newly shaved scalp + snow + sun = singular sensation. love that immediacy of perception.

Software AG and Ecole d'ingénieurs de Fribourg are opening TheXMLAcademy just a stone's throw away from my office.
Together with the new university building being built right now for the econimists and the new EMAF building, Pérolles looks really like the 'hot spot' of Fribourg these days.
We're here for more than two years now, nice -and strange- to see the crowd following now. Locally as well as thematically.

It's again that time of the year again.. the new year has begun, but the semester's end is nearing but sluggishly. This is also the time when we students have to hand in loads of papers, finish projects and do one presentation after the other.

So here's what I had to prepare in the last few days:

For the e-government seminar: "How To Make Citizens Trust E-Government" (slides, paper),

for the Ubiquitous Computing course: "UBIPEDIA, the Ubiquitous Encyclopedia" (slides, paper follows)

for the 'Advanced Software Engineering' course: "Mini CyberCoach" (short report).

The content is not amazing in any way, but getting more and more used to speak in front of an audience is helfpful indeed.

And it ain't over yet, we're just about to finish all the coding involved in the projects above. Next week the final presentations will take place, after that some exams.
And then I'll again have time for.. hm.. erm.. work! :)

The DAO project calls for collaboration in the design of a standard (in the dynamic sense of the word) digital art ontology
Might be something worth a look for the next generation of our 'Medienkunstgeschichte' project. Or for the generation after the next :)

The XQuark ("XQuery Advanced Runtime Kernel") project provides J2EE open source information integration components based on XML and XQuery, wrapping heterogenous datasources such as different relational databases and plain XML files through XQuery.
I must have a closer look at that, as well as (again) at JSR 170 and its implementation, since I'm going to Zivilschutz with the nice guy having the specification lead..

Google is coming to Zürich!


Requirements:

* University Degree in Computer Science or a closely related field (Ph.D. a plus).
* Strong C/C++ programming skills.
* Substantial knowledge of UNIX/Linux or Windows environments.
* Extensive experience designing and programming large scale, distributed systems, machine learning, information retrieval algorithms, network programming, linux kernel and/or developing large software systems.
* Several years of software development experience.
* Enthusiasm for solving interesting problems.
* Fluency in English.


I do not (yet??) qualify, maybe they also take trainees? ;)
Nice to see one more cool internet company in Zürich. Agreed, this is not just 'one more'.

Edit: I'm supposed to prepare exams, but going to see the Google presentation at ETHZ next monday sounds much more exciting! Hm..

The Fribourg canton is gathering way towards building a local eLearning industry.
I can only guess how much they're doing/spending, the article linked to above sounds great, but actually they only continue funding for an existing lawtank project and plan an 'incubator' for companies in that field here at Pérolles quarter..incubating companies just like my mediagonal right down the street..
Let's see how we can deal with a bunch of state-funded competitors :)
Anyhow, perhaps I should find out a little more on how to apply for that campaign..

SlideML again.. my performance was suboptimal, no doubt, next time I'have to work more seriously again, sleeping the night before having a presentation might be a good idea. :)
Overall quality of the seminar contributions was ok in my eyes, but as usual there were huge differences in quality between single presentations.
I'll publish my slides and paper on the dubious topic of "How to Make Citizens Trust E-Government" tomorrow. I'll have to further discuss this subject with the LerNetz folks, they'll certainly agree with me on the great importance of political education. Well right, it's their business ;)

Edit: This time moblogging victims are: Eliane, Tuan and Dominic.

Chregu has set up the ping.kaywa.com tool to aggregate the blogs of PEAR developers: Planet PHP is born!
Nice idea, borrowed from Planet GNOME. Cool.

Edit: Yikes! My blog is one of the aggregatees (?).. Didn't know I was a PEAR programmer. BTW: Thanks Roger and Chregu for continously advertising this little blog of mine.. Seems as it's about time I wrote something of at least minor significance ;)

Roger moblogging me moblogging his talk on moblogging.
Thanks a lot Roger for your talk, at least the students once had an opportunity to grasp actually existing mobile business, which is a welcome change from continuously talking about possibilities and potential opportunities.
I doubt the student actually got the point, at least I could not feel any sign of spreading blogging ecstacy.
I expected Roger's passion for mobile weblogging would infect them all instantly, but in fact I did not see anyone running out to get a Kaywa account.. the students seemed not to care at all. Bunch of ignorants.. ;)


Edit: Note the amazing difference in image quality between Roger's pictures and mine..