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Open Day Talks: Titles and Abstracts

10:30-11:15Jim Davies, to be arranged

11:30-12:15Jeremy Gibbons, Generic programming in Java

Recent versions of Java and C# have introduced the notion of generics, or parametrized types — arguably the most significant change to either language since their inception. Generics allow typing to be much more precise, and eliminate many unsafe uses of reflection and coercion. For example, without generics, a collection of Apples is represented as a collection of Objects; when an element is retrieved, it requires type inspection to check that it isn't an Orange and downcasting to the type Apple. With generics, the representation can be explicitly as a collection of Apples, with no possibility of being an Orange and no need to downcast. We explain the principles of generics, point out some of their dark corners, and show how they help to extend and simplify a number of familiar design patterns.

13:00-13:45Steve McKeever, Joined-up data and services

Since modern systems need to communicate in many heterogeneous and ad hoc ways, a range of technologies has emerged to facilitate the sharing of data across different information systems. Used badly, these can lead to fragile, heavily inter-dependent applications. We will show — with illustrations — how instead XML can be used to deliver robust service-oriented architectures, produce data structures which can be generated and processed on-the-fly, and validate and transform data at the point of need.

14:00-14:45Andrew Martin, It's what you do with it that counts

Security is increasingly seen as a key element of any software design, and there are ever more technologies available to help achieve security goals. But how can we make sure we are addressing the right goals, and how can we make sure people will use the technologies in such a way as to give genuine security benefits? This talk will explain the kind of thinking needed to undertake such tasks, and illustrate the challenges — and some of their solutions — using network protocols as an example.

15:00-15:45Rob Collins, Notations for design rationale and requirements traceability

We are repeatedly entreated to capture rationale for designs, and to trace requirements to analysis and design artefacts. However, little guidance is available on how these things can be achieved successfully. This presentation describes two diagrammatic conventions for capturing design rationale and requirements traceability within models. The notations map naturally to the UML and are expressible using different tools. A brief review of requirements tracing in SysML is presented. The author argues that the current requirements tracing facilities within SysML are insufficiently powerful and argues proposes the notations described in this presentation as useful alternatives.

Read about the Programme, see some testimonials from past and present students, find out how to apply, return to the open day schedule, download the open day poster or the press release, look up directions to the Computing Laboratory, or register or ask for more information.