BCS Oxfordshire

April 25, 2013 @ 1:00 pm – 2:30 pm

BMW Mini Plant, Oxford, Oxfordshire OX4 6NL

100 Years of Car Production in Oxford

We have a special guided tour of the Mini production plant as 2013 marks the 100th year of car production in Oxford. Each car is individually produced to the customer’s precise specification using advanced engineering and computing technology.

Registration is required. Please visit the tour page for more information.

Follow the MINI convoy as it travels to eight former classic Mini production locations across Europe starting 13 March 2013.

21 March at St John’s College, Oxford

The event is intended to improve the dialogue between practitioners, researchers and policy-makers in the broad area of ‘digital economy’ developments.

If you’d like to attend, click here to complete the registration form. Number are limited, so please do this soon.

The visit to ECMWF was scheduled to start with a short introduction about ECMWF, the Computer infrastructure used at ECMWF and a guided tour to the computer hall where all the supercomputers used by ECMWF reside.

Manfred Kloeppel started by introducing ECMWF as an independent intergovernmental organisation currently consisting of 37 Member and Co-Operating states. Established in 1975, ECMWF’s original goal defined by a Convention is to provide medium-range weather forecast to member and co-operating states twice daily and up to 10 days ahead. Each day, more than 300 million observational data elements are collected round the clock by a variety of Earth observing systems, including satellites, automatic and manned stations, aircrafts, ships, weather balloons and buoys. The production of a medium-range weather forecast (up to 15 days ahead) consists of four key requirements: a state-of-the-art data assimilation and analysis system, sophisticated weather prediction models, a constantly updated database of global weather observations and ultra-powerful computers.

ECMWF is not known to the general public because their key customers are the government’s environment department such as the Met Offices of Member and Co-Operating states. ECMWF will typically provide the numerical forecast data to the UK Met Office (or equivalent of the Member or Co-Operating states) and the UK Met Office will apply their weather forecast model to ECMWF’s data and then disseminate the results to the general public via news weather reports, Met Office website etc. Some Member or Co-Operating states do not have their own weather forecast model so they will then just circulate ECMWF’s numerical forecast in their appropriate medium.

Isabella Weger, Head of Computer Division spoke into detail about the need for high compute power to process complex data algorithms being applied to 300 million varieties of data from different sources to come up with the 15-day medium-range forecast.

ECMWF’s High Performance Computing Facility (HCPF) currently consists of two identical IBM Supercomputer 1600 clusters. Each one is based on 272 IBM pSeries p6-575 compute servers interconnected by a low latency high-speed network. The HPCFs have a ~17,400 total number of processes, 330 TFlops Peak Performance and a Sustained performance of ~20TFlops.

ECMWF’s forecast products are disseminated over Regional Meteorological Data Communications Network (RMDCN). The main aim is to provide a network infrastructure for both the connections between ECMWF and its Member and Co-Operating States. The Supercomputers have a 50% resource allocation to Research, 25% for Operational forecasts and another 25% allocated to Member States for any activities they wish to perform.

Alison set the scene by promising us stories to illustrate the points she wanted to make that: data, information and personal knowledge form the main areas of an organisation’s Knowledge Management content. She discussed the costs to the organisation of information not being readily available (the story of “the lost document”), of duplication between departments (“duplication, duplication, duplication”) and of not having the full facts before making decisions (“if only we’d known ….”).

Whilst technology has a central place in the management and dissemination of knowledge in many organisations, there are other methods of knowledge sharing which can be encouraged, or otherwise. She said it could be unclear which department or company function was best placed or indeed held responsible for KM and gave examples where HR, IT or accounts took that responsibility. Alison suggested it was important to spot opportunities for cross organisational links or getting people to talk across hierarchical boundaries. If such sharing is not part of the culture any change would need sponsors, champions or a community of practice to be set up to encourage the organisation to value collaboration, learning and innovation.

Alison used quotes, cartoons and video clips to enliven the presentation and amuse as well as inform the audience.

The evening was finished with a very enjoyable trip to the Lamb and Flag where the subject discussion continued.

Alison’s slides are available in the Meeting Downloads section.

From left to right:
Mr Frampton, Peter Marshall, Undergraduate Programme Lead for the under-graduate programmes of the Department of Computing and Communication Technologies, Paul Oliver, Sheila Lloyd Lyons, Ian Peter Frampton,
Nigel Crook, Head of Department, Department of Computing and Communication Technologies, and Mrs Frampton.

Each year the British Computer Society recognises the efforts of students at Oxford Brookes through the presentation of prizes in the area of computing. The 2012 winners are Paul Oliver and Ian Peter Frampton.

The British Computer Society (BCS) Prize

(awarded for the best results by a first year student in a computing subject)

BSc Mobile Computing

Prize Awarded: student membership plus certificate

Student: Paul Oliver

From left to right:
Paul Oliver, Sheila Lloyd Lyons and Nigel Crook

"It was a great surprise to hear that I had won this award. I feel honoured and proud to have received it. I am determined to achieve the best results I can on my degree course in Mobile Computing and this award gives me even greater motivation to succeed. I am enjoying my studies at Oxford Brookes where there is a great mix of young and mature students."

— Paul Oliver

The British Computer Society (BCS) Project Prize

(awarded for the best final year project in a computing subject)

BSc Computer Science

Prize Awarded: £150 plus certificate

Student: Ian Peter Frampton

From left to right:
Ian Frampton, Sheila Lloyd Lyons and Nigel Crook 

"To be recognised by such an established institution as the BCS is an honour of the highest accord. I was able to use everything I had learnt in my previous 3 years both at Brookes and also whilst on placement to produce this project and for me this is the culmination of 3 years of effort to produce the final outcome. I owe a great amount of gratitude to both the staff (both teaching staff and support staff) and also the BCS in recognising my work and also the effort put in to produce it. This is an accolade which I will talk proudly of for many years to come and it has made the late evenings and early mornings very much worthwhile.

I am now starting the next stage in my career as a Graduate Developer for Golfbreaks.com and I am very much looking forward to making the next steps in my career. Oxford Brookes have provided me with an ideal toolkit filled with skills and ideas, which is testament to the fantastic staff and services which have proven invaluable to me. Thank-you again for the gift and award and I will talk proudly about my achievements for many years to come."

— Ian Peter Frampton

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17 May 2012 – Prof. Joel Ouaknine, University of Oxford

Professor Ouaknine gave an extremely enjoyable talk on Automated Verification, and the theoretical underpinning of the subject. Although a highly technical area, the presentation covered a potentially difficult subject in a way which was accessible to non-specialists, and was appreciated by the large audience. The combination of theory and practice showed how the body of theoretical work could be translated into concrete engineering achievements. Examples were provided from work with industrial partners in the automotive and avionics sectors. It was definitely a session which got the "grey matter" working.

We had a very successful visit to the Museum of Computing in Swindon, with 24 attendees, and everyone had a very enjoyable time.

Jeremy Holt, the chairman, gave us some history of the Museum: t was the first physical Museum of its kind in the UK dedicated to the history of computing. This was followed by Simon Webb (the curator) giving us a tour of the current exhibits. The exhibits are changed regularly either using items from its vast store room, or provided by individual collectors.

The exhibits we saw included:

• The evolution of calculators from log tables to electronic calculators, through mechanical devices and slide rules,
• the development of the "home" computer from 1970 onwards,
• the development of the PC, and Apple Mac systems

Many of these were accessible to "hands on" usage. Do you remember typing Basic programs into a BBC Micro Model B machine?

Their most recent specialist exhibition related to gaming, and showed the evolution of "games machines" over the last 35 years, and again there was the opportunity to play many of these.

The Museum also runs a Saturday Club for children, which is actively supported, and they have a significant waiting list.

I would encourage everyone who could not make it with us to visit on their own. The Museum is open Fridays and Saturdays. Further information can be found at their web site: www.museum-of-computing.org.uk/

On 18 October, 2011, Sheila Lloyd Lyons of the Oxfordshire Branch of BCS had the great pleasure of presenting Joshua Kilburn with the award of Best Results by a First Year Student. The presentation of the award was done at Oxford Brookes with Nigel Crook, Head of the Department of Computing and Communications Technologies, in attendance.

From left to right: Sheila Lloyd Lyons, Joshua Kilburn, Nigel Crook

"Receiving this prize from the BCS was a great honour and something that was totally unexpected.  During my first year I was determined to do as well as I could and with the high standards of teaching at Oxford Brookes I was able to achieve the grades I did."

– Joshua Kilburn

After the presentation Nigel hosted Sheila and Joshua to a gorgeous lunch at the Brookes University restaurant. The restaurant, run by the students, is open to the public. Sheila found the menu to be imaginative and the food absolutely delicious.

13th October 2011: Ian Hughes, Director, Feeding Edge Limited

Following our short Annual General Meeting, Ian Hughes (known as ePredator online), Metaverse Evangelist, talked about how computer games and virtual worlds are changing the way that we look at technology and the way that we communicate in business. Ian writes an entertaining blog at www.feedingedge.co.uk/blog and is Chair of the BCS Animation and Games Development Specialist Group.

Ian explained that for the last few years, he has mostly worked as consultant online in a virtual workplace. Anything else now seems strange to him. He is also the resident ‘Super Geek’ on the TV programme Cool Stuff Collective currently showing on ITV1 on Saturday mornings.

Ian pointed out that most people now play games of all sorts and Gamification is a recognised way to make technology more engaging. Gaming and virtual worlds are also big business. The server side of WoW consists of 20,000 computers, 1.3 petabytes of storage, 75,000 CPU cores, 5.5 million lines of code and 2 million words of text. Second Life’s in-game user-to-user economic activity totalled $567 million in 2009.

We can use this type of technology to improve the effectiveness of what we do and to make it a richer and more memorable experience. For example, the user experience of Second Life can be far superior to that of telephone and video conferencing. We should not regard these technologies as just for amusement; they can help people learn, they can be used to effectively get across messages and can greatly assist the creative process. Ian encouraged us all to embrace these technologies, as otherwise we will be left behind by young people who understand what is possible now and in the future.

It was with great pleasure that we were able to present to Stephen Drain the BCS Prize for Best Final Year Project at the Oxford Brookes University School of Technology graduation ceremonies. Stephen graduated with a BSc (Hons) in Network Computing and was presented the award by Sheila Lloyd Lyons of the Oxfordshire branch of BCS.

"It is a privilege to receive this award from an organisation such as the BCS and I am grateful for the recognition of my academic achievement during my time at Oxford Brookes which this brings. An achievement that I would not have accomplished without the excellent teaching and support network in place at Oxford Brookes." – Stephen Drain

Dr James Anderson’s talk on Extreme Parallel Computing – The Man, Machine and the Maths behind it was well attended with many new faces. James explained the problems for computing resulting from the exceptions that occur in conventional mathematics, such as the inability to divide by zero, and put forward the alternative approach of transreal arithmetic. This concept enabled pipelining of entire programs which is significantly more efficient than conventional parallel processing in terms of the throughput of repetitive calculations. James has been able to demonstrate this through a proof of concept machine and simulator, and is now seeking investment to build prototype machines with a power in excess of today’s super-computers but at a fraction of the price. Plus they don’t crash!

James managed both to challenge our thinking and to show that maths can be fun! After many penetrating questions from the floor, which James answered with real enthusiasm and humour, he left the audience enthralled by the possibilities that this enabled.

The slides can be found on www.bookofparagon.com/Mathematics/ExtremeParallelComputing.pdf

A good evening and we all enjoyed the sandwiches etc. especially the strawberries and cream and pinot grigio, a special treat as it’s June and the last meeting of our 2010-11 season.

10th March 2011 – Cryptography: From Black Art to Popular Science, Part 2 – Professor. Fred Piper, University of London

Prof. Fred Piper returned to lead us again through the intricate and fascinating world of Cryptography. This talk was a follow up to Part 1 which was our Christmas lecture for 2009. Fred reprised the basics of cryptography presented previously but then went on to explore a little more detail on the key aspects of the technology involved.

Fred yet again proved what an engaging and amusing speaker he is on this complex subject on which he has been employed for virtually his entire professional career, making the subject much more accessible to the layman. Difficult concepts began to make a lot more sense and triggered the imagination as to what future developments in this arena might be used in future real world applications. Anecdotes and amusing stories from his experience and from those of many well known technology theorists flowed throughout.

Subjects included in Fred’s talk were:

• The basic concept of secrecy & confidentially
• Secure channels & early cipher system definitions
• Strong and weak algorithms & potential threats & attacks
• The Enigma machine, military use & early Polyalphabetic ciphers
• Enabling factors in the development of cryptography and attacks on cryptographic implementations
• Historical attitudes to its use and development
• Social threats and legislative control
• Human rights
• Details on popular current cryptographic techniques
• New directions in cryptography

Because Fred had so much he wanted to impart from his many years as a leading light in the world of Cryptography, the audience was entirely left feeling the need for what would be a very welcome return for a Part 3 at some time in the future!

The slides from Prof. Pipers’ talk are available from the download area of our Web Site.