Computer Science News ArchiveCS Faculty & Staff Received College of Engineering Awards[5/2/2008} Four members of the Computer Science Department received College of Engineering awards for the 2007 - 2008 academic year. Rhonda Zenner received an Outstanding Staff Member award, Axel Krings received an Outstanding Researcher award, Terry Soule received an Outstanding Educator award, and Bill Junk received an Outstanding Advising award. University of Idaho Redesignated a National Center of Academic Excellence in Information Assurance Education[5/2/2008} The University of Idaho recently received notice that we were redesignated as a National Center of Academic Excellence in Information Assurance Education. This designation is based on a review of our successes in educating students as well as the research performed. Computer Science Professor Dr. Jim Alves-Foss will be travelling to Dallas, TX for the awrad ceremony on June 4. University of Idaho CS Students Take Second Place Award in Cyber Defense Competition
[4/26/2008] Eight students from the University of Idaho Computer Science Department recently competed and took second place in the 1st Pacific Rim Regional Collegiate Cyber Defense Competition held April 26 & 27 at the Microsoft Campus in Redmond, WA. Members of the team included: Corey Thuen (Captain), Kris Watts, Katie Smith, Ben Ridgway, Johann MacDonagh, Brian Seel, Ben Sanders, and Lucas Marshal. David Manz served as the team's advisor. The event was sponsored by the University of Washington Center for Information Assurance and Cybersecurity. In the competition the teams were challenged to operate a computer system for a "fictitious" company and defend it against attacks from a "red team" sitting in an adjacent room. More information about the competition can be found on the CIAC Web Site. The University of Idaho team was the only team at the competition that did not get hacked by the red team. Congratulations to our team on their second successful competition this year. Computer Science Students Display Their Work in Annual Engineering Expo
[4/25/2008] Students enrolled in CS 481 Senior Capstone Design during the 2007-2008 academic year recently displayed the results of their projects in the annual Engineering Expo held in the Student Union Ballroom on April 25. The Engineering Expo is an event showcasing the creativity, hard work and engineering tallents of College of Engineering students. Computer Science projects exhibitted were: Code Turmoil Tool, VRAD Lab, GIMPED, Cell Processor Data Encryption, and RadSAT Enhancements. More information about these projects can be found at the CS 481 Senior Capstone Design website. 
Dr. Terry Soule's CS 470 Artifical Intelligence class also demonstrated their "smart" Connect Four games. Visitors were challenged to beat the computer. The computer implementation used a variety of advanced algorithmic solutions to improve its chances of winning against a human competitor.
Frank Jones and Curt Stein Receive Computer Science Outstanding Senior Awards for 2007-2008. Dr. Terry Soule Receives ACM Outstanding Faculty Award.
[4/23/2008] Frank Jones and Curt Stein were presented with awards as the outstanding graduating seniors for the 2007-2008 academic year. Frank completed his BSCS degree in December and is now employed by the U. S. Navy at China Lake, CA. Frank was unable to attend the award presentation. Curt will graduate in May and then plans to assume a position with Chief Architect in Coeur d'Alene, ID. The award for outstanding senior is made annually based on recommendation of the CS Department faculty. Dr. Terry Soule was presented with the Student Chapter of ACM Outstanding Faculty Award for the 2007-2008 academic year. Bill Junk Retires from CS Faculty After 28 Years
[4/23/2008] Friends and colleagues of Bill Junk and his wife Ginny, Professor of Family and Consumer Sciences, gathered to honor the couple for their service to the University of Idaho at a reception held in the Wallace Complex April 23. Bill is completing his twenty-eight year and Ginny her twenty-second year. The official retirement date for the couple is June 30. Bill joined the Electrical Engineering faculty in 1980 after twelve years with General Electric Co. In 1982 Bill became one of the founding members of the Computer Science Department. During his career, Bill developed a number of courses and was an active contributor to the Engineering Outreach program. Throught out most of his tenure Bill has been involved in teaching software engineering courses and the senior capstone design projects. For the last two years he as served has the Associate Chair of the department. Artificial Intelligence Class Holds Connect Four Tournament
[4/11/2008] Students from the Dr. Terry Soule's Artificial Intelligence class (CS 470) recently participated in an A.I. Connect-Four tournament showcasing game playing programs they developed. The students' programs employed computer agents able to use adversarial techniques including minimax search, alpha-beta pruning, selective evaluation, and singular extensions. In the tournament the programs were pitted against each other to determine which computerized player performed the best. Congratulations to Brandon Morton whose program won the competition over a very close runner-up developed by Curt Stein. Schweitzer Engineering Laboratories Donates Real Time Operating System (RTOS) Development Systems
[2/25/2008] Schweitzer Engineering Laboratories, our industrial neighbor located in Pullman, Washington, has donated eight 1102 Systems and USB Programmers for our recently-established embedded systems laboratory. These systems allow the department to offer a Real-Time Operating Systems (RTOS) class for the first time this spring. The term "embedded system" is used to describe any device that has a microprocessor built into it, programmed to do a set of tasks specific to the device. Examples of common embedded systems include automobiles, cell phones, and microwave ovens. The programming of such systems requires the use of a separate development system, since the embedded systems usually have small amounts of memory and don't have any internal programming support, or even an operating system for that matter. The equipment donated by SEL provides the host environment, and also includes both an on-board embedded processor and numerous input / output devices with which the students can experiment. We thank SEL, and in particular, Jason Dearien and Dennis Gammel, for their support of our educational program. The demand for embedded systems experts is expanding rapidly. This donation allows our students to gain the needed skills in this burgeoning market. University of Idaho CS Students Take Second Place Award in National "Capture-the-Flag" Contest[11/26/2007] Kris Watts, Katie Smith, Corey Thuen and Mike Krueger, a team of University of Idaho computer science majors placed second in the national "Capture-the-Flag" contest held the weekend after Thanksgiving. The contest was sponsored by Polytechnic University of New York and was open to students from colleges and universities nationwide. The University of Idaho team members are all student researchers in the Center for Secure and Dependable Systems (CSDS). 
The Capture-the-Flag contest challenges teams with offensive and defensive computer network security strategies and mitigations. The team from the Naval Postgraduate School won the competition with a combined score of 8300 points. The University of Idaho team earned 7250 points and the SUNY Stony Brook team came in third with a score of 6850. Other notable universities placing in the top ten were Polytechnic University of New York, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, New York University, SUNY Binghamton, and Witchita State University. The University of Idaho team will be traveling to New York to receive their award December 4, 2007. More information on the contest can be found at the Polytechnic University Information and Internet Security Lab website. Articles by University of Idaho CS Faculty and Students Appears in this Month's Special Issue of "Genetic Programming and Evolvable Machines."[11/26/2007] This month's issue of "Genetic Programming and Evolvable Machines" is a special issue on medical applications of genetic and evolutionary computation. Of the eight articles appearing, two are by University of Idaho CS faculty members publishing with students:
University of Idaho Programming Team Takes Second Place at the Spokane site in the annual ACM International Collegiate Programming Contest.[11/12/2007] "Brute Force," a programming team from the University of Idaho that included Ben Sanders, Brandon Morton, and Curt Stein, took second place at the Spokane site in the annual ACM International Collegiate Programming Contest. The five hour competition involved submitting program solutions to several different problems. Teams are judged based on how many problems they solved correctly. If teams tie in the number of correct solutions, the teams accumulating the smallest total time in solving the problems is the winner. Penalty minutes are assessed for submitting inocrrect solutions. The University of Idaho team tied with the first place team in the number of problems solved, but required 23 more minutes for their solutions. John Munson receives SBIR Grant Award to Develop Technology in Dynamic Kernel Monitoring for Attack Recognition and Mitigation
[9/26/2007] The activity of the kernel of an operating system may be monitored dynamically in real time. As the kernel executes its normal service functions, the transition among the constituent components of the kernel will follow a very regular and predictable pattern representing the normal operation of the kernel in this service function. An attack on the operating system will induce a significant and immediately recognizable disturbance in this pattern of normal activity. We propose to monitor the kernel activity through the use of a security co-processor. This co-processor will operate in parallel with the main CPU to detect changes in the nominal execution patterns of the kernel. When departures from the normal execution patterns are detected, an interrupt on the main CPU can be created which will permit the analysis of the currently executing task that created the anomalous kernel activity. The activity may then be mapped to a particular executing process or kernel activity. Thus, the proposed security monitoring system represents a hybrid extension of the operating system kernel with an active security monitor and a software interrupt service routine to analyze and manage the specific nature of the attack on the OS kernel. The primary objective of the Attack Recognition and Management (ARM) project is to create the infrastructure for an autonomic kernel protection system and then productize this infrastructure. John Dickinson Memorial Scholarship Established
[9/4/2007] A scholarship fund has been established in memory of former Computer Science Department faculty member and chair John Dickinson. John died tragically in a motor vehicle accident January 7, 2007 while attempting to aid another accident victim on the I-84 bridge over the John Day River in Oregon. Those wishing to contribute to the scholarship fund may send their contribution to: John Dickinson Memorial Scholarship Fund The CS Department opens its reconfigured space in JEB 211 as the "CS Commons"
[8/24/2007] Over the summer the CS department reconfigured the computer lab space in JEB 211. We removed some old CRT monitors, servers, and tables. The room now is more usable as a between-class study area and as a group project meeting place. Systems are available for both Linux and Windows. There's also plenty of space where you can sit and use your own laptop. Stop by to check it out for yourself. The CS Commons is located immediately behind the Computer Science Assistance Center in the Janssen Engineering Building. CS 105 and CS 445 Required in 2007 BSCS Curriculum[7/31/2007] A BSCS curriculum change is in effect for those students on the 2007 curriculum. Students who are attending the University of Idaho for the first time beginning with the Fall 2007 term are automatically assigned to the 2007 curriculum. In addition to the requirements existing under the 2004 curriculum, the 2007 curriculum added CS 105 Computer Science as a Profession and CS 445 Compiler and Translator Design as required courses. Free elective credits were reduced to maintain the total credits required for the degree at 128. New freshman and lower-division students transferring from other institutions should be enrolled in the Fall 2007 offering of CS 105. Karen Zucco-Gatlin Joins CS Department
[7/23/2007] The CS Department welcomes Karen into our Administrative Assistant II position replacing Jo Campbell who recently accepted another position within the University. Karen joined us on July 23, 2007. She has primary responsibility for student support, maintaining student records, as well as performing may other duties associated with departmental operations. Karen's office is located in the CS Department's main office suite, JEB 236. Sarah Park Receives CS Department Outstanding Senior Award[4/27/2007] During the Dean's Reception for the 2007 Engineering Design Expo Sarah was presented with the award voted by the CS Department faculty as the outstanding graduating senior for the 2006-2007 academic year. In addition to an outstanding academic record, Sarah was an activive participant in many student activities and organizations including the University of Idaho Student Chapter of ACM. |