northamptonshire - iphone and ipad app update

In may 2011 the Northamptonshire County Council iphone app was launched (http://computingnorthampton.blogspot.co.uk/2011/05/northamptonshire-county-council-launch.html) produced in a partnership between Northamptonshire County Council and the University of Northampton.

Now there is a new version of this app on the Apple App Store (https://itunes.apple.com/gb/app/ncc-northamptonshire/id432288976?mt=8) that includes the following:

· School term dates and closures
· Find It feature with distance and map directions from your current location to country parks, libraries, registration offices, recycling centres, schools
· Your 5 nearest bus stops and scheduled bus times
· Opening hours and contact information
· Council and School job vacancies
· Up to the minute council news

with the improved features:
· Available for iPhone 3Gs, iPhone 4, iPhone 4S, iPhone 5, and all iPads
· New county news feed
· New Schools Vacancy feed
· Updated Maps
· Updated Contacts

update: Selection of 2012 Computing publications

A selection of 2012 publications involving staff from the Department of Computing and Immersive Technologies, University of Northampton

Journals

• Turner, S (2012) Case Studies in Web Sustainability Ariadne No 70 ISSN: 1361-3200
• Maunder, R., Turner, S., Sneddon, S. and Crouch, A. (2012) Editorial. Enhancing the Learner Experience in Higher Education. 4(1), pp. 1-2. 2041-3122.
• ihsan lami, Ali Al-Sherbaz (2013) W2BC: A Proposal for a Converged Baseband Implementation of WiMax and WiFi Transceivers International Journal of Information and Network Security (IJINS) Vol.2, No.1, February 2013, pp. 426 - 437 ISSN: 2089-329
• Kariyawasam K., A., Turner S., Hill G. (2012) "Is it Visual? The importance of a Problem Solving Module within a Computing course", Computer Education, Volume 10, Issue 166, May 2012, pp. 5-7, ISSN: 1672-5913.
• Hill G., Turner S. (2012) "Referencing within Code in Software Engineering Education!", Computer Education, Volume 10, Issue 166, May 2012, pp. 1-4, ISSN: 1672-5913.
• J.W.J.Xue and A. Yahya. (2012) “Critical Analysis of ECM Applications in the Clouds: a case study”, International Journal of Computer Science and Information Technology (IJCSIT) Vol.4 No. 3, June 2012. ISBN:0795-4660.

Conference

• Padillia I, Zhang Y (2012)Developing a haptic interface to manipulate and section high polygon models from x-ray data,  International Conference on Electrical Engineering and Computer Science (EECS201)
• Dravid R and Al-Sherbaz, A (2012) Optimization of Routing Protocols for Wireless Mesh Networks (WMNs) to Achieve Higher Quality of Service for Real-Time Applications 3rd Annual Grace Hopper Celebration of Women in Computing, Bangalore, India, December 12-14 2012
• Turner, S. and Al-Sherbaz, A. (2012) What's the problem with problem-solving? Seminar Presentation presented to: Insights into the future of learning and teaching at Northampton, University of Northampton, 3rd December 2012
• Bouyerbou, H. Oukid, S. Benblidiya N. and  Bechkoum, K. (2012). “Hybrid Image Representation Methods for Automatic Image Annotation: A Survey”. Proceedings of the IEEE International Conference on Signals and Electronic Systems, ICSCS 2012, 18-21 September 2012, Wroclaw, Poland.
• Al-Sherbaz Ali, Dravid Rashmi, Svennevik Espen and Picton Phil  (2012)" iSurvival: A Collaborative Mobile Network System for Disaster Management" PRO-VE’12 -13th Working Conference on Virtual Enterprises : Collaborative Networks in the Internet of Services, University of Bournemouth, 1-3 October 2012
• Al-Sherbaz A, Dravid R (2012) "Ultilising Mobile Mesh Networks for Disaster Management" M4D2012, 27-29 February 2012, New Delhi, India

BCS: New Colossus Gallery, Bletchley Park

23rd or 24th January 2013 - New Colossus Gallery at Bletchley Park

Time: 7pm , for a tour start at 7:30pm finishing at approx.. 9pm.

Presenter: Barney Duffy Chair, BCS Northampton (2012-2013)

Venue: Bletchley Park, Sherwood Drive, Bletchley, Milton Keynes, MK3 6EB.

Synopsis: 

Visiting the new Colossus Gallery with the ability to walk around the system. Colossus, the world's first programmable electronic computer, had a single purpose: to help decipher the Lorenz-encrypted (Tunny) messages between Hitler and his generals during World War II. The Colossus Gallery housing the rebuild of Colossus tells that remarkable story. Colossus reduced the time to work out the Lorenz chi-wheel settings and enabled more messages to be deciphered and the whole code-breaking operation to be accelerated. The information gleaned from the decrypted messages is widely acknowledged to have shortened the war by many months, saving tens of thousands of lives. The cipher text was input via paper tape and the 2500 valves of Colossus would find the Lorenz machine chi-wheel settings. By the end of the war, 63 million characters of high-grade German communications had been decrypted by 550 people helped by the ten Colossus computers. Plus a look at the NPL gallery, how the internet was built. 

Directions

Article: Web Sustainability

A new article has been published in Ariadne on the work done at the University of Northampton on web sustainability.

Turner S (2012) . "Case Studies in Web Sustainability". November 2012, Ariadne Issue 70 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue70/turner ISSN: 1361-3200

At the moment organisations often make significant investments in producing Web-based material, often funded through public money, for example from JISC. But what happens when some of those organisations are closed or there  is no longer any money or resources to host the site? We are seeing cuts in funding or changes in governmental policy, which is resulting in the closure of some of these organisations.

What happens to those Web resources when the organisations are no longer in existence? Public money has often been used to develop these resources - from that perspective it would be a shame to lose them.

Moreover, the resources might be needed or someone may actually want to take over the maintenance of the site at a later date. How do we make these sites more sustainable? Is there any way we can move sites to somewhere that is free to host the Web pages, and can be left there or modified when needed? JISC previously funded three projects to look at this area through a programme called Sustaining ‘at risk’ online resources. One of these projects, which ran at The University of Northampton, looked into ‘rescuing’ one of the recently closed East Midlands Universities Association’s online resources. This resource, called East Midlands Knowledge Network (EMKN), lists many of the knowledge transfer activities of 10 of the East Midlands universities. The project looked at options on how to migrate the site to a free hosting option to make it make it more sustainable even when it is no longer available on the original host’s servers.

This article looks at this work as a case study on Web sustainability and also included a case study of another project where Web sustainability was central.

Acknowledgements

I am grateful to Amber Thomas (who also has an article in this edition of Ariadne) and the JISC Infrastructure for Education and Research Programme: Geospatial (15/10) for providing the funding for the initial project for the East Midlands University Agency. My thanks go to +Ahsan Anderson for the STEM Northamptonshire work as well as to the Nuffield Science Bursaries Scheme for its support.

Full text of this article can be found at: http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue70/turner 

update: Computing Student Prizes 2012 with pictures

Computing Student prizes for students in the School of Science and Technology and Northampton Business School

Winner of BCS The Chartered Institute for IT - Best Technical Computing 1^st Year Award. 

Gaurav Ravindra (see photo to the left)

Winner of BCS The Chartered Institute for IT Best Student Performance Prize

John Marsh, 

BSc Computing (Network Engineering)

Winner of BCS The Chartered Institute for IT - Best Student Business Prize. 

Sabah Dada 

BSc Business Computing Systems

Winner of BCS The Chartered Institute for IT Most Promising Student Business Prize

Timothy Bradley 

BSc Business Computing Systems

Winner of the HM Government Communication Centre (HMGCC) Best Dissertation Prize

Tennakoon Wanninayaka 

BSc Computing (Network Engineering)

Winner of the Orange Instruments Best Dissertation Prize

Mike Scott 

BSc Computing (Software Engineering) 
(see photo to the right)

Winner of the Best Group Project Prize from HM Government Communication Centre (HMGCC)

                 Andy Taylor

Abdul EI-Hawary

Daniel Von Bode

Ieng Kit Liu

Terence Hunter.

BSc Computing (Graphics and Visualisation)

(see photo to the left)

BSc and HND Computing Provision (click on the links below for more details of the courses)

• BSc (Hons) Computing (also available part-time)
• BSc (Hons) Computing (Computer Networks Engineering)
• BSc (Hons) Computing (Computer Systems Engineering)
• BSc (Hons) Computing (Graphics and Visualisation)
• BSc (Hons) Computing (Internet Technology and Security)
• BSc (Hons) Computing (Mobile Computing)
• BSc (Hons) Computing (Software Engineering)
• BSc (Hons) Computing - One Year Top-up
• BSc  Computer Games Development
• HNC Computing (part-time)
• HND Computing (Computer Networks Engineering)
• HND Computing (Computer Systems Engineering)
• HND Computing (Graphics and Visualisation)
• HND Computing (Internet Technology and Security)
• HND Computing (Mobile Computing)
• HND Computing (Software Engineering) 
• HND Computing
• HND Computer Games Development

The University of Northampton's, Department of Computing and Immersive Technologies offers five courses within the MSc Computing postgraduate provision (shown below) all available either part-time or full-time. 

• MSc Computing
• MSc Computing (Internet Technology and Security)
• MSc Computing (Computer Networks Engineering)
• MSc Computing (Software Engineering)
• MSc Computing (Immersive Technologies)

Developing a haptic interface to manipulate and section high polygon models from x-ray data

A paper was published on the use of Haptic devices

Padillia I, Zhang Y (2012)
Developing a haptic interface to manipulate and section high polygon models from x-ray data,  
International Conference on Electrical Engineering and Computer Science , Shanghai, China, August 16 - 17 



For more work in this area see 

A Virtual Environment Training System for Haptic Laparoscopic Surgery

Computing Courses

BSc and HND Computing Provision (click on the links below for more details of the courses)

• BEng/MEng Computing (Computer Networks Engineering)
• BEng/MEng Computing (Computer Systems Engineering) 

• BSc (Hons) Computing (also available part-time)
• BSc (Hons) Computing (Graphics and Visualisation)
• BSc (Hons) Computing (Internet Technology and Security)
• BSc (Hons) Computing (Mobile Computing)
• BSc (Hons) Computing (Software Engineering)
• BSc (Hons) Computing - One Year Top-Up 
• BSc  Computer Games Development
• HND Computing (Compute​r Net​works Engineering)
• HND Computing (Computer Systems Engineering)
• HND Computing (Graphics and Visualisation)
• HND Computing (Internet Tech​nolog​y and Security)
• HND Computing (Mobile Computing)
• HND Computing (Software Engine​ering) 
• HND Com​puting

The University of Northampton's, Department of Computing and Immersive Technologies offers five courses within the MSc Computing postgraduate provision (shown below) all available either part-time or full-time. 

• MSc Computing
• MSc Computing (Internet Technology and Security)
• MSc Computing (Computer Networks Engineering)
• MSc Computing (Software Engineering)
• MSc Computing (Immersive Technologies)

The contents are the opinion of the author(s) and not necessarily the view of the University of Northampton.

W2BC: A Proposal for a Converged Baseband Implementation of WiMax and WiFi Transceivers

A recently published paper by Dr Ali Al-Sherbaz in 

International Journal of Information and Network Security  Vol 2, No 1 (2013)

ihsan lami, Ali Al-Sherbaz (2013) W2BC: A Proposal for a Converged Baseband Implementation of WiMax and WiFi Transceivers

International Journal of Information and Network Security (IJINS) 

Vol.2, No.1, February 2013, pp. 426 - 437 

ISSN: 2089-3299

W2BC: A Proposal for a Converged Baseband Implementation of WiMax and WiFi Transceivers

ihsan lami, Ali Al-Sherbaz

Abstract

There have been many attempts to converge wireless teraservers functionality and implementation at various layers. The approach of this work is to explore the similarities of the OFDM signals, as used in WiMax and WiFi, to converge their baseband implementation at the physical layer. The proposed W2BC solution reduces implementation complexity, size, power, and cost, while preserving signal and communication integrity for standalone WiMax and WiFi functionality. This paper reviews the convergence approaches that lead to the proposed W2BC implementation, explain the mathematical derivation, describe the simulation model and discuss the test results for real-world usage scenarios.

Full Text version can be found at: PDF

What's is the problem with problem solving?

What is the problem with problem solving? on Prezi

Recent presentation:

Turner, S. and Al-Sherbaz, A. (2012) What's the problem with problem-solving? Seminar Presentation presented to: Insights into the future of learning and teaching at Northampton, University of Northampton, 3rd December 2012.

Taken from a blog written at Irchester Primary School http://lab13network.wordpress.com/2012/11/28/dads-robot-lab/ about a robot activity. For more details about Lab_13 go to: http://lab13network.wordpress.com/

Dad’s Robot Lab!

Posted on November 28, 2012 

Hi! This is Morgan and Emily. Our Dads come to Dads Club in Lab_13.

Last week, we had some visitors! They demonstrated how all of the robots worked. There were some amazing remote controlled robots and a Lego robot. The name of the person who worked with all of the extraordinary robots was Scott Turner. We were amazed by the robots. Thank you for coming.

 The Lego robot could be controlled by the computer. The other robot could do handstands, roly-polys and cartwheels. Some were doing gymnastics, walking, bowing and dancing. The Lego robot just went all over the place!

 

Emily’s stepdad, Robin, said “It was fantastic – I want a robot for Christmas.”Unfortunately they are £800! And Kris, Kieran’s dad said “Thanks for organising the robot lab … a nice little event, an amazing robot!” 

BCS Event: Northampton Branch AGM

Northampton Branch AGM

Date

22nd November 2012

Agenda

Welcome and Introductions

Apologies for absence

Minutes of the previous AGM (and if appropriate EGM)

Matters arising from the minutes

A report from the Chair on the year's activities

A report from the Treasurer, including a review of income and expenditure against the budget agreed with BCS HQ for the past year and an explanation of next years budget request. 

Election of Chair, Treasurer and committee members

Any other business

Start Time

19:00

Location

Room MB8, Avenue Campus, University of Northampton, NN2 6JD

How to find Avenue Campus

BCS Event (update): Stakeholder Management: Hard tools and soft skills

Date: Wednesday, 12th December 2012

Title: ‘Stakeholder Management: Hard tools and soft skills’

Time: Evening session with networking opportunities and drinks

- Registration: 19:00

- Presentation: 19:30

- Q and A: 20:45

- End: 21:00

Presenter: Dr Peter Parkes FAPM CITP FBCS (Director, Peak Performance)

Venue: University of Northampton Park Campus , (Room C101), Cottesbrooke Building, Boughton Green Road, Northampton, NN2 7AL

Register here:

- Open to both BCS and non-BCS members, no cost.

- Students and young professionals are encouraged to attend

- To enable us to accurately monitor numbers can we ask that you please register for this event here: https://events.bcs.org/book/328/  

Synopsis: 
We want stakeholders to believe their project to be a success. Hence, a good understanding of stakeholder groups and networks is essential, not only to delivery of your project, but also in how it is perceived in terms of success, on delivery and afterwards during benefits realisation. But understanding who your key stakeholders are and what they expect is only half of the story. What is the best way to communicate with them in terms of not only channels but also style and language, and how do you find out? In this interactive talk Peter will describe some of the conventional stakeholder management tools that he has found effective and then go on to discuss some methods for determining communication preferences and developing flexibility in style.

Presenter Profile:

Peter has held project leadership roles in the private sector, public sector, PPPs and Big 4 management consultancies, usually leading technology enabled transformation or recovery of major projects. He has successfully engaged a range of stakeholders including; regulatory bodies, trade unions, government departments, MPs, investors, international JV partners, suppliers, CXOs, Sponsors / SROs, and of course customers and end users. He is an established platform speaker and regular contributor of articles to trade journals. His book, NLP for Project Managers, was published by the BCS in 2011 and he is currently delivering soft skills based training for PMs as a Director of Peak Performance - see www.NLP4PM.com. He is also a director and trustee with the Association for Project Management, being board champion for best practice groups (SIGs).

counting vicars!

Examples of some now historic work done at the University of Northampton looking at counting behaviours in historic data. In these studies looking at historic census data where the data was taken in the church on a particular sunday - was estimation occurring?

‘BASE-NUMBER CORRELATION’: A NEW TECHNIQUE 

FOR INVESTIGATING DIGIT PREFERENCE AND DATA HEAPING

R. G. M. CROCKETTA. C. CROCKETTS. J. TURNER

Citation Information. History and Computing. Volume 13, Page 161-179 DOI 10.3366/hac.2001.13.2.161, ISSN1753-8548, 

http://www.euppublishing.com/doi/abs/10.3366/hac.2001.13.2.161

Turner SJ, Triastuti E, Crockett RGM, Picton PD, Crockett AC (2002) Intelligent Techniques for Detecting Estimated and Falsified Numerical Data Proc. 6th Conference of the Systemics, Cybernetics and Informatics (SCI'2002) Orlando, Florida USA, July 14-18 2002 pp. 445-450, IIIS, Eds. Callaos N, Leng T, Sanchez B, ISBN 980-07-8150-1.

Turner SJ, Crockett RM, Picton PD, Triastuti E (2001) Genetic Algorithms for Simulating Counting Behaviour 19th Biennial Conference on Numerical Analysis Dundee.

Hospital Management in Rural Pakistan

A recent dissertation by an MSc Computing student at the University of Northampton Javed Ahmed looked at software for managing healthcare in rural Pakistan.

Abstract

The adoption of information technology plays a vital role in the domain of health and patient care. Most of developed countries are using information technology in health care in order to provide better services to patients with quality care and getting more benefits. Apart from developed countries the developing countries like Pakistan and other are lacking behind from use of information technology in the field of healthcare.

This dissertation is based on the development of hospital management system for developing countries in order to enhance the performance and provide quality healthcare in rural areas. This web application reduces the paper work and keeps the computerized patient records. This web application will be considered as an initial step towards the betterment of patient care and also improve the hospital services delivery system in developing countries especially in rural areas.

The research is also done in this dissertation for development and controlling of user access rights dynamically at application level in enterprise web applications. Through this users are tightly controlled and within their assigned menus. These user menus and user role rights will be managed and update through GUI with administrator login.

Computing Courses

BSc and HND Computing Provision (click on the links below for more details of the courses)

• BEng/MEng Computing (Computer Networks Engineering)
• BEng/MEng Computing (Computer Systems Engineering) 

• BSc (Hons) Computing (also available part-time)
• BSc (Hons) Computing (Graphics and Visualisation)
• BSc (Hons) Computing (Internet Technology and Security)
• BSc (Hons) Computing (Mobile Computing)
• BSc (Hons) Computing (Software Engineering)
• BSc (Hons) Computing - One Year Top-Up 
• BSc  Computer Games Development
• HND Computing (Compute​r Net​works Engineering)
• HND Computing (Computer Systems Engineering)
• HND Computing (Graphics and Visualisation)
• HND Computing (Internet Tech​nolog​y and Security)
• HND Computing (Mobile Computing)
• HND Computing (Software Engine​ering) 
• HND Com​puting

The University of Northampton's, Department of Computing and Immersive Technologies offers five courses within the MSc Computing postgraduate provision (shown below) all available either part-time or full-time. 

• MSc Computing
• MSc Computing (Internet Technology and Security)
• MSc Computing (Computer Networks Engineering)
• MSc Computing (Software Engineering)
• MSc Computing (Immersive Technologies)

The contents are the opinion of the author(s) and not necessarily the view of the University of Northampton.