LE DOCTOR RAJ...On September 25, Raj Reddy received an Honorary Doctorate -- Doctor Honoris Causa --from the l'Universite' Henri Poincare' de Nancy in France for his outstanding contributions to AI and computer science. As elegantly noted, for his "Chercheur exceptionnel aux remarquables qualities humaines." No matter what the language, the distinction behind the award is undeniable. Congratulations Raj and a salut from the SCS community!

WING APPOINTED ASSOCIATE DEAN...Jeannette Wing has accepted the position of Associate Dean for the Ph.D. Programs in SCS. As noted by Raj Reddy, "The Provost is about to initiate a University-wide review of all the Ph.D. programs to ensure that they are consistent and maintain the quality of standards expected across the University. Within SCS, we have been having similar discussions across all the units and it seemed desirable to have a single point of contact and coordination for the Ph.D. programs within SCS." While undertaking these new duties, Jeannette will continue her own research endeavors. SCS will be supporting her!

NEW AWARDS...John Lafferty has been awarded a 1998/99 IBM University Partnership Program Research Award. John will use the $40K award for his research in language modeling and document clustering with application to natural language understanding and information retrieval.

AND DISTINCTIONS...The paper, "Development of a Video-Rate Stereo Machine", written by T. Kanade, H. Kano, S. Kimura, E. Kawamura, A. Yoshida, and K. Oda, and published in the Journal of the Robotics Society of Japan, won the 1998 Best Paper Award from the Robotics Society of Japan.

SCS DISTINGUISHED ALUMNI LECTURE...David Lorge Parnas ('65), NSERC/Bell Industrial Research Chair in Software Engineering and Director of the Software Engineering Programme, Department of Computing and Software, Communications Research Laboratory, McMaster University, will join us on Thursday, October 15 as SCS Distinguished Alumni Lecturer. He will explore "Software Inspections We Can Trust" at 4:00 pm in Wean 7500. Dr. Parnas will also discuss "Software Engineering Programmes are not Computer Science Programmes" at a special afternoon seminar on Friday, October 16 at 12:00 noon in Wean 4623. All are welcome.

OUR FRIENDS ARE COMING HOME...the weekend of October 16-18 for Homcoming 98. This year's festivities will focus on the first 50 years of the university. The Wean Hall Celebration, also known as "When We(an) Were Young", will feature two special programs by alums:

**"When We(an) Weren't Here: Computing in the World (and Carnegie Tech), 1908-1958", with JIM "Coach" TOMAYKO, Assistant Dean for Distance Education and Director, MSE Program, 4:00 pm, Wean 7500 (reception at 3:45 pm)
**"Hierarchial Introspective Logic", with JOHN NASH, Nobel Laureate 1994, 4:30 pm, Wean 7500.

A visit to the "New" Undergraduate Physics Laboratory, including the museum of historical instruments and a history display on the Saxonburg Accelerator (an amazing effort led by the CMU Physics Dept!) will also be open to all from 3:30-6:00 pm. The Wean Hall Celebration is hosted by SCS and the Departments of Mathematics and Physics. All students are invited. The alumni would like to meet you! Watch for more particulars next week...

NOMAD FOUND IN LOCAL FREEZER...Nomad, which made its unprecedented 133-mile journey through Chile's Atacama Desert in the summer of 1997, is heading off to the Patriot Hills in Antarctica on October 15. The research team will be testing technologies that enable Nomad to search for Martian meteorites on the frozen continent. Funded by NASA, the goal is to use the instruments and systems tested in Antarctica for planetary exploration. To prepare for the tests, robotics researchers have put Nomad through its paces in a 3.8 million-cubic-foot freezer where temperatures range from -25 to -40 degrees fahrenheit. The facility, operated locally by New Federal Cold Storage Company in Cranberry Township, is owned in part by the Robert Wholey Co. On October 7, the media were invited to don coats, gloves and fuzzy clothing in anticipation of the time they would spend in the freezer observing the robot in action! For more information on the search for Antarctic meteorites, visit www.cs.cmu.edu/~meteorite. And watch for frozen newscasters on the news :-)

HOT OFF THE PRESS...John Reynold's new book,"Theories of Programming Languages" (formerly known as the CS 15-711 class notes :-) is now available from Cambridge University Press (ISBN 0-521-59414-6, 1998). As noted, "this textbook is a broad but rigorous survey of the theoretical basis for the design, definition, and implementation of programming languages, and of systems for specifying and proving program behavior." Yet another accomplishment...

SCS IS UP AND RUNNING...The SCS Running Club was well represented at the "Pittsburgh Great Race 10K" on September 27. Seen among the throngs were Michael Abowd (52:51), Adam Berger (38:49), Juergen Dingel (43:18) and Dirk Kalp (48:21). At the Johnstown, PA Marathon on October 4, Frank Pfenning ran a 3:43. At the Erie Marathon September 13, Dirk Kalp ran 3:54 and Vandana Verma ran 3:52. The club also fielded an entry in the recent CMU intramural cross-country race and won First Place. Adam Berger notes that "in a few months we'll all start gearing up for the 1999 Pittsburgh Marathon next spring." Whew! And congratulations to our fleet of foot!

@PGH.CAFE...Tuesday, October 13 is the date! Over 70 high technology firms from the Pittsburgh area will assemble in Rangos Ballroom from 3:00-7:00 pm for this annual social event. Students are invited to stop by and meet with project engineers and executives of technology companies based in the Pittsburgh region. Created in 1996 by the Pittsburgh Technology Council (PTC), @pgh.cafe is a mechanism for building campus awareness of the 400-plus software companies and hundreds of other high-tech firms headquartered in the Pittsburgh region. Learn about career and internship opportunities, local research, and business directions during this casual, relaxed setting. There will be plenty of time for your questions and ideas. Dress casual and be prepared for tons of food and beverage. As the PTC notes, "It's not your typical job fair!" For details on the event and participating companies, visit http://www.tc-p.com/atpgh.

SCS INVITED TALKS...Jeannette Wing presented the inaugural Distinguished Lecture at DePaul University on October 2. As the first invited speaker of this new series, she discussed "Formal Methods: Past, Present, and Future."

CARNEGIE LEARNING, INC....has been formed by CMU and will commercialize our series of software-based cognitive tutors. These tutors have been successfully teaching algebra and geometry to middle, high school and college students since 1993. Robert A. Longo, a marketing executive and former educator, has been named President and CEO of the company. The tutors, "backed by nearly two decades of research and more than $11 million in funding from government agencies and foundations, are based on a learning model or expert system that blends research in cognitive psychology with AI to diagnose learning difficulties and coach students at any time as they work through a problem." Used by thousands of students, the tutors have improved standard test scores and significantly increased student achievement gains over traditionally delivered classes. The tutors, developed by John Anderson (CS/Psych), Albert Corbett, and Ken Koedinger, are built upon the theory that students learn best by actively participating in a learning process rather than receiving static, verbalized information. The algebra tutor, first tested in six Pittsburgh-area schools, has now also been implemented in more than 60 schools across the country.

THIS WEEK...
**VSAM: Video Surveillance and Monitoring Workshop, October 8-9, on campus.
**The 29th Annual Carnegie Symposium on Cognition: Mechanisms of Cognitive Development: Behavioral and Neural Perspectives, October 9-11, Adamson Wing.
See the www.cs.cmu.edu/~calendar for links to details.

CAREER PLANNING...
**EPIPHANY Special Seminar/Information Session: On Wednesday, October 14, featuring Ben Wegbreit, Founder, on "Anatomy of a Startup: From Startup to Speedup, Wean Hall 5409, 5:30 pm. Food will be provided and some lucky soul will win a digital camera!
**GTE Information Session: Thursday, October 15, Wean Hall 5409, 6:30 pm
**ORACLE Information Session: Thursday, October 22, Schatz Dining Room, University Center, 6:30 pm. Food will be provided and another lucky and soon-to-be very relaxed person is going on a cruise!

SCS FAMILY ALBUM...Ariana Elizabeth joined the family of Debi and DAVID PATRON (MSE program) on September 23. Welcome to their new 6 pound, 10 ounce bundle of human code. Congratulations!

END OF WEEK WORDS OF THOUGHT:
FRIDAY, OCTOBER 9
**ROBOTICS SEMINAR: Henrik Christensen, Director, and Tom Wadden, Project Manager, Centre for Autonomous Systems, Royal Institute of Technology, Sweden, "The Design and Control of a Quadruped Robot For Difficult Terrain", 10:00 am, Wean 4623 (Note special time/location!)

**JOINT RI/MECHANICAL ENGINEERING SEMINAR: Gregory Chirikjian, Departments of Computer Science and Mechanical Engineering, Johns Hopkins University, "Applications of Noncommutative Harmonic Analysis in Robotics and Imaging" 3:15 pm, Scaife Hall 125 (Refreshments at 2:45 pm)

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