The September 2008 CTP of F# is now available for download. F# is a functional programming language for the .NET Framework and really should be looked at by scientists/researchers. Also check out the F# Developer Center on MSDN for more info and resources.
There are a lot of new features in this release – here’s a sampling:
The Units of Measure checking and interference feature is very exciting feature and potentially most scientifically revolutionary programming language features around - scientists and engineers to check out. This is because the F# compiler knows the rules of units
When values of floating-point type are multiplied, the units are multiplied too; when they are divided, the units are divided too, and when taking square roots, the same is done to the units. So by the rule for multiplication, the expression inside sqrt above must have units m^2/s^2, and therefore the units of speedOfImpact must be m/s.
Take a look at the SolarSystem sample - A Solar System simulation application, taking advantage of Units of Measure in F# to do physics simulation. Andrew Kennedy, who researched, architected and implemented this feature has all the details.
Other F# resources:
Microsoft F# Developer Center
There’s a new release (1.0.1.52) of .NetMap available – which includes both the Excel Template and the class libraries. The big feature in this drop is the ability to do Directed or Undirected graphs. This determines whether arrows are drawn on the graph. Also take a look at the discussion on using the class libraries in other apps.
.NetMap - Home
Sam Stokes has spun up a blog to make research more accessible to students and though's of us that are learners for life. His latest post is looking at a project Sensor touch: Fun in reaching out using Xbox controllers…sounds like fun – would also be interesting to see if there is a way to use the Xbox Messenger Kit – maybe to text to IM or twitter or even a remote LCD panel.
Sam Stokes on Research in your life and studies
While I’ve been pushing the ideas of using OLAP data cubes to evaluate scientific data for awhile, I thought it might be a good time to pull together some relevant papers and links. I believe OLAP is ideal to help analyze large quantities of data including time series information...making it easier for the scientist/researcher to explore the data in real-time and from tools they know like Excel. For example the data served up on FluxData site is done by creating OLAP cubes using SQL Server Analysis Services.
A couple of tools/links that might be of interest as well:
Here are a couple of papers that reference the use of OLAP for different types of scientific data.
It’s great to see that Pixar will be releasing RenderMan on the upcoming release of Windows HPC 2008.
The rendering software behind such hit animated movies as The Incredibles, Ratatouille and Monsters Inc. should become even more powerful when it becomes available on Microsoft Corp.'s most advanced operating systems later this year. At the Siggraph 2008 computer graphics conference in Los Angeles this week, Pixar Animation Studios Inc. said that a new RenderMan Pro Server 14.0 release will be the first version of the software that runs on Windows HPC Server 2008, the upcoming release of Microsoft's operating system for high-performance computing clusters and supercomputers. RenderMan 14.0 will also support the 64-bit version of Windows Vista, according to Pixar's announcement.
The rendering software behind such hit animated movies as The Incredibles, Ratatouille and Monsters Inc. should become even more powerful when it becomes available on Microsoft Corp.'s most advanced operating systems later this year.
At the Siggraph 2008 computer graphics conference in Los Angeles this week, Pixar Animation Studios Inc. said that a new RenderMan Pro Server 14.0 release will be the first version of the software that runs on Windows HPC Server 2008, the upcoming release of Microsoft's operating system for high-performance computing clusters and supercomputers. RenderMan 14.0 will also support the 64-bit version of Windows Vista, according to Pixar's announcement.
Siggraph: Pixar animation software to get boost on Windows supercomputers
The registration site for this year’s Microsoft eScience Workshop at IUPUI is now open and the call for papers deadline has been extended to September 15th.
The 2008 Microsoft eScience Workshop at IUPUI December 7-9, 2008, Indianapolis, IN, USA Important Dates: Paper submission opens: July 1, 2008 (http://microsoft.redwhale.com) Paper submission closes: Extended to September 15th, 2008 at noon, Pacific Time
Important Dates:
Paper submission opens: July 1, 2008 (http://microsoft.redwhale.com)
Paper submission closes: Extended to September 15th, 2008 at noon, Pacific Time
The 2008 Microsoft eScience Workshop at IUPUI
I’ve been using the internal drop of pptPlex from OfficeLabs for awhile and really enjoy using the zoomable canvas. glad to see they’ve made it available to a wider audience. I especially like being able to combine different presentations together and tailor your presentation to the audience. Try it and let me know what you think.
Project: pptPlex
pptPlex
I really like the functionality provided by Live Mesh…and the video below helps
More info -