I've just returned from the first Microsoft Ireland finals of the Imagine Cup , an annual international student competition hosted by Microsoft. The theme of the Imagine Cup competition this year is "Imagine a world where technology enables a better education for all." Although the competition...

I was excited to see a good friend, Mona, start blogging about her experience running a science center located north of the arctic circle. It's fascinating reading. They're designing interactive exhibits and experiments: everything from visualizing DNA to creating 5-meter-high geisers of Coke and...

Over 100 students from 23 Colleges and Universities in Ireland and Northern Ireland have registered for the Imagine Cup Competition . And it's not too late: the competition is open to students from all third level Colleges and Universities around the world to compete in nine categories which span...

For the first time ever, this year's Imagine Cup competition will include Ireland ! I just got out of a meeting with Liam Cronin, one of my colleagues here at Microsoft Ireland, who is leading the charge and making it happen. The Imagine Cup is an international competition for students, with 9...

Last Wednesday I gave a presentation to SkyNet , the University of Limerick Computer Society. About 30 undergrad and graduate students turned up for Atlas, Vista and pizza, in that order. What I showed them was basically a riff on my ASP.NET "Atlas" presentation from ApacheCon Europe , but I also...

Clare asked Dave and me to reveal some hidden gems that are available from Microsoft for technical support and learning. This was our list of the shiniest gems that we find devs and IT pros don't always know about. I also posted the Best of the Rest as an article. 1. MSDN Forums – http://forums...

Here is a link to the slides from Andrew Blake's fascinating presentation last night on Computer Science and Illusion. ( 44MB, zipped PPT ) His presentation took us on a journey through four topics from computer vision: perspective drawing, texture, shading, and his current interest, stereo projection...

If you're in the Dublin area, don't forget that Andrew Blake from Microsoft Research will be presenting on Wednesday night at Trinity College Dublin on the subject of Computer Science and Illusion . The talk will explore and demonstrate connections between visual perception, geometry, and computer processing...

A highly respected Senior Researcher from Microsoft Research in Cambridge is visiting Dublin on Wednesday September 6th to give an evening's presentation titled Computer Science and Illusion: A Computational View of the Interpretation and Manipulation of Images . Professor Andrew Blake has made major...

" XNA Game Studio Express is a set of tools based on Visual C# Express 2005 that allow students and hobbyists to build games that target both Windows and Xbox 360." To all the enthusiasts, hobbyists and students who have ever asked me if they could develop apps for their Xbox 360, this is the news...

While I was away in Canada last week, Siggraph 2006 was taking place down in Boston. Many of the papers from that enormously engaging conference on graphics and interactive techniques are now available on the web . During the conference, I enjoyed reading Ben Constable (of the Microsoft Max team)...

While scanning through the papers this weekend (over some Taiwanese High Mountain green tea that was relayed to me by the thoughtful and multilingual Eric Fish ), I discovered that robots had invaded the National College of Ireland on Friday ! NCI had hosted the annual RoboCup competition, which features...

I had the good fortune of spending Thursday and Friday last week at Microsoft Research in Cambridge. I had been invited to visit by Ralf Herbrich and Thore Graepel, the leaders of MSRC's newly-formed Applied Games Group . Before starting the Applied Games Group, Ralf and Thore were members of the...

Next week, on the 3rd and 4th of May, four of our technical communities - the ICS , INDA , IrishDev , and NIMTUG - are joining forces to host their largest .NET developer conference ever at the Morrison Hotel in Dublin. If you're a developer, a project manager, a technical architect or a company director...

I gave a presentation yesterday to a packed room of students and faculty of the Univeristy College Dublin School of Computer Science and Informatics. I love speaking with student audiences - they ask the most insightful questions, don't pull punches, and (in Ireland anyway) typically come from non-.NET...

At long last, I've posted the photos of some of the many participants who tried out the Mind Balance brain-computer interface at the Dublin launch event. I previously chronicled the story of the resurrection of Cerebus, our wireless brain-computer interface, prior to the launch event. Many participants...

Great news for students, hobbyists, casual developers and curious newcomers! The Express Editions of Visual Studio 2005 and SQL Server 2005 are now available to you in their RTM (Release-to-Manufacturer) format. And you can download them from the web free of charge, here on the Express Edition page...

"Do you think we can get it working again?" I asked Scott, as he opened up the Marsellus Wallace briefcase to reveal the bits of a disassembled brain-computer interface. Here we were on a Saturday morning, in Gary's stunning office space overlooking Saint Stephen's Green in the heart of Dublin...

In this week's MSDN Flash Ireland editorial, I reflected on Steve Ballmer's visit to Dublin and looked toward our next focus: the November launch events. I've been eagerly awaiting the official photos from the SteveB visit. Here are a few half-decent photos here I took of the various SteveB events...

I'm down to Waterford tonight to talk about SQL Server 2005 at the local INDA usergroup . If you're down in the southeast, come on out and I look forward to seeing you at Dooley's Hotel. Just a bit of personal interest to round out my blog for today. Gamasutra (a site devoted to the art and science...

The Steve Ballmer Academic Event in Dublin, " Creating Innovation with Real Impact ", is taking place at Trinity College Dublin on the 7th of October, and it's almost completely booked up. There are 200+ people signed up already to hear our energetic and insightful CEO, and we also have space reserved...

As you've probably heard by now, Steve Ballmer, Microsoft's enthusiatically pro-developer CEO, will be visiting Dublin as part of the Microsoft 20 Years in Ireland celebration on October the 7th! To all academics - both students and faculty - in Ireland and Northern Ireland: Steve has specifically...

One of the books that became part of our .NET Academic Library was Tom Miller's Managed DirectX Kickstart . It's still a very useful book, and great to learn from, but the Managed DirectX API has changed a little bit since it was written. Enough so that quite a few of the code samples from the book no...

One of my favourite professors from grad school, Hiroshi Ishii , draws a beautiful analogy that compares the richness of the seashore to the interaction between bits and atoms, technologies and humans, sciences and arts. "People tend to think of borders as separators," he writes , "but it is important...

Today, at Tech Ed Australia, Microsoft announced that Valve, makers of the exquisite game Half Life 2, have declared Visual Studio 2005 C++ Express Edition to be their preferred platform for developers to use when writing "mods," or modifications, to the game. Check out the Half Life 2 page on the...