Email Mikhail at mikhail.prokopenko@csiro.au if you are interested.

So the semester’s wound down, exams are over, and you’re dutifully reading our newsletter while Facebook, Steam and YouTube leer at you with beckoning fingers and the promise of a good time. Maybe you’ve finalised your holiday plans and are dreaming of a faraway place. Maybe your plans are with someone called Bethesda and your destination is Skyrim.

Either way, we hope you’ve had a good year. Congratulations to Bernhard Scholz and Dominick Ng, our Best Lecturer and Tutor, elected by YOU for making your year better! And thanks to all our members for making our year better, too! That’s right, it’s time to lay on the cheese and exclamation marks, because this is our last (planned) newsletter for the year!

Here we have some ideas for a productive summer, with a survey, T-shirt designs, and vacation jobs for you. For those of you reaching your honours year, the School of Geosciences is interested in taking you on. Don’t forget to swing by our stall at O-Week next year, because we can’t wait to see you again!

With love,
SUITS Exec
Now with extra cheese!

SUITS End of Year Survey

SUITS is a society run by its members, for its members. And so we need YOU, our members, to tell us what we are doing right, what we are doing wrong, and what we might not be doing at all.

We can only perform so awesomely because we try to do what you guys want, and if we are to get any better we need your help. The survey will only take about 5 minutes and we’d really appreciate the feedback.

The survey is available at: https://docs.google.com/a/suits.org.au/spreadsheet/viewform?hl=en_US&formkey=dFloaGpVTllkeW00dGlOWWcxZEtBdmc6MQ#gid=0

Thanks again for the year!

2012 SUITS T-shirt Competition

Have you always wanted one of your designs on a T-shirt? Well now is your chance! O-week is fast approaching and SUITS needs a brand new T-shirt for the new year.

Our previous shirt, featuring the SUITS Yeti, was amongst the best on campus, featured in several USU brochures and was runner up at the C&S awards. Apart from that, sightings were reported throughout the year all around campus from science to engineering.

If getting your design out there isn’t enough, the winner will be receiving free BBQ’s all through the next year, as well as recognition on the SUITS Website and in our various publications.

To apply, submit your T-shirt design as a png or pdf to tshirts.suits.org.au.

Images should be designed so that they will fit onto one side of a T-shirt (sadly, only one side), and include the USU logo somewhere in the design. The logo is available on the USU Website here.

Silicon Beach Sydney Startup Community Christmas Party/World Record Attempt

When: Friday 9th December, 6:00pm
Where: Bar 77, Grace Hotel, 77 York St, Sydney

Silicon Beach/Open Coffee/PushStart invite you to the official Sydney Startup Community Christmas Party!

Come and celebrate the massive year the Sydney startup community has had with some Christmas cheer and a World Record Attempt for Charity!

Click here for more details and to vote for the world record you’d most like to be a part of…

Spread the word.

Looking for a summer job?

Want to work in a social enterprise startup?

Bernard O’Sullivan is looking for talented developers and designers to get involved in his innovative startup in the social enterprise space. So if you want to do some good while doing business, here’s your chance!

For more details, call Bernard on 0418783072.

Are you a keen iOS developer who wants to take a punt with a slice of equity in a really promising startup?

A crack team of Valley-funded USyd grads have marketing experts, an expert in branding & design, awesome specs, brilliant idea AND a corporate strategic alliance already on board. This mix will get the app a lot of press and quick uptake once it’s live. The missing piece of the puzzle is a great iOS dev on board as a long-term part of the team rather than a paid employee. Is that you?

It’s not a difficult app to build (it should only take 2 to 3 weeks), but it’s unique. All you need to apply is a portfolio of your previously-built apps. Experience with commercial projects and social media development is preferred.

If you think you’re up to the job, send your CV/portfolio to Samantha at drupal.applicants@yahoo.com. If you are the right guy but need $$$ (you can’t work for equity), contact her anyway to make arrangements.

Looking for a 50:50 partnership in stock market software?

A stock market trader and investor is looking for someone who can develop a trading program that interacts with live (dynamic) stock market data produced by existing Java-based software. Similar trading software is used by most professionals and individual share traders (including through online brokers such as CommSec and E-Trade), and as such, it’s a lucrative opportunity to get involved in the stock market.

As a 50:50 commercial partnership, you won’t be paid for labour (you’ll be paid in equity), but will receive compensation for other necessary operating costs.

Interested? Call Nick on 0448098979.

Honours with the Earthbyte Research Group

The Earthbyte Research Group at the School of Geosciences offers a range of Honours projects. Most involve computational modelling and past experiences have shown many projects are particularly well-suited to IT students.

Interested? More details and the full list of projects on offer can be found here.

Remember how, in last week’s newsletter, we said we’d try to avoid bankruptcy for another year? After a week at the helm, we’ve decided to pursue the slightly-less-lofty goal of simply surviving the remainder of 2011 to ring in the new year with the gift of existence.

And how close to the end of the year it is! The scent of freedom is almost overwhelming. If only this stinking pile of exams would get out of the way. Don’t worry, though: we have a promising line-up of events to help you procrastinate.

First things first: we’re going to get you sloshed. Preferably in a cocktail dress (that goes for everybody, regardless of gender). That’s right, it’s another SUITS Drinks Night on Tuesday, and the theme is “Casino Cool” (the “cool” part is necessary because the sun will probably be trying to make us a tender roast). So grab some drinks on us (free for Access card holders, $10 for non-Access) and raise your glass to HashBang, our new publication, which we will be launching on the night.

We’ll be following that up with our usual weekly BBQ and a special Halloween-themed Movie Night with SUTEKH on Thursday. This week, we’ll be screening The Nightmare Before Christmas or Zombieland (whichever is more popular among the attendees). So everybody make a scene (drunken or otherwise)! We’ll see you there!

With love,
SUITS Exec
(clinging desperately to our Swivel Chairs of Power)

Drinks Night and HashBang Launch

Join us to celebrate the end of semester!

When: Tuesday 25th October, 5:30-8:30pm
Where: Hermann’s Bar
RSVP: Facebook

The Sydney University IT Society is launching a new student publication on campus, HashBang.

The Wired Magazine of Sydney Uni, the TechCrunch of our startup community, HashBang aims at bringing together tech news, industry figures and startup stories from a student perspective.

Created by Computer Science students from the University of Sydney and beyond, HashBang will feature articles and stories written by IT students and will primarily be an online publication with quarterly print versions.

Come and join us as we celebrate the end of semester, distribute the first print versions of HashBang and launch our online space.

Free drinks for all access card holders! $10 for non-access.

Best Lecturer/Tutor Nominations

Had a great lecturer or tutor this semester? Maybe you had one a semester ago who was so great you can’t stop raving about them.

SUITS is awarding the best lecturer and best tutor certificates, with the recipients being selected by your vote! If you think one of your tutors or lecturers did an amazing job this year, here is a chance to give them the recognition they deserve.

Simply submit a nomination here, and we’ll forward them some love on your behalf.

SUITS/SUTEKH Spooktacular Screening

When: Thursday 27th October, 5:30-8:30pm
Where: SIT Boardroom
RSVP: Facebook

In celebration of Halloween, SUITS/SUTEKH is having a spooktacular movie screening. We will have yummy Halloween-themed treats and will be putting the movie up to popular vote: The Nightmare Before Christmas or Zombieland, you decide! So join us for food, friends, a film and fun times!

DotA Soc AGM

When: Friday 28th October, 2:00-3:00pm
Where: Elisabeth Sidler Room, Manning House

We had our own AGM recently and the time has come for the DotA Society to have theirs.

One of the issues being raised on the day is a change of society direction. Given that DotA as a game is being phased out and Starcraft is achieving the greatest success, some of us are looking to change “DotA Society” into “Starcraft Society”.

If you would like any more information, have any questions or any issues you want to raise, please contact Brian at “brian.ng at ausproleague dot com”.

ING Direct Inspirational Talks

When: Tuesday 25th October
Where: New Law Building, Lecture Theatre 024
RSVP: Facebook

Studying bringing you down? Feeling purposeless and lacking direction? Perk yourself up with a series of free inspirational talks by some of Australia’s latest success stories!

Speakers include Jack Delosa – a 23 year old entrepreneur whose company is one of the Fastest 50 Start-Ups in Australia and who consults for brands like Microsoft, Virgin and CPA Australia; Samah Hamid, whose humanitarian work for the UN and NGOs like Oxfam and Amnesty International has been highly commended; Dr. Sam Prince – an entrepreneur, medical doctor, and philanthropist who is working to systematically eliminate infectious diseases from Australia for good, one at a time; and Leigh Morrison, a life coach who helps people figure out what they should do with their lives to make them meaningful and fulfilling. Joining them will be ING Direct guest speakers.

Interested? Just register at the Facebook page above.

Last week we waved off the 2011 exec as the AGM ushered in a group of fresh and familiar faces for 2012. A special welcome to Sebastian Pauka, who escaped the position of PR Officer to take the presidency, and thanks to our ex-president, James Alexander, for leading us through the year. We’ll do our best not to go mad with power.

Thanks to the 2011 exec, we also claimed honourable mentions for three titles at the USU Clubs & Societies Awards: Best Publication for our newsletter, Best Major Joint Event with the Engineering societies and Best Non-Major Joint Event for our weekly Movie Nights with SUTEKH. May we keep up the good work (or at least avoid bankruptcy for another year).

What, then, are we doing this week? We’re having another Sports Tuesday with Rock-Climbing at St Peters! Join us in the SIT foyer at 5pm to catch a train there.

We’re also holding our regular Thursday events: our delicious weekly BBQ and our (honourably mentioned) Movie Night with SUTEKH. This week, it’s Spaceballs. So grab a harness and some noms: we’ll see you there!

With love, from our Swivel Chairs of Power,

SUITS Exec

Rock Climbing with SUITS!

When: Tuesday 18th October, 5:30 PM
Where: Sydney Indoor Climbing Gym
(Unit 4C/1-7 Unwins Bridge Road St Peters)
Meet At: SIT Foyer to catch a train down together @ 5PM
RSVP: Facebook

Thats Right!

For the first time, SUITS is going rock climbing! And just to put your minds at ease, we wont actually be doing it in suits (although please feel free to if you like…).

Come along for an afternoon of rock climbing goodness with the awesome people from SUITS and relax with DINNER ON US!

We will be meeting as a group in the SIT foyer at 5 to catch the train up as a group. Alternatively, meet us on location for a 5:30 start!

Please RSVP as soon as possible on Facebook so we can get an idea of the numbers attending.

SUITS all new Exec

Last week was the SUITS AGM, where an all new (totally awesome) executive team was elected. Over the last couple of weeks, they will be taking over from the old exec team, who are stepping down from their old roles. To bring you up to speed, the new team are:

• President: Sebastian Pauka
• Vice President: Tinlok Pang
• Treasurer: Alan Su
• Secretary: Stephen Young
• Events Coordinator: Tyler Johnson
• PR Officer: Michelle Mo
• Industry Liaison: Lisa Elizaveta
• IT Officer: Peter Ward
• Undergraduate Rep: Callan Mcnamara
• Postgraduate Rep: Joshua Akehurst

If you see then around, don’t forget to congratulate these guys if you see them around. But most importantly, if you guys see them around, tell them about stuff you want to see us doing. As always, we are only awesome if we are doing what our members want!

Keep your eyes peeled for the end of year report prepared by the previous exec to let you know about all the stuff that happened this past year.

As always, general emails can be sent to suits@it.usyd.edu.au. We would love to hear from you guys.

Movie Night with SUTEKH

This week:  Spaceballs

When: Thursday 20th October
Where: School of IT Boardroom

Sit back at SIT, and get ready for blast off as SUITS and SUTEKH embark on the wild ride that is Spaceballs.

This cult classic is sure to have you gripping your sides as we follow your favourite charachters from star wars, star trek and way too many other films to list through the wild land of parody.

This ons is definitely not one to miss!

Silicon Beach

Last Time this Year!

When: Thursday 21th October, 6PM
Where: Bar 77, Grace Hotel 77 York Street, Sydney

PITCH WEEK is coming up soon and this Friday, it is the last time you can get valuable tips and the spirit from Silicon Beach needed for an awesome pitch.

We will directly go to Grace Hotel together after the lecture.

This event is not only for participants of Matt Barries’s class, but for EVERYONE who’s interested in startups, entrepreneurship and innovation in IT and wants to come with us. =)

But, as with all things, this executive must now bow out, to let in a new wave of fresh minds and highly motivated individuals. Just in case I wasn’t clear, I was talking about you!

If you are interested in applying for an executive position and becoming more involved in the society, here is your chance! We want EVERYONE who is interested to apply. It doesnt matter if you are first year or last year, undergrad or postgrad, we need you on the new executive!

We are still looking for people to fill the positions of Secretary, PR Officer, Industry Liaison, Undergrad Rep, Postgrad Rep and International Rep, although all positions are still open. No previous experience is necessary as long as you are motivated and care about the society. Check our the details below.

Apart from that, we return to the end of this semester at full hilt. Our regular events, including Code Jam’s are back! Come along for a fun filled afternoon of code and hackery this Monday in SIT Lab 118!

In addition, after our AGM, we will be continuing the tradition of Video & Board Games in the Boardroom, the first event for our brand new exec! For the rest of the week, we are continuing with Movies with SUTEKH and our regular weekly BBQ is on as always.

And bowing our for the last time, hope you enjoyed the newsletters, Have a great week,

Sebastian Pauka
SUITS PR Officer

SUITS AGM

Nominate yourself for a position NOW!

When: Tuesday 11th October, 5:30 PM
Where: School of IT Boardroom

After a year of tumultuous change which saw our membership double to over 400 people, the introduction of new weekly events to bring us up to 3 per week, and towards getting the SUITS publication getting up and running, its time for a fresh team to step in and lead SUITS towards even greater heights.

Applying for an executive role is an excellent way to make a difference in the life of the society, changing it to make it better and bring it even closer to being the best society on campus. In addition, they are a fantastic way to grab the attention of future employers. We also have access to the mystical SUITS room, as well as after hours access to the School of IT.

Positions are open to all access card holders. There are no restrictions as to who can apply, and you do not need previous experience. Applicants will be selected by vote at the AGM, so it is essential to get as many members as possible coming along on the night. The positions that are up for grabs are:

• President
• Vice President
• Secretary
• Treasurer
• PR Officer
• Events Manager
• Undergraduate Representative
• Postgraduate Representative
• International Student Representative
• Industry Liason

If you are interested in applying, please fill out the Google Form. If you have any questions about executive positions, or want to know more about what is involved in each position, please don’t hesitate to contact us via email, or talk to one of our current friendly executives.

SUITS Video & Board Games Night

FOLLOWING THE SUITS AGM

When: Tuesday 11th October, 6:30PM Onwards
Where: SIT Wintergarden & Board Room

After the SUITS AGM comes some fun. But this is not just any video & board games night. It is the FIRST, yes the FIRST games night of the new executive!

Come and celebrate the election of a whole new executive with a night of board games, video games and of course, free thai!

As per usual, we will have all the classics, from Monopoly to Jungle Speed, Super Smash to Mario Kart, a ton of good friends and a whole new group of people who are about to go through the experience of being executives.

Code Jams

Thats Right, They’re Back!

When: Monday 10th October
Where: School of IT Lab 118

Code Jam’s are nights of hackery, where we delve deep into the secrets of programming to concoct some of the most devious of code…

Seriously though, regardless of coding experience, come along for a night of pressure free, fun fueled coding. Previous topics have ranged from super weird algorithms, to code obfuscation to problem solving techniques, and no matter how much we thought we knew, we always walked away with some new trick under our belts!

Movie Night with SUTEKH

This week:  The Fifth Element

When: Thursday 13th October
Where: School of IT Boardroom

Come join SUITS and Sutekh this Thursday for the comedy classic Airpla…I mean, Flying High! Considered one of the funniest films of all time, and arguably Leslie Nielsen’s greatest role, surely you can’t miss this.

Once again we’ll be in the School of IT Boardroom, with snacks and drinks available at the cost of only a gold coin donation. We need people who can not only enjoy a great film, but who didn’t have fish for dinner.

More details can be found at our facebook event.

Job Notice

An exciting eCommerce start up has just launched a world-first patented technology in Australia.

We’re looking for an extremely switched on software developers with very strong java skills and preferably some commercial experience who can come on board in a full time / part time capacity.

In addition, we are looking for a group of 2/3 interns who are highly committed and willing to learn to join our team.

Please contact robert@wyngle.com.au for more info.

I kid, of course (we are awesome), but still, a chance to relax is always welcome, and I will certainly be taking this opportunity to catch up on some much needed sleep.

The big news this week is of course the conclusion of the Hackathon, which was an awesome event. 24 hours of coding led to some amazing apps, with submissions from first year to post grad competing on equal footing for the grand prize. You can read more about it in our writeup below.

During the holidays we will also be running the annual SUITS Site tours, visiting Deloitte and Thoughtworks to see what life after uni might be like. The tours are on this Wednesday, and places are filling up fast. More info is available below, but get your details in fast because registrations are vital, and numbers are limited.

Nominations for SUITS executive positions are now open. If you would like to be more ninvolved in running SUITS (arguably the BEST society on campus!!!), fill out the nomination form available below, and come along to our AGM, where we will discuss the past year, the coming year, and elect a whole new exec team to lead us into the future.

Lastly, have a good Mid-Sem Break!

SUITS Exec

SUITS Site Tours

When: Wednesday 28th September, 12:50PM
Where: Outside Deloitte Sydney; 225 George Street, Sydney

SUITS will be hosting site tours to several industry leaders during this mid-semester break. We will be visiting some of the biggest IT firms in Australia; Deloitte and Thoughtworks. These tours are a fantastic way to check out what IT in Australia is like, with the event open to all, from first year to post-grad.

The schedule for the day is:  
1:00-2:30: Deloitte Tour
3:00-4:30: Thoughtworks Tour + Food

Deloitte is one of the big 4 advisory firms, currently expanding their IT Operations. One of the biggest employers of IT Graduates, they are looking for people interested in IT Consulting and Developers in areas such as Stratergy, Development, Online, Security and Analytics.

Thoughtworks is an agile IT Development and Consulting firm. They manage and design applications for a large number of clients with a focus on customizing applications to suit clients needs, and an agile development cycle, delivering highly specialized solutions.

To those that have already registered, we will be meeting outside the Deloitte Offices 10 minutes before the event begins. Snacks will be provided at the various locations.

There are only 20 places on the day, so registration is essential. If you are interested, register at https://suitstours.eventbrite.com/

Sydney Hackathon

The Sydney Hackathon was on this weekend, and WOW! The quality of applications that came out of the marathon 24 hour competition was just AMAZING.

First off, there are some acknowledgements in order, because such and event can only be successful with the effort of a dedicated team, who in this case put in many many hours, including long conference calls with the US to make this happen. At our end, a huge thanks to James Alexander and James Curran without whom this event could not have happened. Thanks also goes out to the entire Elsevier team, some of whom flew out from the US to give support to contestants at the event.

First place on the night went to the Presentify team, who made an automated presentation app which turns papers into slideshow presentations. Second went to SciPlay whose app builds quizzes based on papers as you read, and third went to Macadamia, and app which integrates search, comments and more into Journal searches.

Photo’s are slowly going up on the Hackathon website at www.sydneyhackathon.com.au, as well as on the facebook page. Check it out!

SUITS AGM

Nominate yourself for a position NOW!

When: Tuesday 11th September, 5:30 PM
Where: School of IT Boardroom

After a year of tumultuous change which saw our membership double to over 400 people, the introduction of new weekly events to bring us up to 3 per week, and towards getting the SUITS publication getting up and running, its time for a fresh team to step in and lead SUITS towards even greater heights.

Applying for an executive role is an excellent way to make a difference in the life of the society, changing it to make it better and bring it even closer to being the best society on campus. In addition, they are a fantastic way to grab the attention of future employers.

Positions are open to all access card holders. There are no restrictions as to who can apply. Applicants will be selected by vote at the AGM, so it is essential to get as many members as possible coming along on the night. The positions that are up for grabs are:

• President
• Vice President
• Secretary
• Treasurer
• PR Officer
• Events Manager
• Undergraduate Representative
• Postgraduate Representative
• International Student Representative
• Industry Liason

If you are interested in applying, please fill out the Google Form. If you have any questions about executive positions, or want to know more about what is involved in each position, please don’t hesitate to contact us via email, or talk to one of our current friendly executives.

The PHD Movie

When: Tuesday 4th October, 7:30-9:30PM
Where: International Student Lounge, Wentworth Building

“Piled Higher and Deeper” The Movie is a live-action adaptation of the popular online comic strip by Jorge Cham (www.phdcomics.com). It was filmed on location at and was produced in partnership with the California Institute of Technology (Caltech).

The film introduces audiences to the unique and funny culture of Academia and follows four graduate students (Cecilia, Mike, Tajel and the “Nameless Grad Student”) as they struggle to find balance between research, teaching and their personal lives with humor and heart.

Entry is free for USyd Students. Popcorn and drinks will be provided.

First off, BIG NEWS!!! This weeks BBQ will be free this Thursday for everyone thanks to our friends at Freelancer, who have decided to shout us all free food and drink this week. And its not just any old food, we have gourmet sausages, salads, cheese and vegeterian options!

Secondly, the Sydney Hackathon is almost upon us. This is an absolutely awesome event sponsored by Elsevier and Google, and is a chance for you to develop an awesome application and win money while doing so.

To give you a head start, we also have an OpenSocial Web Gadget Workshop, run by some of the SciVerse Developers. If you are even thinking about participating (or even if you aren’t), come along to get a head start in developing with OpenSocial. Details are below.

Finally, we have all our usual events and a whole heap more. From video games, to movies, to revues and more, we have it all.

Have a great week,

SUITS Exec

Sydney Hackathon

When: 24-25th September
Where: School of IT, University of Sydney
Registration: http://www.sydneyhackathon.com.au/

Sydney Hackathon is a 24 hour application development competition aimed at fostering innovation and creativity among developers and designers utilising open source APIs. Now there are abundant sources of ‘open data’ provided by companies and organisations with rich data sets.

Specifically, Elsevier, who host one of the largest collection of Scientific, Engineering and Medical articles in the WORLD will be opening up their SciVerse and ScienceDirect platforms to students to code up applications which use the available data in new and creative ways to encourage sharing and make the immense amount of knowledge locked up in Elsevier’s databases accessible to everyone. This data includes over 10 million publications from over 2600 journals.

The winning team will recieve $1500, with $1000 for second and $500 for third, as well as an $500 people’s choice award for the best project as voted by you.

Food, drinks, entertainment and chill out areas are provided for this marathon 30 hour hackathon, which includes 24 hours of development time.

Places are limited, so if you are interested in participating, register at the website: http://www.sydneyhackathon.com.au/

Open Social Web Gadget Workshop

When: Tuesday 20th September, 11AM-1PM or 5-7PM
Where: Lab 118, School of IT
Registration: http://is.gd/TjJVsO

The web is more interesting when you can build apps that easily interact with your friends and colleagues. But with the trend towards more social applications also comes a growing list of site-specific APIs that developers must learn.

OpenSocial defines a common API for social applications across multiple websites. With standard JavaScript and HTML, developers can create apps that access a social network’s friends and update feeds.

The Workshop:

The OpenSocial Workshops will introduce developers and students to the OpenSocial platform and SciVerse API. The workshop will look at easily building web gadets around the OpenSocial platform and science applications using the SciVerse API and OpenSocial platform.

The OpenSocial workshop is presented by SciVerse Developers and is open to anyone. The workshop runs for around 2 hours and free food will be provided.

Workshops will be run at:

11am – 1pm, School of IT Lab 118
5pm – 7pm, School of IT Lab 118

If your reigstered for the Sydney Hackathon competition attending the workshop is a great way to get a head start before the actual competition.

SUITS Board and Console Games

TUESDAY Afternoon

When: Tuesday 20th September, 6PM Onwards
Where: Board Room and Wintergarden, School of IT

Back for the last week before we all leave for the holidays, thats right Board Games and Console Night.

We will once again be opening our board games and video games collections to y’all to come and have some fun.

We will have games from Mario Kart to Monopoly. From Super Smash to Solatare. From Jungle Speed to Risk to Poker.

The event is open to everyone, and comes with FREE food for access card holders. So come along, unwind. Have some fun.

SUITS Site Tours

When: Wednesday 28th September,
Where: TBD, Attendees will be emailed closer to the date

SUITS will be hosting site tours to several industry leaders during this mid-semester break. We will be visiting some of the biggest IT firms in Australia; Deloitte and Thought Works. These tours are a fantastic way to check out what IT in Australia is like, with the event open to all, from first year to post-grad.

The preliminary schedule for the day is: 
11:30-1: TBD
1:00-2:30: Deloitte Tour
3:00-4:30: Thought Works Tour + Food

Deloitte is one of the big 4 advisory firms, currently expanding their IT Operations. One of the biggest employers of IT Graduates, they are looking for people interested in IT Consulting and Developers in areas such as Stratergy, Development, Online, Security and Analytics.

Thought Works is an agile IT Development and Consulting firm. They manage and design applications for a large number of clients with a focus on customizing applications to suit clients needs, and an agile development cycle, delivering highly specialized solutions.

There are only 20 places on the day, so registration is essential. If you are interested, register at https://suitstours.eventbrite.com/

Movie Night with SUTEKH

This week:  Army of Darkness

When: Thursday 22nd September
Where: School of IT Boardroom

In a surprise upset, the next screening will be of a film not present on the Facebook poll but instead voted for by the screening attendees! But if there were ever a film awesome enough to break the rules, it’s Army of Darkness!

Starring the best almost-leading man ever, Bruce Campbell, and directed by Sam Raimi of Spiderman-trilogy fame, AoD is the story of the most badass store clerk ever who gets sent back in time to battle the undead. Armed only with a shotgun, a chainsaw-hand, his Oldsmobile and a Chemistry 101 textbook, Ash must defeat an army of the undead, kick his evil twin’s arse, and return home.

Featuring some of the greatest one-liners in cinema history, after seeing this you too will hail to the king of all cult-classics, baby!

Serious time: drinks and snacks will be provided at the cost of only a gold-coin donation.

More details can be found at our facebook event.

Sydney Teaching Colloqium IT Student Survey

Hi,

We’re going to be part of a student panel for the Sydney Teaching Colloquium answering questions from the student point of view.

We’re interested in learning what _you_ think about assessments, including:

* balance between quiz/assignment/exams
* groups vs individual assignments
* quality and timeliness of feedback, etc.
* how do the assessments affect you personally

We have set up a survey for you to fill out, available at:
http://is.gd/YitAKT

The panel is on Wednesday 21st September 2011, but if you want to submit responses after that, feel free – the more data the better! Thanks, and pass it on!

Will Radford, Tim O’Keefe, Joel Nothman

UNSW CSERevue

When: Tuesday 20th-Friday 23rd September, 7:30 PM Onwards
Where: UNSW Science Theatre
Tickets: http://www.cserevue.org.au 

CSE Revue is an annual sketch comedy show incorporating dancing, singing, sketches, videos and all things funny! With our roots in Computer Science and Engineering, the show delivers a fresh, innovative take on comedy.

Since 2002, CSE Revue has proven to be a hit with a wide range of audiences, leaving everyone awed by the special effects, slick videos, exciting set design and our commitment to make them laugh.

Great scott! This year, CSE Revue is hacking to the future! So relax, grab a bunch of friends and come for an all round good night! Get your tickets fast, or you’ll be outta time!

Tickets are available at our website:
http://www.cserevue.org.au

Silicon Beach

When: Friday 23rd September, 6-8:30PM
Where: Bar 77, Grace Hotel 77, York Street, Sydney

This week, like every Friday, entrepreneurs will meet, do business and network at Grace Hotel for Silcone Beach.

Originally started from the students of the Technology Venture Creation course, we want to organize a regular group of students interested in entrepreneurship to go there.

Many young people will be there, it’s very laid back and anyone can come, so WHAT ARE YOU WAITING FOR?

To get involved join the SUITS facebook event: https://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=189525084454097

Honours Information Week

When: 20-23th September
Where: School of IT, University of Sydney

This week is the University Honours Information Awareness Week. For this event, the various research groups around the School of IT will be giving brief (12 minute) presentations on the research they are doing around the university.

The events will run from Tuesday to Friday. A timetable (subject to change) for presentations is available here.

The PHD Movie

When: Tuesday 4th October, 7:30-9:30PM
Where: International Student Lounge, Wentworth Building

“Piled Higher and Deeper” The Movie is a live-action adaptation of the popular online comic strip by Jorge Cham (www.phdcomics.com). It was filmed on location at and was produced in partnership with the California Institute of Technology (Caltech).

The film introduces audiences to the unique and funny culture of Academia and follows four graduate students (Cecilia, Mike, Tajel and the “Nameless Grad Student”) as they struggle to find balance between research, teaching and their personal lives with humor and heart.

Entry is free for USyd Students. Popcorn and drinks will be provided.

Just a quick reminder to everyone that wants to participate in the ACM Programming Competition. Registrations close TOMORROW, that is on Wednesday the 7th of August.

We have a number of teams that registered for the ACM training day but have NOT registered for the actual competition. If you do not complete your registration by tomorrow, you will not be eligible to compete.

To register, please send a Team Name, and the Name and Email of UP TO THREE people to: taso.viglas@sydney.edu.au.

Please do this ASAP, as you will then be asked to fill out your personal details.

After you Register:

After you register you will be sent an email asking you to log into the online ACM competition site and fill out some personal details. If you do not do so, you may not be eligible to compete in the finals.

If you have not revieced this email, and you have previously registered, please check your spam filter or email taso about it.

A number of people have not completed their registration completely. If you have registered, make sure you fill out your details on this form.

On the Day:

The competition is scheduled to start at exactly 12:00PM this Saturday (10th of September). Registration will commence at 11:30 AM, and it is vital that you arrive as close to this time as possible, to ensure that the day runs smoothly.

Due to the competition the undergraduate lab area will be out of bounds to anyone not competing for the weekend.

We apologise for the inconvinience but the computers will be set up for the competition, and the area must be restricted to competitiors and organisers.

Good Luck to all those who are competing, and see you all there…

ACM Team

I joke, of course, since this week, we are planning a heap of events to keep both me, the rest of the exec and of course you very busy. Don’t worry though, it will be a lot of fun.

We start off this week with another of our Console and Board Games Nights at SIT from 5:30PM On, before jumping straight into our regular weekly BBQ, and finally, the new addition to the SUITS calendar, Movie Night with SUTEKH. This week, we are bringing along our shadowy friends from the Suspense and Mystery Soc to watch Sherlock.

On a more serious note, the ACM is fast approaching, and we have been frantically preparing, making sure all will be in readyness. This Saturday we will be running our next ACM Training Day from 12PM for anyone who is planning to compete. The day will include a practice competition with the computers set up exactly as they will be in competition, as well as a chance to go through some of the harder questions that have come up in previous years. Register Below…

Also, next Monday Afternoon will be the final code jam before the ACM. The past code jams have been absolutely AWESOME encompassing a hige range of topics from obfuscation to problem solving to speed. Come along next week from 4PM in SIT Lab 118. A huge thanks too to James, Giles, Sasha and Peter who have done a monumentally great job setting these events up, despite their own busy schedules.

This year, we are gonna be awesome. I know it! And on that note, its sayonara from me for another week. But I know I’ll see you all at our events…

Yours,

SUITS Exec

SUITS Social Nights; Board & Console Games

TUESDAY Afternoon

When: Tuesday 30th August, 5:30PM Onwards
Where: SIT Wintergarden and Board Room

After a long day of hard work, all you want to do is go home and study. Wait, no, thats not right. You want to have some FUN! Unwind a little. And SUITS is here to let you do that.

We are back for another week with out regular Board Games and Console Night featuring, but no limited to, Monopoly, Jungle Speed, Super Smash, Scrabble, and sooooo much more!

And, as always there will be FREE FOOD for access card holders.

I can’t believe we are almost halfway through semester. One month has ACTUALLY passed since the holidays. Hell, I almost feel like its been only an instant since the Summer vacation, and here we all are finalizing applications for summer scholarships.

You know what, its best not to think about the past. Instead, focus on what SUITS is doing this next week. Alot. First off, we are hosting another Code Jam. Suitable for all ages and skill levels, we have been covering a heap of awesome topics, from obfuscating code, to problem solving techniques.

Apart from that, we also continue with all our awesome weekly events. This week, we are back to our usual Board and Console Games Nights, and then we move into our Weekly BBQ on Thursday, finishing with the new event in our winter schedule, Movie Night with SuTEKH. This week featuring Bill Murray and the gang from Ghostbusters.

Finally, we will also be holding our next ACM Training session on Saturday the 3rd of September (not the 27th, as I may have said last week, Oops…). And this time, we will be joined by people from other uni’s, so we want to have the strongest possible presence! Apart from it being an awesome day of coding fun, its also a chance for us to test our systems for the competition, and for you guys to start sorting out teams. So we want to see as many people there AS POSSIBLE! Register your interest below.

So, see you all next week. Until next time,

SUITS Exec

SUITS Social Nights; Board & Console Games

Now at the all new time; TUESDAY Afternoons

When: Tuesday 23rd August, 5:30PM Onwards
Where: SIT Wintergarden and Board Room

After a long day of hard work, all you want to do is go home and study. Wait, no, thats not right. You want to have some FUN! Unwind a little. And SUITS is here to let you do that.

We are back for another week with out regular Board Games and Console Night featuring, but no limited to, Monopoly, Jungle Speed, Super Smash, Scrabble, and sooooo much more!

This week, just to shake it up a little, there will also be a Starcraft Table for those who want to show off their MAAAAAD skills, or maybe just try out this game that everyone is always talking about…

And, as always there will be FREE FOOD for access card holders. This week, just to shake it up a bit, FREE PIZZA!!!

CodeJams!

When: Monday 22nd August, 4 – 6PM
Where: SIT Lab 118

Code Jams are casual weekly coding afternoons for anyone to hone their skills before the upcoming ACM, or just want to try their hands at different problems. We will be working through individual problems before looking at example solutions. Everyone is welcome, regardless of programming ability. The best way to learn is to code!

Movie Night with SUTEKH

This week: Ghostbusters 

When: Thursday 25th August, 5:30PM On
Where: SIT Boardroom

Who ya gonna call? Well, Ghostbusters, according to our voters.

Continuing with our brand-new weekly event, we scrap the previous theme of a few British guys having a whacky adventure to instead show a film about a few American guys having a whacky adventure.

Also: this next screening will have a fee of a gold-coin donation. We’re sorry for any inconvenience caused by this. On a lighter note though, if anyone has any suggestions for Ghostbusters-themed snacks for the screening we’d love to hear them (so long as they’re not too messy, so nothing Slimer-inspired please).

Check out more details at out Facebook Event! ZOOL!

Science Review

Presents: NASAblanca

When: 25-27th August, 7-9PM
Where: Seymore Centre, USyd

It’s one small step for man, one giant show you should definitely see! NASAblanca sees the space-race reignited as the Cosmonauts and Astronauts fight to be the first to plant the flag in or on Andromeda. But, while the war rages outside, there stands one safe-haven on lake tranquility where Russian and American alike can drink, laugh, and not-murder-each-other.

Strap on your rocket-boots and set a course for space as Sydney University’s Science Revue brings you an original story from the magical world of NASAblanca! Brace yourself for a flurry of songs, dances, sketches, and downright blatant magic that will leave you in space-stitches.

Now in its sixth and finest year, the Science Revue has built a reputation on bringing the funniest, most exciting show of the year right to your salivating mouth. This show is humanity’s best chance to ever live in peace and happiness, and not buying a ticket would stake your claim as direct opposition to the very concept of love.

Seeing this show is in a very real sense the greatest decision you will ever make. So, put away that engagement ring, set fire to that mortgage and don’t shoot that president! Science Revue is back in town and better than ever!

Book now at www.sciencerevue.com. Tickets are $18 for Access cardholders, $23 for other students. Show runs from 7-9PM this Thursday, Friday and Saturday

ACM Training Day 2

When: Saturday 3rd September, 12 – 5 PM Onwards
Where: School of IT, Usyd

The ACM International Collegiate Programming Competition (or just ACM Programming Competition) is one of the worlds leading programming competitions between the universities of the world.

University of Sydney will host the Sydney regional finals before the winning team is flown to the finals in Poland for this year. Last year a team from UNSW got through but this year we hope to be sending a USYD team to the finals!

SUITS and School of IT will be hosting an ACM Training Day on Saturday afternoon week 5, 28th of August, in School of IT Labs from 12 to 5PM. If you have never participated in a programming competition and interested in participating please come along. If you would like to form a team for this years ACM ICPC please also come along to build up your skills and get a feel for the event.

The ACM Programming competition schedule for this year is as follows:

• Training Day – Week 6 Saturday 3rd of September
• ACM Competition Day – Week 7 10th of September
• Code Jams – Every Monday in SIT for the ACM/general coding fun!

Please register your interest here so we know how many people to expect for the training days and too keep you all in the loop, all types of contestants are welcome from beginners to past ACM competitors!

Freelancer – Graduate Positions

Freelancer.com is the largest Australian run website in terms of global traffic, and is growing at an exponential rate! We’re now in the top 250 websites worldwide.

We are seeking developers to work in our software engineering team, you will get the chance to work with web-scale data in a high performance Linux cloud environment.

Ideally you will have experience with:

- PHP
- MySQL
- Linux
-jQuery
- HTML / CSS

Mandatory:

- Tertiary Degree in Computer Science/Engineering (or Related). MS or PhD a plus.

Pluses:

- Experience with building Internet scale systems (scalability into the tens of millions of users)
- Experience with any of: redis, varnish, haproxy, performance tuning mysql, nginx, hadoop, mapreduce, etc.
- Language experience with any of: php, python, ruby, erlang, C++

Freelancer.com software engineers have a strong understanding of core computer science and software development, are intelligent, highly motivated, welcome responsibility, and love to tackle difficult problems.

This won’t be your typical cog-in-the-machine type of job. You will be exposed to the fast pace of a startup at the grass roots by a team who have built global technology companies before, designing and developing the software that drives our platform of over 2.5 million users.

We have a very attractive office overlooking the harbour in the Sydney CBD. We have a very vibrant and fun team atmosphere. This is a challenging and engaging workplace where you will really enjoy working.

If you’re a high achiever with talent who is looking for something more than a boring job in a corporate, doesn’t need to be hand held, and wants to be in at ground zero with a company that has a shot at being one of the biggest sites on the Internet, then contact us.

Summer Scholarships

Interested in exploring the potential for a career in Information and Communication Technology research?

The Summer Scholarship Program offers eligible students the opportunity to spend up to 12 weeks over the summer working on one of our research projects under supervision of a researcher. Summer Scholars are awarded a tax-exempt scholarship for the duration of the summer research experience.

Please find more information about the Summer Scholarship Program and projects offered here: http://sydney.edu.au/engineering/it/current_students/undergrad/summer_scholarships.shtml

If you have any questions regarding this Summer Scholarship Program, please feel to contact Ms Evelyn Riegler (Evelyn.riegler@sydney.edu.au)