Officer Elections 2009/2010

Congratulations to our new officers! Based on the online votes cast, Raymond Le Grand is the new club president. Joey Rich is now the club's vice president and Tricia Landers is the club secretary. Samuel Clark has been selected as the new secretary. I will be passing the official torch soon. Look forward to many great things from them next year.

-Chris Fallin, outgoing president

Spring 2009 Programming Contest Results

We concluded our biannual programming contest this afternoon with three winners: Sam Banina in first, Tommy Walton in second and Tricia Landers in third. Results can be found here; more information, including the problem set and reference solutions, is here. Thanks to all who came!

Former ND ACM member Jeff Smith appears in Microsoft commercial

ND ACM is proud to pass on an interesting bit of news -- Jeff Smith, an ND CSE '07 grad and a former member of ND ACM, as well as a consistent member of our regional programming contest team, appears in Microsoft's latest commercial in the "I'm a PC" series, viewable here. Jeff appears in the server room about 10 seconds into the ad. He's a member of the Windows Networking team at Microsoft, where he has worked since graduation.

Fall 2008 Programming Contest Results

We held our biannual ND Fall Programming Contest this afternoon, Sunday, September 21, in the Fitz Linux cluster. Six teams competed, working with a set of six problems over a three-hour span. Results are here, and more information can be found here. We have determined the team members that will travel to Michigan in November for the Regional Programming Contest: Chris Fallin, Joey Schmitt, Matt Prelee, Sam Banina, Tommy Walton and Patrick Braga-Henebry. Congratulations to all who participated for an excellent showing!

Special Guest Speaker - Software Engineering

A visiting guest speaker on software engineering is coming to Notre Dame on the first Monday back from spring break!

• Monday, March 10, 2008
• 3:00 PM
• Debartolo 126
• Dr. Andrian Marcus, Wayne State University,
  speaking about software engineering
• Refreshments will be served!

Dr. Marcus will present an overview of the software development and evolution process, as well as go into some detail regarding his research. This would potentially be very relevant for many of you if you are going to do anything with software in industry or academia, or are just interested in learning more about the software development process.

AFTER the talk (around 4:30 or 4:45), ACM members (that's you) are invited adjourn to a special session in the engineering student lounge (217 Cushing) for a smaller, less formal, more technical Q & A with Dr. Marcus. Free dinner will be served at this portion.

Feel free to come to one of both of these events whenever you're free!

Dr. Marcus's research interests include:

• Software Development and Evolution
• Program Understanding and Software Visualization
• Software Analysis and Metrics
• Cognitive Models of Software Development Processes

This event is jointly sponsored by the ND student chapters of ACM (Computer Club) and the Upsilon Pi Epsilon honor society.

Speaker on Data Mining

Dave Cieslak, a computer science Ph.D. student at Notre Dame, gave an interesting talk on data mining and its applicaitons to the ND ACM chapter on Wednesday, January 23, 2008 at 6:00 PM.

"Detecting Fractures in Classifier Performance," a paper by Dave and Dr. Nitesh Chawla, was recently selected as the Best of the IEEE International Conference on Data Mining.

2007 ACM East Central Regional Contest

ND ACM sponsored two teams to represent Notre Dame at the ACM East Regional Programming Contest in Ann Arbor, Michigan on November 10, 2007. Both Notre Dame teams provided an impressive showing, with Irish Blue placing 11th and Irish Gold placing 26th overall among 91 university teams in the region.

Irish Blue consisted of Dan Dugovic, Chris Fallin, and Joey Schmitt. Irish Gold consisted of Pavan Sadarangani, Sam Banini, and Raymond Le Grand.

Fall 2007 Programming Contest Results, Photos

Our biannual Programming Contest was held on Sunday, October 7, 2007 in the Fitzpatrick Hall Linux Cluster (room 148). The contest was run in a PC² environment using Knoppix LiveCDs on Hewlett-Packard xw4100 Workstations. Teams werre afforded two hours to answer as many of the seven contest questions as possible. Rankings were determined based on the number of problems solved and the total cumulative time consumed in solving problems.

The final standings can be viewed here. Also, check out the photo gallery for the contest. The contest problem set is available on the programming contests section of this site.

The contest questions were written by Chris Fallin. Nick Schott organized the logistics of the event. Chris set up the contest environment, with some assistance from Dan Dugovic.

Video Game Night a Smashing Success!

Our first ever Video Game Night was ineffably amazing. Over thirty students attended the event, which was held in the Engineering Student Lounge. We had several Xbox 360, Wii, PlayStation 2, and GameCube systems setup on three TVs and two 6' X 6' projector screens. DDR was played using arcade-quality pads. Those in attendance enjoyed free pizza, pop, and chips, and played games for prizes as well as just for fun.

The winners of the tournaments were:

• Super Smash Brothers - John Meehan
• Guitar Hero II - Joey Schmitt
• DDR Max - Dan Dugovic
• Halo - Dan Myers

 

Each of these winners received a Best Buy gift card, as well as bragging rights and gamer glory.

See you at the second annual Video Game Night next year!

CRC Responees to ND ACM Computer Club Questions

In March, Dr. Ed Bensman and the ND Center for Research Computing hosted our club for a presentation and question and answer session. (See details on the event below on this page.) Dr. Bensman has provided detailed follow-up responses to questions raised at the presentation. Here are the questions and responses:

 

1. ND ACM Question: Is there a way to run resource-intensive, interactive applications remotely with X term that provides for increased responsiveness?
   
   CRC response: Your best bet here continues to be the cluster machines in Fitzpatrick Hall. We have previously investigated the use of applications servers for such tasks, but there are systematic issues with satisfying a varied customer base with differing needs. CRC will make note of this and may incorporate a possible solution into future acquisitions.
   


2. ND ACM Question: Is there a way to see what users/how many users are utilizing a remote machine before starting an ssh session? Also, is there a way to see a list of workstations available for an ssh session and how many users are signed onto each workstation?
   
   CRC Response: attached [click here] is a file listing all clustered servers throughout the campus. Also, here is a tool to monitor the status of the Condor pool, which contains most (if not all), of the servers in the Fitz clusters: link
   


3. ND ACM Question: Is it possible to view/obtain a map of the locations of all hidden cellular access points on campus?
   
   CRC Response: at this time neither CRC nor OIT have such a map.
   


4. ND ACM Question: Is it possible to obtain more licenses for MATLAB to accommodate more users at peak usage times?
   
   CRC Response: as was addressed at the talk, we recently purchased over 100 additional MATLAB licenses for the campus. These licenses tend to get maximized when class projects are due or toward the end of the semester. In purchasing licenses we have to strike a balance between the need during peaks and during break periods. To ensure availability of licenses, students are encouraged not to wait to begin working on projects that involve the use of MATLAB.
   


5. ND ACM Question: The possibility of obtaining CRC user accounts for interested Computer Club members was also discussed. I understand that this would allow those interested to submit batch jobs to the CRC's powerful machines for processing, as well as provide for remote storage and other features.
   
   CRC Response: to obtain an account with the CRC, send an email to CRCsupport@nd.edu along with your name, your netID, your sponsor and his/her netID. State the purpose for which you wish to have an account and the duration (for the semester, until graduation, etc.)
   


6. ND ACM Question: At the meeting, it was also mentioned that the presentation slides may be made available for online access and archiving purposes. I'd be glad to post such materials on the Computer Club website if you like.
   
   CRC Response: slides are attached to this email. Feel free to post them. [link to slides]

ND Center for Research Computing Presentation Was Fascinating and Impressive

The presentation by the ND Center for Research Computing (CRC) for the ND ACM Computer Club was held on Friday, March 23, 2007 at 4:00 PM at the ND Information Technology Center. A good deal of unique work goes on at the CRC; it was a fascinating, impressive, and worthwhile presentation.

The presentation involved Dr. Edward Bensman, High Performance Computing Engineer, and other CRC staff members providing an overview of the CRC's main functionality and facilities. Dr. Bensman and his colleagues also answered a number of CRC- and OIT-related questions raised by the students in attendance.

The event was held in the access facility for the CRC's Video Access Grid, which has state-of-the-art videoconferencing equipment. Those in attendance were able to see a demo of this equipment at work, which was quite an impressive display.

The CRC's resources also include an internationally ranked supercomputing cluster, located off campus. The presentation included viewing realtime images of these facilities via remote webcams. These resources are part of the Northwest Indiana Computational Grid, which is in turn part of the international Open Science Grid Consortium.

The ND ACM Computer Club would like to thank Dr. Dewitt Latimer, Chief Technology Officer and Deputy CIO, Office of Information Technologies and Interim Director of the CRC; Dr. Edward Bensman, High Performance Computing Engineer, Office of Chief Technology Officer; Jeff Miller, Manager of Academic Media Resources, Educational Technologies; and In-Saeng Suh, High Performance Computing Engineer, Operations and Engineering, who welcomed us into their facility, demonstrated and described the CRC's functionality, and answered our technical questions.

2007 Spring Programming Contest Results, Photos

Our annual spring Programming Contest was held on Sunday, February 25, 2007 in the Fitzpatrick Hall Linux Cluster (room 148). The contest was run in a PC² environment using Knoppix LiveCDs on Hewlett-Packard xw4100 Workstations. Teams werre afforded two hours to answer as many of the seven contest questions as possible. Rankings were determined based on the number of problems solved and the total cumulative time consumed in solving problems.

The final standings can be viewed here. Also, check out the photo gallery for the contest. The contest problem set is available on the programming contests section of this site.

The Contest questions were written by Jeff Smith and Dan Dugovic. Nick Schott organized the event and handled logistics. Jeff was responsible for setting up the contest environment.

ACM Regional Programming Contest Results

The Club organized and sponsored two teams to represent Notre Dame at the ACM Regional Programming Contest. The two teams were registered as Irish Gold and Irish Blue and each consisted of three team members. Prior to the contest, each team held several team practice sessions and researched common programming problem solution algorithms in preparation for the contest.

The ACM Programming Contest was held on November 10-11, 2006, in Ashland, Ohio. Two teams of three, consisting of veteran ACM Contest participants, participants in the ND Fall Programming Contest, and other active Club members represented the University in this international contest. The East Regional portion of the contest, consisting of the Ashland site plus three other satellite locations, involved 116 teams from 64 colleges and universities in Pennsylvania, Ohio, Michigan, eastern Ontario, and Indiana.

Both Notre Dame teams provided a strong showing, with Irish Blue placing 9th and Irish Gold placing 36th overall among 116 teams in the region. Impressively, the Irish Blue team finished 1st among at the 45 teams at the Ashland contest location.

The Irish Blue team consisted of Jeff Smith, Dan Dugovic, and Chris Fallin. The Irish Gold team consisted of Eric Riedl, Joey Schmitt, and Nick Schott. A report on the Notre Dame teams' performance at the ACM Regional Programming Contest can be found here on the ND Computer Science and Engineering Department website.

ND Fall Programming Contest Results

Our annual fall Programming Contest was held on Sunday, October 8, 2006 in the Fitzpatrick Hall Linux Cluster. The contest was run in a PC² environment using Knoppix boot disks on HP machines. The contest lasted three hours, and participants were limited to completing problems in this time frame. Points were awarded for the number of questions solved, and more points were awarded for solving a problem in a shorter amount of time.

The final standings can be viewed here. The contest instructions and problem set are available on the programming contests section of this site. Based on the contest results, past experience, and programmer availability, Jeff Smith, Dan Dugovic, Chris Fallin, Eric Riedl, Joey Schmitt, and Nick Schott will represent Notre Dame in the ACM (Association for Computing Machinery) Regional Programming Contest on November 11, 2006 in Ashland, Ohio.

The ND Fall Programming Contest was set up and administered by Jeff Smith, Computer Club Secretary Emeritus, and Dan Dugovic, Computer Club Vice President.