled "What can you build in a working day?". From 09:00-17:00, 30 students, including joint teams from the Schools of EEE and MechEng, battled it out to build cool stuff with LEGO mindstorms, interfacing to the boards with Python. The day was organized by Charlie Reynolds (Y2, AI4wIE), and facilitated by the MAN-UP team and Gavin Brown. Prizes were £100 for the winners, £50 and chocolates for two runner-up teams. And the winners were... team LMNSHY (Lee Ming Hang (Y1, CS) and Ng Shi Yao (MechEng)) for their self-aiming catapult. Second place went to team Rabbit (Fizuli Valizada (Y2, CS), Ramin Jafarov (Y2, CS) and Hikmat Hajiyev (Y1, CS)) for their pen printer. Third place went to team Noobs (Cristian-Stefan Tutuianu (Y2, CSBMwIE), Anca-Cristina Popescu (Y1, CSwIE) and Irina Hristescu (Y1, CS)) for their robotic drum kit. There was also a visit from BBC staff to see what was going on. Well done all! Check out the superb pix of the day from Teo Taylor (Y2, CS4) → http://fex.toetaylor.co.uk/images.php?key=RobotsAreCool2015
EXAM RESULTS.
We plan to publish the provisional Semester 1 exam results this Thursday 26 Feb. We’ll let you know as soon as they’re available.
EXAM FEEDBACK SESSION.
The Semester 1 feedback session is on Weds 18 March in IT407, from 14:00-16:00. This is your opportunity to view your marked COMP scripts, to help you understand how you did. You need to register in advance (so we can get all the scripts together) – email SSO with your name, student ID number and the list of COMP course unit scripts you’d like to view. Deadline for registering: 12:00 Weds 4 March → compsci-sso@listserv.manchester.ac.uk
SSC MEETING.
The Staff-Student Committee had a very productive meeting last week, with cakes, where we discussed a lot of issues, details of which are on the issues forum on Blackboard ( → http://tinyurl.com/staffstudentBB > School of Computer Science SSC > SSC Issues Forum). We also had a representative from the Students’ Union attending the meeting who said she was impressed with how we run our SSC, and how active and engaged our reps are. If you’d like to report any issues for the next SSC meeting on 15 April, please talk to your reps (below) → http://studentnet.cs.manchester.ac.uk/sscc
HACKING EDUCATION.
This week’s COMP101 guest lecture on Thurs 26 Feb at 11:00 in LT1.1 will feature a series of lightning talks as part of student volunteering week (23 Feb - 1 Mar → http://www.studentvolunteeringweek.org.uk ) from members of Manchester groups including CodeClub, Manchester Coderdojo, Manchester Digital Laboratory, GreatUniHack, Manchester Raspberry Jam, Manchester Robogals and Manchester Girl Geeks. Find out how they’re hacking Comp Sci education. All welcome, not just Y1 students → http://www.cs.manchester.ac.uk/industry/news/full-article/?articleid=1929
* HAPPY BIRTHDAY CSSOC. Bryn Hanby-Roberts (Y2, CSwIE) and Josh Langley (Y2, CS4wIE) write: Somebody get the cake! It's a happy 10th birthday to CSSoc! That's right, on 23 February 2005 CSSoc was registered as a UoM society! So if you see any committee members wandering around today, be sure to give them a pat on the back! Thanks to everybody who has supported us and come along to our events. We'll see you at the next one… which is: if you want to go drinking shortly after you get your exam results (which you will) CSSoc is going on a pub crawl to "celebrate", this Friday 27 Feb from 19:30 at Ford Maddox Brown. Also later this week there’ll be a poll on Facebook for whether anyone else wants more hoodies, so if you missed out on the last batch and you want one make sure to let us know.
FPGA WORKSHOP.
Paul Gafton (Y1, CS4wIE) writes: 1-UP is running another practical FPGA session this Weds 25 Feb at 14:00 in Tootill 0. Come and create your own hardware designs and implement them in a Hardware Description Language. We will be supplying FPGAs, instructions and fully developed designs in VHDL of the previous projects, like hardware design for a processor, image processing of skin colours or generating fractals using the Mandelbrot set. The session is intended for beginners who are interested in FPGA technology but also for students with some experience in hardware design. See you there! More info → goo.gl/aHk3NH or talk to Dirk Koch → dirk.koch@manchester.ac.uk
3D PRINTER.
The School now has a 3D printer available for students to use. It’s an "da Vinci 1.0" ( → http://us.xyzprinting.com ) and it’s located in the corner of Tootill 0. If you’d like to use the printer, contact Steve Rhodes → stephen.m.rhodes@manchester.ac.uk
CAREERS DROP-INS THIS WEEK.
Jannine Andrew and Dominic Laing from the University’s Careers Service are running bookable one-to-one sessions in the Mercury room (next to the Atlas rooms) in Kilburn every Monday 12:00-13:00 to help you with your job/internship/postgrad applications.
* TURING LECTURE. The annual BCS/IET Turing lecture is being given this year by Robert Pepper on The Internet Paradox: How bottom-up beats command and control. The lecture is this Weds 25 Feb at 17:30 in University Place. Robert is Vice-President for Global Technology Policy at Cisco. Register → http://goo.gl/0XAQXv
GREAT UNI HACK.
Sam Alabed (Y1, SEwIE) writes: Great Uni Hack is pleased to invite you to its second edition. Come join us to hack, learn and connect with fellow hackers in a 36-hour hackathon starting on 17 April. Come up with an idea, and turn it into reality. We will provide you with coffee, hardware, talented team members and mentors → https://www.facebook.com/GreatUniHack
MEET SHELL.
Check out the Shell CV Clinic/Drop-in this Thurs 26 Feb. To book a one-to-one CV check/advice with an expert from the Shell team, email your CV (PDF) and preferred time slot to Mabel Yau with 'Shell CV Clinic' as the subject → mabel.yau@manchester.ac.uk
* GAMERS NEEDED. PhD student David Buckley writes: Would you play a video game for science? Whether you've never played a single game before, or you've been playing Counter-Strike since you were little, we’d like you to help us with our research. We’ve designed and constructed a single player, first-person shooter, and we’d like you to test it out. All that's required is that you play. Participation is completely voluntary, and any data collected during the study will be anonymised. Interested? → www.projectblueroom.com/manchester
SCHOOL SEMINAR.
This Weds 25 Feb at 14:00 in Kilburn LT1.4 Professor Aidan Feeney from Queens University Belfast will talk about “The Engine of Thought is a Hybrid”, looking at which knowledge we use for reasoning and how we update that knowledge in the light of new information. All welcome → http://www.cs.manchester.ac.uk/our-research/seminars
SOMETHING TO SHARE?
Deadline for Monday Mail items: 17:00 Friday → toby.howard@manchester.ac.uk
MONDAY MAIL ONLINE.
→ http://tinyurl.com/themondaymail
Good morning UG! It’s Monday 16 February, and it’s Week 4, a B week. I hope everything is going well. On with today’s news, and I have some major stuff to tell you about today! Get ready!
Best wishes, Toby Howard → http://www.cs.man.ac.uk/~toby
WE WIN THE LEAGUE.
We’ve won the Fall 2014 Major League Hacking Europe competition. It’s official. We’re Number One! This is an outstanding achievement and I know you will join me in congratulating all the students involved. Our students triumphed in a massive league of over 1,500 students from almost 90 universities across Europe (see the league table → https://mlh.io/standings/f2014-uk ). Interviewed for Major League Hacking, Sami Alabed (Y1, SEwIE) who attended 6 out of the 10 hackathons said, “I believe Manchester did so well because of support from the University. The email that goes out to students and staff every Monday includes upcoming hackathons and success stories from the previous week.” See full details of our amazing win → http://goo.gl/TAo936
AND ANOTHER WIN!
Congratulations to Dainis Gorbunovs (Y1, CS4wIE), Sami Alabed (Y1, SEwIE), Mihai Bujanca (Y1, CS4wIE) and Cornelia Secelean (Y1, CS4wIE) who together with Jakub Fil (University of Kent) won the "Best use of Braintree API" prize at the ICHack hackathon last week at GoCardless in London. The team won a Raspberry Pi 2 B+ each. Below left to right: Dainis, Sami, Mihai, Cornelia, with Joe Nash of Braintree → http://ichack.org
* IOS DEVELOPERS LAB. I’m very pleased to announce that our new iOS Developers Lab (Kilburn Room LF17) opens today. The lab has 10 Mac-minis with 27” Thunderbolt displays, two wall-mounted HDMI TVs, and a projector. The lab is specifically intended for UG/PGT/PGR students who want to do iOS/OS X development. I hope developers will enjoy using it, and make fabulous things! Building a brand new lab with completely different hardware to our existing infrastructure has been a challenge, so thank you to the team who made this possible: Tony Curran, Tim Furmston, Duncan Hull, Tony MacDonald, Allan Ramsay, Steve Rhodes, Paul Waring, and all the students who helped us with commissioning. For details of access, infrastructure, security, and support → tinyurl.com/CSMacLab
IOS WORKSHOP.
And one of the first events in the new lab will be an iOS Workshop organised by Mark Larah (Y3, CS) and HackSoc, this Weds 18 Feb from 15:00-18:00. Sign up → http://goo.gl/y7an5W
SSC.
The next Staff-Student Committee meeting will be this Weds 18 Feb 14:00–15:30. If you'd like to raise anything, please contact one of your reps ASAP → http://studentnet.cs.manchester.ac.uk/sscc
* NSS PRIZEWINNER. Congratulations to Alex Herbert (Y3, CM) who wins a £100 Amazon voucher in our National Student Survey prize draw. Y3 students: having completed your NSS, just take your acknowledgement page to SSO for a free bar of chocolate and entry in the fortnightly prize draw. You’ve got to be in it to win it!
UG HANDBOOK.
We’ve updated the UG Handbook to reflect changes to the University’s procedures for handling Mitigating Circumstances, and to add a statement about the School’s policy on students attending extra-curricular activities which overlap scheduled UG activities. Plus the handbook is an essential read anyway – lots of important stuff there! → http://studentnet.cs.manchester.ac.uk/ugt/2014/handbook/
ETHICAL HACKING.
This week's guest lecture for COMP101 will be given by Paul Vlissidis from NCC Group plc on the subject of ethical hacking and penetration testing. 11:00 this Thurs 19 Feb in LT1.1. All welcome, not just first years → https://www.nccgroup.com
ROBOT HACKATHON.
Gavin Brown and Charlie Reynolds (Y2, AI4wIE) invite you to the School's first robotics hackathon, 09:00-17:00 this Sat 21 Feb in Kilburn. All kit provided, but bring your own laptop. Judging criteria are: technical achievement, how cool your robot is, and how useful your robot is. There will be prizes, and winning robots will be shown off to the public at the University Public Open Days! Practice session 14:00-17:00 this Weds 18 Feb in Collab. Interested? Talk to Gavin → gavin.brown@manchester.ac.uk
ROBOT RACE CHALLENGE.
Continuing with the robotic theme, today Monday 16 Feb here on LF from 12:00, Thales are bringing a challenge to campus for you in the form of robot races! Win prizes, learn more about jobs and placements and get an invite to a Google Hangout with Thales engineers. Sound interesting? Sneak preview here → http://youtu.be/B0am5382W0c
* MEET EVE. Yet more robot news! The School’s Professor Ross King is developing a robot scientist called Eve, and it was featured widely in the news last week. Eve is designed to automate early-stage drug design and has already discovered that a compound shown to have anti-cancer properties might also be used in the fight against malaria. You can see Eve in action here → http://goo.gl/GC6lIF and Ross discusses automated drug discovery in this BBC article → http://goo.gl/mc7cVP
* CSSOC MOVIE NIGHT. Can it just be a coincidence that CSSoc are running a movie night this Wednesday in the SU to watch… a robot movie? It’s Wall-E as voted for by you. It's free entry and starts at 20:00 sharp. For more details → https://www.facebook.com/events/1412505325714407
ENGLISH WRITING HELP.
Are you an International student and feel you could benefit from some help with your written English? Free places are still available at the University’s Academic Writing Tutorial Service → http://goo.gl/UoyZuv
* BIG CHIP AWARDS. Find out more about this year's Big Chip Awards. Last year, an MEng student from the School of Computer Science (Raluca Puichilita) won the award for best student placement. This Wednesday night UK FAST will be launching this year's competition, so come along to find out more → http://goo.gl/v3xbgO
CAREERS DROP-INS THIS WEEK.
Jannine Andrew and Dominic Laing from the University’s Careers Service are running drop-in sessions in the Byte Cafe every Monday 12:00-13:00 to help you with your job/internship/postgrad applications.
MANCHESTER TECH NIGHTS.
They're back this Weds 18 Feb at 19:00. This week there are sessions on Agile, Startup, Scrum, Jim and accessibility. Venue: SpaceportX. Free reg → http://manchestertechnights.org
MINING REAL WORLD NETWORKS.
Dr Natasa Przulj from Imperial College London will be talking about data mining from biology to economics. tomorrow Tues 17 Feb at 14:00 in LT 1.3. All welcome → http://goo.gl/Y3w1ta
* STUDENT TEACHING AWARDS. Have you had inspirational teaching/support? (I hope so!). Why not nominate someone for the Students Union Teaching Awards 2015? → http://manchesterstudentsunion.com/teachingawards
SCHOOL SEMINAR.
This week’s School Seminar features Professor William Langdon from University College London, who will talk about “Optimising Existing Software with Genetic Programming”. Weds 18 Feb at 14:00, Kilburn L.T 1.4. All welcome.
CS AMBASSADORS.
Why not become an ambassador for computer science? Get involved with STEMNET outreach activities like science fairs and exhibitions, with activities for teachers and schoolchildren. There’s no commitment if you sign up → http://studentnet.cs.manchester.ac.uk/volunteering
SOMETHING TO SHARE?
Deadline for Monday Mail items: 17:00 Friday → toby.howard@manchester.ac.uk
MONDAY MAIL ONLINE.
→ http://tinyurl.com/themondaymail
Good morning UG! It’s Monday 9 February, and it’s Week 3, an A week. I hope things are going well. On with today’s news, and there's a lot going on this week!
Best wishes, Toby Howard → http://www.cs.man.ac.uk/~toby
BUILD A ROBOT.
Gavin Brown ( → www.cs.man.ac.uk/~gbrown ) and Charlie Reynolds (Y2, AI4wIE) write: What can you build in a Working Day? That’s quite a challenging question. Join others in building whatever you want in the School's first robotics hackathon, 09:00-17:00 on Sat 21 Feb. All kit provided, but bring your own laptop. Judging criteria are: technical achievement, how cool your robot is, and how useful your robot is. There will be prizes, and winning robots will be shown off to the public at the University Open Day! Practice session 14:00-17:00 next Weds 18 Feb in Collab. Interested? Talk to Gavin → gavin.brown@manchester.ac.uk
DYNAMIC PROGRAMMING.
Karol Jurasiński (Y2, CMwIE) writes: coding Dojo and 1UP are hosting a workshop on dynamic programming this Thu 12 Feb 16:00-17:00 (location TBA). The session will introduce the idea and then move on to harder problems. It’s a great opportunity to practice before your technical interviews, for Google Code Jam or Facebook Hackercup and most importantly, the upcoming Staff vs Students Competition! You’ll need to bring your own laptop or pair up with someone who has one → https://www.facebook.com/events/402935483216890/
* HACKSOC. Mark Larah (Y3, CS) writes: Join the brand new society HackSoc for our launch event “Cracking the Coding Interview Workshop”, at 13:00-14:30 this Weds 11 Feb (location TBA), where we'll be running mock interviews, and going over common interview questions and algorithmic techniques. HackSoc will run regular workshops throughout the term to keep you up to scratch with languages and frameworks used in the hottest startups and big tech companies → http://goo.gl/OT4LnE
MEET THE PROFESSIONALS.
We're holding a “speed networking” event with a eight different alumni from the School of Computer Science this Thursday evening (12 Feb). During this event, you can chat informally to each alumnus in small groups for ten minutes in Collab. After ten minutes, the groups rotate. The evening finishes with informal networking, drinks and food. A briefing pack on who the alumni are and what they have been doing since graduation will be released before the event, in the meantime, sign up → https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/DKTFNPF
MANCHESTER DIGITAL TALENT DAY.
Over sixty of the North West's leading digital and creative companies will be exhibiting in Manchester Town Hall this Weds 11 Feb. Many of these local employers are looking to recruit graduates or placement and intern students in Computer Science. Register → http://goo.gl/Tj0x0g
* CSSOC QR HUNT. Josh Langley (Y2, CS4wIE) writes: Get ready for Wednesday, because we're holding a QR Code Hunt then! This will be set in Kilburn Building, so hopefully you're used to the layout by now! You can do it as a team (max 4 per team) or you can go solo, whichever is best for you! Don't forget to bring a smartphone that can register QR Codes → http://url.cssoc.co.uk/qrcode
THREE LUNCHTIME CAREERS DROP-INS THIS WEEK.
Jannine Andrew and Dominic Laing from the University’s Careers Service are running drop-in sessions in the Byte Cafe every Monday 12:00-13:00 to help you with your job/internship/postgrad applications. In addition this week there are drop-in sessions from Capita ( → http://www.capita.co.uk ) tomorrow Tues 10 Feb 12:00-14:00, and TopCashBack ( → http://www.topcashback.co.uk ) on Thurs 12:00-14:00, both of whom are recruiting placement and graduate students.
TAUGHT POSTGRAD STUDY.
The University is holding a PGT Open Day on Weds 18 March. To find out more about opportunities in our School, visit us our stand in the Schuster Building 14:00-15:00. Register → http://goo.gl/6l9eq4
POSTGRAD RESEARCH.
Our Centre for Doctoral Training (CDT) in Computer Science provides a six month “foundation” period consisting of taught units, followed by a 3.5 year period of focused PhD level research. The CDT has 18 studentships available for UK and EU students, which cover tuition fees and a stipend for 4 years. Funding opportunities are also available for our 3 year PhD programme. See a list of PhD projects → http://goo.gl/b42PtZ or you can propose your own. Entry reqs for CDT/PhD is 1/2.1 degree. Find out more from Anthony in the External Affairs Office (Kilburn 2.10) or → http://goo.gl/IJEumK
* NOT JUST FOR BOYS. Over 50% of the 200 women who attended an “IT’s not just for the boys!” event in Autumn 2014 have gone on to work for one of the companies they met there. The next event takes place on Fri 20 March at Deloitte HQ in London. If you’re a female student considering summer placements and internships you can apply for this prestigious, expenses paid event, and discover opportunities in 2015 and beyond → www.itsnotjustfortheboys.co.uk
CS AMBASSADORS.
Why not become an ambassador for computer science? Get involved with STEMNET outreach activities like science fairs and exhibitions, with activities for teachers and schoolchildren. There’s no commitment if you sign up → http://studentnet.cs.manchester.ac.uk/volunteering
SCHOOL SEMINAR.
Dr James Hetherington from University College London will talk about “The Craftsperson and the Scholar” this Weds 11 Feb at 14:00 in Kilburn LT 1.4. James will discuss the relationship of software engineering best practice to the construction and maintenance of research code. All welcome.
* CALLING ENTREPRENEURS. Ideas Factory is a regular series of early stage guest entrepreneur events for all students with an interest in enterprise and entrepreneurship. Lunch is provided. Upcoming @ 12:00, Alumni Clubroom, MBS West are Vikas Shah (this Weds 11 Feb), MD of Swiscot Group; Amin Amiri (next Weds 18 Feb), A2E Venture Catalysts Ltd; and Weds 4 Mar: Nikolay Piriankov, Co-founder and CEO of Rare Pink Diamond Jewellers. Reg → http://goo.gl/pT87QU
THE HUT CHALLENGE.
Following their COMP101 guest lecture last year, The Hut Group are offering £5,000 for their machine learning challenge. Can you improve personal retail recommendations using their big data? Deadline 15 March → http://www.thehutchallenge.com
SOMETHING TO SHARE?
Deadline for Monday Mail items: 17:00 Friday → toby.howard@manchester.ac.uk
MONDAY MAIL ONLINE.
→ http://tinyurl.com/themondaymail
Good morning UG! It’s Monday 2 February, and it’s Week 2, a B week. I hope you're settling in after the exams period. Lots of Monday news today, so let's go...
Best wishes, Toby Howard → http://www.cs.man.ac.uk/~toby
PASS1.
PASS Co-ordinators Dan Underwood (Y3, CS) and Sarah King (Y3, CMwIE) write: PASS for Year 1 starts again this Weds 4 Feb. Same time same place as last semester except that if you were previously in IT406, you will now be in Collab 2 (CM students, your PASS leaders should be getting in touch with you about arrangements for your sessions). If you’ve enjoyed PASS as a first year or are going into your third or fourth year and not going to be on placement, then we are now recruiting PASS Leaders for next year. Becoming a PASS leader helps to improve all the soft skills that employers are looking for: communication, team working and facilitation. It stands out on your CV as something you do to help give back to the community – a virtue that companies actively seek. Just fill in this form (with no obligation – you’re just expressing interest) → http://goo.gl/forms/YfC3jXdYfS
PASS2 COURSE ADVICE.
Matt Akerman (Y4, CSE4) writes: Second years, come along to Collab1 at 14:00 tomorrow Tues 3 Feb to hear some third year students’ opinions and advice about your course unit choices.
COURSE UNIT CHOICES.
And speaking of course unit choices, this is the final call to enter your Semester 2 choices. Deadline 17:00 this Friday 6 Feb → http://studentnet.cs.manchester.ac.uk/ugt/options.php
* FUNCTIONAL PROGRAMMING. Charlie Reynolds (Y2, AI4wIE) writes: UP will be hosting a workshop on functional programming in Node.js, led by our good friends at Phyramid ( → https://www.phyramid.com ). The workshop will feature a short talk on how functional programming can aid you in writing more beautiful code (with examples in Ruby), and a series of practical exercises to familiarise you with this paradigm in the popular Node.js (which is a valuable skill to have). You’ll need to bring your own laptop or pair up with someone else who has one. Mac/Linux environments preferred, but not required. This Weds 4 Feb 13:00–14:00, location TBA → http://www.facebook.com/events/727136094069164/
CSSOC GO-KARTING.
Bryn Hanby-Roberts (Y2, CSwIE) writes: CSSoc are going Go-Karting this Tues evening (3 Feb) around 18:00-19:00. Get your crash helmet on! Please book the session yourself. We'll be making our own way there via the Trafford Centre bus. Tickets cost £22. As always, everybody is welcome to attend! For more details, including which round we're participating in → http://url.cssoc.co.uk/karting15
HOODIES.
Also from CSSoc: CS Hoodies are being distributed this week in the Byte Cafe. If you've bought a hoodie, come along and collect it 12:00-15:00, Mon-Fri. Look out for the poster and laptop! You can also pop into our meeting this Weds 4 Feb 13:00-14:00 in LF15 to collect.
CSSOC ANNIVERSARY YEAR EVENTS.
And yet more: CSSoc are planning our 2 largest events ever for our 10th anniversary year! In conjunction with MLH ( → https://mlh.io ) and many others, we shall be organising The Great Uni Hack! You can pre-register now → http://greatunihack.co.uk . We expect this event to be massive, so make sure you register early. More details to follow as they unfold. In addition, the ever-successful May Ball will happen this semester, so keep an eye out for that, too! After last year's huge success, we're looking to make this year even bigger and better :)
* CALLING ALL BLOGGERS. Are you a keen writer/blogger? Want to earn a bit of extra money while studying? The School is recruiting up to 5 new student bloggers to represent life in the School and Manchester. To give you an idea, check out the blog by Edoardo Moreni (Y3, CS4) ( → http://goo.gl/OoGj5D ). We’re seeking talented writers who’ll commit to contribute posts regularly. If you’re interested in applying (£100/semester) → http://bit.ly/cs-blogs
SEEKING AMBASSADORS.
Want to share your passion for Computer Science with secondary school/college kids who want to be Computer Scientists? Learn new skills to develop your CV, meet new people, and earn some money too. Become a Computer Science Student Ambassador. Deadline for applications is next Thurs 12 Feb → http://bit.ly/student-amb
CAREERS DROP-IN.
Jannine Andrew and Dominic Laing from the University Careers Service will continue to run weekly drop-in sessions in the Byte Cafe every Monday in Semester 2 from 12:00-13:00 to discuss job applications and the latest vacancies (internships & graduate positions) drop by and say Hello!
* BUILDING BRAINS. Steve Furber (Professor of Computer Engineering, co-designer of the ARM chip, and teaches COMP28512 Mobile Systems) will be talking about bio-inspired massively-parallel computing tomorrow Tues 3 Feb 19:00-20:00 at the Royal Northern College of Music. Don’t miss the opportunity to hear one of Steve's entertaining and inspirational talks. Everyone welcome! Free registration → http://goo.gl/RXW2nb
STARTUP WEEKEND.
FutureEverything and the Greater Manchester Data Synchronisation Programme are hosting a Lean Startup weekend for entrepreneurs, technologists, creative professionals and social innovators, 21-22 Feb. Participants will be given the opportunity to work with highly skilled specialists to help bring their business ideas to life. There’s £25,000 in prizes available → http://goo.gl/qz81ou
SOMETHING TO SHARE?
Deadline for Monday Mail items: 17:00 Friday → toby.howard@manchester.ac.uk
MONDAY MAIL ONLINE.
→ http://tinyurl.com/themondaymail
Good morning UG! It’s Monday 26 January, and it’s Week 1 of Semester 2, an A week. We’ve got 12 weeks of teaching ahead, and then the Summer exams. For your diaries: the Easter vacation starts after Week 8, for 3 weeks from 23 March - 13 April. I hope you enjoy this Semester! OK, on with today’s news...
Best wishes, Toby Howard → http://www.cs.man.ac.uk/~toby
RESULTS.
So the exams are over – but when are results published? → http://goo.gl/2lRUXC
THIRD YEAR MEETING.
There’s an important meeting for all 3rd Year students, tomorrow Tues 27 Jan at 12:00 in Kilburn LT1.1. I look forward to seeing all 3rd Years there.
PASS.
Dan Underwood (Y3, CS) writes: PASS for first years will be starting in Week 2 this semester – at the same time and the same place as last semester so make sure you come along with any questions from the first week of lectures. We’re also wanting to collect feedback on first semester courses in general so that we can feed it back, so please have a think of what you did and didn’t like and let us know in your PASS session. Keep an eye out as well in the coming month for information on how you can apply to become a PASS leader next year and gain invaluable experience to help get you an awesome internship or career after you graduate!
FACEBOOK SUCCESS.
Remember that amazing win before Xmas by Team Goat at the Facebook Global Hackathon finals? Now you can read the full story → http://goo.gl/c4tYsI
GOOGLE SCHOLARSHIP.
The Google Anita Borg Memorial Scholarship for female students studying Computer Science offers a EU 7000 award and the opportunity to attend a networking retreat in summer 2015. Deadline for applications is 2 Feb → www.google.com/anitaborg/emea/
* DISTINGUISHED SCIENTIST. Congratulations to Simon Harper (founder of our new Human-Computer Interaction programme, and runs COMP33512 User Experience → http://simon.harper.name ) who has been recognised as a Distinguished Scientist by the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM). Simon was the only UK winner out of 49 awardees worldwide from academia and industry → http://goo.gl/cEJwIa
CALLING ALL BLOGGERS.
Are you a keen writer/blogger? Want to earn a bit of extra money while studying? The School is recruiting up to 5 new student bloggers to represent life in the School and Manchester. To give you an idea, check out the blog by Edoardo Moreni (Y3, CS4) ( → http://goo.gl/OoGj5D ). We’re seeking talented writers who’ll commit to contribute posts regularly. If you’re interested in applying (£100/semester) → http://bit.ly/cs-blogs
GRAPHENE.
Professor Ernie Hill asks ‘What’s next for Graphene and 2D materials?’ this Weds 28 Jan at 14:00 in Kilburn LT 1.4. All welcome → http://goo.gl/peh9fw
* NUMBER TEN. Steve Pettifer ( → http://aig.cs.man.ac.uk/people/srp ) was stalking the corridors of power last Friday. Steve was at No.10 Downing Street representing the School at a meeting looking at the government’s new Degree Apprenticeships programme.
MADLAB.
Manchester Digital Laboratory (MadLab) has a new year programme of creative courses. From WordPress to rat taxidermy, physical computing with Arduino to butterfly setting, funding bid writing to computer games design, their upcoming courses are a great way to learn something new in 2015. MadLab courses are hands-on, affordable and fun and based in the heart of the Northern Quarter → madlab.org.uk/courses
BIG CHIP AWARDS.
Have you built an interesting digital artefact as part of your study or industrial experience placement? Why not enter it for this year's BIG CHIP awards in Manchester? → http://goo.gl/ReYgle
COURSE UNIT CHOICES.
Please review and enter your Semester 2 Course Unit choices. Deadline Friday 6 Feb, but the sooner the better → http://studentnet.cs.manchester.ac.uk/ugt/options.php
* REPRODUCIBILITY IN SCIENCE. The School’s Professor Carole Goble ( → http://www.manchester.ac.uk/research/Carole.goble ) will be speaking at Reproducibility in Science and Policy - An Open Data Manchester January Special, tomorrow Tues 27 Jan from 18:30 at Manchester Science Park. Free reg → http://goo.gl/YeKbct
THE HUT CHALLENGE.
Following their COMP101 guest lecture last year, The Hut Group are offering £5,000 for their machine learning challenge. Can you improve personal retail recommendations using their big data? Deadline 15 March → http://www.thehutchallenge.com
SOMETHING TO SHARE?
Deadline for Monday Mail items: 17:00 Friday → toby.howard@manchester.ac.uk
MONDAY MAIL ONLINE.
→ http://tinyurl.com/themondaymail
Good morning UG! It’s Monday 19 January, and it’s the second week of exams. I hope they’re going well. Once again, make sure you know your schedule. In case of emergencies, don't delay, contact SSO immediately → compsci-sso@listserv.manchester.ac.uk or 0161 306 6625. Semester 2 teaching starts next Monday – something to look forward to!
Best wishes, Toby Howard → http://www.cs.man.ac.uk/~toby
VENTURING OUT.
Congratulations and good luck to Jie Liu (Y3, CSwIE), who has been shortlisted as a finalist in the “business idea” category in this year’s Venture Out ( → http://goo.gl/rVGKxW ), the University’s student ideas competition sponsored by PZCussons.com. Winners will be announced at the live final at the Whitworth Hall on Thurs 29 Jan.
HERITAGE HERO.
UG student Ciprian Tomoiaga (CSwIE), currently out on Industrial Experience at CERN, stars in a short video made by the University Media Team, about his “heritage hero” Alan Turing → http://goo.gl/NN87En
UG OF THE YEAR.
The TARGETjobs Undergraduate of the Year Awards launched six years ago, to celebrate the UK's best undergraduates. Are you a final year student and think you could be Computer Science Undergraduate of the Year? Application deadline 4 Feb → http://undergraduateoftheyear.com/computer
* BRAINS AND CHIPS. Steve Furber (Professor of Computer Engineering, co-designer of the ARM chip, and course leader for COMP28512 Mobile Systems) will be talking about bio-inspired massively-parallel computing on Tues 3 Feb 19:00-20:00 at the Royal Northern College of Music. Don’t miss this opportunity to hear one of Steve's entertaining and inspirational talks. Everyone welcome! Free registration → http://goo.gl/RXW2nb
STUDENT TEACHING AWARDS.
Have you had inspirational teaching/support? (I hope so!) Why not nominate someone for the Students Union Teaching Awards 2015? → http://manchesterstudentsunion.com/teachingawards
COURSE UNIT CHOICES.
Please review and enter your Semester 2 Course Unit choices. You have until the end of Week 2 (Friday 6 Feb) to finalise your choices, but the sooner the better → http://studentnet.cs.manchester.ac.uk/ugt/options.php
SOMETHING TO SHARE?
Deadline for Monday Mail items: 17:00 Friday → toby.howard@manchester.ac.uk
MONDAY MAIL ONLINE.
→ http://tinyurl.com/themondaymail
Good morning UG! It’s Monday 12 January. Welcome back and Happy New Year to you! I hope you had a good break. The two-week exams period starts today, so I wish you good luck. Top tips: stay calm, write and illustrate your answers clearly – and keep in mind that someone has to actually read your writing!
Best wishes, Toby Howard → http://www.cs.man.ac.uk/~toby
EXAMS.
Make sure you know your exam schedule and locations precisely – it's your responsibility to be in the right place at the right time. In case of emergencies, don't delay, contact SSO immediately → compsci-sso@listserv.manchester.ac.uk or 0161 306 6625.
KNEEBONE AWARD.
Congratulations to Ryan Malone (Y2, CSwIE) – selected as this year’s recipient of the Kneebone Bursary, founded by the Kneebone family in memory of their daughter Kate, who was an undergraduate here in the School. The bursary comprises a cash award and an opportunity for an internship with ARM in Cambridge.
QUIET ROOM.
A reminder that we have a quiet study space here in Kilburn, which you might find helpful for exam revision. It's Room 1.12, and you get to it through the 3rd Year Lab, Room 1.8. It's specifically for quiet, personal study, away from the hustle and bustle of the School. No chat, no phones, just quiet.
EXAM SUPPORT.
The University is offering a variety of support sessions to help you prepare for your Semester 1 exams → http://goo.gl/RRaXYD
COURSE UNIT CHOICES.
Please review and enter your Semester 2 Course Unit choices. You have until the end of Week 2 (Friday 6 Feb) to finalise your choices, but the sooner the better → http://studentnet.cs.manchester.ac.uk/ugt/options.php
SOMETHING TO SHARE?
Deadline for Monday Mail items: 17:00 Friday → toby.howard@manchester.ac.uk
MONDAY MAIL ONLINE.
→ http://tinyurl.com/themondaymail
Good morning UG! It’s Monday 8 December. Not only is it Week 12, an A week, but it’s also the last week of term – but you probably already know that! I hope this Semester has gone well for you, and that you've had a stimulating, interesting, and fun 3 months. On behalf of the School I wish you a very Merry Xmas and a Happy New Year. The Monday Mail will be back in mid-January, for the first week of the exams. Until then… on with today's news.
Best wishes, Toby Howard → http://www.cs.man.ac.uk/~toby
1ST YEAR PROJECTS.
The poster session last Thursday had a great buzz, with fabulous ideas on display, as always. You can see all the posters in our Y1 Project Poster Gallery → http://studentnet.cs.manchester.ac.uk/ugt/2014/COMP10120/projects/
COURSE UNIT FEEDBACK.
Please take a few moments to give us your feedback on each of your Semester 1 course units – deadline this Fri 12 Dec. We want your feedback and we take it seriously, and we react. Use the app or do it online → http://goo.gl/g3YWiH
Y1 LIKES/DISLIKES.
And speaking of feedback, each year we ask Y1 students to tell us their likes, dislikes and suggestions as part of their Reading Week essay submissions. This generates a huge amount of data, but we’ve now read it all, summarised the most frequently-raised points, and responded → http://goo.gl/6BRpcV
SSC.
Still on the topic of likes, dislikes and suggestions, the next Staff-Student Committee meeting will be this Weds 10 Dec 14:00–15:30. If you'd like to raise anything, please contact one of your reps ASAP → http://studentnet.cs.manchester.ac.uk/sscc
PASS XMAS QUIZ.
Dan Underwood (Y3, CS) writes: PASS for First Years this week is the Christmas Quiz rather than your normal sessions. This will be taking place in Collab 1 and there will be free mince pies and prizes! So come along and prove that your tutorial group has the best Christmas knowledge! Look forward to seeing you all there!
DEBUG YOUR CV.
Dominic Laing from the Careers Service will be on LF from 12:00–13:00 TODAY Mon 8 Dec, for any students wanting feedback on their CVs and job applications. Dominic knows his onions. Don’t miss this opportunity.
CSSOC.
Josh Langley (Y2, CS4wIE) says: CSSoc Hoodies are now on sale. Come to the Byte Cafe 12:00–15:00 every day this week to pre-order your hoodie. All sizes are available in a variety of colours, each pre-order is £20 and will be delivered when you come back from Christmas holidays. And head on down to the Grove this Weds 10 Dec at 19:00 for the delayed CSSoc Pub Quiz for prizes, drinks and a little competition. Not all questions are CS related so come prepared! Hope to see you all there! → https://www.facebook.com/cssoc.man
XMAS HOURS.
For Kilburn and SSO opening hours over the Xmas vacation see the UG homepage → http://studentnet.cs.manchester.ac.uk/ugt/
RESPONSIVE WEB.
Thanks to work in the last few weeks by the School’s IT support engineer Iain Hart, we’ve now gone a long way to making the School’s web pages device-responsive. We hope you like it. Let me know what you think, and any loose ends you may find.
* DAFT NEWS OF THE WEEK. According to YouTube's Google+ blog, "We never thought a video would be watched in numbers greater than a 32-bit integer (2,147,483,647 views), but that was before we met PSY. Gangnam Style has been viewed so many times we had to upgrade to a 64-bit integer (9,223,372,036,854,775,808)" → http://goo.gl/EXnrPQ
GO VIRTUAL.
Computer Science PhD student Tama Madli needs subjects for his virtual reality “spatial memory” research experiments. He’s paying £10 a go. → tmadl@cs.man.ac.uk
GAMES DESIGN.
Interested in doing a PhD in Intelligent Games and Game Intelligence? There are positions available at the University of York, the University of Essex and Goldsmiths College, University of London → www.iggi.org.uk
SCHOOL SEMINAR.
This Weds 10 Dec at 14:00 in Kilburn LT1.4, Helen Parkinson from the European Bioinformatics Institute will talk about their use RDF and OWL → http://www.cs.manchester.ac.uk/our-research/seminars/
BIG DATA.
The Hadoop and Big Data in Manchester group are meeting this Weds 10 Dec at 18:30 in the Greenheys Building, Manchester Science Park M15 6SE. This week Les Klein from Pivotal.io will be talking about their approach to Big Data. Free registration → http://www.meetup.com/HadoopManchester/events/218871073/
ROYAL NAVY WORKOUT.
The Royal Navy is hosting a Undergraduate Leadership event this Thurs 11 Dec. It starts at 16:30 in K3 Sackville Building. It’s a mixture of practical leadership exercises and a physical workout. Dress appropriately! → https://www.royalnavy.mod.uk/careers/graduates/ulp-signup
MANCHESTER GEEK NIGHT.
Tomorrow Tues 9 Dec at ThoughtWorks in Manchester. Paula Morton from Ladies Who Code will be talking about Cross Functional Teams and how to collaborate. Free reg → http://www.meetup.com/manchester-geek-nights/
MANCHESTER TECH NIGHTS.
Also tomorrow Tues 9 Dec at SpacePortX in Manchester. Speakers include @RosieCampbell, from BBC R&D who will be talking about designing for displays that don’t exist yet. Free reg → http://manchestertechnights.org
SOMETHING TO SHARE?
Deadline for Monday Mail items: 17:00 Friday → toby.howard@manchester.ac.uk
MONDAY MAIL ONLINE.
→ http://tinyurl.com/themondaymail
Good morning UG! It’s Monday 1 December – can it really be December?! – and it’s Week 11, a B week. On with the news and I have a jam-packed edition for you today.
Best wishes,
Toby Howard → http://www.cs.man.ac.uk/~toby
1ST YEAR PROJECTS.
Good luck to all Y1 students for their project presentations this week. The poster session, this Thurs 4 Dec 11:00 – 12:30, is open to all students and staff, so come and check out the creativity and ideas of this year’s Y1 students.
ACM PROGRAMMING COMP.
Thanks to "Team Brogrammers" Karol Jurasinski (Y2, CMwIE), Ettore Torti (Y2, CSwIE) and Ion Diaconu (Y2, CS), and their mentor, Tudor Morar (PhD, Y2) who represented the School in the prestigious and very demanding annual International ACM programming competition, held at the weekend at Linköping University, Sweden. While they weren't among this year's winners, Tudor reports that they had an amazing and stimulating time, and learned much from the experience – which will help us prepare for next year's comp! → http://www.nwerc.eu
COURSE UNIT FEEDBACK.
Please take a few moments to give us your feedback on each of your Semester 1 course units – deadline 12 Dec. We want your feedback and we take it seriously, and we react. Use the app or do it online → http://goo.gl/g3YWiH
XMAS HOURS.
We’ve put full details of Kilburn and SSO opening hours over the Xmas vacation on the UG homepage → http://studentnet.cs.manchester.ac.uk/ugt/
* 1-UP. This from Petrut Bogdan (Y2, CS4): 1-UP is organizing the first practical FPGA event of this academic year. It's this Weds 3 Dec at 13:00 in Tootill 0. Join us in implementing your own hardware design for a processor, image processing of skin colours or creating funky fractals, such as the Mandelbrot set. We will be supplying FPGAs, instructions and fully developed designs in VHDL of the previously mentioned. You can come along even if you have other ideas of something you might want to do (e.g. Bitcoin/Dogecoin mining). More info → goo.gl/aHk3NH or from Dirk Koch → dirk.koch@manchester.ac.uk. See you there!
PASS1 GETS FOCUSSED.
PASS Leader Sarah King (Y3, CMwIE) writes: this week in PASS1, we’ll be running interest stations with a Christmas theme. Instead of your normal PASS rooms, we‘re giving you the choice to focus on the course you’re having the most trouble with – and putting our expert PASS Leaders on the case. So, please go to the following rooms for help. Collab 1: Java, First Year Team Project; Collab 2: CM (as normal) IT406: CSwBM (as normal); IT407: Fundamentals of Computer Architecture; LF15: Mathematical Techniques for Computer Science; G102: Fundamentals of Computer Engineering. Also, we’re still looking for your responses to our survey. Tell us what you think of PASS → http://goo.gl/forms/K0Utg5mDL5
PASS2 DOES ASSESSMENT.
Matt Akerman (Y4, CSE4) says: come along to Collab at 12:00 tomorrow Tues 2 Dec for some PASS2 practice assessment centre activities. With many of you sure to be getting invitations to interviews and assessment centres soon, this should be a great session to practice and get feedback. It’s aimed at second years hunting for placements, but open to everybody! Students will also be on hand to help with academic issues as usual.
PASS3 IF YOU WANT IT.
And more from Matt: with finals looming on the horizon, we’re looking into the possibility of running some 3rd Year PASS revision sessions over the next few weeks! Got any suggestions, ideas or requests? Fill in a quick survey or contact one of the 2nd/3rd Year PASS Coordinators (→ matthew.akerman@student.manchester.ac.uk or Rebecca Doran → rebecca.doran@student.manchester.ac.uk) so that we can sort something out! → http://tinyurl.com/lf2s72r
CSSOC PUB QUIZ.
Josh Langley (Y2, CS4wIE) writes: this Weds 3 Dec at 19:00 come to the Grove for the CSSoc pub quiz for drinks and prizes. Bring you and your friends as there's no entrance fee so you have no excuse. Should be an excellent night, so hope to see you all there! → https://www.facebook.com/cssoc.man
SOFTWARE ON THE RED PLANET.
As you probably know, most academic staff in the School are active researchers, and sometimes they get up to things that may surprise you. A team led by Dr Giles Reger, Professor Howard Barringer and Dr David Rydeheard have developed the project work of Helena Cuenca, an MSc student here in the School, and worked with scientists at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory on software used to check the correctness of code running on Mars rovers. Find out more → http://goo.gl/zMzZrV
KNEEBONE BURSARY.
A reminder about the Kate Kneebone Acorn Bursary. In addition to £500 funding, the Bursary offers the opportunity to discuss an internship (preferably with an Engineering bias) with ARM in Cambridge. All Y2 students in the School are eligible, application deadline 12 December → http://studentnet.cs.manchester.ac.uk/ugt/kneebone/
SIXTH FORMERS HERE.
This Weds 3 Dec the School is again welcoming sixth-formers from local schools keen on studying Computer Science at University, for a day of talks and activities. If you see them around LF during the day, why not say hello and tell them how much you enjoy studying, and doing, Computer Science!
MANCHESTER GEEK NIGHTS.
They’re back next Tues 9 Dec at ThoughtWorks in Manchester. Paua Morton from Ladies Who Code will be talking about Cross Functional Teams and how to collaborate. Free registration → http://www.meetup.com/manchester-geek-nights/
MANCHESTER TECH NIGHTS.
These are back too, also next Tues 9 Dec at SpacePortX in Manchester. Speakers include Rosie Campbell from BBC R&D ( → http://www.bbc.co.uk/rd/people/rosie-campbell ), talking about designing for displays that don’t exist yet. Free registration → http://manchestertechnights.org/6/
CHRISTMAS CARD COMP.
Design an e-Xmas Card and win £100 in Amazon vouchers. STEM Graduates is running a competition for Computer Science students. Enter by this Friday 5 December → http://goo.gl/8lvCws
ON THE BEACH.
On the Beach is the UK’s fastest growing online travel business, based in Cheadle, South Manchester. The Talent Acquisition Manager and two Ruby developers from will be hosting a drop-in session tomorrow Tues 2 Dec, 11:30 – 14:00 on LF → https://www.onthebeach.co.uk
SOMETHING TO SHARE?
Deadline for the Monday Mail is 17:00 each Friday → toby.howard@manchester.ac.uk
Good morning UG! It’s Monday 24 November, and it’s Week 10, an A week. I hope you're well! On with this week's news.
Best wishes,
Toby → http://www.cs.man.ac.uk/~toby
KERNEL HACKING WITH 1-UP.
Petrut Bogdan (Y2, CS4) writes: we’re hosting our second Kernel Hacking event this Weds 26 Nov at 13:00 in Tootill 0. Bring your Raspberry Pi and laptop. We‘ll provide serial cables and instructions on how to create your own patches for Raspbian → http://goo.gl/I4CWMe
AZERBAIJANI NIGHT.
This from Mikayil Murad (Y3, CS): Would you like to discover the mystical culture of Land of Fire? A place where East met West to create one of the world's most beautiful cultures dating back to ancient times. I want to invite everyone to our event, Azerbaijani Night, this Friday 28 Nov at 19:00 at Academy 2 (Student Union). Free entry, free food, live music and dances! → http://goo.gl/lwWc2h
CSSOC.
Bryn Hanby-Roberts (Y2, CSwIE) and Josh Langley (Y2, CS4wIE) write: this week, CSSoc are heading to Red Hot World Buffet on Thurs 27 Nov for a big nosh up! Everybody's welcome, but bring your student card to get the discounted rate of £12, and please make sure you register for the event so we have accurate seating arrangements. See you there! → http://url.cssoc.co.uk/buffet14
HOODIES.
CSSoc are getting ready to sell hoodies (cost: £20), and they need to know who wants them. Sign up this week in the Byte Cafe at times published on Facebook and posters.
* CODE CLUB MANCHESTER. Code Club is a nationwide network of volunteer-led after-school coding clubs for children aged 9–11. They’re having a meetup this Thurs 27 Nov from 18:00, at Code Computerlove Digital Agency in central Manchester. If you’re curious about teching Computer Science in primary schools, why not find out more → http://goo.gl/ZLzIWL
QUIET ROOM.
A reminder that we have a quiet study space for all UG students, here in Kilburn, a great place to get away from the hustle and bustle. It's Room 1.12, and you get to it through the 3rd Year Lab, Room 1.8. It's specifically for quiet, personal study.
TECH CHALLENGE.
Good luck to our team competing in the University Technology Challenge at MediaCityUK this week! → http://goo.gl/dZwkOT
STUDENTS BEYOND GRADES.
Are you an undergraduate who has shown Exceptional Initiative? Want to be recognized at a national level? The Students Beyond Grades (SBG) Project is a UK-wide online magazine for students. The magazine is a place for you to share your subject-related work that has stood out from the crowd → www.studentsbeyondgrades.uk
IGEM.
Here’s something unusual. The organisers of the International Genetically Engineered Machine competition 2015 are looking for people from a range of disciplines, including Computer Science, to take part. The team will go to Boston, USA for the Giant Jamboree to compete with 250 teams from all over the world. There’s a start-up meeting on Weds 10 Dec at 13:00 at MIB G.051. Details → http://igem.org/About
RENTAL CARS.
Rentalcars.com are running a drop-in session this Thurs 27 Nov at 12:00–14:00 in Kilburn. Pizza will be served.
CREDIT SUISSE.
Y1 students: Credit Suisse are offering pre-Christmas fun, food and drinks, if you're interested in doing a placement with them. This Weds 26 Nov, 19:00–21:00. Pre-registration required → http://goo.gl/uBe0Qk
MBS MASTERS.
Interested in doing a Masters Degree at Manchester Business School? Come to an MBS Info Session and meet staff and current students and discover how their courses can boost your career prospects. This Weds 26 Nov, 12:30–14:00, in the MBS East Atrium (26 on the campus map). A number of graduates have the opportunity to progress directly onto the Full-time MBA as a Young Potential Leader – could you be one of them? Loyalty bursaries are offered to University of Manchester students.
UG OF THE YEAR.
Are you a final year undergraduate? Could you be the Computer Science Undergraduate of the Year for 2015? This is a unique opportunity to be in with the chance of winning a full time, graduate job with CGI. Practice online tests, assessment centre skills and enhance your CV → http://undergraduateoftheyear.com/computer
SOMETHING TO SHARE?
Deadline for the Monday Mail is 17:00 each Friday → toby.howard@manchester.ac.uk
Good morning UG! It’s Monday 17 November, and it’s Week 9, a B week. I hope things are going well. On with today's news!
Best wishes,
Toby Howard → http://www.cs.man.ac.uk/~toby
FACEBOOK SUCCESS.
Huge congratulations to Team Goat, aka Mark Larah (Y3, CS), Bartek Siemieniuk (Y2, SE4), Antonio Marino (SEwIE, on IE at CERN) and Jessie Abramson (graduated last year, now at HP) for their amazing win at the Facebook Global Hackathon finals at Menlo Park in California at the weekend. They beat 16 other teams from around the world (Mexico, USA, Singapore, Brazil etc) with their iOS app AppChef, which Mark describes as “an easy to use iOS app that allows you to create apps! No Xcode or programming knowledge needed – simply download it from the app store, and you can be creating the next Facebook on the bus home in no time!“. The team won $2000 and an Oculus Rift each. In the photo below (L to R) are Jessie, Antonio, Bartek and Mark. A fantastic achievement – well done!
WELCOME FOUNDATIONERS.
I'm sure you'll join me in giving a warm welcome to the 28 students currently on their Foundation Year in our Faculty, who this week start their studies here in the School, in preparation for joining us as Y1 students next year. Welcome!
SSC MEETING.
The Staff-Student Committee had a lively and productive meeting last week. We’ll be posting updates on the SSC issues tracker on Blackboard (→ http://tinyurl.com/staffstudentBB ). Meanwhile your reps (33 of them, below) are waiting to hear about anything that concerns you → http://studentnet.cs.manchester.ac.uk/sscc
CHILDREN IN NEED.
Last week the School’s online charity auction raised an amazing £478 – thank you to everyone who contributed! The book sale will stay open for a few more days – at the top of the stairs leading to Kilburn 2nd floor. Have a look and grab a bargain!
MM GOES MOBILE.
We’ve redesigned the Monday Mail web version and archive to work responsively on phones and tablets. Let me know what you think → http://tinyurl.com/themondaymail
CSSOC KARAOKE.
Bryn Hanby-Roberts (Y2, CSwIE) and Josh Langley (Y2, CS4wIE) write: CSSoc’s Karaoke event is this week! We’re at The Grove (inside Whitworth Park) this Friday 21 Nov for the big event, starting at 19:00, and it’s free entry. We hope to see you there! → url.cssoc.co.uk/karaoke14
KERNEL HACKING WITH 1-UP.
Petrut Bogdan (Y2, CS4) writes: 1-UP is organizing an event in collaboration with Codethink ( → http://www.codethink.co.uk ), who specialise in system-level software infrastructure. This Weds 19 Nov at 13:00 in LT1.5 will be the first session of a two-part event on OS kernel hacking. You’ll have the opportunity to understand how a kernel works and get a chance to modify it. We'll be working on Raspberry PIs (if you don't have one please let us know in advance to get a few ready for you) → http://goo.gl/w6VC5j
IMAGINATION TECHNOLOGY.
They’ll be guest lecturing this Thurs 20 Nov at 11:00 in LT1.1 on “The business of Intellectual Property” – what it means to run a technology busines on IP. They’ll also cover opportunities for placements and graduate positions. All welcome.* PG STUDY. The Postgraduate study fair is coming to Manchester Central this Weds 19 Nov. If you’re thinking of doing a Masters or PhD, register now → http://www.careers.manchester.ac.uk/events/postgraduatestudyfair/
SCHOOL SEMINAR.
This week we have two seminars, both on Weds 19 Nov. At 12:00 in Kilburn LT1.5 Professor Jonathan Coker of HGST ( → http://goo.gl/sb0aHR ) will talk about ‘Opportunities and Challenges in Two Dimensional Magnetic Recording’. And at 14:00 in LT1.4 Dr Andrew Dowsey ( → http://www.manchester.ac.uk/research/andrew.dowsey ) will discuss ‘Applications and possibilities for signal processing, machine learning and computational statistics in clinical proteomics and metabolomics’. → http://www.cs.manchester.ac.uk/our-research/seminars/
UG EVENTS CALENDAR.
Don’t forget to add this handy calendar of UG events to your favourite app. There’s an ics feed → http://goo.gl/FDIXGA and an HTML view → http://goo.gl/2P7UFs
ARM INTERVIEWS.
ARM is holding two interview days at the University on 26 & 27 Nov. Final Year students will have the opportunity to fast-track their way to interview for hardware roles. To be considered, send your CV by the end of TODAY Mon 17 Nov → fiona.smith@arm.com
ERNST AND YOUNG.
Visit the EY Stand in the School, 11:30–14:00 this Thurs 20 November. They’re ready to answer your questions on opportunities for Computer Science students, offer top tips on successful applications and help you understand what it’s really like to work in one of the world’s leading organisations.
MANCHESTER GEEK NIGHTS.
These resume at the City Tower Manchester (great view!) this Thurs 20 Nov hosted by ThoughtWorks. This week – Pixelated: A secure Open Source email solution. Free registration → http://goo.gl/BN1KKr
MICRO TYCO.
The Deloitte “Micro Tyco” University Challenge for Y1 and Y2 students has opened. Become an entrepreneur to fund an entrepreneur using MicroFinance → http://goo.gl/HLC9rA
SOMETHING TO SHARE?
Deadline for the Monday Mail is 17:00 each Friday → toby.howard@manchester.ac.uk
Good morning UG! It’s Monday 10 November, and it’s Week 8, an A week. I hope everything is going well. On with today’s news, and there’s quite a lot of it!
Best wishes,
Toby → http://www.cs.man.ac.uk/~toby
STUDENTHACK.
Congratulations to all our teams who participated in the 36-hour StudentHack Halloween event last week at Autotrader HQ. Dainis Gorbunovs (Y1, SE4), Sami Alabed (Y1, SEwIE), Joao Ruschel and Cristiano Dias (visiting students) won the Best BrainTree Hack – in the top pic. The Best Fresher Hack prize was won by Cornelia Secelean (Y1, CS4wIE), Mihai Bujanca (Y1, CS4wIE) and Cristina Cristescu (Y3, CSwIE) – lower pic – for their app sms2ssh. Daniela Florescu (Y3, CSwIE), Dragos Rosu (Y3, CSwIE), George Vanburgh (on IE) and Dan Tzabar (Y3, CS4) all made the final presentation stage (10 lightning presentations from over 40 entering teams). Well done everyone! → http://www.studenthack.com
SSC.
The first Staff-Student Committee meeting to discuss issues is this Weds 12 Nov 13:00–15:00. If you'd like to raise anything, please contact one of your reps → http://studentnet.cs.manchester.ac.uk/sscc
CSSOC.
Bryn Hanby-Roberts (Y2, CSwIE) and Josh Langley (Y2, CS4wIE) write: karaoke is CSSoc’s next event! We’re going to The Grove in Whitworth Park tomorrow Tues 11 Nov for a night of (bad) singing, so come and join us → http://url.cssoc.co.uk/karaoke14
PASS CAREERS CLINIC.
This from Zac Hamid (Y3, CMwIE): last Week in PASS2 we had a Careers Discussion with a panel of students with Industrial Experience, and Duncan Hull. Read about it on the PASS Blog ( → http://goo.gl/8ElPeU ). And Matt Akerman (Y4, CS4) writes: at PASS2 in Collab tomorrow Tues 11 Nov at 12:00 we’re running a careers clinic where we’ll help with CV advice, finalising your applications and also interview/assessment centre preparations. There should be something and/or someone to help everybody applying for placements so don’t miss out!
GUEST LECTURE.
“(What’s wrong with) Software Engineers?” Craig Dean from Web Applications UK in Oldham and co-organiser of Hack Manchester will be giving a guest lecture this Thurs 13 Nov at 11:00 in Kilburn LT 1.1 as part of COMP101. All welcome!
WHERE ARE YOU FROM?
We’re proud to have students from all over the world. Where are you from? The Tactus screen on LF is displaying the home towns of over 120 students. Log on and contribute to the project! (all data is anonymous) → http://studentnet.cs.manchester.ac.uk/tactus/SetMyLocation/
RUBY INTRO.
Charles Reynolds (Y2, AI4wIE) says: 1-UP will be running an introductory session on the Ruby programming language this Weds 12 Nov at 13:00 in Kilburn room 2.25D (the Masters lab). Ruby is well known for having a good balance of powerful features and a simple syntax. People of any level of experience with Ruby or programming are welcome, as we’ll start from the basics :) Bringing your own laptop (ideally Linux /Mac OSX) is preferred, but not essential → https://www.facebook.com/events/773603032715228/
KNEEBONE BURSARY.
The Kate Kneebone Acorn Bursary is an annual commemorative award of £500 funded by the Kneebone family and ARM. In addition to the funding, the Bursary offers the opportunity to discuss a funded internship placement (preferably with an Engineering bias) with ARM in Cambridge. All Second Year undergraduate students in the School are eligible to apply, deadline 12 December → http://studentnet.cs.manchester.ac.uk/ugt/kneebone/
THINK TEACHING.
David Rydeheard writes: this week is "Think Teaching" week. If you have even a vague interest in a teaching career – giving schools access to Computer Science – there are three upcoming events for you given by "Teach First" ( → http://www.teachfirst.org.uk ). There’s a pizza lunch tomorrow Tues 11 Nov, 13:00-14:00 in LF. Drop in and have a bite and a chat with the Teach First people. And on Thurs 13 Nov at 17:00 in Kilburn Atlas 1, a presentation: ‘Teaching as a career for Computer Scientists’. Finally, next Weds 19 Nov, there’s a session in University Place titled ‘Tomorrow’s Leaders’ – talking about developing teachers for the future, including sponsoring companies PwC, Accenture, Civil Service Fast Stream, Aldi and Goldman Sachs. With drinks and networking. Sign up → http://goo.gl/z8E2ZS
CODE CLUB.
And speaking of enthusing kids about CS, Code Clubs are a nationwide network of volunteer-led after-school coding clubs for children aged 9-11. Why not get involved? The next North West meet-up is Thurs 27 Nov. Free tickets are going fast → http://goo.gl/V5IUQk
SILICON MILKROUNDABOUT.
Find your next job/internship at a startup via the London tech startup jobs fair, with a focus on engineering roles. Sunday 15 Nov, Old Truman Brewery London → https://www.siliconmilkroundabout.com
PG STUDY.
The Postgraduate study fair is coming to Manchester Central next Weds 19 Nov. If you’re thinking of doing a Masters or PhD, register now → http://www.careers.manchester.ac.uk/events/postgraduatestudyfair/
FEMALES IN IT.
‘IT's not just for the boys!’ is an event designed exclusively for female students who are looking to find out more about technology careers. Meet Deloitte, BlackRock, Bloomberg, CGI, CHP Consulting, CitiBank, GE, HP, IBM, M&S, SunGard and ThoughtWorks in London on 14 Nov. To apply for this prestigious expenses paid event → www.itsnotjustfortheboys.co.uk
CHILDREN IN NEED.
Please donate any no-longer-needed items for our annual Children in Need Online Auction. Take your stuff to ACSO, Kilburn 2.127 anytime. The auction will open soon – we’ll email details ASAP.
UG OF THE YEAR.
Are you a final year undergraduate? Could you be the Computer Science Undergraduate of the Year for 2015? This is a unique opportunity to be in with the chance of winning a full time, graduate job with CGI. Practice online tests, assessment centre skills and enhance your CV → http://undergraduateoftheyear.com/computer
SCHOOL SEMINAR.
This Weds 12 Nov at 14:00 in Kilburn 1.4, Dr Matt-Mouley Bouamrane (University of Aberdeen & Glasgow) will talk about “eHealth Policy & Implementation in Scotland & Evaluation of the UK dallas Programme” → v
SOMETHING TO SHARE?
Deadline for the Monday Mail is 17:00 each Friday → toby.howard@manchester.ac.uk
MONDAY MAIL ON THE WEB.
→ http://tinyurl.com/themondaymail
Good morning UG! It’s Monday 3 November, and it’s Week 7, a B week. I hope you had a refreshing break last week. We’re back now to normal timetabled activities, and I hope you'll enjoy the second half of the semester. On with today’s news...
Best wishes,
Toby → http://www.cs.man.ac.uk/~toby
PROJECT SEMINARS.
Good luck to all 3rd Year Project students, whose Project Seminars begin this week. Check your schedule → http://goo.gl/7gqmSO
HACK MANCHESTER WINS.
Congratulations to George Vanburgh (out on IE) and Matt Akerman (Y4, CS4) who won the ‘University Challenge’ at Hack Manchester at MOSI last week, with their app ‘SMS against humanity’. Also congratulations to John Gresty (Y2, CS4wIE) who won a runner-up prize for his HackPad app. In the pic are Matt and George collecting their prizes.
NEW SUPPORT SYSTEM.
A reminder that we now have a Grand Unified mechanism for reporting issues around the School. For things like disk quota or email problems, issues with software or hardware, requests to install new software, environment things – you can report your issue directly and we will swiftly investigate and respond → http://support.cs.manchester.ac.uk
SSC.
The first Staff-Student Committee meeting to discuss issues will be next Weds 12 Nov 13:00–15:00. If you'd like to raise anything, please contact one of your reps → http://studentnet.cs.manchester.ac.uk/sscc
TACTUS WANTS YOUR APPS.
Gavin Brown writes: After a brief period of downtime for maintenance, the Tactus Touchscreen information system is back in the LF area. An exciting new development is that you’re invited to write your own apps to go on the screens. Take a look at the screen in LF, which among other things has a Student Map of where you all come from. Read more about Tactus, download an app template, and update your own map pin → http://studentnet.cs.manchester.ac.uk/tactus
CSSOC HOSTS CREDIT SUISSE.
Credit Suisse are in Kilburn TODAY Mon 3 Nov. Come along and learn what you can do in the financial services industry. There’ll be people to network with from the business, so it’s a great way to get a head start and make your application stand out. The presentation begins at 13:00 in IT 407. Register → http://url.cssoc.co.uk/creditsuissepresentation
CHILDREN IN NEED.
The time has come to start clearing out your cupboards and donating any no-longer-needed items for our annual Children in Need Online Auction (a bit like eBay, only better). Please take your donations to ACSO, Kilburn 2.127 anytime from now on. The auction will run from next Monday 10 Nov to 17:00 Fri 14 Nov.
CYBER TALK.
Today Mon 3 Nov 11:00–12:30, Room 2.19, Professor Colin Williams of the University of Warwick will talk about the safety and security implications of the cyber phenomenon, from massively complex interconnected systems to robots. All welcome.
SCHOOL SEMINAR.
This Weds 5 Nov at 14:00 in Kilburn 1.4, Ross King will talk about 'A Computer that Grows: Implementing a Universal Nondeterministic Turing Machine Using DNA'. All welcome → http://www.cs.manchester.ac.uk/our-research/seminars/
CRYPTO CHALLENGE.
To celebrate the launch of The Imitation Game movie starring Manchester alumnus Benedict Cumberbatch as Alan Turing ( → http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2084970 ), the School of Maths has launched a cryptography comp with great prizes → http://goo.gl/M10rmC
BANK OF AMERICA MERRILL LYNCH.
If you’re looking for a taste of technology infrastructure in banking, an internship or full time opportunity, there’s an exclusive Step Into Technology Infrastructure event at the BOAML Chester office next Weds 12 November, 14:30–18:30. Sessions include: technology at an investment bank; technology infrastructure workshop; a tour of the command centre; interview tips; and an opportunity to network with technology professionals. Register (deadline 11 Nov) → http://goo.gl/l6s0IK
SILICON MILK ROUNDABOUT.
It’s back for the eighth time (#SMR8). Find your next job at a technology startup on the weekend of 15-16 November at the Old Truman Brewery in London → https://www.siliconmilkroundabout.com
BBC IN MANCHESTER.
The BBC Develop Conference will be running in Salford next Tues 11 Nov, and 20 guest places have been allocated for students. Speakers include Softwire, Typesafe, Songkick, Couchbase, Juxt.pro, Github, ThoughtWorks, Twitter, The Guardian and the BBC. Interested in going? Contact Duncan ASAP (first come, first served) → duncan.hull@manchester.ac.uk
SUPER TECHIES.
Applications for the Cap Gemini super techies event (a UK Technology Consulting Competition) is now open. They’ll be visiting the School later this Semester to give more details to interested students → http://goo.gl/90Rha1
SOMETHING TO SHARE?
Deadline for the Monday Mail is 17:00 each Friday → toby.howard@manchester.ac.uk
MONDAY MAIL ON THE WEB.
→ http://tinyurl.com/themondaymail
Good morning UG! It’s Monday 27 October, and it’s Week 6. The clocks have gone back, so it’s now officially winter, and this is Reading Week, so there are no scheduled teaching activities. It's a chance for you to have a break and make sure you're up to date with everything. Usual teaching and timetabled activities resume next Monday 3 Nov (Week 7B). Now, on with today’s news...
Best wishes,
Toby → http://www.cs.man.ac.uk/~toby
SSC.
The Staff-Student Committee had their start-up and training afternoon last Wednesday, fortified by cakes and drinks. The first SSC meeting to discuss issues will be Weds 12 Nov 13:00–15:00. If you'd like to raise anything, please contact one of your reps → http://studentnet.cs.manchester.ac.uk/sscc
TEAM GOAT SUCCESS.
Huge congratulations to Team Goat: (L to R in the photo below) Jessie Abramson and Antonio Marino (both on industrial placement at CERN), Grzegorz Jacenkow (Y2, CSBMwIE), and Mark Larah (Y3, CS) – who won not just one but TWO categories at this year’s TechCrunch hackathon. Their first win was for “a Siri for social network management” → http://challengepost.com/software/yammer-concierge and their second was for a “virtual changing room”, where the system detects colours and suggests what users should wear → http://challengepost.com/software/cloakroom
ACM TRIAL WINNERS.
Gavin Brown, sensei of our Coding Dojo, writes: The ACM trial winners have been chosen! Last Wednesday afternoon, 23 brave students (first pic, below) tackled five challenging algorithmic problems. The winners were (second pic, right to left) Karol Jurasinski (Y2, CMwIE), Ettore Torti (Y2, CSwIE) and Ion Diaconu (Y2, CS). Congratulations! The School is flying the winners to Sweden next month, accompanied by their mentor, Tudor Morar (PhD, Y2), far left in the pic, to represent Manchester in the prestigious annual International ACM programming competition. See the problems and other info → https://www.facebook.com/groups/coding.dojo
CSSOC HOSTS CREDIT SUISSE.
Bryn Hanby-Roberts (Y2, CSwIE) and Josh Langley (Y2, CS4wIE) write: CSSoc are hosting the Credit Suisse presentation next Monday 3 Nov at 13:00–15:00 in IT407. If you want to learn more about a job in financial services, this is the place to go! After the presentation there'll be time for you to network with current employees. Come along and learn about what your future in Credit Suisse could be → http://url.cssoc.co.uk/creditsuissepresentation
* IN THE NEWS. Congratulations to Raghav Bansal (Y2, CS4), who was featured in The Guardian newspaper last week (print circulation: 200,000, monthly web hits: 53 million) in their “Meet the Global Student” section → http://goo.gl/klQF4h
CUTTING EDGE RESEARCH.
As you probably know, our School is a hotbed of cutting-edge research, much of it done by PhD students working together with academic and research staff. Want to know what’s going on? Check out our annual Research Symposium this Tues/Weds and find out what over 50 of our research students are up to. There’s amazing stuff from Multi-core Computing to Learning from Data, from Digital Biology to Logic and Automated Reasoning → http://studentnet.cs.manchester.ac.uk/pgr/symposium/
MOVEMBER.
Every year, staff and students in the School grow and groom (or glue on – comedy moustaches are available) facial hair to raise awareness and money for prostate cancer, testicular cancer and men’s health. The pic below shows last year’s fearless Mo Team. Please join in and help us look even sillier this year, and raise cash → http://www.cs.manchester.ac.uk/about-us/news-and-events/full-article/?articleid=1444
GOOD LUCK!
...to all our students competing in Studenthack ( → www.StudentHack.com ) and the Barclays / BBC Tech Challenge, both on Friday this week (31 Oct – Halloween!).
HACK GALLERY.
Following Danielle George’s recent talk on “Hacking your Home”, if you have any interesting hacks involving a lightbulb, telephone or motor that you’d like featured in her BBC Christmas Lectures, you can submit them (deadline this Fri 31 Oct) → http://www.hackgallery.org
AUGMENTED REALITY.
The University’s Digilab people are looking for Augmented Reality demos for their next event on Weds 5 Nov. Contact Ros Bell → https://twitter.com/ros_bell
CREDIT SUISSE CHALLENGE.
Participate in the annual Credit Suisse IT Challenge and showcase your analytical skills. You can win an iPad Air, Amazon vouchers or the chance to meet senior representatives at Credit Suisse in London. Deadline this Fri 31 Oct → http://itchallenge.credit-suisse.com
SOMETHING TO SHARE?
Deadline for the Monday Mail is 17:00 each Friday → toby.howard@manchester.ac.uk
MONDAY MAIL ON THE WEB.
→ http://tinyurl.com/themondaymail
Good morning! It’s Monday 20 October, and it’s Week 5, an A week. Next week is Reading Week, and there won't be any scheduled teaching activities then – it's a chance for you to take a breather. But this week is busy, as you'll see below – so on with today’s news!
Best wishes,
Toby → http://www.cs.man.ac.uk/~toby
SSC.
Voting has now closed and this year's SSC reps have been elected. There'll be a start-up and training meeting for all reps this week, and the first SSC meeting to discuss issues will be announced next week. Meanwhile, if anything concerns you, contact a rep! → http://studentnet.cs.manchester.ac.uk/sscc
OUR RESPONSE TO YOUR FEEDBACK.
We’ve now looked in detail at your Course Unit Evaluation Questionnaires from Semester 2 of last academic year. We take your views seriously, and all the Course Unit lecturers have responded to your comments. Read here → https://wiki.cs.manchester.ac.uk/index.php/US_Response_AY1314_Semester_2
CAREERS FAIR.
Last week’s Careers Fair was a huge success with over 20 companies coming to us looking for the best Computer Science graduates (you!). Thanks to Duncan Hull and Mabel Yau for organising the day, and I hope you found it useful.
CODING DOJO.
The Coding Dojo trials take place this Weds 22 Oct, 14:45-18:00 in Collab (bring a laptop with Java/C/C++). Practice with last year's problems → http://goo.gl/TnYUYL The top 3 coders will be flown to Sweden to represent Manchester. Interested? → gavin.brown@manchester.ac.uk
BBC BARCLAYS TECHNOLOGY CHALLENGE.
Want to enhance your skills and employability? Relish the opportunity to gain insight into the operations of three major organisations? This year's BBC Barclays's Tech Challenge takes place on Friday 31 October. If you’d like to enter a team, contact Duncan Hull by this Thurs 23 Oct → http://www.cs.manchester.ac.uk/about-us/news-and-events/full-article/?articleid=1391
CSSOC HALLOWEEN PUB CRAWL.
Bryn Hanby-Roberts (Y2, CSwIE) and Josh Langley (Y2, CS4wIE) write: Come along to CSSoc's Halloween pub crawl, this Thurs 23 Oct. There'll be prizes for costumes and the like! More details to be posted on the CSSoc page, make sure you're subscribed to keep up to date → http://url.cssoc.co.uk/facebook
GET FEEDBACK ON YOUR EXAMS.
Final call to register for the feedback session for all current Y2 and Y3 students to look at last year’s Y1/Y2 COMP exam answer-books (14:00 Weds 5 Nov in IT407). Email SSO with your name, student ID number and the list of COMP scripts you wish to view. Deadline 12:00 today Monday 20 Oct → compsci-sso@listserv.manchester.ac.uk
UG CAL.
Keep up to date with our handy calendar of UG events. There’s an ics feed → http://goo.gl/FDIXGA and an HTML view → http://goo.gl/2P7UFs
EEE CAREERS FAIR.
The School Electrical and Electronic Engineering (EEE) have their annual careers fair this Weds 22 October 11:00–15:00 in the Renold building (North Campus). Many of the employers are also recruiting computer scientists. Why not have a look?
GOLDMAN SACHS.
This Weds 22 Oct, 13:00–13:45, your opportunity to hear more about careers in Technology at Goldman Sachs and positions at Intern, Work Placement and Graduate level. Presentations from senior, junior and intern Technologists, followed by opportunity for networking, with food and drinks. Sign up → www.goldmansachs.com/careers/campusevents
CRYPTO COMP.
You probably know that Alan Turing worked on early computers here in the University, and that a film about his life, ‘The Imitation Game’ opens soon, starring Benedict Cumberbatch (who studied Drama at this University). StudioCanal and the School of Mathematics are running a cryptography competition to tie in with the film, with great prizes: signed film posters, books, soundtracks, DVD bundles, day passes for Bletchley Park – if you can crack the codes! Deadline to enter the comp is 28 Nov → http://www.maths.manchester.ac.uk/cryptography_competition_the_imitation_game
POSTGRADUATE STUDY.
Interested in PG study? Check out the Postgraduate Open Day this Weds 22 Oct → http://goo.gl/OPEvxI
EQUALITY IN TECH.
ThoughtWorks are hosting an event this Thurs 23 Oct, 18:00–21:00 on the top floor of the City Tower (M1 4BT) on 'The Quest for Gender Equality in Tech'. Free registration → http://info.thoughtworks.com/Ada-Lovelace-Manchester_registration-page
SCHOOL SEMINAR.
This Weds 22 Oct at 14:00 in Kilburn 1.4, Jason Anderson of the University of Toronto will talk about ‘Raising Computational Throughput and Energy Efficiency by Synthesizing Software into FPGA Hardware’ → http://www.cs.manchester.ac.uk/our-research/seminars/
HACKATHON.
On 23-24 Oct at MadLab, Sparta Digital invite you to participate in their exciting hackathon, where you have the opportunity to work alongside local companies to build apps that solve business challenges and could be used alongside next year's Rugby World Cup! In addition to demonstrating your skills and making new contacts with organisations outside the university, the winners will receive a prize of £1000! Register → http://goo.gl/JFr1gi
SOMETHING TO SHARE?
Deadline for the Monday Mail is 17:00 each Friday → toby.howard@manchester.ac.uk
MONDAY MAIL ON THE WEB.
→ http://tinyurl.com/themondaymail
Good morning! It’s Monday 13 October, and it’s Week 4, a B week. I hope things are going well. As you’ll see below, today we’re announcing a new centralised support system for all students. I hope you’ll find it helpful, and I’m very keen to hear your feedback. On with today’s news!
Best wishes,
Toby → http://www.cs.man.ac.uk/~toby
NEW SUPPORT SYSTEM.
Something not working or could do with improving? Thanks to Paul Waring and Chris Page we now have a unified mechanism for reporting issues around the School. Whether it's things like requests to install new software, your Raspberry Pi has exploded, or a problem with the heating, you can get help → http://support.cs.manchester.ac.uk
WIKI GOODNESS.
Speaking of support, have you seen the School’s wiki pages? There’s a huge amount of useful stuff there, growing all the time → https://wiki.cs.manchester.ac.uk/index.php/Main_Page
HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO US!
I mentioned a few weeks ago that this year marks the 50th birthday of the School. We’ve had some special booklets made – you can pick one up from the SSO counter.
SSC VOTING.
Voting for Staff-Student Committee reps is still open in Blackboard. From ‘My Communities’ select ‘UG Community’ then click the SSC Voting folder. Make your vote count! Closing date 12:00 this Friday 17 Oct.
CAREERS FAIR.
The annual Careers Fair takes place on the lower first floor (LF) of Kilburn tomorrow Tues 14 October. There'll be over 20 employers, specifically looking to recruit Computer Scientists from The University of Manchester (in other words, YOU!). Drop by and say hello.
* PASS BLOG. Pass Leader Zac Hamid (Y3, CMwIE) writes: Last week in PASS, some groups got to experience a working Neurosky Mindwave device – it’s a headset that measures brain activity. Read all about it, and much more, on the all-new CS PASS blog → http://cspassmanchester.tumblr.com
CODING DOJO.
The Coding Dojo trials take place next Weds 22 Oct, 14:45–18:00 in Collab (bring a laptop with Java/C/C++). Practice with last year's problems → http://goo.gl/TnYUYL The top 3 coders will be flown to Sweden to represent Manchester → gavin.brown@manchester.ac.uk
CSSOC LASERQUEST.
Bryn Hanby-Roberts (Y2, CSwIE) and Josh Langley (Y2, CS4wIE) write: Laserquest with CSSoc! This Thurs 16 Oct, CSSoc is going to the Trafford centre for 2 games of Laserquest. The arena can only hold 30 people so places are limited. We’re selling tickets in the Byte Cafe Mon-Thurs (£10 per person). We’ll be getting a bus from Kilburn at 18:30 although feel free to meet us at the Trafford Centre. Hope to see you there!
GET FEEDBACK ON YOUR EXAMS.
To register for the feedback session for all current Y2 and Y3 students to look at last year’s Y1/Y2 COMP exam answer-books (14:00 Weds 5 Nov in IT407), email SSO with your name, student ID number and the list of COMP scripts you wish to view. Deadline 12:00 next Monday 20 Oct → compsci-sso@listserv.manchester.ac.uk
QUIET ROOM.
Did you know that we have a quiet study space for all UG students? It’s a great place to get away from the hustle and bustle. It's Room 1.12, and you get to it through the 3rd Year Lab, Room 1.8. It's specifically for quiet, personal study. It’s a noise-free zone.
UG CAL.
Add this handy calendar of UG events to your favourite cal app. There’s an ics feed → http://goo.gl/FDIXGA and an HTML view → http://goo.gl/2P7UFs
WOMEN IN TECH.
IBM and BNY Mellon are hosting this year’s women in technology day in Manchester on Weds 12 November. Free registration until this Fri 17 Oct → http://www.cs.manchester.ac.uk/employability/news/full-article/?articleid=1358
POSTGRADUATE STUDY.
If you’re interested in PG study, check out the Postgraduate Open Day next Weds 22 Oct → http://goo.gl/OPEvxI
CODE FIRST GIRLS.
CodeFirst:Girls ( → http://www.codefirstgirls.org.uk ) offers free coding courses to girls. They’re looking for teaching assistants, typically Computer Science undergraduates with a good knowledge of web development. Interested? → rebekah.mercer@student.manchester.ac.uk
SCHOOL SEMINAR.
This week “Can Computers Change their Minds?” – Professor Alan Bundy from the University of Edinburgh will argue that successful reasoning is dependent on appropriate representation of both knowledge and of successful methods of reasoning, with illustratrations from multi-agent planning and the evolution of theories of physics. This Weds 15 Oct, 14:00, Kilburn L.T. 1.4 → http://www.cs.manchester.ac.uk/our-research/seminars/
LINUX USER GROUP.
The Manchester Linux User Group (MAN-LUG) is looking for volunteers to help with their open day at Madlab (→ http://madlab.org.uk) this coming Sat 18 Oct. Contact Daniel Botting → daniel@manlug.org
SOMETHING TO SHARE?
Deadline for the Monday Mail is 17:00 each Friday → toby.howard@manchester.ac.uk
MONDAY MAIL ON THE WEB.
→ http://tinyurl.com/themondaymail
Best wishes,
Toby → http://www.cs.man.ac.uk/~toby
SSC VOTING.
Voting for Staff-Student Committee reps is now open in Blackboard. From “My Communities” select “UG Community” then click the SSC Voting folder to access the survey. Make your vote count! Closing date 12:00 Friday 17 October.
* PHD SUCCESS. PhD student Kostas Sechidis, supervised by Gavin Brown, collected the prize for Best Student Paper at the European Conference on Machine Learning (ECML). The paper introduces statistical hypothesis testing methodology for positive-unlabelled big data → http://www.cs.man.ac.uk/~sechidik
HARDWARE LIBRARY.
Do you have an interest in hardware? Like to experiment with hardware and software? You can borrow hardware components from the School. We have Arduino boards and shields, Raspberry Pi components and much more → http://studentnet.cs.manchester.ac.uk/ugt/hardware/
CODING DOJO.
The Coding Dojo announces the ACM trials 2014! On Weds 22 October, 14:45 – 18:00 in Collab, there’ll be a variety of a challenging algorithmic problems to enjoy. The top 3 coders in the trials will be flown to Sweden on 28 November to compete in the International ACM Programming Competition. Please bring a laptop to the trials, ready to go with Java/C/C++. All UG students welcome. Any queries about how to get prepared? → gavin.brown@manchester.ac.uk
1-UP.
Petrut Bogdan (Y2, CS4) writes: The student-led Manchester Ultimate Programming group “1-UP” is starting its new year of fun with computers this Weds 8 October at 13:30 in Kilburn LT 1.4, with a talk about hardware design and an introduction to our FPGA projects organised with the help of Dirk Koch ( → http://www.cs.man.ac.uk/~kochd ). Suitable for all years, everyone welcome! See how you can create your own processor or your own awesome visualization of the Mandelbrot set → https://www.facebook.com/groups/manchester.ultimate.programming
OPEN DAY.
We had another very successful Open Day on Saturday. Thanks to everyone who helped!
CSSOC NEWS.
Bryn Hanby-Roberts (Y2, CSwIE) writes: Bowling was a huge success last week, we hope you all enjoyed it! We have nothing scheduled this week so we can meet the new committee, but next week will be huge – we’re organising a trip to the Trafford Centre for Laser Quest.
EXAM FEEDBACK SESSION.
There’ll be a feedback session for all current Y2 and Y3 students to look at last year’s Y1 and Y2 COMP exam answer-books, at 14:00 on Weds 5 November in IT407. Pre-registration required. Email SSO with your name, student ID number and the list of COMP course unit scripts you wish to view. Deadline for registration 12:00 Monday 20 Oct → compsci-sso@listserv.manchester.ac.uk
SHELLSHOCK.
To update your Raspberry Pi to fix the “shellshock” vulnerability → http://www.cs.manchester.ac.uk/study/news/full-article/?articleid=1308
ADA LOVELACE DAY.
Ada Lovelace (1815-1852) was an English mathematician widely regarded as the world’s first computer programmer. The Women in Science Engineering and Technology group is running “Ada Lovelace Day” on Weds 15 Oct, Room G107, Alan Turing Building. There’s talks, refreshments and demos from Robogals ( → www.robogals.org ). Book your place → http://goo.gl/0XzFYq
HOW QUICKLY CAN YOU CHANGE A TYRE?
Shell is offering you the opportunity to change the wheels of a full-scale Ferrari F1 car under timed conditions. This Weds Oct 8, 10:00 – 15:00 outside the Dalton Nuclear Institute, Sackville St. Campus → http://goo.gl/Ft6e7R
* SCHOOL SEMINAR. This week: “Researching User Experience in an IP Broadcasting System”. Dr Mike Evans from BBC Research and Development will talk about his team’s work developing APIs for severely disabled people to control TVs, and will demonstrate the ambient Smart Wallpaper prototype. Weds 9 Oct at 14:00 in Atlas → http://www.cs.manchester.ac.uk/our-research/seminars/
MORGAN STANLEY.
MS invite all interested CS students to their event at the Manchester Museum tomorrow Tues 7 Oct 11:00 – 16:30, and their “tech expo” in London on 22/23 Oct → https://moodle.cs.man.ac.uk/mod/forum/discuss.php?d=26661 and → http://goo.gl/iZUEl3
CALCULATING CAREERS.
The Alan Turing Building is hosting this year’s Calculating Careers Fair this Weds 8 Oct. Many of the employers present are recruiting CS/CM students → http://www.maths.manchester.ac.uk/study/careers/calculating-careers-fair/
VENTURE OUT.
Do you have a great idea for a business? Here’s your chance to win cash prizes to make it a reality. The PZ Cussons Venture Out 2014 ideas competition is for all students across the University. Last year, two students in our School, Radu Nedelcu (CSBMwIE), and Daniel Jamieson (PhD) won £10,500 with their company Biorelate. The launch event is this Weds 8 Oct, 12:00 – 13:00 in Room 10.02, Harold Hankins Building, with lunch and refreshments. Register → http://goo.gl/a5RviN
CREDIT SUISSE CHALLENGE.
Participate in the annual Credit Suisse IT Challenge and showcase your analytical skills. You can win an iPad Air, Amazon vouchers or the chance to meet senior representatives at Credit Suisse in London. Deadline 31 Oct → http://itchallenge.credit-suisse.com
SOMETHING TO ANNOUNCE?
Deadline for submissions to the Monday Mail is 17:00 Friday before the Monday → toby.howard@manchester.ac.uk
CAREERS / COMPS / REPORT ENVIRONMENT ISSUES.
→ http://tinyurl.com/themondaymail
Best wishes,
Toby → http://www.cs.man.ac.uk/~toby
OPEN DAY.
Saturday’s Open Day was a great success with over 150 guests and potential applicants visiting the School to find out who we are and what we do. Thanks to all the UG students who helped with the day.
HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO US.
Did you know that on Wednesday this week the School is 50 years old? (There’s a clue in the photo above!)
PASS STARTS THIS WEEK.
Year 1 PASS meetings start this Weds 1 Oct, 12:00-13:00 – First Year students please go to the Collab to be sorted into your PASS groups. Year 2 PASS starts tomorrow Tues 30 Sep, 12:00-13:00 in Collab with a session about course unit choices, with students from Y3 and beyond talking about their experiences.
SSC.
Nominations for student reps on the UG Staff Student Committee are open. If you’d like to be a rep, email Paul Nutter ( → p.nutter@manchester.ac.uk ) by 12:00 this Friday 3 Oct, including a brief statement (around 50 words) about why you want to be a rep. Once all the nominations are in, there’ll be an online vote for students to elect this year’s reps – details next week.
COURSE UNIT CHOICES.
If you haven’t yet, please finalise and enter your Semester 1 Course Unit choices. Deadline 5pm this Fri 3 Oct → http://studentnet.cs.manchester.ac.uk/ugt/options.php
UG EVENTS CALENDAR.
Add our handy calendar of UG events to your favourite cal app. There’s an ics feed → http://goo.gl/FDIXGA and an HTML view → http://goo.gl/2P7UFs
BOWL WITH CSSOC.
Bryn Hanby-Roberts (Y2, CSwIE) and Josh Langley (Y2, CS4wIE) write: Join CSSoc at All Star Lanes this Weds 1 Oct – we want as many people as we can to come along! We’re meeting outside Kilburn at 18:45 (updates will be posted here → http://url.cssoc.co.uk/bowling14 ). It costs £5 with your Student Card and they have a bar as well. Hope to see you all there!
HACKING YOUR HOME.
Got any hacks or demos you’d like to see showcased by the BBC on national TV? Come along to find out more from Danielle George this Weds 1 Oct at 15:00 in Kilburn LT1.3. Danielle will be talking about her upcoming Christmas Lectures “Sparks will fly: How to hack your home", to be broadcast by the BBC this December → http://www.cs.manchester.ac.uk/about-us/news-and-events/full-article/?articleid=1295
TEXTBOOK FAIR.
PASS Coordinators Sarah King (Y3, CMwIE) and Dan Underwood (Y3, CS) write: want to buy some pre-loved text-books? Come along to the Alan Turing Building, Ground Floor Foyer, this Weds 1 Oct 10:00 - 16:00 to check out the first annual PASS and Peer Mentoring Book Fair!
CS AMBASSADORS.
Why not become an ambassador for computer science? Get involved with STEMNET outreach activities like science fairs and exhibitions, with activities for teachers and schoolchildren. There’s no commitment if you sign up → http://studentnet.cs.manchester.ac.uk/volunteering
• UG AREA ON FRIDAY. This week again there’ll be some LF/Collab disruption on Friday 3 Oct, as part of the preparations and set-up for our second Open Day on Saturday. Apologies for any inconvenience.
TUESDAY MARKET.
Fancy something different for lunch? Every Tuesday 10:00-15:00 in term time, just behind the Kilburn building there’ll be a pop-up market selling locally sourced and produced products like organic coffees, BBQ food, wood-fired pizza, meaty and vegan hot dogs and pies, pulled pork sandwiches, and Burmese curry. If you have a sweet tooth, there’s marshmallows, cake and ice cream too. Something for everyone!
SCHOOL SEMINAR.
This week Professor John Goodacre, Director of Technology and Systems, ARM Ltd., will talk about his career and research interests. Through ARM, John has defined and led the introduction of various new processor technologies, and he will describe his vision for a new generation of computer systems. This Weds 1 Oct at 14:00 in Kilburn LT1.4 → http://www.cs.manchester.ac.uk/our-research/seminars/
CREDIT SUISSE CHALLENGE.
Participate in the annual Credit Suisse IT Challenge and showcase your analytical skills. You can win an iPad Air, Amazon vouchers or the chance to meet senior representatives at Credit Suisse in London. Apply now (deadline 31 Oct) → http://itchallenge.credit-suisse.com
CODING INTERVIEWS.
If you're preparing for a "coding interview" at Facebook, Amazon, Google, or similar, the Kilburn library now has copies of “Cracking the Coding Interview” available through the Student Support Office (SSO). This book provides useful background on how to tackle the technical interviews common in many large tech companies.
SOMETHING TO ANNOUNCE?
If you have something you’d like announcing in the Monday Mail, the deadline for submissions is 17:00 Friday before the Monday → toby.howard@manchester.ac.uk
CAREERS / COMPS / REPORT ENVIRONMENT ISSUES.
→ http://tinyurl.com/themondaymail
Good morning! It’s Monday 22 September, and it’s Week 1A of Semester 1. Teaching starts today. Throughout each semester we alternate Week A's and Week B's, with different timetabled activities according to A and B (→ http://studentnet.cs.manchester.ac.uk/ugt/timetable). The Monday Mail will always remind you which week it is – and this is a Week A.
First year students, I hope you enjoyed Welcome Week. Here you are listening to Steve Pettifer talking about what inspired him to be a Computer Scientist. What inspires YOU? Tell me → toby.howard@manchester.ac.uk
We tried not to overwhelm you with information last week, so if you have any questions, drop into our Student Support Office (SSO, next to lab LF31), or contact your Personal Tutor – they’ll be very happy to help.
OK, on with today’s news...
Best wishes,
Toby → http://www.cs.man.ac.uk/~toby
JOIN CSSOC.
Bryn Hanby-Roberts (Y2, CSwIE) and Josh Langley (Y2, CS4wIE) write: After a hugely successful pub crawl last week, CSSoc are now recruiting! If you want to join the committee and organise this year’s events or just lend a hand, come along to LF15 at 13:00 this Weds 24 Sept. Free food, too! → http://url.cssoc.co.uk/recruitment
PASS STARTS NEXT WEEK.
First year students: please note that your PASS meetings start next week (Week 2B, Monday 29 Sept), not this week. What’s PASS? It’s “Peer-Assisted Study Sessions” – in other words, experienced students mentor newer students. It works fantastically well, so check it out.
PRIZES.
Every year the School awards prizes to UG students who have excelled academically or made significant contributions to the School. Below are just a few of the winners whose prizes were awarded last week by Jim Miles, our Head of School. Clockwise from top left: Ffion Atkinson and George Hadjitofallis (IBM Think Pad Challenge for the best second year group project), Karol Jurasinksi, Richard Hunt, Ettore Torti, Bogdan Stoian, and Petrut Bogdan (Golden Anniversary Prizes for excellence in first year studies). Karol also won the Michael Jealous Memorial Prize for best first year student. Full details of all winners → http://studentnet.cs.manchester.ac.uk/assessment/prizes
TEACHING ASSISTANTS.
What’s in a name? Well, to better reflect what they do, we’ve re-named our “Lab Demonstrators” as “Teaching Assistants (TAs)”. It will take a while for the term “TA” to become the norm, but for now please remember that “Demonstrators” and “TAs” are two terms for the same people!
LADIES WHO CODE.
They’re having their next meet-up tomorrow Tues 23 Sept in SpaceportX (24/26 Lever Street, Manchester M1 1DZ). Jules Coleman will be telling her story: “A former management consultant, I taught myself to code, quit my job and built hassle.com" → http://www.meetup.com/Ladies-Who-Code-Manchester
UG AREA ON FRIDAY.
There’ll be some disruption in the Lower-First Floor (LF) UG area (the open corridor space near LF31, Collabs, Tootill Labs) this coming Friday 26 Sept, as part of the preparations and set-up for the following Saturday’s Open Day. The LF space and all its furniture should be back to normal on Monday.
* WIRING IT UP. Over the summer, Jonathan Heathcote, who graduated from the School in 2013 and is now a PhD student in Steve Furber’s Advanced Processor Technology group, made an amazing time-lapse video of the 4 hours it took him to wire up over 100,000 ARM cores in a massively parallel architecture to simulate the human brain. See Jonathan in action → http://goo.gl/UiIJBg
LINUX USER GROUP.
The Manchester Linux User Group (MAN-LUG) is looking for volunteers to help with their open day at Madlab (→ http://madlab.org.uk) on Sat 18 Oct. If you’d like to help, contact Daniel Botting → daniel@manlug.org
SCHOOL SEMINAR.
Most Wednesday afternoons the School hosts a guest research seminar. This week Duncan Brumby from University College London talks about “Improving everyday interactions with your phone”. Weds 24 Sept at 14:00 in Kilburn LT 1.4. Everyone welcome, especially UG students → http://www.cs.manchester.ac.uk/our-research/seminars/
* PHD PULSARS. Since August this year five new pulsars have been discovered by a team at Jodrell Bank using a new data classifier developed by Rob Lyon, a Computer Science PhD student here in the School’s MLO Research Group. It’s a superb example of the role of Computer Science in modern scientific exploration → http://www.scienceguyrob.com
FREE MUSIC.
In need of some culture? Grab a free student ticket for the Manchester Chamber Concerts Society concert at the Royal Northern College of Music at 19:30 next Monday 29 Sept. Pianists Kathryn Stott and Martin Roscoe play Mozart, Debussy, Rachmaninov and Gershwin → info@chamberconcerts.org
HACK MANCHESTER.
It’s back again on 25/26 October at the Museum of Science and Industry (MOSI). This year’s new challenges have just been posted, and tickets are selling fast at £10 each. Lots of current & former student teams from the University will be participating → http://www.hackmanchester.com
MANCHESTER RASPBERRY JAM.
Calling all Pi lovers! The 23rd Manchester Jam is Saturday 11 October; tickets are available now → http://mcrraspjam23.eventbrite.co.uk
STUDENTHACK.
It’s back. The Halloween 2014 edition is happening from 31 October to 2 November at the new Autotrader HQ in Manchester City Centre. Tickets are being released in batches, with the next round available from next Sunday 28 September → http://www.studenthack.com
BAR CAMP MANCHESTER.
This is an “unconference” where all 200 attendees are encouraged to participate in delivering two whole days of tech talk and geekery on 18/19 October at SpacePortX . Free tickets going quickly → http://barcampmanchester.co.uk/
CAREERS / COMPS / REPORT ENVIRONMENT ISSUES.
→ http://tinyurl.com/themondaymail
Best wishes,
Toby → http://www.cs.man.ac.uk/~toby
TIMETABLES.
This is Welcome Week. Lectures start next week (Week 1). The timetable for Welcome Week is special, so please have a look and make sure you know what’s going on → http://studentnet.cs.manchester.ac.uk/ugt/2014/timetable/welcomeweek.phpNEW FOR 2014.
We’ve been busy over the summer! We hope you like the new furniture in LF and in the labs. We’ve created a new lab specially for iOS & OS X development, and there’ll be a new teaching space/COLLAB on the ground floor. Both of these will be opening soon.STUDENT FEEDBACK.
This year the School scored a record 93% satisfaction rating in the National Student Survey, voted by final year UG students, making us the top-ranked School in the Faculty of Science here at the University. We take the student experience very seriously, and always want your feedback. We’ll soon be launching this year’s Staff-Student Committee, in a new format which we hope will be more effective than ever. Details soon.LOOKING FOR INFO ABOUT THE SCHOOL?
Bookmark the UG homepage → http://studentnet.cs.manchester.ac.uk/ugt/BACK FROM IE.
If you’re returning from your year out on Industrial Experience – welcome back! You’ll need to know about the major IT changes the School made a year ago → https://wiki.cs.manchester.ac.uk/index.php/It.changesMICRO AIR SUCCESS.
Congratulations to Kirill Kldiashvili (CM, Y3), Antonio Sanchez Gomez (Y2, CSMBwIE) and Davide Vitelaru (Y4, SE4) who were sponsored by the School to attend the International Conference on Micro Air Vehicles in August in Delft. They did very well, coming 7th out of 13, beating several international groups. They’ll be doing a talk for UGs later this semester. In the photo are Kirill, second from left, and Antonio third from right. → http://imavs.org/2014/
CREDIT SUISSE SUCCESS.
Congratulations to Tom Robinson (Y4, CS4) who won First Prize in the Credit Suisse IT Challenge, and to Miljan Martic (graduated 2014, CS) who won 3rd Prize. Why not try for the 2014 challenge? → http://itchallenge.credit-suisse.com/challenge.htmlACADEMIC ACHIEVEMENT AWARDS.
Nicholas Garner (Graduated 2014, CS) won one of the University's very prestigious Outstanding Academic Achievement Awards. Well done Nicholas!BCS PROJECT AWARD.
And congratulations to Sarah Thomas (graduated 2014, CBA) who won a BCS scholarship of £25,000 to undertake training as a schoolteacher specialising in Computer Science. Sarah was one of 4 students who did their 3rd Year projects in collaboration with local schools. Alex Webb (graduated 2014, CSwIE), who developed Raspberry Pi and robotics teaching activities for schools, won the best project prize. Below: the school-based project students (L to R) Nick Melia, Sarah Thomas, Alex Webb, Lizzy Hamer, together with Duncan Hull, who supervised the projects.
HACK WIN.
Congratulations to (below, L to R) Grzegorz Jacenkow (Y2, CSBMwIE), Victor Rodrigues (Y2, CSwIE), Bartlomiej Siemieniuk (Y2, SE4) and Mark Larah (Y3, CS4), who won the AngelHack hackathon back in June, and were invited by AngelHack to take part in their accelerator programme, to launch a startup. → http://www.angelhack.com
HACK MANCHESTER.
It’s back again on the 25/26 October at the Museum of Science and Industry (MOSI). This year’s new challenges have just been posted, and tickets are selling fast at £10 each. Lots of current & former student teams from the University will be participating → http://www.hackmanchester.comSTUDENTHACK.
The Halloween 2014 edition is happening from 31 October to 2 November at the new Autotrader HQ in Manchester City Centre. Tickets are being released in batches, with the next round available from 28 September → http://www.studenthack.comBAR CAMP MANCHESTER.
This is an “unconference” where all 200 attendees are encouraged to participate in delivering two whole days of tech talk and geekery on 18/19 October at SpacePortX Manchester (city centre). Free tickets going quickly → http://barcampmanchester.co.uk/WATCH THE SKIES.
Jodrell Bank Observatory (did you know it's part of the University?), home to one of the largest radio telescopes in the world, is being transformed into a massive outdoor cinema as part of the Abandon Normal Devices (AND) Festival on 3 & 4October. Tickets for night-time scifi screenings of 2001: A Space Odyssey and Alien are on sale now → http://www.andfestival.org.uk/events/watch-the-skies-2/CAREERS / COMPS / REPORT ENVIRONMENT ISSUES.
→ http://tinyurl.com/themondaymail