February 2012 - csc-general

Feynman Lectures Screening / OpenCL Final Code Party / SDN's CSS & JQuery Workshop
by Computer Science Club 27 Feb '12

27 Feb '12

Hello, membership! I trust that you all had a relaxing reading week. Now that things are back to the grind, I have a few events to announce that should lighten the week a little! FEYNMAN MESSENGER LECTURES: Every Wed. at 5:30 PM in PHY 150 --- The Computer Science Club and PhysClub will be screening the classic 1964 Messenger Lecture Series by Richard Feynman for the rest of term. Join us every Wednesday evening at 5:30 PM in PHY 150 for our five single and double feature evenings. Dinner will be provided, so come on out, relax in the comfy PHY 150 theatre, and enjoy. We will be screening the lectures as follows: - Feb. 29, 5:30-6:30 PM: Law of Gravitation: An Example of Physical Law - Mar. 7, 5:30-7:30 PM: The Relation of Mathematics and Physics; The Great Conservation Principles (double feature) - Mar. 14, 5:30-6:30 PM: Symmetry in Physical Law - Mar. 21, 5:30-7:30 PM: The Distinction of Past and Future; Probability and Uncertainty: The Quantum Mechanical View (double feature) - Mar. 28, 5:30-6:30 PM: Seeking New Laws OPENCL FINAL CODE PARTY: Fri. March 2, 7:00 PM - 12:00 AM --- The OpenCL competition comes to an end this Friday, with submissions closing at 11:59 PM. The submissions will be judged this evening, with prizes being awarded at the close of the party. Even if you're not registered, feel free to come out, write some code, support the contestants, and of course enjoy the available food. SDN'S WEBSITE THEMING WITH CSS & JQUERY WORKSHOP --- Our friends at the Student Developer Network invite you to this workshop for an introductory walk-through of CSS and JQuery. As always, free snacks are provided. Date: Thursday, Mar. 1 Time: 6PM- 9PM Location: MC 4060 Skill Level: Beginner Also, look forward to UNIX 102 coming up next week, and a hardware tutorial later in March. Announcements with official dates and times will be made soon. Hope to see you there! -- Elana Hashman Vice-President Computer Science Club University of Waterloo ehashman(a)uwaterloo.ca

1 0

CSC/AMD OpenCL Competition
by Computer Science Club 15 Feb '12

15 Feb '12

Hello CSC Members, Want to win a new laptop or GPU? The University of Waterloo Computer Science Club and AMD are running an OpenCL programming competition. If you're interested in writing massively parallel software on the OpenCL platform, come out and join us for our introductory code party! The introductory part is at 7:00 PM on February 16th, 2012, in MC's Comfy Lounge (MC 3001). We'll be presenting a tutorial on writing OpenCL and GPGPU applications. OpenCL reference books will be available at this tutorial, courtesy of AMD. OpenCL is an open standard, and works as an extension of the C and C++ programming languages to allow programmers to control different types of processors at one time - multiple CPUs, GPUs, and Cell processors. OpenCL's parallel computing features make it very effective at simulating a variety of real-world systems as well as solving interesting computer science problems. Contest registration begins after the introductory code party on the 16th. If you want to participate and possibly win prizes, you'll need to register here between the 16th and 24th of February. On March 2nd, we'll be holding a contest code party. All contestants are invited; the submissions deadline will be at 12:00 AM. At the conclusion of the party, there will be judging and prizes. Participants will have the chance to win one of two HP laptops or an AMD desktop GPU. If you have any questions, please contact exec(a)csclub.uwaterloo.ca or drop by the Computer Science Club in MC 3036. We hope you'll join us! Cheers, Marc Burns President, University of Waterloo Computer Science Club.

1 0

Algorithms Talk / UNIX 101 / SDN Hackathon!
by Computer Science Club 02 Feb '12

02 Feb '12

Hello, membership! I hope you have all been having a pleasant term. We have a few events coming up that we'd like to share... ALGORITHMS TALK: Feb. 7, 6:00 - 7:00 pm, MC 4045 --- Are you interested in algorithms? What is an algorithm anyway? We will discuss two or three neat problems with very elegant answers. Some of these answers are actually fast, and some will result in a proof that the problem is NP-complete. (What does that mean?) We will also discuss the motivating thoughts that led us to the solutions. Join Victor Fan for his talk, intended for all second-year math students with a solid first-year background. Even if you are a first-year or a seasoned veteran, you will probably still take home something new, so please come out to enjoy the talk! Refreshments will be served. UNIX 101: Feb. 9, 5:00 - 6:00 pm, MC 3003 --- New to the Unix computing environment? If you seek an introduction, look no further. We will be holding a series of tutorials on using Unix, beginning with Unix 101 this upcoming Thursday. Topics that will be covered include basic interaction with the shell and the motivations behind using it, and an introduction to compilation. You'll have to learn this stuff in CS 246 anyways, so why not get a head start! If you're interested in attending, make sure you can log into the Macs on the third floor, or show up to the CSC office (MC 3036) 20 minutes early for some help. If you're already familiar with these topics, don't hesitate to come to Unix 102, planned to be held after Reading Week. SDN HACKATHON: Feb. 10, 7:00 pm to Feb. 11, 2:00 pm, Comfy Lounge (MC 3001) --- Jenna, on behalf of the Student Developers Network, has requested I pass this on: Do you have an idea? It's time to ship it. Event: SDN Hackathon Event Website: http://goo.gl/qBRPQ Place: MC Comfy Lounge Start: Friday Feb. 10 @ 7PM Finish: Saturday, Feb. 11 @ 2PM Details: - Edibles: Dinner (~9PM, Friday) & Lunch (~12PM, Saturday). - Tunes: Spun by Qifan Xi. - Practice your pitch: Show what you finished on Saturday at noon. - Stuck for an idea? See the website for a Google doc with some excellent project ideas brainstormed during the SDN Brainstorming session. - Don't know how to code? That's okay. We need designers, testers, and writers to join the teams. Make sure to sign up on the website to ensure enough food will be available. *** Good luck on your upcoming midterms, and hope to see you out at our events! -- Elana Hashman Vice-President Computer Science Club University of Waterloo ehashman(a)uwaterloo.ca

1 0