CENTRE FOR APPLIED INTERNET RESEARCH
Newsletter January-March 2004 (Vol. 1, No. 1)
Computing researchers in the Centre for Applied Internet Research (CAIR) are as busy as usual these days. Following on from successful conference presentations by Fatima Mansour, John McGinn and Dr. Rich Picking in recent months, members of the group will be giving six papers at national and international conferences in March and there is news of other success to report.
CAIR leader, Dr. Vic Grout, has returned from a trip to Guadeloupe in the French Caribbean, where he presented two papers: ‘A Self-Partitioning Link-State Routing Protocol’ and ‘The Minimal Connector Problem for Wireless Networks’ at the third IEE/IEEE International Conference on Networking (ICN’04) from 1st-4th March. The conference included over 160 papers from more than 30 countries and was attended by some of the world’s most senior networking researchers (and Vic). A number of useful contacts were established or renewed.
Stuart Cunningham will be leaving for Portugal shortly to present his work, ‘Suitability of MusicXML as a Format for Computer Music Notation and Interchange’ at the IADIS International Conference on Applied Computing in Lisbon from 23rd-26th March. IADIS (the International Association for the Development of the Information Society) is one of the prime movers and shakers in the eWorld so Stuart is certain to find the trip very worthwhile!
However, he will barely have time to draw breath before racing back to the UK to catch the BCS/CPHC conference on Grand Challenges in Computing Education (29th-31st March). Here, with co-author Rich Hebblewhite, their paper, ‘Computing for the New Generation’, will form a significant part of a theme on current and projected programme structure for computing courses. The British Computer Society (BCS) in conjunction with the Council of Professors and Heads of Computing (CPHC) will use the conference to formulate professional strategy for the years ahead. Computing staff await their feedback with interest!
At the same time as this, Vic Grout will be in Lancaster presenting two further papers, ‘Scope and Resolution in Local Search Optimisation’ and ‘Complexity and Performance Issues in the Re-Ordering of Internet Access Control Lists’, at the fifth International Combinatorial Optimisation Conference (CO 2004) from 28th-31st March. John McGinn is co-author on the second paper and he and Vic have also had to turn down a trip to Florida to present a paper at the seventh INFORMS Telecommunications Conference due to these other commitments!
CAIR members may be hoping for a relaxing April but there’s not much chance of that! A number of other works are in the pipeline and new ideas are emerging all the time. Also, the recent ‘Awayday’ to St. Deniol’s Library in Harwarden was hailed as a great success and another is planned for 23rd April. The idea behind these trips is to get all active and potential researchers together, away from the distractions of everyday routines and let the creative juices flow … and flow they have if recent events are anything to go by: John Davies and Vic Grout already have presentations to prepare for the fourth BCS/IEE International Network Conference (INC 2004) in Plymouth in July!
The latest in the CAIR series of seminars has also gone down well with John McGinn and Dr. Rich Picking giving a presentation of ‘Using Metaphors in Information Visulation’ and Wez Edwards sharing his ideas on ‘Social Modelling and Simulation’. John and Rich’s work, which includes ‘DAVE’ (the Decision and Argumentation Visualisation Explorer) has already been well-received at conference and Wez’s proposals should form the basis of a promising MPhil/PhD project. These short lunchtime sessions provide a valuable and appreciated vehicle for placing CAIR’s work before a wider audience. Further sessions are planned for the months ahead.
Finally, one of last years collaborative students, Artur Wilkowski from Poland, has just been awarded his MSc in Mathematics and Information Science from the University of Technology in Warsaw. Artur’s project, forming the basis of his final dissertation, was conducted at NEWI so we are all delighted with his success.
Further information about CAIR can be found at http://www.newi.ac.uk/computing/research.
Details of all recent CAIR activity and copies of most material can be found at http://www.newi.ac.uk/computing/research/school.htm.