ACM INTERNATIONAL PROGRAMMING CONTEST...CMU participated in the East Central Regional competition of the ACM International Programming Contest, held at the University of Waterloo, Canada on November 14-15. "This event is", notes Mark Stehlik, "one of the most competitive regionals as there are typically 90 teams vying for 2-3 slots to advance to the international finals." The CMU team of Yih-Chun Hu (Grad), Dan Rosenberry (Senior), and Larry Greenfield (Junior) were one of only 2 teams, out of 90 (!) that competed, to correctly solve 6 of the 8 problems and placed second (behind the University of Waterloo). This has "earned them a trip to Eindhoven, Holland" for the International Finals scheduled for April 8-11. The other CMU team of Jesse Rosenstock (Grad), Matt Kraai (Senior), and Dan Gindikin (Junior) correctly solved 4 of the 8 problems and finished in 7th place. Congratulations to our magnificent (team of) 6! Get those wooden shoes ready :-)

NEW HONORS...GIRIJA NARLIKAR has received the "Best Student Paper Award" at the "SC98: High Performance Networking and Computing Conference" held last week in Orlando. She presented the paper "Pthreads for Dynamic and Irregular Parallelism", co-authored with Guy Blelloch.

QUARK EXPRESS DONATED TO SCS...Quark has generously donated the most recent version of QuarkExpress PC software to SCS, a gift which has now been installed in one section of the Habermann Cloassrooms (aka, the 5419 Clusters). Additional Copies of the software have also been loaded onto machines in CFA. Many thanks to Quark for this wonderful contribution!

IN DEFENSE...
DANIEL TUNKELANG sketches out "A Numerical Optimization Approach to General Graph Drawing" at his ACO thesis oral on Thursday, November 19 at 4:00 pm in Wean Hall 4615A. His committee includes: Daniel Sleator (Chair), Paul Heckbert, Bruce Maggs, Omar Ghattas (Civil and Environmental Engineering, CMU), and Mark Wegman (IBM TJ Watson Research Center).
CHRISTIAN LEBIERE studies "The Dynamics of Cognition: An ACT-R Model of Cognitive Arithmetic" at his CS thesis defense on Monday, November 23 at 10:00 am in Wean Hall 4601. His committee adds up to: John R. Anderson (Chair), Bonnie John, Tom Mitchell, and Robert Siegler (Psychology/CMU).

PROPOSALS!....
**KIMBERLY JO SHILLCUTT examines "Task Evaluation for Robotic Explorers" at her Robotics thesis proposal on Wednesday, December 2 at 11:00 am, FRC 100. Her committee includes: William Whittaker (Chair), Reid Simmons, Anthony Stentz, and Peter Bonasso (Metrica NASA JSC).

CONSTRUCTION CAM!...Are you in a windowless office? Are you on the Frew side of Wean? Are you a "night" person and never see buildings in natural sunlight? If so, visit /www.cs.cmu.edu/~construction/ for regularly updated images (ie, every 10 minutes) and archives on the new SCS Building Project!

REV YOUR (MOBOT) ENGINES...A special Mobot Information Session is scheduled for Tuesday evening, November 17 at 6:00 pm in Wean 5409. Members of the Mobot Committee and past race participants will be available to review the Mobot Kit, official rules, and other special topics. Questions are encouraged. Potential race participants or those pondering the possibilities are welcome. Cheese and pepperoni assembled on dough will be served :-) The Annual Mobot Slalom Race is scheduled for Friday, April 16, which is a lot closer than you think :-) See www.cs.cmu.edu/~mobot for race particulars.

SCS EMIGRATION CONTINUES..."Industrial Research from DEC to Compaq, or How to Change Employers Without Changing Your Office" is the subject of discussion at the next SCS Emigration Course on Friday, November 20 at 1:00 pm in Wean Hall 5409. Jim Rehg (CMU/95), who joined the Cambridge Research Labs in 1995, has "lived through" DEC's acquisition by Compaq Computer. He'll describe his experiences as an industrial researcher living (and working) through this landmark event, and much more.

SLEEPING BAGGERS RETURN...on Sunday and Monday, November 22-23. Watch for them across campus and in Wean!

SCS GRADUATE COMPASS, OR WHERE HAVE ALL OUR GRADUATES GONE?...
CHRIS MAEDA (CS '97), now at Rubric, Inc. in San Mateo, California, is noted, quoted, and photographed, in "Start-up bets big on computer age", an article appearing in the the November 16 issue of USA Today. An online version of the feature, which details the birth, growth, and vision of this new company can be viewed at /www.usatoday.com/life/cyber/bonus/1198/cb003.htm. You'll enjoy reading about this group, whose directions to the office read, "Turn down the little side street just after the cow hanging in front of the bar." Read for yourself! Our best to Chris.

TURKEYS FLEE IN FLOCKS!...The university is preparing for the annual Thanksgiving Recess. No classes will meet on Wednesday-Friday, November 25-27 and University business offices will be boarded-up on Thursday-Friday, November 26-27. Normal class and office schedules resume Monday, November 30.

BLACK FRIDAYS...While we hate to mention it, the dates are set. Robotics Black Friday is scheduled for Wednesday, December 16. CS will convene on Thursday and Friday, December 17-18. Watch for particulars.

DON'T FORGET YOUR BENEFITS...The faculty and staff benefitis enrollment deadline is Friday, November 20! If you haven't reviewed your forms, now is the time to "finally" open those packages :-)

WORDS FOR THOUGHT...
WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 18
**POP SEMINAR: Sebastian Thrun, "Towards a New Programming Language for Embedded Systems", 3:30 pm, Wean 8220.

THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 19
**PURE AND APPLIED LOGIC SEMINAR: Peter Freyd, University of Pennsylvania, "Logic and Category Theory", 4:30 pm, Wean 5409.
**CALD SEMINAR: Howie Choset, "Sensor Based Exploration of Planar and Three Dimensional Environment and Optimal Path Planning Using Homotopy Theory", 4:00 pm, Doherty Hall 1112.

FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 20
**ROBOTICS SEMINAR: Bill Townsend, Barrett Technology, Inc., "Advanced Robot-Arm Design", 3:30 pm, Adamson Wing, Baker Hall (Refreshments at 3:15 pm).
**AND MORE POP SEMINARS: Mark Wegman, IBM TJ Watson Research Center, "Global Trends in Flow Analysis", 12:00 noon, Wean 4601.

MONDAY, NOVEMBER 23
**COMPUTER SYSTEMS SEMINAR: Kaigham Gabriel, ECE/CMU, "TBA", 3:30 pm.

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