ACM KANELLAKIS AWARD...Hearty congratulations to Randal Bryant, Edmund Clark, E. Allen Emerson (University of Texas), and Kenneth McMillan (PhD/CS 92, Cadence Labs) who have received the 1998 ACM Kanellakis Award for Theory and Practice for "their invention of 'symbolic model checking', a method of formally checking system designs that is widely used in the computer hardware industry and is beginning to show significant promise also in software verification and other areas." The actual award, including a $5K cash prize, will be presented at a formal award ceremony on May 15 at the Waldorf Astoria in New York City. As eloquently noted, "symbolic model checking is one of the most important formal techniques used in the computer and semiconductor industries...these industries face a complexity explosion of near-crisis proportions, what with six-month design cycles in which products of unprecedented complexity have to be 'right' the first time in order for companies to survive. Symbolic model checking offers design teams shorter time to market and increased product integrity." No need to check here, this is a well-deserved award!

NEW DISTINCTIONS...Mel Siegel and co-authors Priyan Gunatilake and Gregg Podnar and have been awarded the most outstanding paper published in the 1998 volume of Industrial Robot (MCB University Press). The paper, "Robotic Assistants for Aircraft Inspectors", was a slightly updated version of an article that originally appeared in the premier issue of IEEE Instrumentation and Measurement Magazine (March 1998), and was reprinted in slightly abridged form in the SME publication Robotics Today (Second Quarter 1998).

AND MORE UNDERGRADUATE HONORS...SCS is delighted to announce this semester's winners of the $300 Textbook Scholarships sponsored by Electronic Data Systems Corporation. Juniors David Atkinson, Shirwah Tam, and Anthony Watkins, and Sophomores Elena Balestreire, Eric Kadehjian, and Jeffrey Zarrella will each receive this scholarship in recognition of their outstanding academic a performance during the Fall 1998 semester. These students will be recognized at a special awards dinner on February 10. From SCS and EDS....a round of applause.

SCS INVITED TALKS...
MARK STEHLIK is an invited speaker/panelist at the February 18 MIT Entreprise Forum of Pittsburgh, which focusses on "Recruiting Top Technical Talent to a Start-Up in Pittsburgh." Details on the program are available at 681-2625.
ED CLARKE will present an invited lecture at CWI SOIREE, the Dutch Research Institute for Computer Science and Applied Mathemetics, on March 24 in Amsterdam. Organized biannually for the Dutch Research Community, these lecture evenings include two specially-invited distinguished speakers. Ed will be presenting along with Bjarne Stroustrup. This year's SOIREE coincides with ETAPS'99, the Joint European programming conferences.
TOM MITCHELL presents "Mining the World Wide Web" on March 26 at the 1999 Louisiana Distinguished Lecture Series, the Center for Advanced Computer Studies, the University of Southwestern Louisiana.
KATIA SYCARA gave an invited talk at the International Computer Symposium in December in Taiwan, where she focussed on "Distributed Intelligent Agents for Information Gathering and Decision Support".

ON-LINE COMMUNITIES...were discussed on February 4 at the Andy Warhol Museum as part of their on-going series of "Community Forums" featuring local, national and international speakers. This session focussed on the diverse cultural issues and community concerns related to the future of electronic communities, including how the internet impacts life in Pittsburgh, and the nature of "on-line" communities. Guest panelists were our own Bill Scherlis (SCS), Carolyn Speranza (STUDIO for Creative Inquiry) and Carl Redwood Jr. (Kingsley Association).

RI SPONSORS TAYLOR ALLDERDICE TEAM...For the second year in a row, Robotics is sponsoring a team of students from Taylor Allderdice High School (SqHill) who will participate in a national robotics contest sponsored by NASA. Teams of high school students from around the country will attempt to build a mobile robot from a box of materials supplied by competition organizers. "Finished" robots will be judged in early April at the Eighth Annual "For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology (FIRST) Competition" at Walt Disney World's EPCOT Center in Orlando.

WINDOWS 2000...Scott Evans, Microsoft Corporation and the Department of ECE, The Ohio State University, will present a hands on introduction to many of the new features of WINDOWS 2000 (NT 5.0), including discussion, demos and Q&A, on Thursday, February 11 at 4:30 pm in Wean 7500. A domain controller and workstation will be networked together to simulate a miniature enterprise environment and allow for discussion and demonstration of features including: new end-user features, services for Unix interoperability, networking enhancements (kerberos 5, etc.) and administration features such as remote install, managed software installer, and change and configuration management. Food? Of course.

EMIGRATION CONTINUES...Nevin Heintze (PhD/CS 92) and Jon Riecke, Bell Labs/ Lucent Technologies, present "Finding a Job: The Research Lab Option" on Friday, February 12 at 1:30 pm in Wean 5409. They will discuss the experience of working at a research labl and what "makes and breaks" an interview. Dessert will be served.

MOBOT OPEN HOUSE...On Wednesday, February 17, the mobot committee will host a Mobot Open House at 6:00 pm in Wean Hall 5409. While similar to last terms's information session, this program has a more technical flavor. Dan Bothell will (legendary champ!) briefly discusses the "mobot kits" (now on sale), Illah Nourbakhsh presents a talk on microcontrollers, and former participants Bob Grabowski and Luis Navarro-Serment review the technical details of their Open Class Prize winning Mobot, "Mecless". The committee will also provide an update on all rule changes and a Q&A session. In keeping with the more technical aspect of the Open House, the committee welcomes participants (and those still thinking about participating) to bring specific questions on design issues related to their own Mobots. As always, there will be pizza. All is in preparation for the "$99 Mobot Mini Challenge" and "Mobot Clinic" (March 31) and the Annual Mobot Race (April 16) which are just around "a curve" away...so don't delay!

SCS LUNCHTIME VIDEO REPLAY SERIES...(Re)view Raymond Kurzweil's presentation "The Age of Spiritual Machines" on Thursday, February 11 at 12:00 pm in Wean 5409. A videotape of his February 4 blockbuster presentation will be played in its entirety. Bring a lunch and hear/see what he had to say. Details are available at www.cs.cmu.edu/~calendar/kurzweil-video.html.

ANDERSEN CONSULTING LECTURES CONTINUE...Dr. Charles Nebolsky, Manager, Emerging Technology Solutions Group, Technology Research and Development Division, Andersen Consulting, presents "Core Collaborative Infrastructure" at 12:00 pm in Wean 5409. "Net-centric technologies have become prevalent in many industries in the past year...however, corporations still struggle with re-inventing their old problems by merely transferering their existing systems into a net-centric environment." Learn more at the talk. All are welcome.

FACILITIES UPDATE: MATHEMATICA...The Mathematica universal passwords on the Mac, PC, and Unix servers have been updated. If you are running an individual license server on your own machine and your password has expired, you should visit www.wolfram.com and request that your license be extended. Questions? Contact help+license@cs.cmu.edu for details.

PERL MONGERS RETURN...The Pittsburgh Perl Mongers bi-weekly talk is scheduled for Tuesday, February 9 in Wean 7220 at 6:30 pm. The topic for discussion is "Using regex in Perl," by Kevin Lenzo, and will include a tutorial and some "tricks" on using Regular Expressions in Perl, and illuminate why Perl's regex-like expressions are more powerful. Simple matches, metacharacters, saving expressions, assertions, and flags will be covered, along with some one-line tricks. Contact lenzo@cs for more particulars.

ARGUMENTATION IN COMPUTER MEDIA...The Interest Group on Argumentation in Computer Media gathers on Thursday, February 11 at 4:30 pm in Wean 4625 and will "provide an opportunity to meet with local researchers who share an interest in theories of argumentation and their extension to multimedia presentations in computer media, whether designed by humans or intelligent systems." Researchers interested in principles of effective communication from a variety of disciplines, including but not limited to HCI, Computer-Aided Instruction, Rhetoric, Computational Linguistics, and Communication Design are welcomed. Participants will determine meeting format and times. If you are interested in participating (and possibly cannot attend), send email (Ascii only, please) to nancy.green@cs.

SEI PUBLIC COURSES...The following public courses will be offered at the SEI in March. (Mar17-19) Introduction to the Capability Maturity Model (R) for Software; (Mar22-26) Consulting Skills Workshop; (Mar22-26) CBA Lead Assessor Training; and (Mar22-26) Computer Security Incident Handling for Technical Staff. A com listing of courses can be found at: www.sei.cmu.edu/products/calendars/calendar.html

UNDERGRADS IN SEARCH OF MINORS?...Take heed of the upcoming Information Sessions: "The HCI Minor" with Richard Scheines (freshmen/sophomores), 4:30 pm in Wean 5403; and "The Robotics Minor" with Howie Choset (freshmen), 4:30 pm, Scaife 301.

HOW TO START YOUR OWN BUSINESS...The spring 1999 "Starting a Technology-Based Venture (STBV)" course will be offered through the Donald H. Jones Center for Entrepreneurship on 7 consecutive Tuesdays in Room 146, Posner Hall, beginning March 30. Designed to "teach entrepreneurs with a science, engineering and/or technology background how to turn a business opportunity into a successful venture", the course is free of charge (and non-credit) for faculty, staff and PhD students. Taught by Jack Roseman, the format includes lectures and presentations from computer scientists, engineers and others who have actually built successful high-tech corporations and guest speakers who are experts in the fields of finance, law and intellectual property. Class topics include: Entrepreneurship Overview and Planning, Marketing, Finance/Accounting, Legal Issues, Obtaining Capital, Management Team, and Presentation of Mini-Business Plans. To register, contact John DiRicco, diricco+@andrew.cmu.edu, x8.7758.

IN THE NEWS...The January 2 issue of Science News notes the RETSINA multi-agent system currently under development by Katia Sycara's group. The article also mentions the e-commerce RETSINA applications, the RETSINA middle agents (matchmakers and brokers) that help agents find others on the Internet and the LARKS language for agents to advertise their capabilities and know-how to the middle agents so these capabilities can be matched in response to requests.

CS DEPARTMENTAL MEETING...is scheduled for Thursday, February 25 at 4:00 pm in Wean 7500 (Refreshments at 3:45 pm). Watch for details.

CAREER PLANNING?...
**AKAMAI CORPORATION: Bruce Maggs,currently visiting at Akamai Corporation, visits Monday/Tuesday, February 15-16 and is interested in meeting with students interested in professional opportunities (BS/MS/PhD) at the company. Contact copetas@cs for an appointment.
**HEWLETT-PACKARD: will visit campus the week of March 2, with an information session that evening in Wean (location to be announced). Contact the Career Center, x2064, for appointments or sign-up at the Info Session.

WHAT'S BIG, BOLD AND VERY RED...The SCS Dragon has returned to the 5th floor of Wean Hall. Check it out!

CALENDAR WATCH...Spring Mid-Semester Break: March 1! No classes.

GET A LIFE!....Need to get out of your office? The School of Music will present the "Carnegie Mellon Jazz Ensemble" on Friday, February 12 at 8:00 pm in Carnegie Music Hall. Tickets are $5 at the door. Also take note of the "Cuarteto Latinoamericano" performing on Saturday, February 13 at 3:00 pm in the Mellon Institute Auditorium. Tickets are $10 at the door. Call 268-2383 for details on both concerts. And now that you have the hang of getting out, the Drama Department presents "The Mystery of Edwin Drood" by Rupert Holmes, on Monday, March 15 in Kresge Theatre, with a reception preceding the 8:00 pm curtain. All proceeds from the ticket sales benefit the 1999 Senior Class Presentation Fund, that helps seniors in drama with the large expenses involved in auditioning in Los Angeles. Take a break and help support your students and classmates.

WORDS FOR THOUGHT:
WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 10
HCI SEMINAR: Raul Valdes-Perez, "Human Computer Collaboration in Knowledge Discovery", 3:30 pm, Wean 5409.

THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 11
PURE AND APPLIED LOGIC COLLOQUIUM: Jaap van Oosten, Utrecht University, "Realizability: Combining Proof Theory and Category Theory", 4:30 pm, Wean 5409.

FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 12
*POP SEMINAR: Nevin Heintze, Bell Laboratories, "Security, Dependency and Regions", 3:30 pm, Wean 8220.
*ROBOTICS SEMINAR: Robert Collins, RI/CMU, "Calibration and Modeling for Visual Surveillance", 3:30 pm, Adamson Wing.

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