End of the Quarter Colloquium Fall 2012

The end of the quarter colloquium comes a week earlier than it has in the past.  This means more students attending as it is the week before the end of classes instead of the Friday after classes end and finals week begins.

There are around 30 presentations on internships, readings and research, as well as graduate students presenting on their capstone projects.  As the number of students in the Information Technology and Systems, Computer Science and Systems and Computer and Engineering Systems programs grow, so does the event.  Likely it will be split in the future with research on one day and internships on another.

But for now, here is the unofficial schedule for presentations.

Institute of Technology

End of the Fall Quarter 2012 Colloquium

CP 108

9:00am
Michael Satran (Internship)

            Experience distributing code on a large scale production environment (Andrew Fry)

9:30am
Tom Rochat and Sambath Sok (Internship)

                Internship at Avanade (Bryan Goda)

10:00am
Alexander Kramer (Internship)

                Weyerhaeuser Intern EHS Support Function (Bryan Goda)

10:30am

Joseph Raymond Stout (Internship)

            Weyerhaeuser Internship (Bryan Goda)

11:00am
Dallas James Rosson (Internship)

             Automated Web Application Graphic User Interface Testing Utilizing Selenium (John Mayer)

11:30am

Wen-Chung Chen (Internship)

            Protective Coatings Inc. Internship (Bryan Goda)

12:00pm

Beth Morris (Internship)

            Information Services Security Intern (Andrew Fry)

12:40pm

Mikhail Moskvich (Internship)

                Internship with Vlink, All Project Solutions and Amazon (Andrew Fry)

1:00pm

 Young Choh (Internship) Museum of Glass Mobile Application Development (Andrew Fry)

1:20pm
Darrion Harris (Internship)

            Discovering the Software Developer Within – Mobile App Development (Bob Guttman)

1:40pm

Rodica Cladicov (Internship)

            Mobile Application Development with Pierce County IT (Andrew Fry)

2:00pm

Tyson Lewis and Paul Flores (Internship)

            White Pass Patrol Scheduling Mobile Application (Andrew Fry)

2:30pm

Fa (Jason) Tang (Internship)

            Web Development for Marketing Puget Sound (Andrew Fry)

3:00pm

Open Slot

CP 105

9:00am
Zehra Vajeeh (Independent Study)

            Gait Based Gender Recognition (Matthew Alden)

9:30am

Khanh-Hoa Luong and David Souphommanichanh (Internship)

                Internship at Callison Architecture (Yan Bai)

10:00am
Maggie Liao (Internship)

            Intern at UW Information Technology (Yan Bai)

10:20am

Long Pham (Internship)

            PACCAR Information Technology Division (Yan Bai)

10:40am
Benjamin Kim (Internship)

                Internship at BECU(Yan Bai)

 11:00am

Marissa Bower (Internship)

Security Information and Event Management at the Boeing Company (Yan Bai)

11:20am

Rodney Short (Internship)

                Trials and Tribulation of Vinkco LLC (Andrew Fry)

11:40am

12:00pm
Jayshree Agarwal  (GRADUATE  THESIS)

                Predicting Risk of Re-hospitalization for Congestive Heart Failure Patients

                (Ankur Teredesai, Senjuti Basu Roy)

12:30pm

Allison Jean Graham (Internship and Independent Study)

            Internship with Drugstore.com

            Directed Reading on Database studies and ASP.NET MVC (Senjuti Basu Roy)

1:00pm

Joseph Floyd (Internship)

                TBG (Bryan Goda)

1:20pm

Jeremiah D Miller (CAPSTONE PROJECT)

            An Online/Offline Cross-Platform Mobile Web App for Geolocation Field Data Collection:                             LocationSharpener

                (Sam Chung, Yan Bai, Barabara Endicott-Popovsky, and Jan Whittington

           

2:00pm

Fnu Swathi Balakrishna (CAPSTONE PROJECT)

            An Efficient Client Server Assignment for Internet Distributed Systems

Ideas for Companies Finding Some Footing

Now that I have caught my breath I just have to say that the inaugural South Sound Entrepreneurs Weekend rocked. Twenty three company ideas were presented on Friday Sept 14th  and nine well thought out business initiatives were presented on the afternoon of Sunday Sept 16th. I would not be surprised if several of those took serious root as companies in the future.  At the very least sixty participants enjoyed the enthusiasm that accompanies the pursuit of taking an idea and turning it into a product or service, then pursuing that as a business.

The News Tribune did an excellent article on the event and summed up the participation nicely. 

The participants included a wide range of entrepreneurs, from inexperienced students with just a glimmer of an idea, to those already in business but wondering how to take it to the next step.

Their ideas were heavy on high-tech applications but otherwise varied widely – from remotely controlled gardens set up in shipping containers, to a computer game design consortium and a national on-line debate forum that would lead to a final, hopefully compelling smackdown in what would be called “America’s Ring.”

Read more here: http://www.thenewstribune.com/2012/09/16/2298164/how-about-a-remote-controlled.html#storylink=misearch#storylink=cpy

During the course of the weekend several prizes were awarded through drawings, including domain name registration, Starbucks coffee cards, books on innovation and entrepreneurship (The $100 Dollar Startup) and more.

My favorite was the drawing for the RR Anderson provided "One (1) Hour Logo" which was won by Otis Anderson and the team behind BoxCrop.  What a perfect prize for that weekend. Someone has an idea, then 54 hours later they have a business concept, and now they have an awesome logo.  You can see it at the top of this post.

Several of the businesses that came out of the weekend, either newly or further formed are moving forward including the aforementioned logo winner.  Additionally, a solution for managing energy efficiency and code requirements, a social media management service and a game development collective are all still in play.

One company that was formed but participated in the weekend has recently opened shop a block up the street called FabLab which should be checked out.  I may write about that next.

Things worked out well enough that there will definitely be another SSEW come September 2013.

Two Innovative Events Over the Next Seven Days

Two years ago we held a dry run of what we hoped would be a Startup Weekend like event.  Held at Suite133 and free to anyone who wanted to give starting up a company ago, we had 12 people who wanted to give it a go and some spectators as well.  It gave some idea of what needed to be done to make it a success.

Flash forward to tonight.  The inaugural South Sound Entrepreneurs Weekend is kicking off at 5:30 in William Philip Hall on the University of Washington Campus. This three day event has nearly 60 people signed up so far.  Most are attendees, but many are mentors and technical help that will be on hand to register domains, put together quick web sites and maybe even build a mobile app or create a company logo.

The number of attendees is exciting, but when you consider that this time we have a registration fee to cover food, coffee and a T-Shirt, it is even more impressive.

What will the outcome be?  I don't know, but I hope that there is enough momentum from the weekend to make this into an annual event.

If you like your innovation conversation in a presentation format, with access to many of the states innovative forces, then plan on attending the Pacific Northwest Innovation Summit in Seattle, Washington September 17-19, 2012 as part of the 50th Anniversary Celebration of the Seattle World’s Fair. The Summit will focus on building dynamic collaborations in the Pacific Northwest, stimulating entrepreneurship, examining Washington state’s innovation ecosystem, and a look a financial resources in the region. The Pacific Northwest Economic Region (PNWER) and the Washington Economic Development Commission (WEDC) are the co-organizers of the innovation summit program.

Participants will include business, government and academic leaders in the states and provinces of the Pacific
Northwest interested in accelerating innovation and economic collaboration. The Summit will be held at Intiman Playhouse located at 201 Mercer St., Seattle, WA. The cost to attend the summit is $95, which includes meals.

For more information about the Summit, visit http://www.pacificnwinnovation.com.

Summer 2012 End of the Quarter Colloquium

Time for the end of the quarter colloquium for the Summer quarter at the Institute of Technology.  There are around 35 presentations on internships, readings and research.  If the CSE program senior projects were included as they were last quarter there would be a record number of students participating this quarter.

Given that next quarter we will see the addition of around 120 more students in the Information Technology and Systems, Computer Science and Systems and Computer and Engineering Systems programs it will just grow in subsequent quarters.  In the next academic year there will be upward of 450 Juniors, Seniors and Graduates in the collective academic degrees.

For now, the unofficial program below gives a sampling of some of the presentations.

SCHEDULE FOR SUMMER 2012 Colloquium

CP 105

09:00am   Jody Weeks                 

Title:  Intern at The Boeing Company

Sponsor: Andrew Fry

Airplane Programs IT Business Partner: Review the past quarters opportunities and projects at the Everett based Boeing plant.

09:30         Nicholas Andrew Mennenga

Title:  Helping People and Enabling Business in the Eyes of a Systems Administrator

Abstract: My internship as a system administrator at Precision Machine Works (PMW) exposed me to a holistic view of the field.  The company had only one other person as an official systems administrator and they had only recently taken the position.  The change in administrator leads to a completely different style of management which meant that many parts of the company’s systems infrastructure needed to change. I was employed to help with most of these large projects and spent time working with everything from running cables in a building to redeploying the enterprise level antivirus to providing desktop support.  From this experience I’ve gained much experience in a very large amount of different areas of computing and feel that I’ve gained a far better understanding of how computer systems are managed in a business environment on every level.

10:00         Long Le Pham

Title: PACCAR Information Technology Division (ITD) Internship 

Sponsor: Yan Bai

Abstract: During my duration as a PACCAR intern I assisted the system administrator in software deployment. It includes packaging applications to deploy throughout North America, maintaining desktop support, and providing quality assurance for software coming down the pipeline. Although I mainly worked with the system administrator, I was also arranged to a rotation to different fields. I worked closely with PACCAR's specialist in fields such as VPN, software development, system architecture, active directory, and hardware implementation, and gained a broader understanding of the company.

10:30         Frank  Sinek

TITLE:  The Journey to Boeing and beyond.

SPONSOR:  Yan Bai, Andrew Fry

ABSTRACT:  The complexities of the Boeing Company are evident when you try and understand their enterprise system.  Boeing is thought to be an airplane manufacturer, which it is, but it is a lot more then that; this presentation will attempt to show that Boeing is a people company.  I will also give viewers an idea of the type of work I was doing and what it was like to work for Boeing.

11:00         Ryan C Wooten

TITLE:  Internship with digital advertising agency, Razorfish.

SPONSOR:  Yan Bai

ABSTRACT:  As a developer intern, the chance to learn the process of creating and deploying applications for clients was a must.  Razorfish is one of the top digital advertising agency's with clients like Microsoft and Nike.  They were owned by Microsoft and after being sold to their parent company, Publicus Group, are at the top of the list for the best advertising agency.  As an intern, I worked on a Microsoft project building a User Interface for an internal application that is used with retail technology stores.  I also worked with the other interns across the West with creating a plan for getting college students to consider Razorfish and the digital advertising industry as a career choice.

11:30         Robert Charles  Rankin

TITLE:  Pathway to the Stars: Summer 2012 Boeing Internship.

SPONSOR:  Yan Bai

ABSTRACT:  This presentation details my internship experience at the Information Technology Operations Center with the Boeing Company.  This presentation describes Boeing’s commitment to and purpose in their internship programs.  I then describe my past experience with Boeing and its impact on my internship experience.  After this, I tell exactly what I did and explain in general terms how it fits into the Information Technology business unit.  Lastly, I give my impressions of the experience and give an epilogue of how I am doing in terms of getting full time employment.

12:00         Rochat, Thomas L

TITLE:  CCDC Training Proposal 

SPONSOR:  Yan Bai

ABSTRACT:  Every year, selected members from the Greyhat Group represent the University of Washington, Tacoma at the Pacific Rim Collegiate Cyber Defense Competition (PRCCDC). In order to improve the overall training efficiency and performance at the PRCCDC a training methodology needed to be developed and implemented. In order for ever increasing performance a method of passdown needs to be developed so that outgoing seniors and veteran PRCCDC participants can train incoming PRCCDC participants in a reasonable amount of time. I will show the overall development plan for a virtualized training environment, a list of tactics and strategies for the UWT team to implement during the PRCCDC as well as thoughts and input from previous members of the UWT Greyhat Team from previous competitions.

12:30pm      Jeremiah Miller 

Masters Capstone Sponsor: Dr. Sam Chung (Dr. Yan Bai, Dr. Barabara Endicott-Popovsky, and Dr. Jan Whittington)                                                    

Title: An Online/Offline Cross-Platform Mobile Web App for Geolocation Field Data Collection: LocationSharpener

Abstract: 
This talk summarizes the first half of a two-quarter masters capstone project.  The inaccuracy of geolocations for small-scale water supply infrastructure as recorded in water management databases negatively affects the effective management of limited water resources.  Workers wishing to quickly update location data for these facilities from the field have used GPS terminals, which are expensive, platform-dependent, and not online. Instead, we propose a platform-independent mobile web application that simply runs in an HTML5 capable browser.  No native app needs to be compiled or installed since this is just a web application.  The Geolocation API is used to access geographic coordinates from the device. HTML5 Application Cache is employed to run the application regardless of interrupted or unavailable mobile Internet connections. A web browser standard interface for a local database, IndexedDB, is used to store the gathered GPS coordinates until an Internet connection is restored at which time the data are securely uploaded to a web app and enterprise data management system in the cloud. Our approach demonstrates that HTML5 mobile web apps are ready to supplant native mobile apps for geolocation field data collection. The usage of platform-independent technology, HTML5, reduces app development cost and supports easy data migration from a smartphone terminal to any application server. By employing the concept of a smart phone’s BYOD (Bring Your Own Device), the cost of data collection terminals can be saved. In addition, through the development of the mobile web app for offline or online data collection, we attempt to discover guidelines for prospective developers of mobile apps to use when they are considering whether to use a browser based HTML5 app.            

01:00pm                      Tom Rochat                                                    Dr. Sam Chung

Title: TINFO 499  Certificate Friendly Curriculum

Industry representatives are constantly in search of qualified graduates however they want to know exactly what technologies a graduate has experience and exposure in. The method by which industry measures that experience is through the use of Industry specific Certifications. Academia is not able to teach to specific certifications favoring a more theory based approach to education that can be applied to any technology. However a way by which to quantitatively measure how close specific course work prepares a student to take specific certification exams needed to be developed. I will show my work in this area during the past quarter, and preliminary findings in ways by which students and faculty will be able to measure how much extra study a student will need to undertake in order to prepare them to take a specific certification exam and stand a reasonable chance to pass.

01:30pm   Frantz Vibert          

            

Title:  Web Development in HTML 5

Sponsor: Andrew Fry

A self guided project to develop and enhance a website for a local restaurant.  Starting from the ground up the customer was introduced to the possibilities of a web presence and how it can enhance their business.  In order to complete the project, several resource books were used to teach implementation of HTML 5 technologies and Photoshop use.

 

02:00pm   Dallas James Rossen                        Dr. John Mayer

Title: The Advantages and Disadvantages of GUI Testing via Sikuli

Abstract:

This project involves exploring the advantages and disadvantages of automating graphic user interface testing by utilizing the Sikuli scripting language.  The goal is to discover whether or not Sikuli is an efficient and robust enough language to support shifting to an automated testing process without accruing a large overhead cost.  This has been accomplished by transferring existing test cases currently in use by the software testing group and converting them over into Sikuli centric programs through utilizing Sikuli’s provided integrated development environment or importing the Sikuli functionality as a plug-in into a Java project.  With examination of the data obtained from testing both development methods, it is clear that both implementations can be useful depending on the test case and the software tester’s experience with writing code.  From this project, it has been determined that Sikuli can be used successfully and effectively in conjunction with standard software testing.

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CP 108

09:00           Abbey David                                Bryan Goda

Title: Nordstrom Corporate IT Internship

Abstract: In this presentation, I will be discussing my internship experience at Nordstrom which includes being immersed into the Nordstrom culture and learning about various parts of the company by spending time working on the front-line as well as going on a tour of the Nordstrom Quality Center and the Innovation Lab.  I'll also be talking about my role and how I supported the project that my team has been working on.

09:20           Ravi Kumar Bansal ­                                Bryan Goda

Title: Virtual Networking

Abstract:

Virtual switches connect virtual network interfaces in virtual machines by emulating in software what a physical network switch does. The hope for this technology is twofold: to isolate network traffic (especially for security-related exercises and testing) and to seamlessly join VMs across subnets.       

                   

09:40           Mary Kozy                                    Bryan Goda

TITLE: The Service Delivery Management Role In IT at Boeing

ABSTRACT: This presentation will outline the variety of the role of a Service Delivery Manager (SDM) in the Boeing IT Infrastructure organization. A large part of the job involves good communication skills and being able to help the application managers determine the appropriate server hosting requirements for their applications and also to get them the right resources to solve any IT Infrastructure issues. Broad technical knowledge across the IT spectrum is helpful in understanding how the various applications interact with their platforms and aids in furthering Boeing’s effort to modernize their data centers and move to more modern OS platforms. In particular, an effort to move legacy applications off of outdated mainframe technology is being undertaken with an eye toward eventual retirement of the mainframe environment. These activities are just a small part of the overall SDM role that will be covered.

                   

10:00           Christopher Martinez                    Bryan Goda

TITLE: Anonymity & Security in Genomic Datasets

ABSTRACT: Definition of "best practices" for designing Proteomic, Genomic, and Metabolomic databases to enable data sharing and reuse while managing privacy and security requirements.

SPONSOR: The National Science Foundation (Grant #1062970) and Purdue University (Dr. John A. Springer).

                   

10:20           Alexander Olsen                           Bryan Goda

Title: More with Less

Abstract: Franklin Pierce School District is a smaller school district located within the heart of Spanaway, WA. With a small understaffed but dedicated IT department they service around 7,000 devices and growing and provide support fro 1,000 employees and a student population of around 7400. In most large companies, employees roles are defined and they generally work within in the confines of their job description. This is not the case in this district where no one is above any duty in regards to the IT field. This could mean laying network cable and building server racks, all the way to creating and maintaining network access points. From this standpoint I have done everything from image teacher laptops, to helping rebuild server racks, and even designing a play for ipad deployment. This team creates a new definition of overworked and understaffed yet seems to always pull off the impossible and complete the task assigned to them.

                   

10:40           Tom Rochat                                  Bryan Goda

Title Internship: Intern, Infrastructure Engineer with Avanade, Seattle, WA

I will discuss my work with Avanade as an Infrastructure Engineer Intern, during the summer and continuing into fall quarter. I will explain how a global enterprise level business conducts infrastructure operations to support multiple branch offices and datacenter locations all over the world. In addition, I will explain specifically what I have been asked to work on, and what the future holds for Avanade, and where I fit into that picture.

                   

11:00           Joseph Stout                                  Bryan Goda

Title "Going Mobile".

Abstract: I will be discussing the roles of an IT intern at weyerhaeuser and the weyerhaeuser values. Along with discussing my internship role in the Cellular Services team which is part of the Network Operations Team. Discussions will include the role of mobile devices in a international forresty company and the importance of these mobile devices in the development of weyerhaeuser. Lastly a discussion of my view of IT at weyerhaeuser and my general experience there.

11:20           Ken Norton                                   Bryan Goda                              

11:40           Robert Flood                                Bryan Goda

Title: Help Desk Technician

Abstract:

The topic of discussion will be on the Help Desk Technician.  I will discuss the various levels of the Help Desk Technician; tier 1, tier 2 and tier 3, and how these different levels apply towards various job applications in the job market.  I will explore the skills required to work in this field as well as interpersonal skills needed to work in the field.  I will explain the various technologies in use and how you can use this field to expand your technology skills and apply them to many different aspects in the IT field.

12:30           David Everitt                                Andrew Fry

TITLE: Directed Reading on HTML 5, Virtual Verification and internship support for mobile application development.

01:00           Sean Brown                                  Andrew Fry

Title: Costco Hardware Support Internship
Abstract: This summer I was privileged enough to work in the IS department at Costco's corporate headquarters in Issaquah, Washington.  The department of focus for this internship was Hardware Support, which manages and troubleshoots only escalated technical issues.  Most of these issues involve non-functional or troublesome hardware devices at the company warehouses and depots, including but not limited to: universal power supplies, thin client computers, full PCs, scales for meat/deli/bakery, RF guns and hand scanners, price checkers and printers.  Almost all of these devices are connected to Costco's internal network (many are also wireless), so as expected, many of these issues are related to networking.  Finally, I was able to utilize some of my data mining knowledge to assist my supervisor to create custom tables and charts that focused on the issue ticketing system and its data for six months prior.
Industry Sponsors: Rich Morris (supervisor) and Tod Dropelman (manager)

01:30           Shawn Paul Smith                       Ankur Teredesai

TITLE: Using and Comparing Big Data Storage Systems

ABSTRACT:
During the course of doing business, modern companies generate huge quantities of data.  This data can be used to make informed business decisions, and to make these decisions companies increasingly are turning from standard relational database systems to specialized data storage software designed for querying against large static datasets.  In this presentation, several features found in such systems are examined to consider why they are advantageous for this particular kind of work.  I will also describe benchmarking three different implementations of such systems using the TPCH Star Schema benchmark, with analysis of how performance scales, and what features might explain the results. 

02:00           Lane Harris                                   Sponsor: Dr. Matthew Alden

Title: Compilers and Programming Language Design
Abstract:  Programming languages and their accompanying compilers are
vital tools in the increasingly complex world of technology.  This
talk will outline some of the core issues and concepts related to
programming language implementation and usage.  A simple compiler that
implements a subset of the C programming language will be dissected
and demoed.                                                    

02:30   Ben Hadorn and Michelle Miller        Sponsor: Matthew Alden
Title: Mobile Development on the Android Operating System and Content Pre-Positioning

Abstract: Throughout the Internship process at Opanga Networks, Inc., we have practiced a full spectrum of software development tasks ranging from planning, designing, implementing, and testing. As Project Manager, Michelle Miller got the opportunity to schedule upcoming releases for the next year, plan the versioning system, implement a system for tracking issues and features utilizing software development tools and provide design documentation for new feature sets. As Software Engineer, Ben Hadorn had the opportunity to take the design documentation and provide an implementation from that. In addition, Ben was responsible for determining use cases for testing documentation and performing a thorough testing of the new software releases/feature sets. In addition to our specific tasks, we gained experience through working in conjunction with a software development team and using agile software development practices.