School of Computing News

The School of Computing will host a variety of activities at the upcoming University of Kent Open Day on Saturday 3 October. Demonstrations showing a variety of research and student projects will run in the School of Computing building on the Canterbury campus from 9:30 to 15:00, with admissions officers available there and in the sports centre all day. There will be a panel session in Cornwallis SW101 (Brian Spratt room) in the Cornwallis building, for prospective undergraduates and their fa...

Two educational programming environments developed at the University of Kent, BlueJ and Greenfoot, are now included with the distribution of the standard Raspberry Pi operating system, Raspbian. Over five million Raspberry Pis, the low-cost credit card sized computer, have been sold within the past three years making programming accessible for young people in particular. The inclusion of BlueJ and Greenfoot adds the Java pr...

An app developed by students at the School of Computing will be used to track the progress of cyclists from the University of Kent as they make their way from Paris to Canterbury. David Chadwick, Simon Thompson, Richard Jones and Omid Hajilou, along with other university colleagues, set off from Paris on Tuesday 1 September as part of the 50th Anniversary Goldstein Cycle Rides. David said: ‘We will start on Tuesday afternoon with a 30-40 mile...

The School of Computing’s staff and students have a history of taking on challenges for charity with previous efforts including marathons, triathlons and treks. However none have involved a pair of Kylie-esque golden running pants, until now. Senior Lecturer, Eerke Boiten, explains: ‘Straight to the point: if my supporters help me reach my fundraising target for WaterAid, I will run the 2015 Bristol Half Maratho...

International chess Grandmaster, John Emms, will be helping the School of Computing to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the University of Kent on Saturday 5 September. As well as giving talks about chess and computing, John will demonstrate his remarkable chess skills by playing blindfolded and by playing up to 15 people simultaneously. John will be in room SW101 in the Cornwallis Building on the Canterbury campus from 10.00 to 16.30 and everyone is welcome...

Computer Science is the fastest growing area of undergraduate study in the UK with a 13% growth in applications this year. With an increasing number of applicants in the graduate jobs market it is more important than ever for students to gain the skills and experience that will make them stand out from the crowd. Interviewed on BBC breakfast news, IBM UK's Graduate, Student and Apprenticeship Programme Manager, Jenny Taylor said: ‘It's not ju...

The School of Computing has performed well in the latest National Student Survey (NSS 2015). Our students reported high overall satisfaction (87%) in the quality of their course. Our students also reported high levels of satisfaction with their teaching (85%) and with learning resources (87%). The NSS 2015 gathered students' opinions and more than 300,000 students at the end of their studies in the UK responded to the survey. The ful...

A new automated data mining system researched at the University could lead to the detection of potentially illegal eBay sales of elephant ivory. Law enforcement agencies and conservationist are expected to make use of the system – developed by researchers from the University's Centre for Cyber Security – in their ongoing battle against illegal ivory sales. At the moment, identifying illegal ele...

On Monday 13 July at the degree congregation in Canterbury Cathedral, the Chancellor conferred an honorary doctorate on a former student of the School of Computing, Dr Anthony Robert West for championing student placements. Tony, as he is more commonly known to his friends in the School, has a long career in research and industry with roles in IBM, Xerox, Sun Microsystems and Cisco. He implemented the Cisco International Intern Programme, which has bene...

The University has launched a series of masterclasses in Erlang, a programming language that powers websites around the world, including WhatsApp. The free online classes  include contributions from Simon Thompson, Professor of Logic and Computation at Kent, and industry experts Joe Armstrong (one of the inventors of Erlang) and Francesco Cesarini (founder of the largest Erlang consultancy). The masterclasses build on the School...