The Research Software Engineers community was founded to support the people who develop software used in research. If you want be a part of the community, come to our AGM and hackday which takes place on 15-16 September at King’s College London. It’s a free event thanks to our sponsor Maudsley Digital (no11WW).
Back in March 2012, we began raising awareness of the research community’s reliance on RSEs. In the last last year, we have made excellent progress in gaining recognition for RSEs. In the coming year, we want to continue this work, and attract more people to the community so that we have the weight of numbers to change how academia deals with its software developers.
Register now!
There are only 80 places available at the AGM and 60 at the hackday. If you want to attend, please register now.
The AGM and Hackday will take place at Ortus, which is based at King’s College London on 15 and 16 September 2014. More details are available on the registration page.
You can elect to attend either the AGM, the hackday or both events!
Agenda
15 September 2014 - AGM
- 10.00-10.10: Welcome - Simon Hettrick
- 10.10-10.40: Introduction to the RSE campaign - James Hetherington
- 10.40-11.10: Keynote: Maudsley Digital - Kumar Jacob
- 11.10-12.00: What's New?
- A chance to talk to people about something that interests you. It could be a technology, an idea, a project or anything else that's interesting. It's your chance to interest people in your work, talk about new technology or get a problem solved.
- 12.00-13.00: Lunch
- 13.00-13.20: Introduction to the breakout sessions
- Discussion groups where we can get a better understanding of issues that affect the research software engineer: careers, recognition, working in research, reward and other issues.
- 13.20-14.20: Breakout session 1
- 14.20-14.40: Reporting back session 1
- In this session, we will hear back from the discussions that took place during breakout session 1.
- 14.40-15.00: Coffee break
- 15.00-15.40: Cloud session with Microsoft Research and Google
- 15.40-16.40: Breakout sessions 2
- 16.40-17.00: Reporting back session 2
- In this session, we will hear back from the discussions that took place during breakout session 2.
- 17.00-17.15: Final thoughts and election update
- 18.00-19.00: Start of hackday, pizzas and pitches.
16 September 2014 - Hackday
- 9.00-9.15 Welcome to newcomers and any questions
- 9.15-12.00 Hack!
- 12.00-12.45 Lunch
- 12.45-13.00: Opportunity to send out call for skills
- 13.00-15.45 Hack
- 15.45-16.15 Presentations from hacks
- 16.15-6.45 Coffee break whilst judges deliberate
- 16.45-17.00 Prize giving and wrap up
The AGM
The AGM will feature various sessions designed to bring RSEs together, to swap expertise and to discuss how we can improve the situation of RSEs in academia The technology showcase provides you with time to discuss technology that you’ve developed, or just a technology that you like to use. Training sessions let you pass on expertise that you’ve developed to other RSEs. Finally, discussion groups let us pick your brains about issues that affect the RSE community so that we can better represent those views to research stakeholders
The Hackday
In collaboration with our sponsor, Maudsley Digital, we will run a hackday on 16 September which will focus on how activity data can be used to help understand and diagnose mental health issues.
We will provide activity data and monitors, cloud resources, food, coffee and - of course - plenty of RSEs to hack with. We’ll be asking clinicians to provide some pointers about the help that they need, but what you work on will be completely up to you. The best hacks will not only receive prizes, but will also get the chance to engage with Maudsley Digital to ensure that their work can be used to help the community.
The Elections
If the RSE Community is to last, it should be self-governing. For this reason, we will soon be holding elections for places on the committee that organises the community. The people who are interested in running the community will get the opportunity to present a lightning talk about why you should vote for them.
Thanks to our Sponsors!
We are indebted to Maudsley Digital who have provided us with an excellent venue and catering for the event. We would also like to thank Microsoft Research for providing tablets and passes for Azure Cloud. Other sponsors will be announced soon!
Last year's meeting
In 2013 we ran the first ever workshop for Research Software Engineers. If you would like to know where it all began, take a look at last year's workshop.
