[PRL] pl-seminar for Fall 2007

[Mitchell Wand]

Hi guys,

Since Matthias is on sabbatical, I'm taking the lead in getting pl-seminar
going.  We didn't do such a good job last Fall, and I'd like to do better
this time.  Here's the plan:

Wed 9/19 -- Community Meeting & Elevator Pitch Idol.   I'd like to start off
with a round-robin of 5-minute presentations, much like the one we had last
March.  That will get everybody up to date, especially the new students and
Pete (and me!).  I'd like to make this a little more concrete than last
year's by doing more explicit role playing-- instead of each student talking
at the air, I'd like to have each presentation be a dialogue between one
student (playing him- or her-self) and one faculty member (playing an
Important Person Whom the Student Has Buttonholed at a Conference).   The
student gets to introduce himself and initiate a conversation with the
IPWtSHBaaC.   Where the conversation goes depends on how the IPW.. reacts,
of course.  After 5 minutes a bell goes off, and we move on to the next
speaker.

We'll choose the faculty member randomly, excluding the student's advisor.
I think this will be fun for everybody.

We'll do this on 9/19, maybe extending to 9/26.

I'm happy to get feedback on this proposed format.

10/3 is ICFP week; no seminar.

Starting on 10/10, I'd like to get together a series of talks on programming
models for concurrency, with a focus on programming for multi-core and
many-core chips.  This should be a way for us to find our way into this
important area.

I'd like to get 5-6 volunteers to make presentations.  (BTW, I expect
*everybody* to make at least one pl-seminar presentation during the year).

Olin and I had a brainstorming session on this a while back.  The resulting
topics are at https://wiki.ccs.neu.edu/x/oAAU .  Feel free to edit this page
(it's a wiki, of course!).

Please let me know ASAP which topic you'd like to present starting on 10/10,
or you can schedule yourself on the pl-seminar schedule wiki at
https://wiki.ccs.neu.edu/x/HwM .

--Mitch
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