Kampkoder

The verdict is in, Uffe Sørensen and I got our paper on “Slicing for UPPAAL” accepted at AISPC’08. Now, among other things we just need to produce a camera ready version for Jan 15th.

Update:

The camera ready version is now finished, I have uploaded it, here if you want to have a look.

I have updated my CV.

Well I have had some complaints on my (currentley) very inactive blog. So here is a bit of news, for you. As you might remember I finished and defended my Master Thesis this summer, so you might ask, what I am doing now? Well that is actually not an easy question to answer.

Due to tradition (and surely some official reason) students at AAU completes the thesis on their fourth year, and on the fifth year (the last year of graduate school) we may choose to do something else. The last year is used by students to think and decide on what life should bring after graduate school. So enough with the talk and back to the real question, what am I doing these days?

Well, I choose not to do something else, I choose Computer Science, again. But this time with strong emphasis on the Science part! Some may call it Ph.D. preparation, others unnecessary fooling around with greek letters. The fact of the matter is that I’m currently studying the classical theoretical results of modeling and verification. If this description is too weak have a look a here for more complete description of the material. My supervisors this semester is Jiri Srba and Kim G. Larsen. Secondly I’m currently following a course on Abstract Algebra given at our math department, just to give the gray matter a small jolt. My personal motivation for spending half a year on this, is somewhat mysterious even for me. But maybe the next part may give a clue.

So, having answered that to some degree, what does the future bring? Well that is an equally tricky question, which I was hoping to have a clear idea of by now (now how naive am I?). My options as I see them are either: 1) staying at university or 2) leaving to do something else.

1. Staying, implies doing a Ph.D. which is quite appealing at times, especially since both Kim and Jiri are very convincing on the subject. Moreover, I’m finding that I quite like studying formal methods, especially applying modeling and verification to actual engineering problems. Problems like the one I investigated in my master thesis, on slicing models and improving performance of the UPPAAL tool. The down-side to a Ph.D. for me right now is the uniformity of the work compared to what I have been doing the last 5 years. I am currently finding myself longing to return to traveling or more precisely sailing as I did before I started studying.
2. Leaving is somewhat more tricky, since this would mean, having to choose or find some way of supporting my self, also known as “getting a job”. Which sounds really, really … really serious and grown up – which I’m not really a fan of. Anyway, If I were to choose this path, I would definitely be looking for some place where I would be allowed to use greek letters once in a while. That is, I would love to be able to use and explore the theory which I have been studying for the last couple of years now. Maybe some sort of research and development lab or department concerning reliable or imbedded software. Who knows what opportunities are out there, I certainly don’t.

Now, If anybody knows the real reason why and what to choose, please let me know – the suspense is killing me A quick google on the subject gave me this, an essay (I think it may be called) by Ronald T. Azuma. I haven’t read all of it yet, but he is definitely off to a good start with this quote:

“Being a graduate student is like becoming all of the Seven Dwarves. In the beginning you’re Dopey and Bashful. In the middle, you are usually sick (Sneezy), tired (Sleepy), and irritable (Grumpy). But at the end, they call you Doc, and then you’re Happy.”