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My AHR review of Joe November's _Biomedical Computing_
by Thomas Haigh 04 Oct '13

04 Oct '13

Hello everyone, Just got an email from The American Historical Review that my book review of Joe's "Biomedical Computing" is now published in its October issue. It's an excellent book and I was pleased that AHR plucked it from what must be an enormous pile of incoming volumes and selected it for a review. Read the full text of the review at http://ahr.oxfordjournals.org/cgi/content/full/118.4.1226?ijkey=ow7btdAynjQe JXr <http://ahr.oxfordjournals.org/cgi/content/full/118.4.1226?ijkey=ow7btdAynjQ eJXr&keytype=ref%20> &keytype=ref Tom

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HaPoC 2013, ENS (Paris): Programme Online
by Maarten.Bullynck＠kuttaka.org 04 Oct '13

04 Oct '13

Dear SIGCIS members, The program for the 2nd Conference on the History and Philosophy of Computing (HaPoC 2013) that will take place at the Ecole Normale Supérieure in Paris from 28th to 31st of October 2013 is now online (with abstracts): http://hapoc2013.sciencesconf.org/program I also want to remind you that normal registration for HaPoC 2013 is still open until October 15th: http://hapoc2013.sciencesconf.org/registration/index best regards, the organisers, Maarten Bullynck (Paris 8 & SPHERE) Jean-Baptiste Joinet (Lyon 3, IRPhil & CIRPHLES) History and Philosophy of Computing (HaPoC 2013, 28-31 October, Paris) http://hapoc2013.sciencesconf.org/

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CfP: 2nd Symposium on History and Philosophy of Programming
by Liesbeth De Mol 03 Oct '13

03 Oct '13

Dear all, I hope the following cfp is of interest to some of you, very best wishes, Liesbeth. Apologies for Multiple Postings -------------------------- /Call for Papers/ Second Symposium on History and Philosophy of Programming www.computing-conference.ugent.be/hapop2 At AISB-50, Goldsmiths, London 1-4, April 2014 As part of the AISB-50 Annual Convention 2014 to be held at Goldsmiths, University of London, on April 1st--4th 2014 www.aisb.org.uk/events/aisb14 The convention is organised by the Society for the Study of Artificial Intelligence and Simulation of Behaviour (AISB) http://www.aisb.org.uk/ Overview The history and philosophy of computing only started to develop as real disciplines in the '80s and '90s of the previous century, with the foundation of journals (e.g. the IEEE Annals on the History of Computing, Minds and Machines and the like) and associations (SIGCIS, IACAP, . . . ), and the organization of conferences and workshops on a regular basis. A historical awareness of the evolution of computing not only helps to clarify the complex structure of the computing sciences, but it also provides an insight in what computing was, is and maybe could be in the future. Philosophy, on the other hand, helps to tackle some of the fundamental problems of computing. The aim of this symposium is to zoom into one fundamental aspect of computing, that is the foundational and the historical problems and developments related to the science of programming. This is the Second Symposium on History and Philosophy of Programming, following the first edition organized in 2012 at the AISB/IACAP Joint Convention in Birmingham, UK. It is supported by the Commission on the History and Philosophy of Computing (http://www.hapoc.ugent.be/home) A historical awareness of the evolution of computing not only helps to clarify the complex structure of the computing sciences, but it also provides an insight in what computing was, is and maybe could be in the future. Philosophy, on the other hand, helps to tackle some of the fundamental problems of computing. The aim of this symposium is to zoom into one fundamental aspect of computing, that is the foundational and the historical problems and developments related to programming. Topics of Interest That a logico-mathematical-physical object called program is so controversial, even though its very nature is mostly hidden away, is rooted in the range of problems, processes and objects that can be solved, simulated, approximated and generated by way of its execution. Given its widespread impact on our lives, it becomes a responsibility of the philosopher and the historian to study the science of programming. The historical and philosophical reflection on the science of programming is the main topic at the core of this workshop and we expect contributions (talks) in the following aspects (and their connections): 1. The history of computational systems, machines and programs 2. Foundational issues and paradigms of programming 3. Methodology of designing, teaching and learning programming We believe the scientific community needs a deep understanding and critical view of the problems related to the scientific paradigm represented by the science of programming. Possible and in no way exclusive questions that might be of relevance to this Symposium are: . What was and is the relation between hardware and software developments? . How did the notion of 'program' changed since the 40s? . How important has been the hands-off vs. the hands-on approach for the development of programming? . How did models of computability like Church's lambda-calculus influence the development of programming languages? . Is programming a science or a technology? . What are the novel and most interesting approaches to the design of programs? . What is correctness for a program? Issues in Type-checking, Model-checking, etc. . How do we understand programs as syntactical-semantical objects? . What is the nature of the relation between algorithms and programs? What is a program? . How can epistemology profit from the understanding of programs' behavior and structure? . What legal and socio-economical issues are involved in the creation, patenting or free-distribution of programs? . How is programming to be taught? Submission and Publication Details Submissions must be full (short) papers and should be sent via EasyChair: https://www.easychair.org/conferences/?conf=hapop2 Text editor templates from a previous convention can be found at: http://www.aisb.org.uk/convention/aisb08/download.html We request that submitted papers are limited to eight pages. Each paper will receive at least two reviews. Selected papers will be published in the general proceedings of the AISB Convention, with the proviso that at least ONE author attends the symposium in order to present the paper and participate in general symposium activities. Important Dates Full paper submission deadline: *3 January 2014 * Notification of acceptance/rejections: 6 February 2014 Final version of accepted papers: 24 february 2014 Convention: 1-4 April 2014 (symposium date tbc) Additional Information Please note that there will be separate proceedings for each symposium, produced before the convention. Each delegate will receive a memory stick containing the proceedings of all the symposia. In previous years there have been awards for the best student paper, and limited student bursaries. These details will be circulated as and when they become available. Authors of a selection of the best papers will be invited to submit an extended version of the work to a journal special issue. Symposium organisers dr. Liesbeth De Mol elizabeth.demol(a)ugent.be UMR 8163 - Savoir, Textes, Languages Université de Lille 3 Bt.B4 Rue du Barreau BP 60149 59653 Villeneuve d'Ascq Cedex, France dr. Giuseppe Primiero G.Primiero(a)mdx.ac.uk website: http://www.cs.mdx.ac.uk/people/giuseppe-primiero/ Department of Computer Science Middlesex University the Borroughs NW4 4BT, London, UK Symposium Website: www.computing-conference.ugent.be/hapop2 Programme Committee G. Alberts (Amsterdam) - TBC M. Campbell-Kelly (Warwick) L. Corry (Tel Aviv) L. de Mol (Lille) H. Durnova (Brno) R. Kahle (Lisbon) B. Loewe (Amsterdam) G. Primiero (Middlesex London) M. Tedre (Helsinki) R. Turner (Essex)

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SHOT is seeking input on its future
by Thomas Haigh 02 Oct '13

02 Oct '13

Hello SIGCIS members, Atushi Akera has asked me to forward the messages below, which relate to a draft report on SHOT's current challenges and future now available at http://shot-talk.org/wp-content/themes/twentytwelve/pdf/Preliminary%20Draft% 20Report%20for%20Membership.pdf. SHOT is the parent organization of SIGCIS, and our annual workshop is held in conjunction with the main SHOT meeting. The report is interesting reading. I hadn't been aware that SHOT was having the problems discussed in keeping up its membership and meeting attendance. Although SIGCIS is not mentioned by name, you do see our influence in various places. The table on page 11 has "computing and information" as the largest category for papers at the upcoming annual meeting, and the graph of attendees at the meetings on page 1 shows that attendance at the annual meeting dropped from almost 600 in 2007 to barely 200 in 2010. So while registrations for our business lunch and workshop have both been stable at around 45-55 each (with considerable overlap), that makes me realize that SIGCIS has become a larger share of the overall meeting since 2007 just by holding steady. It also suggests that the work we've done to attract SIGCIS members to SHOT meetings must have done a great deal to keep them financially viable during the darkest days of the recession. There's a sense running through the report that SHOT has become rather insular. In SIGCIS we've had success in brining scholars from outside the existing core history of technology community to our sessions and workshops, broadening the range of perspectives represented. In some cases this has produced new active members for SHOT. If other SIGS were similarly active then SHOT would be a significantly larger and more diverse organization. The draft report mentions SIGs as a way to "extend the intellectual agenda of SHOT" but does not explicitly position them as a means of dealing with the challenge of broaden SHOT's geographical diversity, reversing its sliding membership, etc. (In fact it notes that SIGs may be "less fluid" as a way of dealing with "new and emergent areas" than the development of non-traditional panel formats). There's also some discussion of SHOT's committee structure, which I confess I have never really understood and is not fully explained on its website. But certainly SIGs could be better integrated into SHOT's governance. As became apparent previously when I was trying to explain SHOT's particular customs to outsiders via this list there are some things that SHOT takes for granted that can be confusing to outsiders when they are trying to get onto its program. We raised some issues with its executive council years ago, but there is definitely scope for improvement regarding . Posting of rules somewhere - e.g. the one about not presenting two years running . Being more explicit about review process, what a commentator does, there being no proceedings, etc. - as we do on the SIGCIS workshop CFP. . Giving some feedback to rejected proposals. Someone could be rejected repeatedly and never know why. Little things like that could make a big difference to SHOT's ability to attract proposals from those whose disciplinary or geographical backgrounds mean they can't pick them up as craft knowledge during their graduate education. However those are just my thoughts and SHOT is encouraging everyone to leave feedback at <http://shot-talk.org/?page_id=30> http://shot-talk.org/?page_id=30. It would be good to have the thoughts of as many SIGCIS members represented as possible. If you have just attended one SHOT meeting or SIGCIS event that makes you the kind of potential active member SHOT is interested in attracting so your thoughts would be particularly useful to its leaders. In fact if you thought about attending SHOT but didn't (abstract rejected, program looked too dull, etc) then that would also be a valuable perspective. Best wishes, Tom From: Akera, Atsushi [mailto:akeraa@rpi.edu] Sent: Tuesday, October 01, 2013 10:57 PM To: rob(a)furglu.com; taeho.kim.75(a)gmail.com; Thomas Haigh; hackerb(a)si.edu; MARSH, ALLISON; secretary(a)sigcis.org; Jonathan Coopersmith; Chris Jones; anna.aberg(a)abe.kth.se; tisha.hooks(a)yale.edu; Deborah Douglas; Andrew Butrica; Geoff Zylstra; cxsgla(a)rit.edu; Andrew Russell; eric.nystrom(a)rit.edu Cc: lhe.lpf(a)cbs.dk; Audra Wolfe (audrajwolfe(a)gmail.com) sgk23(a)drexel.edu; slatonae(a)drexel.edu; Erik Rau (erau(a)Hagley.org) Subject: FW: [Shotnews] Something Different for SHOT's Annual Meeting, 2013 Hi Everyone (SHOT SIG Chairs & Officers), So one of the main pieces of this year's Presidential Roundtables is a report put together by the Ad Hoc Committee on Structure and Organization. This is a report that opens a conversation the future opportunities and directions for SHOT. Comments are already being posted on the website at this link: <http://shot-talk.org/?page_id=30> http://shot-talk.org/?page_id=30 While SIGs are in fact mentioned in one part of the report, what's more important is for there to be broadly representative conversations about the recommendations in the report. As such, we'd appreciate it if you could send a follow up to Bruce's note (below) and encourage all of the members within your SIG to chime in on the conversation. Comments can be left at the bottom of the page listed above, (under "Leave a Reply"). (You can simply forward this note, with your endorsement.) I've also attached a copy of the committee's report for everyone's convenience. And yes, please let us know what you think! - Atsushi (On behalf of the Ad Hoc Committee on Structure and Organization) From: shotnews-bounces(a)muse.jhu.edu [mailto:shotnews-bounces@muse.jhu.edu] On Behalf Of Society for the History of Technology News Sent: Monday, September 30, 2013 2:15 PM To: shotnews(a)historyoftechnology.org Subject: [Shotnews] Something Different for SHOT's Annual Meeting, 2013 Dear SHOT members, As part of the Annual Meeting program upcoming in Portland (11-14 October 2013), I invite you to read on-line the short texts provided by the participants in the opening plenary and various roundtables that will take place during the meeting. Even more, we solicit your comments, feedback and suggestions about the session topics and the individual papers through a blog feature - the first time SHOT has offered such an option tied to sessions and papers. Our goal is to stimulate a discussion among the Society's members about SHOT's intellectual directions and activities. I and the Executive Council strongly urge you to peruse the materials before the meeting, participate in the sessions once you are in Portland, and post your thoughts and ideas during and after the session. We seek to align the Society with exciting intellectual trends and also to help historians of technology make more visible contributions to the development of those trends. We also want to insure that SHOT is responsive to the needs and interests of its members. Thus for the first time, even if you cannot be in Portland, you can interact with this important discussion about SHOT's future. So please use this vehicle! We want to hear your ideas and comments. Here's how it works. For posting materials and the creation of the blog sites, a familiar layout has been used, specifically a wordpress template customized with SHOT branding. Everyone who logs on can access the Plenary and Roundtables blog from the main "SHOT Talk" website (go to shot-talk.org) >From the same page, you also will be able to access a conference blog once the meeting actually gets underway. There will be two options for entering your comments. (1) Go to a particular panel (roundtable or plenary) to read and comment; or (2) enter comments at this top level. For example, you will find a notice about the Ad Hoc Membership committee report at this level - it is well worth reading. If you go to a particular panel, you'll see a short note about each paper followed by a "click here for more" button that will open the entire document. Readers may download or print files, or just read the text in your browser. I hope many of you can find a few minutes to read the posted texts and join those offering comments and feedback. This is a new initiative for SHOT, one that has been advanced through the effort of many people, including the program committee, the roundtable and plenary participants, and the officers and Executive Council. But special recognition goes to Technology and Culture editor Suzanne Moon, who has coordinated the effort to make the materials accessible. We look forward to a good meeting - but even those of you not in Portland can, thanks to the marvel of social media, offer your input and comments. Travel safe and best wishes! Bruce Seely President, Society for the History of Technology PLEASE DO NOT REPLY DIRECTLY TO THIS MESSAGE. IF YOU HAVE A QUESTIONS, PLEASE SEND IT TO SHOTSECY(a)VIRGINIA.EDU THANKS! -- (**Please excuse me if this message seems brief. Especially during my sabbatical year, I am trying to limit my replies to five (5) lines or less. I'm sure you'll appreciate this in turn!**) _________________________________________________________ Atsushi Akera Associate Professor, Department of Science and Technology Studies Rensselaer Polytechnic institute 110 8th Street Troy, NY 12180 USA cel: 518.300.0613/fx:518.276-2659/e:akeraa@rpi.edu /w: http://www.rpi.edu/~akeraa

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Re: [SIGCIS-Members] Response on course design from James Sumner
by Evan Koblentz 30 Sep '13

30 Sep '13

>> the idea of rebuilding ENIAC Bill Mauchly (Cisco engineer and John's oldest son) has told me several times that this is his dream. If anyone is ever serious about it, then I think he'd want to be involved.

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Response on course design from James Sumner
by Thomas Haigh 30 Sep '13

30 Sep '13

[James is still having problems sending to the list, but has a good reply below. Tom] -------- Original Message -------- Subject: Re: [SIGCIS-Members] Seeking help -- if you could design your ideal Computer/Information History course, what would you include? Date: Sun, 29 Sep 2013 11:11:34 +0100 From: James Sumner <james.sumner(a)manchester.ac.uk> To: members(a)sigcis.org Dear all What an excellent question -- and it's remarkable to see that the discussion very quickly worked its way round to early hardware and games. My first thought before seeing the follow-up messages was to give the students a task something like this: "It's 1951. The firm you work for has just announced an electronic digital computer -- the first to be offered for commercial sale. You have no established competition, but this also means you're promoting an unfamiliar idea. Many of the people you're trying to sell to are happy relying on human clerical labour or existing punched-card technology, which they see as cheap and reliable. And many people more generally don't have a clear sense of what 'electronic digital computer' means at all. "Your big opportunity to do something about this arrives with a major public exhibition on new science and technology of the future, to be hosted at [insert name of suitable big expo venue]. Your firm has been offered a prime space of [insert dimensions] for a display introducing computers to the public. Your task is to build the display. You have X weeks." This is loosely based on the situation facing the British firm Ferranti when it produced the Nimrod machine (http://www.goodeveca.net/nimrod/) for the 1951 Festival of Britain. There was not enough time to implement a full-scale working computer, and in any case there were questions about whether a complex machine would be either reliable enough or intelligible enough for public display. The engineers instead put together some relatively straightforward electronics to play a simple interactive game (Nim -- one step up from tic-tac-toe), and housed it in an enormous, imposing case. The result worked well enough for attracting column inches, but was judged a partial failure on the marketing side because it didn't lead people to find out more about fundamental computer concepts. The idea behind this kind of project, of course, is to play to the strengths of a class with a mixture of study backgrounds and skills. A clear understanding of the conceptual principles of digital information processing has to be present and correct, but there are avenues for taking the social history seriously -- what kind of promotional technique were conventional to 1950s audiences? What sections of the public would show up to this exhibition? Would it be wise to address possible labour fears? -- and for thinking about the practicalities of display, the style to aim for in any written materials, and the performance aspects of any demonstration involved. It might even rival "costumed battle on the front quad" if it could really be built, assuming the students followed Ferranti in going for the big-and-imposing spectacle approach. The main headache would be in determining what rules to play by on the practical construction. Insisting on only "materials that could have existed in 1951" would create major problems if rigorously enforced, and would focus a lot of time and attention on elements which would probably be most interesting to a small minority of students. Tolerating too much simulation, on the other hand, would defeat the key point that equipment was inherently unreliable, and that the question of whether digital automation was worthwhile or not was still a live one. Perhaps experienced replicationists might be able to advise here? All best James

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SHOT 2013 SIG teaching panel, comments online
by Marie Hicks 28 Sep '13

28 Sep '13

Hi all, As I mentioned recently, this year there will be a panel on the main SHOT program discussing how SIG concerns are integrated into teaching. As part of SHOT's new website launch, comments from this panel and several other roundtables are being made available in advance (at http://shot-talk.org) I'll be representing the SIGCIS at this teaching panel, and I've posted a draft of my comments on the SIGCIS blog (first paragraph is below, rest is at: http://www.sigcis.org/node/380) Thank you to all those who responded with suggestions and insights as I was preparing these remarks. Feel free to leave comments on the blog post as well. Please come to the panel if you can--the full title of the panel is "Integrating SHOT SIG Concerns into the Teaching of History of Technology: Rethinking Modes of Instruction in a Diverse Communities" and it takes place on Saturday, Oct. 12 from 10:30 am to 12:30 pm. It is part of the President's Roundtable program. ________________________________ Learning about Infrastructure, and Infrastructures for Learning: Insights on Pedagogy from the SIGCIS Our SIG is sometimes viewed as the “computer history SIG” and while that forms an important part of what we do, I would like to start by emphasizing that it is only one part of what we do. Members of our SIG work on topics ranging from telegraphy to labor history, and from voice recognition to video games. Collectively, we are interested in much more than a narrowly-defined computing history: our mandate is to study how computers, information, and society interact, shaping the human experience in the process. As a result, one of the main teaching goals of the SIGCIS is to help students learn how to contend with technologies of infrastructure that creep into all aspects of our lives, from the broadest to the most personal level. (Read the rest at http://www.sigcis.org/node/380) Marie ______________________ Marie Hicks, Ph.D. Asst. Professor, History of Technology Illinois Institute of Technology Chicago, IL USA mhicks1(a)iit.edu | mariehicks.net | @histoftech

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Re: [SIGCIS-Members] Seeking help -- if you could design your ideal Computer/Information History course, what would you include?
by Evan Koblentz 26 Sep '13

26 Sep '13

>> I would recommend treading cautiously around the IP owned by the notoriously litigious Nolan Bushnell. .... As the old saw goes, 'Would you like to play a game?' Thus tic-tac-toe is the better choice. Joshua approved.

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Seeking help -- if you could design your ideal Computer/Information History course, what would you include?
by Andrew Meade McGee 26 Sep '13

26 Sep '13

Dear SIG-CIS friends, I hope you might help me with a happy conundrum. This year I am visiting faculty in the history department of Washington and Lee University, a small but affluent liberal arts college in Lexington, Virginia. One of the school’s quirks is a mandatory four-week April term in which students enroll in only one class and have 8-10 hours or more of weekly face-to-face classroom interaction with the professor (and 20+ hours of readings, assignments, labs), usually on a specialized topic. In recent years the school has embraced “high-concept” classes with catchy thematic topics, deep reading lists, and creative final assignments for this mini-mester – last year, for instance, the Classics Department offered a course on the Trojan War that featured students meticulously recreating Bronze Age military formations and engaging in costumed battle on the front quad. Other classes do digital humanities projects or create documentaries, etc. I have been instructed by Dean and Department Chair to develop a “computer-related” history class for Spring 2014. I essentially have carte blanche create my ideal computer history/information history/information and society class from scratch, as long as I can cram it all into four weeks and devise some clever final project. Ideally I would attract history majors and liberal arts students as well as a few stray engineering and business students intrigued by the topic. So I appeal to the SIG-CIS community for ideas – what would you teach if you could design your ideal class on computer or information history? How would you structure it? Any outlandish ideas you wish you had tried? Books or topics or assignments you feel are must have? I might have school-provided funds for a day trip or two, so I could take the kids within a few hour radius (I’ve thought of DC and the Smithsonian, or the supercomputers at Blacksburg or Oak Ridge). I’ve gone through the excellent syllabus repository on the SIG-CIS webpage and have plundered the university faculty page-posted syllabi of some of the list’s more prominent members, but would appreciate any additional ideas. I’m not sure if I’m going to go with straight “computer history” or a broader “From Gutenberg to Google” type information history class. Given my cultural and political history strengths, other options include a “Computers and Society,” “Digital America,” or “Global Information Age” approach, or even something focused more conceptually on "Data" or "Systems." . So, again, any comments would be greatly appreciated. If you could construct your ideal (but timeframe-compressed) computer/information history class, what would you include? Thank you, Andrew -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- Andrew Meade McGee Corcoran Department of History University of Virginia PO Box 400180 - Nau Hall Charlottesville, VA 22904

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A little "finding" resource
by Dave Walden 26 Sep '13

26 Sep '13

For a (hopefully) complete list of all of the Anecdotes published in the IEEE Annals of the History of Computing, see <http://computer.org/comphistory/anecdotes/>http://computer.org/comphistory/anecdotes/ [The final slash in that URL is necessary.]

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