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12/11/08
Optimising Code Dr Des Watson, Department of Informatics, University
of Sussex
Code optimisation is, and always has been, a key aspect of compiler
technology. Generating high quality code is the aim, but what does high
quality actually mean? This talk included a brief introduction to
some of the main technologies for code optimisation, before looking at the
effectiveness of some of today's techniques and asking why some of the more
powerful algorithms can be exceedingly nasty. Consequently, it addressed
the issue of whether aggressive optimisation is worth worrying about, primarily
in the context of developing code for embedded systems. A PDF
version of this presentation is available.15/10/08
Audio-Visual Conferencing and its Implications for SMEs Giorgio Bragoli & Neil Johnstone, Technilink
IT Ltd
Audio-visual conferencing was once seen as in the remit of the global
corporate companies who had large conference rooms with big digital
cameras and plasma screens. It was used on intranets to connect geographically
dispersed sites together at times which had to be booked in advance
so that everyone who needed to attend could free up their calendars
to do so. With advances in technology audio-visual conferencing has
now reached the desk top. This opens up a whole new realm of possibilities
for SMEs who can now enjoy the advantages of less need to travel to
customer sites and not having to deal with the associated cost of
travel expenses and wasted travel time as well as the reduced carbon
foot print. This talk aimed to promote the use of the audio-visual
conferencing by showing its generic features, putting them in the
context for the SMEs, and explaining how they could be used to reduce
over-head cost.17/09/08
Community Action for Climate Change and Carbon Management Issues Jeff Moine, Bob Crooks, Conrad Taylor & Keith Taylor
It is generally recognised that anybody with senior management and
political responsibility should be active in climate change and carbon management
issues. Introduced by Roy Newell, this workshop had presentations from specialists
in the environmental and geospatial fields. The purpose of the event was
to promote awareness and understanding of the issues, and to consider ways
for the Sussex community to work together in developing action strategies
for effective and efficient responses to the challenges outlined in the
presentations. The presentations were:
14/05/08
The BCS Current Activities and Achievements Rachel Burnett, President of the BCS
Our Society has many varied activities and current achievements, supporting
an IT profession which is vital to today’s society. Rachel highlighted some specific illustrations of these. The ongoing
programme for raising professionalism in IT is focused on the successful
application of IT for business change and for the benefit of society.
In our Learned Society and Knowledge Services work, we are developing
and disseminating IT knowledge to the professional, business, education
and research communities, users and organisations.Our Forums each represent an area of strategic interest for the BCS and the IT profession, often working with other highly regarded academic and professional institutions, ensuring that our IT expertise and experience is taken into account by Government and regulatory bodies, and others. These activities underpin our continuous efforts to meet our Royal Charter object of promoting the study and practice of computing for the benefit of the public. A Powerpoint version of this presentation is available. 16/04/08
'Newyorkyo to Dubainghai' Alan Edgecombe, Kisdata
Imagine if distance disappeared. And remote files and applications
could be opened up to 100 times faster. It’s possible by utilising
Wide Area Data Services. Would you like to collaborate between offices across
town or around the globe as if they were in the same room? By reducing network
traffic up to 95%, the impossible becomes possible, just like that. Alan
gave us a presentation on WDS on a reasonably technical, non-commercial
non-sales basis, explaining what it can do for an organisation with NO changes
to an organisations existing infrastructure. The talk concluded with a demonstration
of the equipment. A Powerpoint
version of this presentation is available.12/03/08
Build an Online Booking Programme in an Hour with Grails/Java Dr Peter Lappo, Systematic Methods Research Ltd
Convention over configuration is the principle behind Grails and its
Ruby equivalent, Rails, which enable web applications to be built
quickly and easily. In this session, Peter built an on-line conference
booking application in an hour. It was inspired by the Sussex Branch’s
need to have a booking application for our conference celebrating
the 50th Anniversary of the BCS.Grails is a framework that relies on programming conventions to achieve its aim of quick and easy web development thus reducing the need for much “glue” code or configuration files. Grails is written in the Groovy scripting language which in turn runs on a Java Virtual Machine and is a compiled scripting language for efficiency. As a result Groovy can efficiently utilise the full power of the Java platform by easily integrating a large number of Java libraries. Code examples and a Powerpoint version of this presentation are available. 13/02/08
Beyond Just The Website Desmond Bokšan-Cullen, CPLUS IT Services
The term usability is often referred to by IT professionals when discussing
website design. Whilst it is true that websites should be constructed
using usability and accessibility features, the term usability is
much more that just websites. Many companies have excellent websites,
but use forms that are difficult to read and understand. Graphical
User Interfaces (GUIs) are often notorious for their bad usability
and one of the most used computer terminals often has a GUI that is
difficult to read, understand and interact with, this being the Automated
Teller Machine (ATM) or cash-point machine.Des showed how best practice can be applied across the IT environment together with some real GUI/website 'Chamber of Horrors'. Des also distinguished between Accessibility and Usability in IT. |
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Events Diary
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